'I think that deep in your heart you're an adventurous earthworm. Am I right, Envy?'
Just a normal Thursday afternoon for the sophomore class in the German course. Sitting in class while our teacher guessed if we were adventurous earthworms or not.
I smiled. 'Me? Absolutely.'


Adventurous earthworm. It doesn't sound very nice, yet still I took it as a huge compliment. You see, there was a good reason why my teacher called me an earthworm. Not because I'm pale and weird, but because of the story one of my classmates had read out loud just a few minutes earlier. From the moment the story started, I'd been rooting for the adventurous earthworm.

"Deep underneath a vegetable patch lived two earthworms and they lived off the vegetables' roots. 
One day the first earthworm said: 'Well, I'm done living down here, I want to go on a trip and explore the world.' He packed his little suitcase and made his way up and as he saw how the sun shone and the wind blew over the vegetable patch, his heart skipped a beat and he happily made his way through the vegetables. But he didn't get more than three feet away before a bird spotted him and ate him. 
The second earthworm however, stayed in his hole in the ground, ate vegetable roots every day and lived much longer. But be honest - is that a life?"

I was about to jump up from my seat an yell "You go, earthworm!" in the middle of class when I heard the worm got eaten. That made me a little sad - until I heard what happened to the other earthworm, the one that did absolutely nothing with its life. If I had to be an earthworm, I'd rather be the adventurous one. I was glad my teacher thought about me that way too, because lately I haven't been so sure about my Adventurous Earthwormness.

We live in a huge and wonderful world. I've seen only a fraction of it. The Adventurous Earthworm that I am deep down inside can't wait to see more of it. My daydreams are filled with visions of Asia, while I dream of America and Australia at night.
I've always said I'd travel the world and still I started doubting if I ever would. Why? Because even adventurous earthworms get scared sometimes. The world is a big place, time is limited, money doesn't last a lifetime... In my darkest moments, I play with the idea of giving up on my travel dreams. But then something small like this happens. It might be a silly story, but ending up like an earthworm stuck at home is one of my biggest nightmares. I don't want to end up like that. Yes, travelling sounds a little scary now and then. There's a lot that could go wrong while you are on the other side of the world. But I'm Envy the Adventurous Earthworm and if I get eaten by a bird on one of my trips, then so be it.

Stay Awesome!

As I'm drafting this blog post in the living room, my mom is watching some tv show about bridal gowns, while I sit at her feet on the floor. Pictures from travel brochures are scattered all around; I've spent the last 40 minutes cutting them out for my art journal. My cell phone is somewhere underneath a pile of pictures. I've just sent my best friend a text and I'm nervous for his reply to come.
It doesn't sound very special, this moment right here. There are thousands of moments like this one. Yet for some reason I'm a little in love with this moment. Because right now, I fully realize how crazy life is. And how much I appreciate that craziness.


Life is weird for all of us. I won't say my life is weirder than that of others, but it's not exactly a normal life I'm living either. In the past I've always chosen to turn right when everyone else turned left. It brought me right here. Every decision I've ever made has led me closer to this moment, the moment in which my life isn't average anymore. In this moment I'm the paler-than-snow Dutch girl who's trying to learn Urdu. I'm the girl who know more about Indian politics than about the politic situation in her own country. I'm the girl who's going to travel to Slovenia just because of one well-written blog post. I never would have become that girl if I hadn't started blogging. I never would have started blogging if I hadn't learned English and so on... It's a gigantic and wonderful chain of events that's brought me to where I am now, that has turned me into this not-so-average person. In this very moment, I'm kind of proud of that person.

