utrecht and the subsequent days!

gonna put pictures in tomorrow its late and im tired.
this week has really been a mixed bag. a mostly positive mixed bag :D sit back, get cozy, let's let the ridiculous narrative of my life begin.
so, on saturday the other americans and i went on a super adventure to utrecht C: we got there at like 10.30 and went to starbucks. cos yknow, thats what we do. then we tried to navigate our way out of the station, which went okay. but its like a station/mall/sprawling food court? so we got kinda confused by that. once we found our way out of the giant indoor maze of consumerism and shoes :D, we set off to find the centrum. whiiich proved difficult, since there was a market, meaning that the outside and the inside were pretty much identically maze-like, except outside it was raining.
we managed to navigate through the stalls and stalls of tacky wonderment, and we found the centrum. it is so beautiful. the sun started shining, the canals were sparkling, and everything was just so european and amazing. i need to go back.
first we went shopping at all the stores, like h&m and stuff, i bought a 20 euro ring from a vendor on the street. i know i SHOULD have haggled, but i really like the ring! its perfect, just the ring ive always dreamed of. so i was willing to foot that loss.
after that ariel showed us to this delicious italian place called mario's? it was totally authentic. and by "authentic" i mean run by turkish guys and i'm faaaairly sure that almost none of the food there was actually italian except pizza XD jacque and i were feeling especially starving and adventurous, so we both ordered these giant pizza shaped slices of what seemed to be calzone? it was full of cheese, egg, mushroom, and meat, and it *might* have been the most sinfully delicious thing i've ever eaten. and thats saying a lot. it was just so... wrong. SO DELICIOUSLY WRONG.
we were really full, so obviously the next thing we did was go to mcdonalds and order stroopwafel mcflurries. BECAUSE THATS THE LOGICAL NEXT STEP.

wellp! nutritionally, the day probably couldnt have gotten any worse anyway. why waste that?

in the line, some boys complimented my hair and then they were like "YOU COME FROM AMERICA? IS IT TRUE THAT EVERYONE IS SHORT AND FAT THERE?"
and i was like "UHH WELL AS A CASE EXAMPLE I CANT PERSONALLY DISPROVE THOSE STATEMENTS, BUT... :I"
:D i love making friends!
anyway, the mcflurries were also a little bit too delicious for words, but i don't think you'd understand if you've never eaten a stroopwafel.
after that we went to hema and bought candy, because hey, why not.
then ariel and jenny went home :< cos they werent feeling too good, for different reasons. the rest of us went and shopped some more until like 5, when we went on a quest to find a bar to spend the rest of the evening cozily indoors.
EASIER SAID THAN DONE, MY FRIENDS. we finally did locate one though, so we stayed there a bit. we had duvel out of swanky glasses and felt quite fancy. but we reeeally wanted bitterballen. but we had forgotton what they were called. so then we had to walk around more asking bars if they had those "little kroket things". at about the third bar, we FINALLY found them, and there was much rejoicing. because who doesnt love a nice scalding hot deep fried ball of gravy? i certainly do.

effective dutch advertising at its best.

then we stopped at the albert heijn [my favorite place in probably the whole netherlands] to buy sandwiches for the train home. thenn we took the train and talked to a nice old lady and went to amy's house and ate granola and went to sleep c: a good time was had by all.
so yeah, that was my first trip to utrecht c: i would like to go there again because it was so pretty and nice. but this weekend is amsterdam. :D SUPER PUMPED.

so now, i will tell you about my wonderful night last night. and by wonderful, i obviously mean terrifying and starcrossed.
i was with jelle in hengelo hanging out, and my phone was out of minutes. so it didnt actually work. usually, i make absolutely sure to notify my parents where i am. but this time it accidentally got away from me. which will never happen again. and you will find out why. so, i started home after telling my parents from his phone where i was. it had already started to get dark, so off i went. just a few blocks into my 20 minute bikeride home, i found that it was increasingly impossibly to pedal my bike. i promptly fell off on the side of the road. confused, i dusted myself off and tried again. and fell off again. now i was getting frustrated.
i tried this shaky, impossible "try to not fall off your broken bicycle in the dark while people look at you funny" thing for a few more blocks until it became painfully obvious that it just was not going to work.
defeated, i started trudging onward with my indignant and resistant bike. at that point, it was pretty completely dark. and i couldnt call my parents to tell them because my phone was out of minutes.
also, sidenote: walking with a bike makes the pedals hit you in the shins. it hurts real bad, especially when the bike doesnt want to move in the first place. when i had gotten about a third of the way home and could feel them bruises happenin' on my legs, i started crying. BECAUSE DONT LIE, YOU TOTES WOULD TOO.
so picture, if you will, a small pink haired girl forcing her bicycle down the street like a belligerant animal, audibly crying at nine o'clock at night. this is my life.
i figured i could walk my bike to the weird hengelo hotel with a tucan on it [an apropriate design choice, i find, because the netherlands has many tucans and other marks of tropical climate in it] and use their telephone.

welcome to holland, your very own tropical oasis!

i calculated that i would get there before passing out from exhaustion. so i did that, explained my situation to the concierge in fairly unbroken dutch, and called home for a ride. the end. the pathetic, tragic end.
NEEDLESS TO SAY, THAT WILL NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN. it was pretty much the worst ever, and i am scared shitless of anything like that happening again. SO ILL PUT MINUTES ON MY PHONE, KEEP EVERYONE INFOMED, AND TRY NOT TO BREAK MY BIKE C: lesson learned.

aaaanyway, traumatic experiences aside, this week has been good so far c: i'll keep you all updated, tot zienss