Introduction week

I join a student union, go sailing in a Skûtsje and take a quick dip in the Amstel river.
As you know I had planned to meet some new people this Wednesday and start making some friends here in Amsterdam. It didn't turn out exactly as planned and I ended up having three great nights instead of one...
To start from the beginning, I have been talking to my colleagues about how to meet new people and get friends in Amsterdam. I've listened to various suggestions and also made some meager attempts, like going out and talking to strangers at bars, but without much success. However, joining an organization has always been my backup plan, as I find it easy to connect with people with whom you share a purpose, like sports. It therefore seemed like a natural step for me to join an organization now that I have spent 2 weeks here without making any friends outside of work. When I talked to a colleague about it, she went online and found Orionis, a student sailing organization for me. I had not imagined such a thing would exist, but I was immediately attracted to the concept. After visiting their website I was sure this was the place for me.

This is a slogan of theirs, I like it :)

So I went to their everyone-is-welcome bar, which they arrange every Wednesday evening and use to recruit new members. It seems to be working quite well, as they currently have around 450 members. As expected I was warmly welcomed by the Orionis recruiters, who gladly answered a lot of questions I had about the organization. What I didn't expect was how easy it was to get in contact with everyone else. You could say I had already grown accustomed to the solitude of exploring Amsterdam on my own, but in fact I am just shy around so many strangers, who all speak a language that I don't understand very well (yet). But here it was no problem that I was a little shy, because people would just come up to me and talk, when I was standing by myself. This helped me a lot and I ended up talking with a lot of nice people that night. I also chose to formally join the organization, as I had known I would since seeing their website the first time.
The next two days I had dinner with Orionis on a huge houseboat. Here Orionis serves the hungry students from the university of Amsterdam, who are celebrating their introduction week. They also give students an opportunity to go sailing in either a Valk or the Skûtsje on the Amstel river (I did both).

The Valk is similar to an Yngling, but without a spinnakker

The Skûtsje is not like most boats

Friday night we stayed late and had a great time on the houseboat, which is a bar on the inside. It was a warm evening, the weather has been great all week, so at one point we decided to go for a swim. Luckily, I bring my swimwear and a towel with me at all times (I'm not kidding), so I could enjoy it without worrying about wet clothes afterwards. If you don't understand why I would carry such things with me, you should read The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, and even if you do understand, I recommend reading it anyway; It's hilarious.