The last week of Nijmegen went by quicker than the past 7 weeks. I can’t believe how much time has passed. It feels like yesterday when I was preparing for the trip. We ran our final pair of participants last Thursday and returned our key to our temporary office on Friday. With everything wrapping up, it felt weird. Almost as though we didn’t actually spend 8 weeks in Nijmegen. It went by in a blink of an eye. Although we didn’t have a whole lot of participants come in for our study, we were able to reach our new goal. We even got a little over our new goal which was wonderful. Shredding all of our papers was a great way to end the study. It felt like a perfect way to say goodbye to the university. Although we’re not done with the study itself, we were done in Nijmegen.
On our final weekend, I decided to pack and relax a bit before the long days ahead of us. We also went to the OpenAir museum in Arnhem. Out of all the places we explored, this place was by far the the most memorable place. It was a trip down Dutch history and culture. The whole place was basically a cute town that consisted of old homes and historical facts about the use of some windmills. We saw a paper factory, butter factory, and a mini town center. The town center may just be a tourist destination, but nevertheless it fit in well.
On Monday, we traveled to Amsterdam and dropped our bags into our hotel rooms. The room was super cozy. I heard so much about it from the fellow researchers who left a week before us. I was looking forward to the fancy iPad controls that changed the mood lighting and the curtains. After exploring with the room a little, we went out to the zoo and saw a lot of animals. Although they were cute, it was sad to see them in such cramped spaces. We then went out into the city and explored Bodyworld. This place was full of donated bodies preserved into display models to illustrate bodily functions. This place was anatomy class in live action. It was a bit creepy, but we learned a lot from it. We went back to our hotel rooms and explored with the iPads before heading to bed. The next morning, we were up and ready to make our way through the airport. Although it was a long day at the airport, we eventually made it back home. It feels weird to be back home. It’s almost as if I never left.