“What was the saddest day of your life?”
“The day I went back to Colombia and realized my traveling had changed me too much to ever fit back in again.”

“Eight months ago we met in this horrible club called ‘The purple turtle’. She seemed to be the only interesting person around. We talked for hours about all kinds of subjects such as art, philosophy and the Latin language. One week later we spontaneously took off for Paris and one month after that she moved in with me on my boathouse. We have been inseparable ever since. A few months ago I came up with the idea to propose to her. We go to the same university so I thought it would be cool to propose to her through our university magazine. I wrote an entire article and send it to the editorial office. Unfortunately they refused to take it serious. After that I tried to propose to her several times but every time something went wrong. It took me a few weeks and 5 proposals before she got the message. Lucky for me everything worked out and now we are on our honeymoon. We are only 19 and 20 years old but I think the fact that we are both a bit crazy makes us work.”

“What do you think is the most important value of street soccer?”
“Street soccer is a sport which is only played on the street mostly by teenage boys. Sometimes they are from less stable families. Not only does the sport keeps them busy it also teaches them a lot of life lessons.”
“Could you give me an example of one of those life lessons?”
“The most important lesson is that sometimes losing is even more important than winning. Winning is fun and maybe good for your confidence but losing a match makes you deal with a lot of emotions such as humiliation, anger and sadness. It motivates you to be stronger and fight back within the boundaries of the game. That is what makes you a stronger player as well in the game as in real life.”

A few days ago I was walking down Rembrandt square when suddenly I noticed this little girl with bright red shoes being completely hypnotized by two street musicians. I got to talk with her father who told me they were from South Africa and her name is Barbara. I asked him if I could take her picture. He said it was no problem but I would need to get her attention by myself. ‘Things that move tend to hypnotize her’. I kept calling her again and again without any success. I wasn’t going to give up and after a few minutes she gave me this look.
After I took her photo, I sat down and I kept observing her. Then I saw her father encouraging her to take a big step.

Check out what happened:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOtOmdBR9TY&feature=youtu.be

Small step for mankind, big step for Barbara.

How do you know each other?
“We’re all medical students studying at the same university in Amsterdam. We are currently medical interns in different hospitals.”
“If you could change something about the medical system what would it be?”
“The current system is very hierarchic. As a medical intern you work full time for three years without getting paid a dime. The appreciation you get for the hard work comes mostly from the patients. Most of the doctors are under big pressure and that why they don’t get to spend a lot of time with their patients. The good thing is though, that we as interns get to spend a lot of time with them.”
“Isn’t it hard to have a close relationship with patients, even though sometimes there is a chance you won’t be able to help them?”
“That is one of the biggest misconception people have about being a doctor. Many think that as a doctor you’re supposed to extend the length of life but in fact as a doctor you’re supposed to contribute to the quality of life, while the patients are still living.”