Today, we had made some plans to head out to a city called “Drammen We had a lovely time with good food and a nice short Sunday walk.
We started today a bit late again, which i don’t have anything against. I made some egg fried rice with the leftovers from yesterday, and then after that my mum and I decided to do the same walk we did the day before. We didn’t go all the way up today since we had other plans later on.
At around 5 pm we all got into the care and were on our way to our ooting. Our plans were to eat dinner at a restaurant and then go for a short walk next to the river.
The restaurant we went to was called “Skutebrygga” and it was really nice interior. We decided to order 1 starter and 1 main course. I had something called “Vitello Tonnato” which was a classic Italian dish. It was a thin slice of calf meat, tuna mayonaise, spring onion, toast and capers. As my main course I had “Spareribs Bullfighter” which were spare ribs marinated with their own saus and served with fries, corn stew and their own burbon sauce. Everything tasted really nice.
After our dinner we decided to take a short walk to digest our food better and to just enjoy the lovely, sunny evening. It didn’t take long and we just headed home right afterwards.
After we got back home we just relaxed and enjoyed the rest of the evening before heading to bed.
So it’s been 3 days since I left to travel to Norway and even though I’m having a lovely time at the moment it was quite an eventful trip so far.
It all started as soon as I left my apartment and headed towards my bus. Apparently, that day, all my transports decided to be delayed. The bus was 20 min, the train was 30 min, and the plane was 50 min delayed, which meant that I didn’t arrive at Malmö where I was meeting my friends until around 11 pm. The night bus to Oslo ended up being 20 min delayed as well.
It was really nice meeting my friends. They were funny and very nice company all together. They acted quite childish towards each other, but that was just super entertaining. We did spend the first night just sitting and trying to sleep as much as we could on the bus. We arrived in Oslo at 7 am on the 9th.
Our first plan was to head over to my friend’s aunt, who lived around 1h away in total from the central station. We walked to the tram and took that to the docks. Then we took the boat and ended up taking a bus before we were at our destination. She lived in a really nice house and had prepared some breakfast for us. We were all quite tired and hungry, so after we had eaten, we took a nap. We slept for around 3 hours, and when we woke up, we had some lunch.
Then we went to the beach where my friend decided to go for a small dip in the ocean. We stayed there for around 1h before we headed home and ate some spaghetti with meat sauce. We had ice cream for dessert. Then they drove me home, and we hung out at my place.
So the plan was originally going to be that the 3 of us would do something in Norway for a week, but then something came up for my friends so it got changed so that they would only stay over the weekend before heading back and I would stay in Oslo and spend time with my family until Tuesday, but it didn’t really go as planned. My friends hadn’t found a place to stay for the weekend due to life get in the way and that they were still quite tired from a trip they had done a week ago, and after spending the entire day with the aunt they weren’t really feeling too good so it kind of ended with them driving home to Sweden that night. They also were having an unexpected guest coming to visit for this weekend. So that was that. Although I’m a bit sad about the entire situation, I understand it, and we decided to just do it another time at a later date. This way, I at least get to spend more time with my family, which is also very important for me since my dad just got home from almost 6 months in the hospital.
Fast forward to yesterday. I just woke up at around 1 pm. and had some noodle soup with baguettes for lunch together with my dad while we just talked and hung out. Then, we had a cronut ( a mix between a doughnut and a croissant) for dessert. Then when my mum got home from a small shopping round.
We walked all the way from our home to the nearest small mountain. That was really exhausting since I’m quite out of shape xD My left hip was hurting together with my right ankle, my back and just my feet in general, but it was a nice walk and I had really miss the nature in general. After we got home, we just hung out on the terrasse before dinner was served.
For dinner, we had sashimi with rice, which was great. Then we watched some tv before heading to bed. So even though things didn’t go as planned, I still had a lovely time with my friends, and I had a great day with my family so far.
Today we went to visit Nathan’s mother. It was a really nice visit. We caught up with each other about what had happened and also had some awkward
We woke up 30 min before we had to leave so we didn’t have much time to prepare, but it was enough. When we arrived we rang the door bell twice, but he didn’t hear it cause they were sitting in the garden. We headed to car and then we were on our way.
When we arrived to the mother’s place we were met by the step father cause the mother was picking up the grand mother. We just hung out in the living room and even started to watch the new Mario movie. A while later the other guest arrived and we all just sat around and greeted each other. The grand mother gave us a nice box of chocolate and the mother gave us another giftcard for food.
When it was around 5 pm we gathered around the table for dinner. Our menu consisted of cucumber soup for starters. Then as a main course we had both chili con carne and pig cheeks stew, served with white rise, crocets and salad. It was all quite tasty. We had some intereresting conversations around dinner. At some point we talked about sex toys and at a different time we talked about me having childeren…
We stayed until around 7 pm. The brother droped us off so we didn’t have to walk which was nice. We also got some left over soup and stew, which Nathan will be in charge of that. We just spent the rest of the evening playing games and hanging out with friends online.
I hope everyone has had a great weekend. It’s getting closer to summer and the weather is getting warmer 😀
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 my boyfriend and I took the train to Tilburg in the Netherlands. This time we saw one of my favourite bands perform. It’s was really fun.
