Den Haag, I say!

Well, I have been so crazy busy this week that I've barely had time to think, let alone blog, but I thought I'd give you all a quick update!!

After having to move out of my place in Denmark last Thursday morning, I lived on Charlotte & Fabrizio's couch until my bus to the Hague on Saturday. I had a nice farewell party on Friday night - it was really sad leaving Denmark and all my friends there, but thanks to the combined wonders of Skype and e-mail, I still feel quite close to everyone (and, of course, geographically, I still am!)

After a quite pleasant (I slept most of the way) 12 hour bus ride, I arrived in Amsterdam, to rain, cold, and the need to drag my heavy bags to the train station! I caught the train to the Hague (Den Haag in Dutch), and called my landlady to meet me. And called, and called - she wasn't answering! After a number of messages and calls, it transpired that she had forgotten I was coming on Saturday night, and was at a dinner party!! She finally picked me up and took me to my new home - a cute little 3 storey terrace in a lovely little street. I was exhausted, so after some food, slept and slept!!

On Sunday I met my 5 new flatmates - Diana and Chelsea from America, Frida from Sweden, Ellie from Austria, and Andrea (the only guy) from Italy. They were all really friendly and lovely - Frida was also starting her internship on Monday, but the others have been here for a while, so were able to give us some tips. I just relaxed on Sunday, in preparation for a big Monday!

Frida and I walked to the ICTY on Monday (only 15 minutes from home is great!), and then spent the rest of the morning meeting the 25 other interns from all over the world starting that day - Americans, Aussies, Kiwis, Bulgarians, Italians, Romanians, Belgians, French, Norweigan, Swedish - even a girl from Cameroon! We got our official UN security passes (very exciting!), and then were divided into our 2 groups - I and about 15 new others are at the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP), which is the part that actually prosecutes the accused, and the others are at the Chambers, who work with the judges and the court. The two parts are quite separate in terms of work, but most of my flatmates are from Chambers, so there is quite a lot of social interaction!!

So in the afternoon we met our supervising attorneys, and were assigned our cases - we all work on a particular case, and I am working on an on-going case, that has been in trial since May last year, so I will actually be helping to prepare witnesses and documents for a live case - very exciting!! Although it is hard to get my head around all the details of the changes in the political and geographical climate of the former Yugoslavia - very complicated!!

The rest of this week has involved some training on computer programs we will need, some team meetings about how our case is going, and preparation for various aspects. I won't actually be able to describe in much detail what I do all day, as a lot of it is confidential, but it will be very hands-on, which is great!

My social life is also similar to my exchange experience, which is great - a fair few of us meet for lunch every day, and we had a drinks night on Tuesday night at a nearby wine bar, which was enjoyable! It's nice to then walk home with my flatmates and chat before going to bed - although there is no sound proofing here, and the kitchen is quite small, the friendliness of having 5 other people around is really nice!!

Tonight I went to the city centre for the first time, as we live between the city and the ICTY, and I have been too busy to get there! It is a cute little centre, cobbled little streets with small cosy bars and restaurants - it was a nice change to eat out, without exhorbitant Danish prices! (Although things are still expensive, the Euro seems much nicer than the Kroner!)