De Griep

One of the ways I see the influence of the Netherlands in America is when I hear Nederlands words that was something that was used when I was a child in New York. The grip is one of them. I can hear my Mom saying, "You have the grip." or "stomach grip" if it involved a stomach ache. Another interesting aspect of learning the language here is how the Dutch use one word to cover a variety of things which we don't do in English and official Nederlands dictionary don't do. De griep is one of those words. Officially it means the flu, a virus with a fever and pain in your muscles according to my Nederlands as a 2nd language dictionary, and that's how I'd describe it. My English/Dutch dictionary is more realistic in how the word is used by Nederlanders. It can mean the flu, a cold, or just generally not feeling well.

So, first Arjan mentioned he hoped I wasn't getting de griep, then my project manager Cas e-mailed that he thought I had de griep. I e-mailed back that I did not have the griep than he e-mailed back that the term is used here for overall illness and feeling ill, and I do remember hearing that in the inburgering course.

Well, I do not have the flu, nor do I have a cold, and I haven't had a fever, but I do have some sort of virus that began the night of the 13th with a terrible sore throat and has led to seeming to wake up every other day with something new, today being a sinus headache that left as soon as I was up and around, and just not feeling 100% any day. The symptoms clear up by the following day and then it's something else the next day. The terrible thing Cas told me is that he has a friend that has had similar symptoms for 8 weeks, 3 of which she lost her voice. I'm praying that's not the course I'm on. I'm getting plenty of sleep, something I know my body needs from when I was a sick 12 year old at the doctor's office and he looked at my mother and said, "You have a child that needs her sleep, 1o-12 hours at this age." Some days recently have included a nap or two, like Saturday I slept for almost 7 hours total during the day! Needless to say, this has put me far behind in blogging.

I do have to just love my kitties. They are so sweet, especially during these times. When I take a nap, they all like to sleep around me with Momma's Boy Pim under the cover with me. Below is the picture I took of him on Saturday after I got up and he moved right over into my place and was sound asleep.