Nathan had taken the day off and my teacher was sick so we could sleep in until noon. Our train didn’t leave until 5 pm which means we had a lot of time to prepare. We started by taking the train from where we lived Roosendaal and then over to Tilburg which was the city where the concert was being held. It only took 1h30 min which is close to the same amount it took us to get the one in Brussels.
When we got to Tilburg we had 1h until the first band would play. We decided to get something to eat and drink before heading toward the venue. I had a salmon with eggs sandwich and a some small fries while Nathan had a croissant. The venue was only 10 min away so we didn’t have to rush.
Cute Christmas decorations outside the train station.
When we got to the place and got in we headed towards the concert hall. This place was noticeably smaller than the other one and there was barely any place to sit beside some steps in the back. So we decided to go there. Then began the waiting.
The warm-up band was someone called “Charming Liars”. They are a band from L.A and UK. I like their songs and thinking about looking more into them. Nathan wasn’t too impressed which is fair since its not really his type of band either.
Charming Liars
Then came the main attraction! AGAINST THE CURRENT. It was amazing to hear them live. They performed some songs I had heard before and some that they released before I started listening to them. They even had some fun chats in between songs. My favourite were definitely “wildfire” and “that won’t save us”. We had to leave before the concert was over because we had to catch the last train home and the entire concert was also behind schedule. We really wanted to hear “weapons” and “legends never die” but those were unfortunately their last songs. If only we could have predicted what would happen next.
Against the CurrentAgainst the Current
We headed towards the train station and made it on the the train as it arrived and got ourself to Roosendaal. Then when we were to check up on the information for our train that would take us back to Belgium it said that had ben cancelled. This is where we started to panic a bit cause we were still in the Netherlands and it as almost midnight which means most public transports had already stopped. I started to reach out to a friend cause I know that she has friends that live in the Netherlands to see if they could help us out.
The first option was to stay at a friends place until morning and then take the train and our second option was that a friend was willing to drive all the way from Belgium to our location and then take us home. We first tried to get a hold of the guy who lived close, but he ended up not being and option so then I messages the guy to ask if he was still willing to get us and he were so yeah. Then we just had to wait 1h for him to drive all the way from his location in Belgium to us. We tried to see if there were any bars were we could sit and wait, but EVERYTHING was closed which we found quite surprising seeing that it wasn’t that late. So we just ended up waiting at the station, by the time he arrived my legs were soo cold. We had really pleasant time in the car and only 40 min later we were finally home.
Nathan hugged the couch as soon as we got home and we immediately made some food, put on our comfy cloths and relaxed in front of the tv watching “the big bang theory”
Despite this not being the optimal concert experience we at least managed to get home only 1h later than planned which is a pretty positive outcome given our situation. All honor goes towards our friend for coming to get us and drive us home. Without him we would probably have had to find a place to stay for the night even if that meant sleeping at the train station.
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.
Lamb ChopsBBQ Baby back ribs
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.
Mai TaiRed Karaf
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.
It has been over a month since I last posted something here. November has been a bit of a rough months for me, but now that we are closing in on Christmas I feel the holiday spirit lifting me up and I’m in a much better headspace.
Not a lot happened in the month of November. It started off with my Autumn break from school which I used for mostly gaming and streaming from home. I have been trying to focus a bit on improving my streams for my current viewers and for potential new ones.
For anyone new; I’m a variety streamer of at twitch.tv/yannani where I play all kinds of games such as League of legends, Teamfight tactics (auto chess), Drake Hollow, 7 days to die etc… I stream every Monday, Wednesday from 2 pm cet and Friday from 6 pm cet. I mostly enjoy playing with friends, but I do play single player games from time to time.
The two other events that happened during November were dinners with Nathans family. We got invited to his mother on the 12th together with Nathan’s brother and grandmother. The plan was to also play some boardgames, but we just ended up having dinner and watching photos from their honeymoon. It was a alright evening. The mum did comment how my naturel hair color was SOO much better than the one I had last time she saw me. She did think I was blond which was surprising since I have only been blond for a brief moment during my bleach. She was referring to when my hair tips were blond, but I found the comment funny non the less xD
Two weeks later on the 25th Nathan, his brother and I were all invited celebrate Nathan’s dad birthday. We had reserved a table at a Chinese restaurant. Nathan’s step mother had also invited her two sons. It was my first time meeting them and they were even around the same age as Nathan and his brother which was a funny coincidence. I ordered some shrimp snacks and then some Chinese spareribs while Nathan had Chinese mushroom soup together with crispy duck. The rest of the table all had a 4 cours menu which included 1 soup, a lumpia and a main course and dessert that they could choose from total of 5 different dishes. The food was really tasty but the family was surprised on how much it was and that the lumpia was so huge. So we did have a lot of leftovers that we split among the party.
As for the rest of the month I was just doing school, gaming and streaming. We do have some plans for the month of december; Against the current concert in the Netherlands, Antwerp winter market and we also have some gift cards we could use. One for a lunch, one for a dinner and one for the movies. So this months will be more active than the previous one for sure.
I will try my best to keep you guys updated on everything. Hope you guys are all going strong and are staying safe especially with everything that is going on in the world.
The Anna behind Yannani 