Hello again, Raffies!
By the way, I cannot write just anywhere. Usually, I like to curl up in my egg chair and let my thoughts dangle.

As for today, I wanted to share the little trip to Amsterdam we had yesterday. My husband had arranged to meet up in Amsterdam with a friend of his from Japan. For those of you who know me, you know that I do not feel very comfortable in crowded places. Generally, I try to avoid places with a lot of people, because I tend to get nervous and irritated. Obviously, Saturday in July in Amsterdam was really crowded.
To be honest, I would have liked to visit the Rijksmuseum and a few other museums, but my husband and I agreed to come back another time to enjoy our art trip.

Since Ryu’s friend only had a limited time in Amsterdam, we decided to walk around the city centre and the boys focussed on catching up with their lives.
While walking down a random street, we saw a Chocolaterie that we had to take a closer look at. In the Nieuwe Spiegelstraat we found the “fine chocolates” of Van Roselen. Apart from several bars of chocolate, mostly organic -which I really liked – and vegan, I got interested in the pralines. I myself am not much of a sugar tooth, quite the opposite of my husband. However, the flavours like cinnamon chocolate, mint chocolate and so on, got me curious. I chose a variety of 12 different pralines and went on.

Once at home, with tired feet and a slight sunburn, which I managed to get even without much sun shining through the clouds – it was time to try those little chocolates.
The first one I tried was the cinnamon praline. Although my husband complained that it was not sweet enough, I really liked it, because it was not too sweet. Next up was an Earl Grey praline, also really interesting. The only one I skipped was the chocolate with figs, because there is a fun story to it:
When I was about 12 years old, my friend and I were bored one afternoon in our summer holidays. So we decided to eat some figs from the fig tree that grows in the garden of my parents’ house. We ended up eating all the figs from that tree. After that, a really fundamental problem came up: “Do the green figs we just ate have the same taste as the black ones?” Since my friend had a black fig tree in her garden, we went and ate all the figs of that tree too. As you might know, too many figs give you a laxative effect. That was the last time I touched a fig. Up to this day, 15 years later, I still get goosebumps and a cold sweat runs down my spine every time I smell the scent of figs.

Well, after this fun anecdote of my life, back to us. If you ever happen to find yourselves strolling aimlessly through the streets of Amsterdam, you should try out some fine chocolates at Van Roselen.
See you very soon!
Love,
Raffi