Bye bye Amsterdam

First of many photos I took in A'dam

So, this is my last blog from Amsterdam and I will dedicate it only to this one and only city, who felt like home to me from the first day I arrived.

Amsterdam wasn’t my first choice for exchange program, it was Porto. Mostly because I prefer warm and sunny weather. I was supposed to go there with my friend, but when I got accepted to Amsterdam, I came all by myself. And I am happy it turned out this way. I met so many people that I’ve never met before in such a short time. Some of them will stay in my life and my memories for ever, some of them won’t. I am grateful for everyone I met and everything I had chance to experience and learn since I’m here. Living here really broadened my horizons and this is just what I needed personally and professionally. The whole exchange experience will help me so much with my work in the future, because I had a chance to get to know better so many cultures, ethnics and religions, that I got rid of most of my prejudices. And this is exactly what all social workers should do. Give a chance to every service user to tell his life story, listen to him carefully, respect him and make him feel special because everyone deserves a chance to be treated the same as every other person and everyone has a right to know that he or she is an expert in his/hers life and he/she has all the power over life, we just have to help them realize that and empower them in every possible way.

Slovenia is very different than Netherlands, as far as I had a chance to know this country. People here are much more open for ‘different’ as Slovenians are. I will try to bring some of that spirit back home, and I will try to start a change, because everyone deserves a chance, our whole system has to start moving somewhere and we definitely need some more diversity in our small endearing country.

It is a human heart that matters, not skin color, religion, ethnics, gender etc. Underneath, we are all the same. That is a thing to remember, and I think after this 5 months in Amsterdam, I will follow that rule, wherever I go.

                            A short clip of a bike tour through Amsterdam

One more thing about Amsterdam I would like to say is, I fell in love with this city the first day, and until the end, I admired the beauty of this city every single day. I can’t get used to these amazing views on canals, cute tall houses, boats, water, and nature everywhere. I have tons of pictures of canals, but I still stop and photograph more, because each and every one of them is special and I want to look at them forever. Cheesy, but true J

Ice skating

Is it true that ice skating here in Amsterdam is like riding a bike? Everyone does it and if you come here, you have to do it like you have to rent or buy a bike. Well, for me neither biking nor ice skating is everyday thing to do in Slovenia. As I said in one of my blogs before, I don’t use my bike for over 4 years now and about ice skating, I’ve only done it once. 2 years ago. So when we decided to go to Museumplein and try our ice skating skills, I was prepared for the worse. Falling down, crashing into people, into fence in order to stop myself and so on. But, I have to say, after 10 minutes, we were all pretty good. Well, as good as we could be. We didn’t hold hands anymore, and we were able to turn without stopping and then just changing the direction on the spot. Now we turned while ice skating, isn’t that awesome? And of course, when I got too self-confident about it, I found myself going towards group of small kids coming closer and closer very fast and I couldn’t do anything else but freeze. I or should I say they managed to avoid me, expect one little boy who bumped straight into me. I managed to catch him so he didn’t fall, and then I kept on moving because I still didn’t know how to stop exactly. The main thing is, we were both fine, no one fell down. Overall it was a great experience and I wanted to do it again, but I didn’t find time when I came back to Amsterdam after Christmas holidays.

We managed to do one picture with everyone standing still. success! 

I am sorry I wasn’t here when all the canals were frozen and people were ice skating all over Amsterdam. Then I would have more space to learn how to stop without bumping into fence or little kids.  But I found a very beautiful video about the winter in 2012, when canals were frozen again after 15 years. It is so lovely to see how many people joined this amazing, for some, one time in a life time experience. 

PRIMARK, heaven for shoppers, hell for workers

I think I can speak in the name of most girls I know who have been to Primark that this is heaven in shopping world. I had never been there until I came to Amsterdam, because we don’t have it Slovenia. I’ve heard stories about it, such as Primark is the place you have to visit if you’re a shopping maniac like I am. I can’t help it, but shopping really does make me happy. Besides food, it is the best therapy ever. So I had to go there and see this shopping paradise. I will not deny it, I loved it. Nice clothes, cheap prices, huge choice of colors, designs, shoes, cosmetics, just everything you want. But then I also heard a reason why the prices there are so low. It shocked me, because I have to admit I didn’t even think about that. The reason why, is that people who are making these clothes don’t get a lot money for their work. As a matter of fact, some don’t even get the minimum and some of them are children. After I heard that, I wanted to make sure if this is true and I found interesting clip, which says the truth about Primark. I won’t have a chance to go to Primark again very soon, but when I do, I think I will rethink my decision of going there and buy clothes, that are made by people who are working so hard for unfair paycheck, just so we can enjoy ourselves in buying cheap clothes. It would just feel wrong.  

Truth about Primark - An article from a British newspaper, Dailymail

Shopping will still of course remain my passion and therapy but I think there are many places where I can shop and in once not support unfair working conditions of people who are actually helping us to look and feel good.