Summary of Day 1 and 2 in Holland

Day 1

I arrived in Amsterdam on Thursday morning at 8. About 45 minutes drive later, we come to the little village of Cothen. This village is so small, I got the grand tour in about 20 minutes. But I'm sure there is more exploring to do. I just have to get out more. My main mode of transportation right now is a yellow bicycle that Danielle (my gracious host) has lent me. Thursday night was my first practice with GoconnectIT/Fortissimo. My new teammates are all really nice and helpful. Especially when the coach starts explaining the drill. At one point he was explaining a drill for 2 minutes, I look over at one of the players for a translation and all I got was "same thing." Oh...okay....keep doing what I'm doing. But overall the practice was not as tiring as I thought it would be. We did a lot of technical work with back and wing relations and back-wing-circle relations. I actually had a lot of fun. The atmosphere was very relaxed and I felt like I knew how to play handball (I don't know how I looked, but it felt good :)

Day 2

Today was a very nice day and very relaxed. We didn't have practice so I went to the gym for my workout. The gym I am using actually belongs to the company Elly works for. It's very small and very few weights. Nothing as heavy as what we usually see in the gym. The trainers Frank and Buff were very nice and was trying to give me guidance on my workout. I have never been to a gym where the trainer comes up and asks "do you need water? Tea? Coffee?" during my workout...so that was quite a novelty. I usually just nod politely and point to my water bottle. I guess the Dutch don't usually bring their own water. But I do need to remember to bring my own towel. Tonight I went with Danielle, her boyfriend Walter, and some guys from the Fortissimo men's team to play squash. Since my only other experience with this sport was that one practice on the squash courts I got my butt handed to me 6 times. Hopefully by the time I leave here, I will be a better squash player too. And to relax after 2 hours of squash, we sat at the bar and had a couple of drinks. That's all for now...I'll post pictures as soon as I figure out how. Good night and stay tuned for the next exciting adventure ;)