I'm a girl of big plans, of high hopes and goals and dreams. Sometimes I get swept away by all that. I get caught up in the words of a foreign language, lose myself in news from faraway countries. Since I've never met anyone like me, I sometimes think those characteristics are bad things. That the person I've become is too weird for this planet. But then a moment like this one comes along. Living it to the fullest, no matter how small the moment itself is, makes me remember how special life is, that all my weird quirks will make me stand out one day. I might be a walking contradiction at the moment, my head might be filled with useless facts about faraway places, but I'm like that for a reason. Once that reason becomes clear and everything falls into place, I think life will become truly awesome. Maybe I'm naive, maybe I'm a dreamer, but I believe we can change the world for the better once we find out why we are the way we are. Life might be a little crazy, but one day I'll understand why. Until that day comes, I'll just keep enjoying the little moments, like this little moment right now.

Stay Awesome!

From the life of a 19-year-old intern, I present you: the battle with the copy machine. It's a ruthless battle, both sides fight for their lives. Yet only one can win...

Okay, as it turns out, this can be pretty hard... This copy machine is huge. It probably outweighs me by at least 50 kilos, it's twice my size and has more buttons than the average space ship! Oh, and there's a touch screen. With a million options on it.
Let's see... A4 sized paper, printed front and back, have to make 30 of those... There's a scanner on this things somewhere... But that won't do 'cause it'll only scan one side. I don't want to split the document into two pages, that would be a waste of paper. No, I love the rain forest too much to do that.
What's this thing here for? Wait, that's where the paper comes out. But there must be a way to duplicate the freaking document without wasting so much paper. Where does it scan the whole thing? Here?
BEEEEEEP
Oh no, oh no, oh no, don't start beeping!
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP
I need help. I need help now.
'Mr. De Jong? Could you help me out with the copy machine?'
'Sure. Are you logged in?'
Logged in? Do I have to log in on this thing? So that's what they gave me the key card for! Okay, logged in and now I just have to watch as Mr. De Jong copies my document. Aha, there's the scanner, then there's a thingy on the touch screen... Easy! I totally could've done that! Thirty pages, printed front and back, just they way they should be. Awesome.

'Envy?'
'Yes.'
My internship coach looks at the copied pages. 'Only half of the document is on these pages. You copied it sideways.'
Oh no...

The dreaded question was asked again. 'Envy, can you copy this page 30 times?'
And of course I said 'yes'. Why couldn't I just say: 'No, I don't know how that stupid machine works!'
Deep breaths. Deep breaths. The machine isn't that intimidating... I think... I mean, you're already logged in and -
BEEP BEEP BEEP
Okay, I take it back. This thing is the most intimidating thing in the history of intimidating things!
I'll just start over. Use my key card to log in. SO far so good. Now, A4 sized paper, print on one side, scan it, print it 30 times. Go.
Printing... No, no, don't do that! Don't print sideways! STOP!
BEEP BEEP BEEP
Oh great... Maybe if I turn the page 90 degrees, then scan and print. Oh yeah! Thirty copies, all 100% perfect! But what do I do with the ten failed ones?
I'll just stuff them in my bag when no one is watching. Recycle them at home. No one needs to know about that fail. I'm the best intern ever.
Can I make five copies of that super important document for you? Why, of course I can! It totally got this. Remember how well I copied that last document? I've got that big bastard of a copy machine totally under control. Log in, scan document, print and don - wait a minute, why doesn't it do both sides of the original document?
Shit, that's right, I was supposed to hit some button on the touch screen before scanning. I just don't remember which one... This one?
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP
Okay, not that one. Maybe this one then?
Click... Click... BEEEEEP
So not that one either... Let me try the big one over here.
BEEP BEEP BEEP
'Need some help?'
'Yes please...'
You win this time, you stupid machine, but I swear I'll be back!


My hands are shaking. I'll have to face the copy machine again in three, two, one...
There it is. The Big Bulky Bastard. Scaring interns since 2015.
BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP
Hey, I didn't even touch you yet! Oh, wait, I'm not alone here today. There's some other guy in the copy room too.
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEP
'Do you know how to log out? It just keeps beeping at me.'
'Don't ask me, I know nothing about this thing.'
We look at the touch screen, then push all the buttons at random.
BEEP BEEP BE - LOGGED OUT
'That wasn't that bad... Good luck!'
'Thanks, I'll need it.'
Four pages, A3 size and an already aggravated copy machine. How am I ever going to survive this? Okay, log in, scan pages, select paper size... print? Print, please print. Oh my god, perfect at first shot!
Au revoir, mon ami! Until next time, until my next victory!

