the dynamic's of being in someone else's home.

Yes the title is the dynamic's of being in someone else home.
In this case, in my son's house and his wife and their daughter of 2 years old. In the Netherlands.
I'm suddenly plunged into the role of Granny( Oma in Dutch) and also suddenly expected to be doing my " Oma duties" with diligence and without any resistance or questions. But because I live 20.000 km away and suddenly in this role, I know for next time, to rent an Airbnb room or apartment and be independant. ( just like my parents were when they visited us in NZ.)
Baby sitting a 2 1/2 year old for a full day( still meant to happen) without backup? Hmmm.
But when questioning that there was a big emotional response. I didn't know my granddaughter well enough at that stage.
Just needed re-assurance that if I couldn't cope someone would be able to come and take it over.
Also staying in someone else's house is all very well, and I am cooking dinner most nights here in the Netherlands but sometimes I realise I shouldn't be staying here. I should be staying somewhere independently, so I can just come and go. Visit like a normal grandparent would do, and then go home again. It's hard that they are here and I think I just have to let them be and do things via Skype.
But I shopped today, had a nice lunch and tomorrow I am going on a 10 day train trip around the middle of the Netherlands: Eindhoven-Zwolle-Kampen-Giethoorn, Emst, Utrecht, Houten, Schalwijk,  Culemborg, Leerbroek, Leiden, Voorschoten, Scheveningen, Eindhoven.
I stop and stay at all these places staying with friends, family and some Airbnb.
Anyway, we had some nice days in Zeeland, this last weekend so here are some pictures of that.
I can now say that after the 10 days, when I came back, I had a different outlook, I knew Violet much better and felt more positive about the baby sitting idea. It all went well.

Hired an e-bike

Enjoying downtown Eindhoven

Yesterday I went to the city by bus( 1/4 of an hour it takes)
Of course to enjoy the Dutch foods I had missed badly.
Started off with coffee( a real barista coffee)
Then walked around going in to" Blokker". Hema( for the smoked sausage) and then Zeeman, after that lunch in " Zoet and Zout" with 2 kroketten.

After that into the " Bijenkorf" which means Beehive where, upstairs, there is a lunch room.

( the Beehive is a big expensive department store.)

Arrived in the Netherlands

Hi there,
After a 12 1/2 hour flight from HongKong, and had a 4 hour sleep on the plane, and watched a movied " Ghandi" I arrived in the Netherlands.
Aaron picked me up and that was great even though it was an early flight.
The reunion with Violet was great! She knew who I was and wasn't shy.
I cooked dinner that same night, as I wasn't feeling too tired. But I went to bed at 8 pm and woke up again at 8 am so 12 hours sleep to catch up. Now I am OK and not tired. I enjoyed visiting the Dutch supermarket Albert Hein, and got some stroopwafels. ( my favourite syrup waffles)

Some pictures of the cable car to the giant buddha statue. Michael( son) and I went together to the cable car and see the Giant Buddha. The cable car ride is 4.5 kM long and takes 25 minutes long. It is definitely the best cable car ride in the world.

ShenZhen, China.

So now I will just tell you the China story.

So I have arrived with Michael after he came to pick me up at my hotel in HongKong. We had lunch together in a western food joint just at the end of the mall. Then we took the free shuttle to the airport and then a minivan that took us to the border of China. ( $27- each one way) but that was super fast. We were there in just under half an hour. At the border we got out, and walked to customs for me to purchase a 5 day visa. I let Michael do most of the talking. They wanted my passport, and a new passport photo and with that they made a new piece of paper that became the visa . After that I walked over the the customs control check point. Here I was fingerprinted and the guy looked very hard at my passport photo in my passport, and took ages clicking with his hands on his computer. Then he looked at me and said" smile!". So I did. Then he looked again and again and then he asked me if I had an other type of ID card with me. So I brought out my NZ drivers licence. He looked again and asked me to smile again. By this time I thought, Oh no, whats going on? I said" It is me" and he slightly smiled. Then finally he let me go. Michael explained to me that anyone with a new passport , they think it's suspicious that you haven't been anywhere and sometimes people that know how this all works, bring their old passport to verify that you really are genuine and not a fake passport. Get used to it, he said, this is China. After we walked into Mainland China, Mike found the Metro . After a little hiccup with his card, we both got in and went to just one stop and got out. There we just looked around at the downtown area and then went to a different Metro to go to his place. I am so glad I had Mike with me all this time. I would never had been able to do this without him. The little apartment I have is great, on the 9th floor. His one is an other huge tower 2 minutes walk from mine. He is on the 26th floor. I can't put any photos on my Facebook because China blocks Facebook, Messenger, What's App and lots more. I am now on Mike computer who uses a proxy network to get on to Facebook( VPN) So the photos will come tomorrow when I am back in HongKong. Mike will take me back there too so we can do some stuff there like going up the cable car to the golden buddha statue. Last night we had a nice dinner at a huge shopping mall, we had friend ride , cauliflower in chilli and sweet and sour pork.( sweet and sour pork is quite rare, it is mainly a western thing.)

in ShenZhen

The humidity is very bad here and oppressively hot. Bit better now. Today no rain, cloudy and nice. Bye for now.
Just a little follow up . Had a good night sleep in my cute Airbnb apartment. Breakfast at Mike's place. We then head into an other area of the city. By the way what i noticed is that there are hardly any other white people and the locals stare at me and Mike like we are unicorns. It's quite embarrassing actually. They look at you hard and when you look at them they look away and when you look away, they look at you again. This is specially in the metro. But also in the park. We went to something like the sky-tower. Its 69 stories high. It cost $17- to get up but really worth the view. Took loads of photos which i will post tomorrow when i'm back in HONGKONG. Ok enough for now. We are going to the old part of the city of ShenZhen ( pronounced ShenJen)to have dinner and to see the night life night the street stalls and huge Neon lights bill boards. 

