Jason's Daily Notes

Woke up to the sound of Jannes and Wendy chatting. Where was I? Oh yeah, on the floor of Jannes's manager's flat in Breda. The air mattress and my sleeping bag were a pretty comfy combination.

Jannes was feeling way worse than I was, so I let him sleep for a couple more hours which I spent online.

We eventually got up and ready (it took me some time to figure out the light in the shower was a pull string on the wall). We said bye to Wendy and walked into the city. Jannes picked up a couple things from the Walkabout Cafe, and we stopped by Panos to get some food (sandwiches, and a croquette pastry for me). There were the remnants of a carnaval parade going through the city center, and we headed to the train station, where we caught a train after 15 minutes to Tilburg. (Luckily, Jannes's discount card got e a reduced fare too on my ticket.)

We arrived in Tilburg after only ~10 minutes on the train; we stashed our bags into a locker and walked into the city to find his friends. They had not responded to his message but he was confident we would find them anyway. The carnaval parade was still going on, and we walked alongside it. Soon, Jannes ran into a friend - Ellen, who was somewhat peeved that I compared her to Mrs. Degeneres. Whatever, it was Carnaval, people were dancing in the streets between the floats. Very few things made sense, but the costumes were really colorful and the mood was very festive.

We found our way to Bolle (ball, or "fat one"), after asking some people for the way. There were several more friends - Stephan, dressed as a bunny, and his brother Centrol (?!) dressed as a phone in a trenchcoat. Then there were the girls - maybe 7 of them, all teachers, all wearing the same costume: Silent Disco. I could not remember any of their names, I think one was Linke? (and I don't think that they all were introduced to me anyway.) But I was tired anyway and simply didn't have the energy to socialise fully.

The bar/club was playing loud embarrasing schläger-style music, including oompah-remixes of hit songs.

We had a couple drinks there; the beers are smaller than in London and only cost 1 token (€2,20) each.  We then all went to McDonald's and Stephan really wanted to know whether they had the McCroquet at McDonald's in the US.

Jannes and I only stayed for 1 more drink, because we were both exhausted. We said bye and walked back through the cold, having a deep conversation about Jannes's interest in justice and ways to improve social understanding of each other.

We rushed onto the train to Eindhoven, which only took like 10-15 minutes. There, we picked up his bike, and since I was tired, he offered to give me his card so I could take the bus while he would bike home. We met at the bus stop, and came home. He has a nice house, lives with his mom, who is also really nice.

She had made some soup, which was perfect for us. We watched TV in the evening, including a romantic miniseries and show (Oon zook naar God) about celebrities living in a monastery. Then, the BAFTA awards, which was actually pretty cool. I recommended several movies to Jannes. And I need to watch Life of Pi and Amour.

Showered. I couldn't figure out how to unlock the plug from the tub. Went to bed upstairs in his room. It was cold. I wore my sweater.