Stay Awesome!

As I'm writing this, I've been on this planet for 19 years, six months and 28 days. I've been to Australia, Peru, the States and most of Europe. I've been through high school. I've been bullied, ignored and laughed at. I've been happy and excited. I've been nervous for my driving exam, overjoyed when I won races, I've been amazed and amused by the awesome things in this world. I've been a lot of things, but there's one thing I still haven't been: I've never been kissed.

When I was 17, I wasn't bothered by the fact that I'd never been kissed. I'd more important things to focus on, like graduating high school. When I was 18, I still had more important things to do, like surviving my first year of college. But doubts began to riddle me. At 19, having a boyfriend still isn't one of my highest priorities. I want to graduate college in 2018, travel the world in the years to come, grow my blog and learn how to make cool videos. But at the same time I do think that there's something horribly wrong with me.
I know people my age who haven't been kissed yet because they've never liked anyone enough to kiss them. I wish I was one of them, but no. I've liked two guys enough to kiss them, but they changed their minds about me before we could ever get to that point. Now once, okay, possible. Twice, that can't be a coincidence. Add Valentine's Day to that train of thought and you'll understand why I'm sad while I'm writing this.

It gets me down sometimes. I barely have any self esteem, so of course I blame this situation on myself. Sometimes I think it's because I'm not pretty enough. Sometimes I think it's because I have an annoying personality. Most of the time I just think I'm a bad person and don't deserve to be in a relationship. It's a negative spiral and I can't stop myself from thinking that way. After all, if I were a cute, awesome girl, I would've been kissed a long time ago, wouldn't I?

Now there's a friend of mine who will explode with anger when he reads this. He told me I'm awesome and I shouldn't think too much. At first I just wanted to laugh at him. I have trouble believing those words if they come from a guy who wouldn't date me even if he could save the world from total destruction by doing so. But then I realized he had some strong arguments. I could keep bringing myself down by thinking this way, or just do more things that make me happy. If I do that, all the rest might come eventually too.

After two hours of thinking about stupid reasons why no guy could ever like me, I'm ready to let that drama go. Okay, I'll probably be alone for the years to come. The only bad part about that is that I can't become a crazy cat lady, because I'm allergic to cats.
Apart from that, I don't see any reason to be sad about my situation anymore. I can travel the world on my own. I can live on my own (as soon as I figure out how a washing machine works), I don't really need anyone. And all the love I have to give, that no one wants to have? I'll put it in my work, in my writing, in my blog and in my videos. Valentine's Day? I'll spend it like this.


It's not that bad to be nineteen and never been kissed. As long as you don't blame it all on yourself.

Stay Awesome!

I was 16 when the third Iron Man movie hit the theaters. Even though I was still a newbie to the Marvel fandom, I was extremely excited. Iron Man was still my favorite Avenger and I couldn't keep my excitement to myself. My high school friends weren't too happy with all that. 'What's so amazing about Iron Man?' they kept asking. I tried explaining on several occasions, but they didn't really listen. To them, I was just a fake fan who'd seen too many Big Bang Theory episodes...
For a while I hid my inner geek, until I noticed that being a geek is completely awesome. I embraced it when I entered college, but a bit of the fake fan shame stuck with me. That's why I put buying a comic book on my Make it Happen List. I'd been missing out on something for years and decided it was time to make up for it.

