As I type this, I'm gearing up for Christmas break. It feels about the right time, as having a break from volleyball for a week with no coaching, or training or matches will definitely help refresh the mind and body after what has been a busy four months.
Our last few games before Christmas have been good and bad. We played SSS at home, a team who we beat back in October. This match up would essentially be a must win match. SSS has a similar record in the ladder to us, so as we progress into the latter part of the season, these 10th vs 11th matches type of matches will be really important as to who can gain an edge to qualify for playoffs. We managed to pull off our first home victory which was huge. We haven't won at home all season, so to finally get that mini-monkey off our back was huge. There's a lot of work that goes into home matches; not just us playing but the volunteers setting up the court, ball kids, towel wipers not to mention all of the supporters that come out to support us and cheer us on. It was great to be able to string together a strong performance in front of them and get a result at home.
The last match was against Landstede in Zwolle. A nice 2 hour drive, we got to see the nicest volleyball stadium I've ever seen. They had stage lighting on the roof, which blacked out of urging the Zwolle player introductions and had some sweet stage spotlights going. Unfortunately we got crushed in under an hour, but oh well.
As I'm writing this, were on the bus back from our last match of the season which was a 'Beker' cup match, which is separate to the league. It is a national cup, that everyone in Holland regardless of division is eligible to enter. It's a single elimination style, where the highest division teams will enter the tournament bracket later on. We entered the tournament in the round of 16. We had a great opportunity, playing against a team from Hengelo who play in the Top Division (which is the division below us). If we had have won that, we would play in the round of 8 against another Top Division team, with a good chance of making the National Final Four which would have been cool. However none of that was to be. We lost 3-0 on their floor, and unfortunately struggled to really get into a rhythm and never really got going. It felt like we lost a chance to progress to the next round, but as tomorrow we're on break it's time to soon forget that match. 
So now I've seen and played against every team in the league, I've got a really good idea of the landscape who is favoured. It seems there's 2 teams a class above everyone else (Lycargcus and Landstede), another 1-2 decent teams (Orion and Dynamo), then 8 teams who can all pretty much beat each other on any given night, and even push those top 4 teams on a good night. So anything is possible on any night which means you have to be on your game always. The biggest difference I'm noticing transitioning from AVL and state league, is that anything short of my and my teams best probably isn't good enough to win as silly as it sounds, it is a reality. Every night the performance on court that we give has to be pretty darn good or else we will struggle as we've shown. As I've been the only setter with our team full time, I have started in every match, often times without a second setter present. This is also an added pressure of knowing that most of the time I'm the only setter, so if I'm playing badly there is no one to sub. But this is great cause I know it means I will be able to work myself out of tough situations, something that is really important in building experience as a setter I believe. This is a huge part of building yourself as a player and it's a cool situation to find yourself in for your rookie season in Europe.
The next part of the season will be important as we strive for the post-season, but I think a really important thing is that we keep trying to improve as players and a team. I've been immersed in a lot of new ideas and concepts from my coaches and team mates and early on what I needed to improve on most was pretty obvious. And I think I've made steps forward in the last few months, so as long as we keep trying to strive to be a better team I think good things will happen. 
Learning about the Dutch culture has also been fun too. As an outsider you can take at look at their traditions with fresh eyes. They have a tradition called 'Sinterklaas' (that's spelled correctly, not Santa). Basically Sinterklaas comes on December 5th, and leaves presents in kids shoes if they've been good or sends them to Spain if they've been bad. Unfortunately my room mate Max got sent to Spain, but me and my other room mate got a nice visit from Sinterklaaswith some nice chocolates. Here's where it gets interesting: Sinterklaas has some 'elf' type workers called 'Black Pete'. Take a look at the photo and form your own opinion but it is really controversial. The locals say it's not offensive because the black comes from the chimney smoke when delivering presents. However this issue has been taking to the UN before because many considered it to be racist. But the Dutch say it's just tradition. Intriguing to say the least.
I'm really excited for my week off though. I'm headed to see Jordan Richards Swiss team play Sunday night. I haven't seen Jordan play in real life in over 18 months so I'm really looking forward to seeing my wall/beach partner go at it. Then we're off to Prague to see my good friend Gerrard 'Lily', who I haven't seen in over 18 months so it will be great to catch up with him! Then maybe a few days in Austria or Germany (it still feels weird to be able to just say you'll take a train a few hours and be in a completely different country). Then back to Holland for New Years, some mid-season (I think that's the term) exhibition matches and straight back to league play on Jan 10th, in what will be a 10 week sprint to the end of the regular season.
But for now that's an eternity away. I will enjoy my time off, have a merry Christmas and a happy New Years. And I'm hoping that you nothing short of exactly the same.
Stay safe ya'll. 
Love love.

I'm well in truly settled in here now.  I know my way around for the most part and it's feeling more and more like home. The cool thing about living somewhere different, is exactly that: it's different. You get to know some cool things about the country and about the people, and it's interesting to compare how things are done here compared to back home in Australia. So I thought today I'd write some interesting differences that I'm slowly learning. 