Part 3 of China and Hong Kong: Michael took me to the " old town" of ShenZhen yesterday. There is was very similar to Vietnam, with hasslers, Hawkers and people that try to get you to buy there stuff. One lady followed us for ages trying us to buy something off her so Michael said in Chinese Mandarin, " Go away" and she got such a shock that Michael could speak Mandarin, that she backed off straight away. We went through a maze of small streets with lots of foodstalls, the food didn't appeal to me although a few had nice skewers of satay chicken kebabs but we didn't feel it was a very hygienic place. He said maybe you see some scorpions of a skewer stick but we didn't see that. We saw pigs feet ( roasted) and more disgusting stuff I wouldn't touch.But the sounds, the smells and the lights( big neon lights everywhere) were sensory overload. 

With going in the Metro and trains, before you go to the platform , all your luggage, bags and whatever you have goes into an X-ray machine. They had a terrorist attack some years ago and since then they upgraded on security. Everywhere are surveillance camera's , when you come out of the station you look straight into a camera, they are really everywhere, in the parks etc etc. It became night and all the people came out and there were also lots of little police stations so the people could see the police was there. Hmmm Brave new world everyone? I was actually getting sick of the crowds and the noise but I had a taste of China.The shopping malls in China( ShenZhen has a population of 17 million and is the fastest growing city in the world) are huge shopping malls. St Lukes is a tiny one to compare to these ones. and they are everywhere. 

Also my first squat toilet since 1997( since our Morocco trip) was at the border, not a bad one though. In the shopping malls they have both so you can choose, but at MacDonalds near Mike's place they only had a squatty job so I waited till we were back at Mike's place. I stayed at an identical apartment as his just a few steps away. That was through airbnb. Nice studio with everything in it. So today we came back again from China into HongKong, same way, with the shuttle( like a minivan- like a sharutz) when it's full they go. It was fast , only half an hour from the border to the airport. From there we took the free bus to Novotel here. Today we went up the big buddha by cable car. That was the longest cable car I have ever been on. Several KM's by cable car up and over the mountains, turning a corner and fantastic scenery. Today was 35 C and at 5 pm it was 33 C. Mike left to go back to ShenZhen after we finished the cable car and walked to the top of the hill at the foot of the statue. ( 235 steps in the heat) we drank lots of water. I had a swim in the pool. Had a quick dinner here at a cheap outlet. Now I am ready to go to sleep.

in HongKong now

Hi there
I have arrived in HongKong. In NZ time 3 am I finally sat on the bed ready to sleep. Didn't sleep in the plane but it was mainly a day flight. Watched 3 movies.
So funny! I am walking through the tube towards the plane about to go in, behind me walks Jan Renwick and her husband . They own Hammer hardware in Katikati and Jan has been up to my place to see the horses . Small world aye ? Had a good flight with a small amount of turbulence above the Philippines. The rest was smooth . It’s raining here now but very humid (28 C) . A big shopping mall is adjacent to the hotel so I had breakfast at a nice outlet of the mall . Not going to do much today . In NZ time I finally went to bed at 3 am . Photos of HongKong click on the link below. 

 https://photos.app.goo.gl/DFqBTnhK7yyyYvDL9

)My friend Christine asked me : Did you even get to sit together? I said:No, but i was in front of them. An Israeli traveller was sitting next to them and he took our picture. He also overheard me saying about my trip to Israel and how I said that Israel was the safest place, and that I love going there. Later on he shook my hands and thanked me for loving Israel( a few times over)

Went by train to an other shopping mall. 

Tomorrow Michael is coming here and picking me up to go to ShenZhen.

Bye for now.

NEW TRIP TO EUROPE

Hi Readers,

I'm not going to post that often here about my new trip, but only when I think of it.

Most of my postings are done on Facebook.

I am leaving tomorrow for HongKong, stay 2 nights in HongKong and then Michael my son, will come and pick me up to go back with him to ShenZhen, and stay there , in the same apartment block as his, in an Airbnb studio room. So that's very handy indeed.

After that I go back to HongKong for an other night and day and then I fly out on a very early morning flight ( 12.15 am), to Holland. 

Aaron my son who lives there, will pick me up as I will have Mike's suitcase and mine as well.

If you want to follow my trip add me on Facebook, but don't just add me, send me a private message first to introduce yourself and tell me why you want to follow my trip.

I don't just add anyone. I am married , very happily for 37 years, so I will not accept single guys looking for a relationship.

That's it, see you later.

Marianna.