From Envy's Make it Happen List
#11: Buy a Marvel comic book at the local comic book store and be proud of it
Status: Awesomeness achieved

Finals week is usually the worst week of the semester. I get bored, frustrated and annoyed, Especially if there's a three-hour break between my finals, a break I really don't want to spend with people who are stressing out even though they're well-prepared.
That's why I decided to go to the comic book store in the middle of my finals week. The comic book store is only 15 minutes away from my college and it's my favorite place in all of Rotterdam. My dad frequented the store long before I was born. He introduced my mom to the store's awesomeness and about six years ago, he took me there for the first time. They have everything: Marvel, DC, manga, every Dutch and Belgian comic you can imagine and merchandise from every franchise... It's like a little piece of heaven to me. Oh, and their bags are freaking fancy. They look like a comic book themselves.


I got to Yendor about once a month, usually to pick up some Dutch comics for my dad. This time I went in with a mission: find myself the perfect Marvel comic book, buy it and be proud of my purchase.
I'd tried before, but failed. It's easy to buy a comic book, being proud of it, however, is a different story. As soon as I entered the store, a nasty voice inside my mind told me: 'You don't belong here. You're a fake fan.'
I stopped for a minute and thought real hard. Why wouldn't I belong here? Because some mean girls labelled me a fake fan years ago? That's ridiculous. Maybe I haven't read every Marvel comic book on earth, but that doesn't mean I don't love Marvel. So I took a deep breath and started browsing.
Believe me, the pressure was on. Not only did I want to buy something awesome, one of my friends who has read practically every comic book in the universe was keeping track of me and wanted to know exactly what I was going to buy. Lucky for me he wasn't there with me, he was just texting and I simply turned my phone off. I still felt the pressure weighing me down though: there were so many awesome-looking comic books there, how was I ever going to find the most awesome one?
I had no idea where to start. Everything looked great. The price tags... not so much. As a sufferer from the broke-college-student syndrome I had to keep things under €20,-. I was about to give up since everything that looked cool was way outside my budget. But then I saw it.
Deadpool. The only thing I knew about Deadpool was that the kid who sat on my head back in May liked him a lot. The cover looked totally awesome and the art inside stole my heart. My high school friends would have called me a fake fan for this choice since the movie will be released sometime soon, but the great thing was: I did not know. I'd been living under a rock for a few weeks and I was absolutely clueless about the movie.
Long story short: I went up to the register to pay, slightly trembling and with a bright red head. Two minutes later the comic book was officially mine. It felt so good.

Let me tell you what happened next. I went to college, where I should've revised for my next exam. Instead I got to know the awesomeness that's Deadpool. As a result, I messed up my exam. But it was worth it. Completely, totally worth it. You know why? Not just because this comic book had me laughing out loud several times. Buying it made me feel good about myself. I'm no longer fake fan Envy. I'm just Envy, in all my awkward nerdiness. Another demon of my past had been slayed.

Last spring my feelings were hurt. Not just a little, they were badly hurt. It doesn't happen every day that the guy you like loses his cool and tells you to die in a plane crash.
At first I was hurt. Just that, hurt. Later on I was angry, sad, bitter, then hurt again. I was hurt so badly that I decided not to have feelings for a guy ever again.

I was very busy at the time. In fact I was so busy with college that the decision to stop having feelings wasn't a conscious one. Subconsciously I scolded myself every time I looked at a good-looking guy. I was not going to get hurt again, oh no.
By the time summer came around, I'd successfully gotten rid of those kinds of feelings. I poured my left-over feelings for my crush into friendships. Everything was okay. I felt hope, excitement, sadness, anger and happiness. Just no love.

As my sophomore year started, I got some exciting news: my friend was moving to San Francisco and I could come over and visit her in the summer. I spent almost all my childhood summers in the Bay Area, so I couldn't wait to buy a ticket and jump on a plane. Three weeks later my friend and I got into a huge fight and my plans were cancelled. I was broken-hearted, but not for long.
With my summer plans cancelled, I had time for a summer program and my college happened to be setting one up. In India. I applied immediately and got a place in the program. You can't imagine how happy I was: this program meant that I could travel on my own, meet a friend in Delhi and celebrate my birthday there. I was the happiest person on earth for about a month. Then the whole thing blew up in my face. The program was cancelled.
I cried for days. It hurt so bad. My hope was shattered, my excitement completely gone. I didn't want to feel like that ever again. At that moment, I got rid of my feelings of hope, excitement and happiness too.

