ISN Cooking Club

Last thursday I went to the ISN Cooking Club. It was a Spring Dinner, so the receipes was going to be spring ones.The menu consisted on chicken wih sprin onions and yoghurt, different kind of salads, pasta... For see the receipes click on this link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1IOn6YZpB2FLsaX6QClmCmz10ja0gm8chE3n-pVL9E7U/edit

The dynamic was the following. There were all the ingredients as well as some receipes printed. People made groups, chose a receipe and started following the steps described. This way, all the dishes were prepared at the same time so no one were idle nor anyone had to wait for eat. However, It was a social event, so while we were cooking/chopping... we were also talking with each other and knowing new people. Besides, sometime there were waiting times (while using the oven or if you needed something that was being used by another person) so they were great moments to chat.

We were 30 of us. That's a lot of people, reason why the kitchens was hectic. It is a small room with two ovens and three cookers, but it was needed for more than eight people almost at the same time. The dinner took place at the Plexus. Fortunely, despite the kitchen isn't very big, the place were the dinner was served was very spacious.

The pasta was cooked by authentic Italians it was absolutely nice. The entire menu was actually terrific, and, on the top of that, the dessert (one of the two dessert) was prepared by me. Guess what dessert was:

Torrijas!!

For those who don't know to it is I'm going to explain you. Torrijas are a typical Easter food in Spain. They consist of bread moist in milk+cinnamon+condensed milk, then dipped in beaten eggs and fried. Basically, they're sweet food (delicious food being exact). Unfortunely, I didn't cooked it very well but all of the attendants enjoy them, which is the important issue.

If you enjoy cooking, learning new receipes and meeting new people while enjoying a great meal, then you must attend to this fantastic club.

Bon appetit!

Den Haag

Last Sunday I visited Den Haag (The Hague) with our Russian buddie, who was our guide there, and my classmate. The first view was Den Haag Central station, which is absolutely illuminated thanks to the glass roof.

After we arrived to Den Haag, we went to see the city hall. It is an enormous white building near the trains station. In the ground floor it can be found cafés, shops and even a stand market over there.

After that, we went directly to see the parliament. In the path to there we walk into shoping streets and near of the Ministry of Justice, wich is just next to the current parliament. The following pictures are from the Ministry, It is a beautiful old building, with some sculptures on the facades.

This pictures are from the building next to the Ministry, the new Dutch parliament. It is a current and modern buidling, with glass facade.

Then, as I told you before, we visited the old parliament. This incredible place looks like a castle, with its own wall, giving the impersion of an isle or so. Inside the wall it can be seen a great square similiar to the Madrilian Plaza Mayor. You can see the entrance to the parliament and the parliament itself just below of this lines.

This is the place where the Dutch King (and the previous Queen before him) give their speeches in special days, such as Christmas.

Also It is here where the prime minister (Mark Rutte from the Popular Party for Freedom and Democracy in Dutch Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie, VVD) have his office, which can be seen from outside the square, It is in front of a lake.

As you may know, in The Hague is where It is located the Govern as well as the Royal Palace (the place where the Royal Family lives in). Therefore, we also could see the Palace, a white building smaller than what I thought, especialy when compared with Palace in Spain. However, It is only visible a part of it, so it could be that the Palace was bigger than its seems.

There, we went to the Escher Museum, located in a Palace used by the Queen Emma. In front of it there is a street with international office such as the Turkish embassy, Spanish office... There were flowers already and one of the most expensive and luxurious hotels in Den Haag.

Finally we had to return to Leiden at the end of a marvelous day with a fantastic host/guide, our friend Tat.

JapanMuseum SieboldHuis

Last Saturday I visited the Japanmuseum Sieboldhuis (Huis means House and Siebold is the name of a person, I will tell you a little more of him). It is located at Rapenburg 19, Leiden (http://www.sieboldhuis.org/).

The following information about Mr von Siebold can be found on the webpage og the museum (this is a sinopsis of what you can read there)

"Philipp Franz Balthasar von Siebold, who born in the Bavarian Würzburg, started Medicine studies in 1815. In 1822 he became surgeon-major Dutch East Indian army stationed in Batavia. There he soon attracted the attention of the Governor-General. He seemed the ideal person to send to Japan, a country with a central place in the changing world politics. Japan was until then an unknown power with strictly closed borders. Trade was allowed, but limited to a trading post on the purpose-built artificial island of Deshima. In this period, only Dutchs were allowed to trade with Japan.

In 1823 Siebold arrived at Deshima with the task to collect information on Japan, trade with Japan and the Japanese political system. Foreigners were not allowed to leave Deshima, but as a doctor were open to him other channels. After curing a local influential officer was opening it allowed a small practice outside the trade post and to make house calls on Japanese patients.

