The Euro 2008 football (soccer) championships begin next week in Austria and Switzerland. Dutch grocery chain Albert Heijn is trying to duplicate the huge success of their Wuppie campaign of two years ago with a new cute character to collect – the Welpie. Welpies are cute little wild-haired lions meant to show support for the Dutch team. Welp is Dutch for baby lion.

We got our first Welpie on Monday and today I picked up another.

Our Welpies

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Yesterday we saw a Big Boy statue in Kaatsheuvel. Instead of holding a plate with a burger, he’s got a giant Coca-Cola strapped on.

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I don’t want to be too negative, but I admit there will be some things I won’t miss when we move from the Netherlands. More »

As we plan to move from the Netherlands to the U.S., I have been thinking about what I will miss the most once we are settled in our new place. Besides our dear family, I am sure I will miss a few other things.
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Ever since I moved to the Netherlands to live with Arthur in May 1999, it has always been our plan to move to the U.S. ‘someday’. In late 2006 we finally made the decision that we would move in early 2009. At that time the plan was to start looking into the process in early 2008. In mid-2007 we decided to move up our plans by several months and by the end of 2007 we decided we would try to move as soon as possible. In order to move we would have two major tasks: applying for Arthur’s immigrant visa, and selling our home in Leiden. More »

Earlier this month we spent a 10-day holiday at the Amar Sina hotel in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt. We chose the Amar Sina because our preferred dive operator, Colona Divers, is located there. Online reviews of the hotel were mixed but mostly favorable. Here is my review of the Amar Sina hotel.

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Last week we had our second excellent experience with Colona Divers, this time in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt. Colona is a Scandinavian dive operator with shops in Hurghada (where we first dived with them in 2005) and El Gouna in addition to Sharm.

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Last Saturday we went to the Arrow Rock Festival in Biddinghuizen. The festival took place at the Walibi World amusement park, in a large field set up for festivals and events. The festival hosted a dozen artists and was headlined by Aerosmith. Here are some short clips of the event:

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Last Sunday the cockpit of an Air France Boeing 707 was sunk in De Beldert lake in Zoelen, the Netherlands. The sinking took place over a year later than originally planned. By the end of the day nearly 20 divers had already visited the new wreck. More »

The legendary musician Peter Gabriel was stranded on the A27 highway in the Netherlands on Saturday when his bus broke down in flames. More »