Today I traveled to New Jersey. Not a direct flight this time; I flew over Atlanta, Georgia. It wasn't too bad but it took me all day.
It's odd to be in Somerset again -- we lived here for 7 months. I bought my milk and cereal at the Shoprite were used to do our groceries.
My hotel is near a major highway, so I really feel I'm back in the busy world. I had a phone call from 8.00 pm until now, tomorrow my meetings start at 8.00 am (a breakfast meeting at 7.00 am was canceled).
Thank you for all the comments, phone calls, cards, e-mails and gifts!
We had apple pie with whipped cream at work, and I went out with my coworkers to Amedeo's. Tonight Sasha and I are going out for dinner, and then a nice visit to the bookstore.
In a corner of a small shopping center in San Jose, not far from highway 101, you'll find "Ori Deli, Dutch and Indonesian groceries". Ori Deli, owned by Robert Tan, is a great place for an Indonesian meal and Dutch shopping.
Nasi rames
The left part of the building is the restaurant. The furniture is in diner style with 30 seats. There are Indonesian posters and decorations on the wall.
The menu consists of classic Indonesian dishes, all home-made. The Nasi Rames comes with steamed rice with beef opor, sambal goreng tahu, spiced potato strings, serundeng, mixed pickled vegetables and sambal, topped with satés and kroepoek (shrimp chips).
The nasi smells delicious, with a small whif of trassi. "We don't use too much", says Tan, "because most Americans don't like it". The sate is excellent and served with a great peanut sauce.
The store and restaurant offer a high level of personal service. The chef/owner takes your order and cooks your meal, using ingredients that he picks up from the store. "We cook the authentic way", says Mr. Tan, who enjoys talking about Indonesian culture and food.
The store has been in existence for over 30 years. Tan says business is slower than it used to be years ago since many of the older generation of Dutch-Indonesians are no longer around. He gets a fair amount of Dutch visitors, who come looking for Dutch items in his store.
The restaurant and the store are connected to each other, so while you wait for your food you can walk around and do some shopping.
Groceries
The groceries section has a large selection of Dutch and Indonesian products. There’s a large selection of drop and Dutch sweets, Honig soups and Delftware. There’s a large selection of Indonesian spices and condiments, and fresh made kroepoek is available for sale.
The weather is wonderful this weekend; it's sunny and 82 degrees today.
After I went for a haircut I read my French book in the Eno River Park. My hair is short again, I enjoyed having it longer for about a year but it's been enough.
The book that I'm reading is L'Étranger by Albert Camus. It's the right level of difficulty but I can only read a few pages at the time because it's still tiring to read in French.
We had a good and productive weekend. Yesterday we went for a walk near Falls Lake, a little north of Durham. We had never been there before and it was beautiful, but we stopped early because of a sign that warned that we were now entering a hunting area. "Reflecting clothes are recommended." Hunting season has recently started. Until October 1st hunting was limited to the use of bow-and-arrow, now other weapons may be used as well.
We left and walked the safe and enjoyable Al Buehler trail instead.
Today I visited the International Festival in Raleigh to take pictures for the other website. In the afternoon we went for a walk together, the Al Buehler trail again. We also reorganized the 2nd bedroom/office and finally put away the luggage and boxes from New Jersey and Washington, DC. Now we have a usable office again.
It's one thing to have poisonous plants and snakes...
...quite another to walk in a gameland public hunting area in hunting season.
The changes to the Dutch citizenship law that were approved earlier this year will take effect on October 1st, 2010. People born outside the Netherlands before 1985 to a Dutch mother and a non-Dutch father may now be eligible for Dutch citizenship. Citizenship is not granted automatically, these "Latente Nederlanders" need to file an application to gain Dutch nationality.
Applicants are reminded that citizenship laws are complicated, and that many countries have restrictions on dual citizenship. Seek information from the officials of every country of which you may be a citizen.
Background
While children born to a Dutch father and a foreign mother have always been eligible for Dutch citizenship, people born outside the Netherlands before 1985 to a Dutch mother and a foreign father were not. This strange distinction was a legacy from an old law from 1892, which was revised in 1985. Children born on or after January 1, 1985 to either a Dutch mother or a Dutch father have been eligible for a Dutch passport.
There was a grace-period in the late 1980’s where people in this situation could apply for Dutch citizenship but this did not reach everybody on time.
Overhaul Dutch citizenship laws
The proposal is part of a larger overhaul of the law on Dutch citizenship, including more measures to prevent dual citizenship and additional rules to revoke citizenship of terrorists in certain cases. More information on this and other changes can be found on the website of the Dutch House of Representatives.
Today I received a package with a paper that I wrote 16 years ago, in high school.
The package didn't contain a note, nor did it have the name of the sender. I thought that perhaps Ettie or my parents had sent it, but I couldn't understand why. Thirty minutes later, when I took a picture for this article, it dawned on me that Niels had asked me for my address recently.
A great surprise! It was fun to read the paper. Papers like this motivated me to learn to use a computer. Teachers would tell me that my handwriting was so awful that it was hard to read. I believe this was the first document I created with Microsoft Word, after using WordPerfect for years. The title page was made in Microsoft Publisher.
I was 15 years old when I wrote it and remember the process (and the stress) quite well. Good times!
Monday is a day off, Labor Day, so it's a nice long weekend. In the morning I studied some French -- a new project I took on -- and in the afternoon I had a great long talk with Natascha, a Dutch lady who we met a while ago.
We talked a lot about food and now I'm frying kroepoek on the balcony.
Today I traveled to New Jersey. Not a direct flight this time; I flew over Atlanta, Georgia. It wasn't too bad but it took me all day. 
Thank you for all the comments, phone calls, cards, e-mails and gifts! 
In a corner of a small shopping center in San Jose, not far from highway 101, you'll find "Ori Deli, Dutch and Indonesian groceries". Ori Deli, owned by Robert Tan, is a great place for an Indonesian meal and Dutch shopping.
The store and restaurant offer a high level of personal service. The chef/owner takes your order and cooks your meal, using ingredients that he picks up from the store. "We cook the authentic way", says Mr. Tan, who enjoys talking about Indonesian culture and food.
The weather is wonderful this weekend; it's sunny and 82 degrees today.
We had a good and productive weekend. Yesterday we went for a walk near Falls Lake, a little north of Durham. We had never been there before and it was beautiful, but we stopped early because of a sign that warned that we were now entering a hunting area. "Reflecting clothes are recommended." Hunting season has recently started. Until October 1st hunting was limited to the use of bow-and-arrow, now other weapons may be used as well.
The changes to the Dutch citizenship law that 
Yesterday Sasha and I went out for dinner at the American Tobacco Campus.
Today at work I played with an iPad for the first time.
Today I received a package with a paper that I wrote 16 years ago, in high school. 
Monday is a day off, Labor Day, so it's a nice long weekend. In the morning I studied some French -- a new project I took on -- and in the afternoon I had a great long talk with Natascha, a Dutch lady who we met a while ago. 