Author Archives: Yannani

Yesterday, I travelled up to Rotterdam to meet up with some of my Dutch friends for the first time. We had made plans to go karaoke singing cause we all love that.

The day started pretty normal. I just woke up, showered, and waited until I had to leave. Thankfully, I only needed to take one train. The trip took a bit longer cause when we arrived in Rotterdam we had to wait for almost 15 min cause they were working on the tracks.

Upon arrival, I met up with my first friend Jo. She gave me a really nice greeting and we got to know each other while we headed towards the place we were going to eat. We had booked a table at this Korean bbq restaurant, which was a part of the karaoke place. It was my first time trying out Korean bbq, but it was really good. It reminded me a bit of Raclett that you can do at home.

After we had eaten, we headed up to the karaoke place. Jo had booked a room for us. We sang everything from Celine Dion, Disney classics, John Legend and it was super fun. The others really know how to sing. One of them even does covers on YouTube. The Karaoke thing had a scare system, but it was a bit off. I did however get the second highest score on my last song “All of me” by John Legends, which I found pretty funny. All the other scores were around 40 and one with 54. We had the room for 2h

When our time was up it was time to head home and pray that I wouldn’t get stuck again like last time xD. I arrived home at midnight and I was super glad to be back. I spent the rest of the night just chilling and playing some games with friends before eventually heading to sleeps.

Hey everyone. I know it’s been a while since my last post. It’s just that there hasn’t been anything worth writing about for the past few months, but yesterday I went out for the first time since January.

The day started as normal except that I had to wake up a bit early because there was a guy coming over at 9 am. We are having all the windows in our apartment replaced from single glass to double glass, so the guy was here to take the measurements he needed. After that I just waited for my boyfriend to come home so we could head out.

We had ordered concert tickets for a band called “Beartooth” in Brussels. They were preforming together with “Motionless in White”. Both my boyfriend and I really enjoy both of the bands and decided that this was a great opportunity to be able to hear their songs live. Since we didn’t care about the first band we decided to head to eat dinner instead since we wouldn’t have to be there until 8 pm.

I had found a really nice Vietnamese restaurant not far from the venue. It was located on small side street and the staff there was really nice. The food was also really good. I ordered “Roasted Duck Noodles,” and my boyfriend had “roasted duck with pineapple sauce.” The duck was really crispy and tender at the same time, and the veggies were also really tasty. I added to chilli oil, which made the dish even better. After our nice dinner, we headed to the venue.

There were a lot of people there which wasn’t surprising since both bands that were left are quite popular. We found a place to sit because I’m never a big fan of standing during concerts and the thought of standing on the floor where people creates “mosh pits” and “rides the crowd” seems both exhausting and kinda scary. So if the place have sitting arrangement I rather choose that.

The first band was “Motionless in white,” which was the one I was most excited to see. I have been listening and enjoying a lot for their music recently and was super stoked to see them perform live. In one of their songs, they even invited the singer of “Beartooth” (the second band) up on stage to sing with them, which was really nice. My favourite songs were definitely “Another Life” and “Masterpiece” since those the ones I knew from before, but I also enjoyed their other songs except for the really heavy ones. They played for around 30 min, which was surprisingly short. In the end, the singer was throwing roses in the crowd when he suddenly got hit by a letter in the face he just looked down with such a disappointed look that it was kinda funny to witness.

While we were waiting for the main band to start they played “Livin’ on a prayer” by Bon Jovi and the entire crowd was singing along to the course. They even muted the music so you could only hear the crowd which made it so awesome

Beartooth’s performance was a really banger. The singer was the most athletic one I have seen. He kept jumping, running, dancing, and headbanging on stage. It was really great to witness. Their songs were also really awesome. My favourites were “Riptide,” “In between,” and “The lines” for the same reason as previous. The crowd was even more wild this time around. Multiple mosh pits and crowd surfers, which just reminded me how happy I was that we didn’t have to stand on the floor. We had to potentially leave the concert early cause we had to make it back home. Thankfully, I got to hear all of the songs that I wanted to hear them perform.

When we got home we watched a couple of episodes of our anime show and then just headed straight to bed since we were both quite tired from all the headbanging (mostly my bf) and singing (mostly me). It was all in all a very successful concert and definitely worth the money and the trip!

Yesterday Nathan and I had plans to meet up with a mutual friend. Our plans were bowling and takeout. It was a really nice evening with some funny moments during our games.

I made a reservation at the bowling place at 3 pm for 1h30, so our friend agreed to come to our place at 2 so that we could go there together. Before he arrived I was just enjoying a new game that I have been playing on streaming called “Kingdom Come: Deliverance” while chatting with my friend. As soon as our friend arrived we almost left instantly. On our way he told us about how it has been being back in Belgium and visiting family.

