Midnight Intruder

I was happily asleep yesterday night and having a rather amusing dream in fact, which had my friends from India, Canada and the Netherlands in it. It had me writing a Dutch language exam with my Canadian friends and Indian friends and I was in a hurry to leave early as I was preparing a traditional south Indian dinner in Chennai! And an American friend from here was helping me cook wearing a 'veshti'(a traditional wear)!!!The dream was so fantastic and vivid that I still remember some details of it.

So, happy as I was having this wonderful dream, I vaguely remembered the calling bell go. Not being a heavy sleeper, I got up confused as I wasn't sure if I was in the dream or in my room. And then the bell rang again! Was it morning already?? I realized I was still very much in Eindhoven and checked the time - 2:30am. Its amazing how adrenaline works! It can bring a person from semi-comatose to "Attention!!" in seconds :). It dawned on me that some body was pounding on my door in the middle of the night!

I tried to be cool and yelled to ask who it was. None of my friends would do that without calling me or informing me before hand. Who the heck was it? No Reply!! My door doesn't have a glass to peep outside or any safety chain, so I firmly decided not to open it at any cost. The pounding continued and I was freaking out! I frantically looked around for what I could use as a weapon (ya, thats how my brain works! :D) and was considering what I should do because the person or persons outside kept banging at my door.

I quickly decided to call this guy I know who lives right next door to check who was banging at mine. I dialed his number nervously, but as I suspected he was probably in much deeper comatose than me to even wake up at the phone's ring. Just as I was getting really nervous, the pounding stopped as suddenly as it had begun.

I ran by the window and closed all the curtains and peeped into the streets to see who it was. No sign of anybody!hmmm....God I couldn't sleep for quite some time after that! I rattled my brain over who did that and why. The only logical conclusion that I came to was that some drunk student must have knocked my door thinking it was his friend's and then must have realized his stupidity and left. Sigh! I hope thats it.:-|

Note to Intruder - Well, if you decide to come by tonight "Mr/Ms Loose Character", I have some surprises waiting for you. Did I mention anytime before I have a karate black belt?

Solitude

Its annoying how exactly when your exams are around, your mind plays all possible tricks on you to stop studying (mine doesn't even have to work hard on that!). Sitting in my room, I conjure up images of how possibly everything in the world is wrong and will go wrong. Wading in self denial over the humonguos amount of reading that I need to get done, I distractedly watched outside my spacebox window. I looked at the river Dommel trickling by gently, the sun lazily setting its fiery wings behind the trees sorrounding the river and a lone cloud drifting across the horizon. It suddenly reminded me of this poem that I read in school (one of the very few) by William Wordsworth -

I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

Well, my inner eye thankfully has stored if not in thousands but at least a hundred of "Daffodil" moments. Living alone can be a tricky thing. It gives you lot of freedom, time and space to do what ever you want, but not without a price (ya, the rent is high too!:)).

Right, back to work...go away you stupid cloud! :D

Confusion with numbers

As if other things were not enough!! The Dutch punctuation system can catch you off-guard sometimes. Okie, so what is this - Euro 3.990? haha! that is not 3 euro and 99 cents my dear friend, that is Euro 3990 and 3,99 is 3 euro and 99 cents. Of course, looking at a bag of noodles you would know that it is not going to cost Euro 399 but cosmetics and jwellery, not so sure! Especially scientific measurements - 1.399,02 - what the heck is that??

The Dutch clock reading is yet another complication - the hour is divided into four quarters. For example -

10:00 - tien uur (perfect!)
10:05 - vijf over tien (5 past 10, fair enough)
10:15 - kwart over tien (quarter over 10, not bad)
10:20 - tien voor half elf (10 minutes of for half eleven - whhhaaa?)
10:30 - half elf (half eleven - why why? why can't it be simple ten thirty?)
10:35 - vijf over half elf (5 past half eleven...I am already lost)
10:45 - kwart voor elf (quarter for eleven - makes perfect sense)
10:50 - tien voor elf (10 minutes for eleven)
11:00 - elf uur (sigh!!)

All that in reading is comprehendable, but in super fast speaking, leaves you wondering which quarter you are in!

Even more confusing is the way they say the numbers. Till 20, perfect, no problem
but 21 - een en twintig (one and twenty)
and 43 - drie en veertig (three and forty)

okie, that is also fine but here is the tricky part. The Dutch speak all numbers in pairs. For instance, if your postcode is -

2143 QK, then they would say - een en twintig drie en veertig QK and you are mentally expecting something like - two one four three QK in regular English. So when you quickly hear - een en twintig drie en veertig you write it as 1234 QK!!! Phone numbers are equally complicated. Sigh!! Thankfully the Dutch are very polite and they immediately switch to English, seeing the lost expression on your face but its not easy in telephone conversations.

Time and only time with some actual practice of my Dutch lessons will help me. For anyone interested, www.taalklas.nl is a good website for basic Dutch.