An easy way for me to organize my memories are by reference to the house and city I live in, probably because I moved a lot. The first 30 years I moved house about once every three years. My parents sure moved a lot. I have now settled more or less in Amsterdam with my family where we have been for almost 8 years now in the same apartment. I never felt too attached to a certain place or home and am able to make friends and socialize where ever I am.

I moved to Leeuwarden with my parents where I lived from 7 to almost 18 years old. I first lived on my own when I did university in Nijmegen, spend a year in the US, got my PhD back in Nijmegen, moved to the London for a research job, met my wife and quite soon after the birth of our son to Amsterdam, where our daughter was born more than seven years later. All cities give me good memories and in each of them I could have stayed if Fate hadn’t decided otherwise. We loved London, we also love Amsterdam. Since the divorce, I moved within the neigbourhood (NL-1019), so basically not a lot has changed since.