We arrived almost 20 min before our time, but our spot was free which meant that we could start earlier. There were a lot of people there which wasn’t that surprising since it was on a weekend. I put our name in and then the games began.

Our first round went great. You could tell that all of us were very rusty xD We did improve throughout the game. We all had problem finding the perfect ball for us, so we just had to make do with what we were given.

Throughout the night I was having a bit of a rough time because I wasn’t preforming that well and a part of me kind of gave up half way. It just felt that the boys were way ahead and I wasn’t able to catch up. Didn’t even get a strike which mad me kinda sad, but at least the boys had fun which is more important for me and I did win a game although it wasn’t a normal one. There was one round where Nathan got 9 point seven times in a row, which was funny and frustrating to watch.

After we were done with bowling we just head home. We ended up playing league with our other friends and order Kapsalon together with some bubble tea. Our friend stayed to around 9 before he headed home.

Yesterday I was invited to join Nathan and his colleagues for their annual Christmas dinner. It was really nice meeting the people who works with Nathan we did have something unexpected popping up.

It all started with Nathan and I making our way to meet up with one of his colleagues that live fairly close to us. When we arrive we all just waited together because the plan was to take a bus together with the rest of the party. After a while we got a call from another colleague telling us that they had try to get a hold of the bus driver, but he wasn’t picking up the phone which meant that we would have to make our way into the city. This was also the day that the public transport people were striking, so we were a bit worried about not getting a tram in to the city. Thankfully it wasn’t that bad and we found our way.

When we arrived into the city we were a bit early so we decided to check out the market while waiting for the others. They had some really nice stalls with food, clothes, jewelry’s etc. After around 1h of walking around we decided to try one of the places that sold gin. I went for chocolate flavor. It was okay but I still don’t like the taste of alcohol that much. We finally met up with the rest of the group and one of the girls immediately brought up a bottle of vodka for us to share. This was something we were not expecting. We all had some including me and Nathan was enjoying the look on my face when i was drinking it. After feeling warm inside thanks to the vodka we slowly made our way to the restaurant. Nathan was feeling a bit tipsy since he hadn’t eaten since noon. I was also feeling lightheaded cause I hadn’t eaten at all xD.

The place we went to was a small tapas place called Tapabar. Everyone had already decided on a menu. I went with a meat version while Nathan took the seafood one. I had a great time talking to the others. I was surprised on how many knew English. Some people were defiantly feeling the effects of the alcohol during dinner, but no one was being super drunk. We got served a bunch of different foods and just shared everything amongst everyone. We had shrimps, mussels, chicken, chorizo and a bunch of other dishes. They were all really tasty. When we got the check everyone’s faces lit up since it was above € 800. Everyone paid for their own food, but we still managed to fall € 100 short so one guy just decided to pay for that instead of having everyone double check again.

After dinner we all just walked around some more because the others hadn’t seen the Christmas market yet. We took some pictures under the tree and had some more flavored gin. Eventually Nathan and I decided to head home because it was getting late and we wanted to make sure we found a bus so that we wouldn’t have to take the electric scooters. I also had a small headache from the drinks and we were both quite tired.

When we got home we just relaxed for a while before heading to bed quite early. All in all it was a really nice evening and I had a nice time speaking to all of Nathan’s colleagues. They also seemed very interested in the fact that I was from Norway just like most of the adults I have met so far.

Yesterday Nathan and I decided that we would go out and spend the day together. It was really nice to do something just the two of us. It’s been a while since we last did that.

We decided that we wanted to try out the restaurant that my parents had gotten us gift vouchers for. The place was called “Umami” and was an Asian cuisine dish located in the southern part of Antwerp. It did take us almost 1h to get there with public transport but the food was worth the trip. The restaurant was big and spacious despite it being located on a side street. There were a lot of people there which wasn’t too surprising cause it was a Saturday during dinner hours. They asked for a reservation, but we didn’t have one to which they advise us to do that if we were planning on coming during the weekends. The restaurant was luckily not full and we got seated right next to the kitchen. We could see the chefs cook in front of us. Then came the time to decide what to eat.

The menu was more expensive than what we are used to with almost every dish being between € 15 – € 20. My parents gave us two cards for € 100. They had shared plates both cold and warm, plus sushi. We both decided to go with something from the “Rabata” menu. I went with the “Tandoori lamb chops with roasted eggplant cream” and Nathan ended up with the “Sticky Korean bbq baby back ribs”. We got a bowl of fried rice to share and the rice felt like it melted on our tongue. We just decided to go with regular soft drinks with it.