One huge difference is the love of football (or as we might call it 'soccer'). This country is football mad. They absolutely love it. When you go past a park you will almost always find steal soccer goals more often than basketball rings. So after school when back home kids are playing AFL and cricket after school, kids here are playing soccer in the streets. Two weeks ago our team got invited by our sponsor to watch Sparta Rotterdam play a home match. It was pretty darn cool. They play in the 2nd highest division in Holland and there but I was impressed by how big the match was. There were heaps of people supporting, and going crazy. The following we got invited to see Excelsior who compete in the highest division in Holland. Both games were fun and also interesting to see some crazy soccer supporters. I'm not sure how, but these fans for the whole entire match are jumping up and down, chanting, yelling and beating their drums lately despite the fact that it's freezing cold. From before first kick to full time they don't stop ever. Even when Excelsior was down 5-0 with 10 minutes left all their home fans were still going crazy. Safe to say their a passionate bunch. 
It's also really obvious to notice the language difference. Although it's a different need for people to learn English, kids learn in school. Which means I can meet a 12 year old and have a conversation in English with them. And I honestly don't remember even being able to speak more than 3 words in Italian when I was that young so its cool to see bi-lingual children so young. 
Speaking of schools, they have an interesting system here. Kids will go through special tests to measure 'academic' and concentration abilities etc. They will the get placed into a class with other children of similar abilities with them. Anyone whose spent more than 10 minutes in a classroom knows it sucks children who are academically accelerated being with children who struggle more with staying focused. So by grouping similar students you can cater to the needs of everyone more easily which is a nice idea. 
Europeans definitely look in the mirror before they leave the house. Hardly ever do you see someone just walking around in their trackies and runners. Apparently even if you're going just to the supermarket then you need to make sure you look presentable. Often I feel under dressed compares to the dutchies but I'm slowly catching up. It also seems an unwritten rule that men must lather their hair in hair gel as well but I don't think I will take it to far. 
Darkness. The sun rises after 8am and sets around 16:30 PM. So it's pitch black at like 17:00 PM. That sucks. 
Coldness. It's starting to hover around the 0 degree mark tinkering into the negatives. That sucks.
Socks. In the Dutch league, you can wear whatever colour and length sock you want, and it can be completely different to your team mates socks. From my experience in Australia, you'd think that the league would fall apart but everything still functions. Maybe back home we can learn something from this free flowing sock uniform model they use here. 
Just a few peculiar things I thought worth noting.
Now onto volleyball. Our team is on the improve. At my last post our teams win loss record was 1-5. We took a hard 3-0 loss to the Talentteam (the equivalent of the AIS team in AVL) full of 17 year olds. So our record went to 1-6 but even thought we had done a lot of losing, our team and coaching staff have had really good morale. There hasn't been any panicking, and our purpose at practice to try and get better has really been coming along the last month or so.
We played against Dynamo, a team who made the grand final last season. Despite losing the first 2 sets, we brought it back to 5th, where a slight rotational error cost us. At one stage we were up 7-5 in the 5th set and feeling good, then we got called for out of rotation and the score changed to 0-6, a tough pill to swallow, but glad to say my experience as a coach of the U/19 Vic Blue boys this year definitely helped me with. We lost the 5th set eventually, but the Mayor of Rotterdam came to watch and I got to meet him which was cool. Turns out Rotterdam is sister cities with Melbourne, a fact I definitely didn't know.
The following week a match against Zaanstaad. And a gym whose roof was the lowest I'd ever lay witness to. In no exaggeration, you couldn't really set a proper high ball because you might hit the roof. The ball would have hit the roof at least 5 times a set, it was ridiculous. But we went on to get our first win in 5 sets in over a month so was pretty happy with that.
Next up was Orion. It's a small world out there, because the setter from Orion is Keith (an American). Where did Keith play his college volleyball? At Grand Canyon Uni, and he played his last 2 seasons with GMVA athlete Gerrard 'Lily' Lipscombe. So before and after (they beat us) we shared a good joke at Gerrards expense, a good pastime I enjoy wherever I am in the world. 
A long distance road match was against Rivo Rivsomething. Of course long distance to the Dutch is a 2 hour bus ride, hardly anything for someone from Australia. For this match we only had 7 players available, so our coach and assistant coaches had to uniform up and be ready just in case of injury. We went down 0-2 and some were worried we might have to bring them on, something I'm not sure their knees could have handled but we managed to come back and win the match in 5 which is a cool thing to do in front of someone else's crowd especially when said crowd is beating a drum for 2 hours during the match.
So right now were 3-8 having played everyone in the competition once. But beyond results we are getting better all the time. We have 2 more leagues matches and a cup match before the Christmas break. So as this year winds down we are getting geared up for a big push in the second half of the season. 
Special shout out of ex-pat Aussie Dave Jones who made his debut at practice for us. Our policy at the club remains: if you are an Aussie, than you're more than welcomed. 
Hopefully in my next post I will be able to delve into what volleyball in Holland is like compared to Australia. 
In the meantime, for anyone whose following my story along if there are any ever questions people have about my journey, or about volleyball in Europe I'm always happy to answer them. 
Until next time peace out holmes.