Arrival in Amsterdam
Yea!!! We are finally here! I'm not quite sure where to start on describing our trip here. Our flight left Tampa Tuesday night at 7:55pm. Jared took the bus with the team to the airport, while I took the rental car. I pulled up to the airport and was very concerned with getting my 2 huge rolling suitcases and my 2 very heavy carry-on's to the counter. I managed to attach them (thanks to Colin showing me how) and lugged everything through the parking garage and airport. When I got to the counter the lady asked me for my passport. To my undescribable shock it was missing. I panicked, I frantically began searching all my bags. It was no where to be found. As tears were coming to my eyes some random guy walked up to me and said "You might need this". As it turns out I left it in the rental car!!! Can you believe it?? Needless to say Jared now asks me every 5 minutes if I have it with me.
Fortunately Jared was able to arrange for us to have seats next to each other on the plane. The flight was very long but we just watched movies and slept. The dinner they had for us was surprisingly very good! We had salad, rice, green beans, grilled chicken, pasta, cheesecake, and of course after dinner tea... very common here. We had a 4 hour layover in the London Gatwick airport. Then our last flight was very quick.
Getting our baggage in the Amsterdam airport was organized chaos. It was 50-60 football players who had been traveling for 24 hours together, everyone was a little tense. Walking from the airport to the buses there were tons of fans dressed in their blue/orange Admirals attire. They were all chanting and singing "We've got the world bowl in our hands" to the theme of He's got the whole world in His hands. It was really exciting. We then had about an hour long drive from Amsterdam to Utrect. It was quite interesting being the ONLY girl on the bus. However, I must say all of the players have gone out of their way to be very nice to me.
The weather here has been pretty much constant rain/drizzle. This afternoon it cleared up for awhile and it's now just cold, not miserable, but chilly. Jared get's every meal provided for him and he brings food up to me. It has been really easy and it's good food too! About 15 of us... when I say "us" I mean 14 football players and me... went out around the town last night. Gibran gave us a mini tour since this is his 3rd year here. You can see some of the boys in the picture. We hung out at a pub for awhile and then wandered around the city some more. The city is amazing!! We are able to walk everywhere, although most people here ride bikes. Above is a picture I took while walking down the street shopping today. There are canals runing through the city and it's shops and restaurants galore!! Today I spent a good 30-45 minutes at this store at the mall called Vroom & Dreesmann, it's 6 floors of a department store. It had EVERYTHING! I felt like I was in Bloomingdale's, Best Buy, Barnes & Noble, Gap Kids, Pottery Barn, and Toys R Us. I noticed that Abby would love it here because the Playmobil stuff is really popular and every girl wears a skirt with boots. To my amazement everyone dresses up here. Just walking through the city most people have on dress pants, dressy shoes (mostly boots) and skirts. It's not a very bright city either. Not just because there is no sun, but people wear black, brown, tan, and gray. As I'm sure you can tell everything is new to us right now. OH!!! And although we've been told most people speak English, everything is still in Dutch.
Jared doesn't know it but I've been writing down some of the funny things he's said (because I always think he has some great quotes)... so far my favorite one he said earlier today... it was "I bet you the lung cancer here is outrageous!!" That unfortunately is probably true. Lots of people here smoke. It's really gross, but we've managed so far.
Well, we look forward to hearing from all of you. Please let us know what is going on in YOUR lives! Even though we have CNN and Oprah in English, we still feel very out of the loop. Take care and God Bless!
Fortunately Jared was able to arrange for us to have seats next to each other on the plane. The flight was very long but we just watched movies and slept. The dinner they had for us was surprisingly very good! We had salad, rice, green beans, grilled chicken, pasta, cheesecake, and of course after dinner tea... very common here. We had a 4 hour layover in the London Gatwick airport. Then our last flight was very quick.
Getting our baggage in the Amsterdam airport was organized chaos. It was 50-60 football players who had been traveling for 24 hours together, everyone was a little tense. Walking from the airport to the buses there were tons of fans dressed in their blue/orange Admirals attire. They were all chanting and singing "We've got the world bowl in our hands" to the theme of He's got the whole world in His hands. It was really exciting. We then had about an hour long drive from Amsterdam to Utrect. It was quite interesting being the ONLY girl on the bus. However, I must say all of the players have gone out of their way to be very nice to me.
The weather here has been pretty much constant rain/drizzle. This afternoon it cleared up for awhile and it's now just cold, not miserable, but chilly. Jared get's every meal provided for him and he brings food up to me. It has been really easy and it's good food too! About 15 of us... when I say "us" I mean 14 football players and me... went out around the town last night. Gibran gave us a mini tour since this is his 3rd year here. You can see some of the boys in the picture. We hung out at a pub for awhile and then wandered around the city some more. The city is amazing!! We are able to walk everywhere, although most people here ride bikes. Above is a picture I took while walking down the street shopping today. There are canals runing through the city and it's shops and restaurants galore!! Today I spent a good 30-45 minutes at this store at the mall called Vroom & Dreesmann, it's 6 floors of a department store. It had EVERYTHING! I felt like I was in Bloomingdale's, Best Buy, Barnes & Noble, Gap Kids, Pottery Barn, and Toys R Us. I noticed that Abby would love it here because the Playmobil stuff is really popular and every girl wears a skirt with boots. To my amazement everyone dresses up here. Just walking through the city most people have on dress pants, dressy shoes (mostly boots) and skirts. It's not a very bright city either. Not just because there is no sun, but people wear black, brown, tan, and gray. As I'm sure you can tell everything is new to us right now. OH!!! And although we've been told most people speak English, everything is still in Dutch.
Jared doesn't know it but I've been writing down some of the funny things he's said (because I always think he has some great quotes)... so far my favorite one he said earlier today... it was "I bet you the lung cancer here is outrageous!!" That unfortunately is probably true. Lots of people here smoke. It's really gross, but we've managed so far.
Well, we look forward to hearing from all of you. Please let us know what is going on in YOUR lives! Even though we have CNN and Oprah in English, we still feel very out of the loop. Take care and God Bless!
posted by The Allens | 7:05 AM
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