After we had eaten everything we were feeling very full. Both of the meats were super tender and the cream tasted delicious. As we were about to pay the guy told us we had to use the whole gift card in one go which meant we had € 22 left which we spent on a “Mai Tai” for Nathan and a “Red karaf” for me.

We ended up being at the restaurant 1h later than expected, but it was a really fun experience. Then we just took the tram to where the Kermis was and even though it was super late and the other stalls had already closed the Casino one with all the coin pushers was stil open. We had some points from a previous time and after playing we ended up with 82k in total. Nathan got a lot of winnings on his machine. They had a bunch of prizes, but we went for a small bowl set and a grilled cheese machine. Then it was finally time to head home.

The rest of the evening was pretty chill. All of our friends had gone to bed early which was a bit sad, but we just ended up watching “The big bang theory” while eating some chips with the the a new dip that I made last week.

That was my weekend. Today I just did my Dutch homework and played games with friends while mentally preparing for next week. I hope you guys have had a nice weekend and are looking forward to Christmas times.

Last week Nathan and I went to Germany for 4 days to meet up with our friend. This time we would also have another friend joining us. It was a really fun and well worth the travel

The entire first day was used for travel. We started by taking a 7h bus to Frankfurt and then a 30 min train to Aschaffenburg where our friend would pick us up with her car.

On Friday our plans were to pick up our friend from the airport and then head into the city for some sightseeing. We had trouble finding him cause he went out in the departure section instead of the arrivals area. After we found him it was off to Frankfurt City for some shopping instead of sightseeing cause it was a rainy day. We walked around the shopping area and i got myself a new pair of gaming headphones, a power bank and some medicine for Nathan since he was ill. When it was time to get dinner we were planning on going for conveyer belt sushi, but the two places that was located in the city was either closed down or closed. In the end we found a restaurant that served Pokebowls. We all made our own bowls with our decided protein, mix, sauce and topping. The place was small and very cute. After dinner we just headed home and spent the rest of the evening gaming and hanging out.

Saturday was the most exciting day. We drove into one of the neighboring city cause we were going to do “escape room”. Our theme was Thanos and our mission was to find all the infinity stones and save the universe. We had 60 min and it took us 58 of them to solve it. It was really fun, but we ended up getting way too many hints which kinda ruined the whole figuring out experience. We later were told that the people who worked there had just started up and that this was a new project for all of them. Which was the reason why they were helping us a lot. They wanted to make sure that everything went smoothly. With some time and more experience they have potential to become a really good business. If you are ever in that city and want to do something fun with friends definitely check them out.

After the escape room we had a couple of hours before dinner. We decided to go to a bar to get some drinks. I had my first “Cubra Libre” and it was stronger than I had imagine, but it tasted really good ^^ Our reservation at the “all you can eat” place was at 7.30 pm which meant that we had a lot of time to kill. We decided to head over there and just played “code names” in the car. The restaurant was super crowded this day. We even had to wait to get seated. When we finally got our table we headed towards where the food was. They had everything from salads, sushi, soups etc… Our friend said that they way people did it was that they first choose their raw meat that they want the kitchen to prepare for them and in the meanwhile you just pick something else to eat. I just had to try the sushi and for my main course I had some lamb cutlets and meat strips together with some broccoli and potatoes. I was very satisficed with my food, but Nathan wasn’t as fortunate. His main course was seafood and apparently his dish was half warm, half cold and his mussels weren’t good at all. Our friend told us that it was usually not that bad and that this was the werst experience she has had which was a bit unfortunate, but nothing to do about it. After we arrived back we again just chilled and played some vr.

On Sunday we just drove to the train station, had a quick breakfast at MacDonalds before heading towards home. Our friend joined us on the bus this time cause he was flying out from Brussels instead of Frankfurt the next day, which meant that he would be staying with me and Nathan for the night. On our way home with the bus something funny happend. After we had left one of the stops I looked out the window and saw a guy running after the bus. First i thought that it was a friend of one of the passengers, but it turned out to actually be one of the passengers. He had gotten off to do something and then missed the buss while it was driving away. Thankfully the driver saw him too and found a place to park while he got on. I have only seen this in movies so it was kinda fun to see it happend in real life.

When we were back in Antwerp we decide to eat out on one of our ramen places. Since Nathan was still feeling under the weather we went to Wagamama cause it was closer to the central station. They had some new items on the menu as well. I had the ramen with duck gyoza (dumplings). After our dinner we just headed home and played some league with our friends.

That was it for our mini vacation. Despite it not going totally as planned we all had a lot of fun. I think the highlight of the trip was the escape room and the pokebowl place. It was also really great meeting the dogs again.