Yesterday I had dinner with my grandmother, my parents were there too. It was very cosy.

I just missed Sasha's phone call yesterday, but she was on the voice-mail. She arrived safely and everything's fine.

I'm going to the swimmingpool now. I'm happy I didn't forget about the summertime.

Sasha called me from the airport in Washington. Her plane is leaving to Paris in 20 minutes so she's checking in now. Ready for Africa! I'm curious if she'll have internet in the plane.

Mark, a colleague, and his wife Saskia got a baby yesterday, her name's Jessica. Congratulations from both of us!

Today at work we've finished a proposal I've been working on last week. It's always nice to see the final result after the "commercial guys" have been working on the text. We went out for a beer, like many Fridays; I enjoyed that. The bar we went to is called "Paris".

Really wonderful news -- Sasha is going to Cameroon!

The last months she's been working in the World Bank in a unit that deals with debts of Third World Countries. Recently she has been "specializing" in Cameroon. Tomorrow she's leaving on a business trip there. It will be for one or two weeks, and she'll be in a group with people from both the IMF and the World Bank.

Cameroon is located in the Horn of Africa, basically between Nigeria and the Central African Republic. Sasha will be staying in the capital, Yaoundé. Cameroon is a stable country, a fact I'm very happy about. The official languages are French and English.

Sasha is flying this Friday. First to Paris, and then an 8-hour flight to Africa. She and her group will be working on the subject of "debt sustainability".

Tonight we started with the grammar of adjectives. Slowly but surely all the grammar that I once learned at school is coming back. The big difference between learning it now and learning it then is that I really enjoy it (that was quite different, then). The teacher gave us a big homework assignment. It is a text in which we have to fill in the endings of all the adjectives and nouns. It's a really useful exercise to practice all the 'Falle' grammar; it will probably take a lot of time.

The German course starts at 18:30 o'clock, and I have been trying to find the best way to have dinner. I don't want to eat in a snackbar every Monday, but I can't wait with dinner till after the course either because it ends at 21:00 o'clock. I think I've found a solution now; today I got a salad and a sandwich from the supermarket and ate it at work. I can eat pretty healthy, and I don't have to be in a hurry.

For my German I found a good program for word-rehearsal: Teach 2000. It's not very extensive, but the program works well and I don't need too many whistles and bells anyway.

Today I studied mainly country names, as well as the names of the citizens of these countries.

Yesterday Jerry and I went out in Amsterdam. We met at Centraal Station, where a special edition of the Volkskrant about the death of Princess Juliana was distributed for free.

First we had dinner in a Thai restaurant at the Nieuw Markt. There was really delicious food and a great atmosphere. It's just that next time I should remember the pepper is really spicey. We talked about a lot of things; Jerry is now working on a research proposal.

Then we went for a walk through the city. It was nice to see Amsterdam at night; it was windy but not cold.

After a while we found a pub in the Jordaan, with nice Duvel and Triple beers but strange enough without music. We agreed that it would be a nice idea to watch the results of the American elections in November together. Every now and then a guy with a camera would come up and ask if he could make a picture, and although we routinely turn them away this time we let one of them take a picture.

We walked together to Centraal Station, where we saw a crowd of people going to their buses. They told us that had done the Stille Omgang.

It was a really cosy evening. I took the last train to Haarlem and was home around 2:00 o'clock.

Princess Juliana, former Queen of the Netherlands died today at the age of 94.

Juliana is the mother of our current monarch, Queen Beatrix. The national holiday on April 30th, which was the birthday of Princess Juliana, will feel different this year.

A colleague was experimenting with a mobile phone-with-camera, so here's a picture of my new desk.

A young Ukrainian woman has created title="PRIPYAT ghost town (1970-1986)" target="_blank" href="http://vincent.vanscherpenseel.nl/chernobyl/">a photo journal of her motorcycle rides through Chernobyl and the area surrounding it.

Surreal pictures of desolated cities, houses and roads. Very impressive.

I ima tezi stranitsi na Bulgarski.

I had a nice working day today. There were a lot of different things going on and I like that.

After work I went for a walk and took some pictures of a building; Joost needed them. The weather was surprisingly mild, and it was light outside till late.