Sarah Lawrence: Camila arrived

This Tuesday we arrived in Bronxville, a beautiful town, half hour drive from Manhattan. It is in the middle of forest, nice one century old buildings, you would forget to be that close to New York. Here we will drop of Camila, from Saturday onwards she will be freshman at Sarah Lawrence College. And she is looking forward to it!

When we arrived Tuesday afternoon we couldn't resist to drive to Sarah Lawrence and have a look. We were quite astonished. The pictures don't really give a complete message. But imagine some Tudor buildings from the 20s, squirls hopping on the grass and you will understand. While we were welcomed and sitting in a wood panneled waiting room with fire place, we suddenly recognized the dean for foreign students who coincidently entered. We had a nice conversation with her in her room and felt almost like coming home.

Camila is going to fill a new blog with all her adventures around NY: it is about lipstick and city lights. I have added it to the list at the right. Saturday we will shoot some more pictures, for now these.

This is the building where Camila is going to live, it's called Hill House:

Back to The Future ...

Today in the Times of India:

Dutch Lion in Kamala Mills

To support the Dutch at their victorious march to the World Championship Soccor I have added the Dutch Lion to the decoration of my cabin. It brought already luck for the quarter finals (when colleague Hans L used it) and now for the semi finals as well. Just one more match to go! Hup Holland Hup!!

Banganga Tank

A half hour walk from our house are the sacred waters of the 12th century Banganga Tank. I have been running many times quite close but never entered the smaller roads of Walkeshwar surrounding this amazing place.
This tank in in the middle of all the new high rises where the rich of Mumbai live, the old mansions, and the small houses of the locals. It is amazingly quiet and peaceful, you leave the hassle of the city completely behind you. And as always I saw not a single tourist (or foreigner).


The story is great: an arrow shot to provide water for a resting and thirsty Lord Rama (while on a mission to rescue his beloved Sita from the demon king's abode in Lanka) created the spring that is believed to be an underground offshoot of the Ganges. And that makes that the water is considered sacred and to have as great healing powers as the river itself. I have not tried ...


Many temples and shrines are surrounding the tank, one of the most famous is the Walkeshwar Temple (in the 16th century destroyed by the Portuguese during their reign over Bombay). Walking around was quite warm (the humidity made that it felt like 40°C), so the temple I will visit next time.

A Bank that understands its clients?

When you move between three countries in two years you end up with a whole lot of bank accounts. With different bank and stories how they (don't) work. In Hong Kong we started banking with HSBC and yesterday I had an interesting surprise, at least when you are Dutch (or Japanese)!
Every day I come down from the flyover you see on the picture, this is Kemp's Corner. At weekdays one of the most busy crossings of Mumbai. Now I came from the other side and saw this high and big bill board of my Hong Kong bank ... Who can read the text and tell me why a Dutch guy would smile with the message in this ad?

Yes, the monsoon arrived

At some places almost 10 cm of water was pouring down today. The parking lot at the back of our office building was some kind of a swimming pool. The garden around and the entranceway to the house are a big mess; it is also quite stormy, one of the tall palm trees broke into two pieces. A big change with a week ago when I left for Hong Kong ...

One of the effects of monsoon is that all the debris that is dumped in the sea over the coarse of a year, is now returned to the city. The beaches are full of it. Today was in the newspaper that at a normal day 10 tons of rubbish is removed from Juhu Beach, in monsoon that is 250 tons. (It is also striking that the 10 tons is removed with 20 people, and the 250 tons with 50 people ...) What would happen with the 250 tons every day? Perhaps it is stored somewhere, to dump it into the sea again after monsoon?

Soccer

Last Saturday IDBI Fortis had a soccer tournement. I would have been part of the Operations team, but got injured in the training. But as a famous soccer player in my younger years (ahum), a colleague and I were invited to form the jury (beste male, best female players, etc.). It was a hard task!