Also, as a physician, he earned a good reputation. He made many visits to the perimeter. He could do not receive payment, but instead he was often gifts from grateful patients. Thus laying the foundation of his ethnographic collection. acquire Following Jan Cock Blom Hoff (1779-1853), between 1818 and 1823, the Dutch commander of Deshima and bookkeeper Johannes van Overmeer Fisscher (1800-1848), he managed a large number of household objects, prints, materials and craft artifacts .
Siebold focused on collecting plants, animals and seeds and all utensils and took artists employed to capture animals, objects and use on paper. Siebold collected during his trips as much as possible natural materials. His disciples took him for plants, animals and rocks, and he hired three hunters to collect exotic animals for him.
In 1825 he was awarded two assistants from Batavia, the apothecary Heinrich Bürger and illustrator C.H. de Villeneuve. B¸rger was a great help in the collection, and from 1828 he was Siebold's successor. The natural history material was spread over the years of Siebold's stay in Japan, in four shipments to the Netherlands. The last mission he took away when he forced the end of 1829 left Japan. Bürger remained on Deshima and sent in the following years three more runs. In the Netherlands, the shipments, which all together comprise about 10,000 items, to this day the Japanese collections of the National Museum of Natural History and the National Herbarium of the Netherlands.
On the basis of the large number of animals Siebold and Bürger sent to the Netherlands, the zoologists were Temminck (Coenraad Jacob, 1778-1858), Schlegel (Hermann, 1804-1884) and De Haan (Wilhelm, 1801-1855), the Japanese fauna describe. When their research was published in the "Fauna Japonica" (published between 1833 and 1850), this work was the Japanese fauna almost unknown in one of the best-described fauna of all non-European countries.
After a month-long trip to Edo, today's Tokyo, where Siebold besides many objects came into the possession of maps of Japan, he would leave to return to Deshima directly to Java. The objects were already sent to Deshima. The maps were discovered and Siebold was accused of spying for the Russian state. Possession of maps was indeed strictly prohibited. After a period of house arrest and investigate Siebold was in October 1829 forever banished from Japan. At that moment he did not know that this ban would be lifted later.
Parts of his collection were stored until then in Leiden, Ghent, Antwerp and Brussels. Siebold decided to settle in Leiden Rapenburg number 19. From 1831 Siebold presented his collection open to the public and after some urging, King William I in response to its previously expressed interest in the Siebold collection. The Hague Collection "Royal Cabinet of Curiosities," the collections of Blom Hoff and Overmeer Fisscher, and the collection of Siebold, were eventually merged. Siebold's collection was purchased by the state for this purpose and the new museum in Leiden, the forerunner of today's National Museum of Ethnology.
Siebold continued to play an important role as adviser on Japanese affairs. In 1859 he traveled to Japan one more time, as a diplomat."

So, as you have read, the museum shows a lot of plants, animals and objects (maps, clothes...) that Siebold got in Japan and sent to The Netherlands. The museum is amazing, specially if you enjoy Japanese culture, because this is a great opportunity to see how the 19th century Japan looked like.

There it can be found enormous animals as well as miniatures of houses and boats, traditional clothes and other daily stuffs.

Besides, all the explanations are in Japanese, Dutch and English, so as long as you are able to understand one of them (at least English) you can learn everything from the Museum. The only exception for this is the temporary exposition of Mount Fuji, which is entirely in Dutch.

The ticket is completely affordable for students, only 4,5 euro, which is a really good price compared with the rest of Museums, around 20 euro. However, if you are into Museums you can get a Museumkaart for 50 euro in any Museum and then entrance in all of them is free. (Gratis in Dutch)

If you want to know my opinion, SieboldHuis is a Museum you should visit, It is cheap and very interesting.

Heaven or hell cocktail party

Last friday ISN throw "heaven or hell " cocktail party.
As it was a themed party, people were supposed to be disguised as angels or devils. However, except staff and two people, none of the attendees wore nothing similar to a costume. Anyway, it was a fantastic party with cheap cocktails. Each one had to buy coins at the entrance, and depending on what you what you had to pay more or less coins e.g. a beer was one coin and cocktails two. At the very beginning of the party there was a happy hour, when the cocktail price was only one coin.
There were at least five different sort of cocktails, with different colours too (red, green, blue...).
Of course, this hadn't been a party if there wasn't music. Aloud music, mainly rap, could be heared during the whole night. Only five or six people were really dancing, which is a great contrast to Spanish parties where everyone dances always.

There I could find my Spanish friends as well as the new people I met at Board Games night. We were chating and drinking until the end of the night. The guys from the board games joined quickly to the group of dancers, who were dancing in a savage style. Interestingly, the guy who organised the party was Boon, the guy from Malasya I had met some days ago in a Spanish meeting. He's a friend of one my Spanish neighbours. It was in De Bonte Koe café, which is a very nice place and I really recommend to go there if you are in Leiden.

The party ended at 23:00 more or less, and most of the people move to "Next" to keep on partying.

ISN Leiden Board Games Club

On thursday I was in this club, that as It can be known from the name, It is a board games themed club. People there is absolutely nice. The organiser is very friendly as well as the participants.

There were a lot of games to play with such as dixit, train ticket... As soon as a group is formed the game starts, so if the game has begun before your arriving, you only have to wait until more people come to start a new game. When I arrived there, the first game had begun, so I wait for some people more. When it happened we start playing "train ticket". The game is about something you aren't going to guess.......Yes! Trains! The objective is to win as much points as you can by building train routes through Europe. The largest the route, the more point it worth. Also It is possible to gain points by reaching some objective described in cards. This objectives consist of build up a route between two cities (the card says which ones), and as well as before, the largest routes worth more points than the shorter ones.

We were five of us playing this game. Almost all international students. The person who explain us the rules, and who seems to be part of the organisers maybe, was the only Dutch in this group (but not in the room). He works in the Plexus too, so I guess he's very involved in events for international students. The other three people were a guy from Taiwan and two girls, one from Austria and the other from Germany. So as you can see this sort of events meet people from worldwide.

The game was very amusing and after finish it we were chating about our studies, food, country...
The Taiwanese guy have an English name. It seems to be something common for asiatic people, I guess because of the difficult names, although there are some Dutch names very difficult too. He was studying Economics and the girl from Austri were studying something related with biotech (just like me!). The German girl was into Law. Here in Leiden, the most prominent fields are Biotech and Law so it quite common to know people from these fields. In the residence I am living in, almost everyone is studying Law (Bachelor or Msc).

If you are in Leiden you should definetely go to this club, It is probably the best or one of the best clubs I've been from ISN. Nice people, great atmosphere and a lot of fun. As the other ISN clubs you only need to join to the Facebook group to be updated.