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My Journey to Myself. Part VI
After several days of hard work, Jeff was done to customize his fat bike. The bike has looked great, and for sure has been an attraction wherever we went. Finally, all tools and the bike vanished from the living room. Only the dust from cutting and drilling was all over the shelves and on hundreds of books.
On Thursday, February 9th, we took off to Amsterdam, the first stop of our wedding journey. I booked us a fabulous Jaz Hotel, a most modern and cool hotel each of us ever spent a night in. The hotel was about twelve kilometers away from the center which was not a disadvantage. The opposite was the case.
Of course, we took our bikes with us, and they were us an awesome means of transportation on the great bike lanes of Amsterdam – the greatest bike city!
Image: Jeff Foster, Cool places in Amsterdam
Friday morning we met Linda, one of Jeff’s Kalani-friends, and she showed us the best of Amsterdam. We had a great time, great food and great beer and soon the time was there to leave. But, the best was the bike ride itself in the city of thousands of bikes.
Image: Jeff Foster, The City of Amsterdam
You probably won’t believe me, dear Reader, but we navigated us through Amsterdam with printed Google maps and Google Map app that not worked out well. Almost miraculously, we have found the right way out of Amsterdam and hit the road back to Germany. We took the longer but very scenic road over the Ijsselmeer – a recommendation by my good friend Sylvia – and spent the lunch close to the shore watching ants removing cookie crumbs which we intentionally put in their entry.
Obviously, the ants didn’t like the sweets and pushed the crumbs out of the entry, even calling their probably strongest working ants which were carrying the crumbs a few centimeters away from the entry. It was such fun to push the crumbs back into the hole. I was very surprised encountering a tribe of ants that did not appreciate cookie crumbs!
On Saturday night we finally entered our accommodation that was way up in the north of Denmark, for we planned to visit the Fjord of Hvide Sande – one of the most amazing landscapes in north Europe – and Copenhagen, one another famous bike city.
Our appointment at the Registry Office in Toender on Monday, February 13th, that served the authorities as a preparation for the wedding ceremony, brought us in sweat for the office representative missed a certain expression on Jeff’s tax return documents. Fortunately, Jeff could straighten it out explaining the documents. We were glad about getting off the hot chairs and leaving the office of our future master of the wedding ceremony.
The days until our wedding passed by in quiet. The weather was cold and windy, and we preferred to stay indoors for Jeff did not feel well. Our accommodation looked very well in the ad but in reality, it did not match the promises made. Many things did not work, the massage chair, the whirlpool, the dryer, the TV. We needed a half-day to find out how to get the internet to work and finally, we somehow got the TV to work.
In the bedroom, the heating was broken. Either we had it super hot or it did not work. Also, the bed had a broken frame, and each of us was challenged by back pain. Jeff, additionally, seemed to get the flu. I talked already on Monday to Dansommer – our renting company – but nobody showed up and no improvement occurred.
However, on Wednesday we tried our wedding suits and prepared for our big day. On Friday, I wanted to visit Dansommer again and ask one more time for improvement or other accommodation.
Image: Jenna Foster, My future husband
Eventually, the Big Thursday was there. The weather could not be more beautiful. The sun was shining on the blue sky. No wind, temperature mild for the Winter season.
Image: Selfie, Waiting on our turn
Our appointment was at 12 am but there was some delay and we needed to wait a little bit in the beautiful old building of the Registry Office. Finally, we got invited to enter the Wedding Hall that was very nice embellished. Our witnesses, a wonderful couple that was married for over 53 years at the time of our wedding, were provided by the Registry. Both were very sweet and the lady very good at taking pictures. Jeff explained to her his tablet and she took all the pictures we have of our wedding. She did a really great job.
Image: Jeff Foster, Tonder Civil office
The marriage vow was very touching to me, and the Master of the Ceremony urged me at some point not to ruin the photographs. We all needed to laugh. After we signed the documents, we received some good piece of advice from our witnesses and the Master of the Ceremony we were ready for our wedding lunch in a restaurant a few steps away from the Registry Office.
Image: Jeff Foster, Almost done
The next day after early breakfast, I wrote a complaint to Dansommer, listing all defects. We packed our stuff together and were ready to go home. My inquiry to change the accommodation was rejected, and we forced to stay there even though we found out that Jeff was suffering under the mold in this house. He reacted allergically to it what we first off interpreted as a starting flu. He always felt better when we spent some time outdoors, and after coming home his symptoms disappeared completely.
Glad being home again, we started our new life together as a married couple. I wondered if it would be different from now on but did not really feel a difference. However, the wording changed in some places and it was a challenge to deal with officialdom. To get my husband a visa we needed to go inline in the morning at 5:30 for Bremen was filled up with refugees. Jeff was able to get a visa for six months and after he would have passed the German test, an unlimited stay.
I started my new job on March 1st and anticipated a very busy time ahead.
I hope you enjoyed this part of my journey. If you are curious about what, happened next, join me in the following part of this story.
Sending much Love and Light your way!
Aloha, Jenna
