Day 7: Europe

 That's right... we're back to writing about Europe! Haha, my excuse is that I got a case of the first trimesters. I'm in my second trimester and feeling much better! So, without further ado...

 Kasey-
Den Haag, the Heavenly city! I served there for 6 months and absolutely loved it. We were on public transportation the whole time there and I just got to know the city really well. So we slept in pretty late because of how tired we were from the previous day. The place we stayed also had a computer in our room so we caught up on emails, uploaded some pictures and videos, etc. Our host, Hans, worked at the Judicial Ministry, he offered to give us a tour of his building. So, we did just that! It was a pretty cool building, full of really interesting architecture. It's an old bank and in a weird way reminded me of the bank in the last Harry Potter. They had vault doors for the bathrooms, and a glass area that went through the entire bank (as to give the impression that the bank was transparent in it's dealings.)

 We walked around the Centrum of Den Haag, saw the Binnenhof, Buitenhof. It's kind of strange, but the Netherlands technically has two capitals- Den Haag and Amsterdam, but the government runs out of Den Haag.

 We saw where John Adams used to live- it's said that his old apartment was the first U.S. Embassy. So we made it to the station and took a bus to the Keukenhof flower gardens. We really enjoyed it there! (This was one of my favorite places-Emily) It was a chilly day and there were some flowers that had yet to bloom, but everything else was great. At the windmill in the gardens there was this old Dutch choir in wooden shoes and traditional clothing that sang and danced- we thought that was cute!

 What's wrong with Kasey in this picture?

 

                                         With all the walking, Kasey's shoe became untied.

 

After being there for like 4 or 5 hours we headed back. Back in Den Haag we got 24 hour passes for the trams and went out to eat at a Surinaams restaurant. It was pretty good, I've had better, though. So it was weird to be outside at night time in the city, but it was neat to just sit on the tram with Emmy and think about being a missionary there 8 years ago. I really loved that city and loved the people. It was just fun to serve in a city that has such a strong international presence and it was so easy to find people to teach. I'm really grateful for all the cities I served in. I grew a lot in each one and it was fun to go back there and ponder my experiences there. Those experiences and those cities are very special to me.