Is it possible to eliminate all those feelings? Yes, it is. It absolutely is... And once you've done that, you won't feel a thing. Nothing.
In November my world turned grey. There was more than enough to be happy about, but I didn't see it. I didn't want to see it. If I saw it, I'd have feelings again and that never ended well for me.
Sometimes I felt a tremendous sadness. It would crush me and the smallest thing would have me crying for hours. I rarely smiled and when I did, I punished myself by drowning myself in college work.
Yet most of the time I didn't feel a thing.

One morning in December I woke up and realized I wasn't as emotionless as I though. I did feel a thing and that thing was unhappiness. Something had to change.
I signed up for the 100 Happy Days Challenge. Things got a little better. People around me noticed a change. My mentor at college decided to have a serious conversation with me to voice her concerns: she'd seen my descend towards depression, and wondered how I'd managed to get myself out of it.

Depression. That word hit home. She only said it once, but the impact it had was enormous. All those months I'd been pushing myself into depression. I'd saved myself just in time.
Depression, the word still echoes through my mind. By trying to protect myself from emotional harm, I'd put myself at serious risk for mental health problem.

If you're hurt or feel like there's no hope, it's possible to turn your feelings off like a lamp. Flick that switch. I promise you won't feel a thing. But believe me when I tell you that what comes after is not worth it. Pain is part of life. It's not a fun part, but without some downs there are no ups in life either. We'd just be flatlining.
Don't turn your feelings off. Don't do what I did. You're stronger than you think. You can handle this. You'll come back stronger. It might hurt now, but it won't keep hurting forever. You've got this.

Stay Awesome!

If you ask me, there are roughly three kinds of friendship in this world. First of all there's the 'We-don't-really-like-each-other-but-we-hate-everyone-else-even-more' friendship. You know, sometimes you just stick with the least annoying person in the room.
The second kind of friendship, the 'We-took-time-to-get-to-know-each-other-and-now-we're-great-friends' friendship, is the most common friendship. Those friends are the people who went or will go through the Five Steps of Friendship with you. You've probably put a lot of time and effort into these friendships and now they're freaking amazing.
Then there's my personal favorite: the Friendship That's Just Meant To Be. In fact, it's so cool that you can hear the capital letters if you say that out loud.

You know love at first sight? Well, the something goes for friendship. Friendship at First Sight, it's a rare occurence, but today I'll show you that it does exist.

'Does anyone have some deodorant?' I asked my former high school friends. It was Career Night at our old high school and we'd come back to tell the 9th graders about our colleges and future careers. But while most of my high school friends were calmly walking around, I had been running through the school hall, meeting up with everyone I remotely knew and have an overexcited conversation with them. That probably wasn't the best idea: it was about 25 degrees Celsius in that hall and I got freaking hot. Luckily I knew that some of my old high school friends never left the house without deodorant in their bags.
I knew they had it with them, so when they all looked at each other, the floor, the ceiling and our of the window while mumbling 'no', I knew they just didn't want to help me out. I was about to roll my eyes at them, someone behind me said: 'I have some, you can borrow mine.'
I turned around and saw a girl in a Hogwarts shirt. I kid you not, she was wearing a Hogwarts shirt. And if that wasn't a big enough sign for a Friendship That Was Meant To Be, she rummaged through her Captain America bag and pulled out the exact same deodorant that I had at home. Now my first reaction was one of total jealousy: why didn't I have that awesome shirt and that even more awesome bag?! Then I realized that I'd met the human equivalent of a unicorn: a Friend That Was Meant To Be. By the end of Career Night, we were talking about superheroes, movies and books while I let all my fake high school friends clean up the mess that Career Night always left behind in the school hall.

Now if this friendship had been a regular friendship, we probably wouldn't have spoken ever again after that night. But this friendship was different. It was Meant To Be. So a few weeks later, we went to Kingsman together and that made the friendship official and also unbreakable. We went to the Avengers: Age of Ultron together and when I wanted to vandalize a street sign so it'd say 'Hermione' (because Harry Potter references on street signs make the world a better place), she was my partner of crime, holding my bicycle up while I tried to climb it to reach the sign.
Oh, and I also had a sort of guest appearance in her very first blog post and I will shamelessly promote her blog. Go follow her now!

Exactly one year after that first Career Night, now one week ago, we celebrated our friendship anniversary in our own awesome way: we started out with ugly selfies, then went on to make my best friend uncomfortable by making dirty jokes. We ended up desperately walking through the rain all through town to find a milkshake, but apparently we live in a place where it's impossible to get a milkshake after 9pm. That was more or less okay, cause with an awesome friend like her, everything is awesome, even if you ccan't get a milkshake.

Stay Awesome!

I think I was 15 when I first had the idea to make a YouTube video. The idea for the video was silly and I just wanted to do it because it sounded like so much fun. I asked a friend to work on the video with me, and even though she agreed to do it, she was not exactly cooperating... And by not cooperating I mean standing in front of the camera with a look on her face that resembled disgust and repeatedly asking: 'Why are we doing this?'
After that I never thought about making a YouTube video again. Not until my best friend mentioned vlogging. At first I just laughed at the idea, but then I started binge-watching Markiplier's SCP Containment Breach series and all Superwoman videos and their awesomeness inspired me. I decided trying couldn't hurt, so I went out one January day and made my first video. Let me tell you, it was a lot harder than I thought.

From Envy's Make it Happen List
#13: Make a YouTube video
Status: Awesomeness achieved

I'm a bit of a perfectionist. My motto could be 'Als je iets doet, doe het dan goed' (If you do something, do it right, well, good, great). That's why it took me so long to finish this whole project. I decided to make a video in which I show why I don't do vlogs, by showing the most boring vlog ever.
I shot the vlog on a Thursday, the 7th of January. All day long I talked to my cell phone, feeling like a fool. At some point people even said to each other: 'That girl over there is vlogging! In English!'. People pointed, people stared, but it was worth it: at the end of the day I had enough footage for a boring vlog.
That weekend I wanted to shoot the intro and outro, but ended up doing a whole lot of work for college and Teenage Blogger Central. My plans were again delayed when I heard that I'd have to shoot a video for college too. My memory card doesn't have enough storage space for both projects, so I put this one on hold. When I finally finished shooting the college video, I was so glad I could get started on the intro. Little did I know that the hardest part was yet to come...

When I started setting everything up, I broke the tripod. The thing survived decades of travelling around the world with my dad, but the minute I decide to shoot a video, it breaks. I roamed the house, searching for a screwdriver and when I found one, I tried fixing the tripod. To my own surprise, I succeeded. All was well - for about thirty seconds. Then I realized my tripod wasn't tall enough. I had two options: make a video while sitting on the floor or build a make-shift tripod. I chose the latter and the result was magnificent.

About two hours and several giggling fits later, I was done shooting the video and could start editing. Not that I knew how to edit a video, so I just used Windows Movie Maker and pretended I totally knew what I was doing. The result wasn't bad, not bad at all. I uploaded the video and was so freaking proud of myself. I'd finally made a YouTube video.



At first I was completely sure I'd never make a new video again. You see, it looks so easy on YouTube. You stand in front of a camera, do your thing, done. In reality I prepared for three hours, wrote a script, took care of all the tripod trouble, shot the actual footage and then edited it.
The next day, people watched the video and actually liked it. Asked for more. Wanted me to make more. And since I'd had so much fun shooting the video, I decided to give YouTube a shot. I don't want to become a famous YouTuber (I don't think I could handle the hate), but I'd love it if you supported me and clicked that little subscribe button.

Stay Awesome!