Elephants feet and Japanese heart surgeons

The weekend started strangely. No sooner had me and Lovely Paris Friend (Now Living in the South) touched Dutch soil, than we were whisked away to a party being held in LPF's honour.

The party was at the house of an old friend of LPF. A house that my Lovely Irish-Dutch Friend had told me was 'a little bizarre'. He wasn't wrong.

If the strange collections of the house's owner weren't odd enough - he had collections of elephants feet, horses teeth, chinese wedding outifts, stuffed crocodiles, roman oil lamps, sword fish swords, ottoman slippers, and so on, and so on - then the way that everything was displayed most certainly was. You see, this guy has a thing for symmetry.

Everything is displayed in pairs and every table had a mirror image facing it. Not just the same things on the same tables, but literally mirror images. Craziness.

And as six-thirty rolled around, and we were on our third glasses of wine, me and Lovely Irish Dutch Friend started to get a bit panicky. The room was filling with the strangest collection of men - all men, all gay, all of a certain age. We started to feel like we were the virgins being offered to the room in a Dutch version of 'Eyes Wide Shut'.

Truly, if the host had appeared in a black cloak and goat skull, I wouldn't have surprised.

Seeing our chance, we slipped out and headed into town for some more 'normal' entertainment. We tried not to skid on the zebra skin or trip over the stuffed turtle as we ran, giggling, out of the front door.

Having eating fabulous Thai food, we met up again with LPF and a couple of others and headed to one of the Hague's finest homo establishments for a couple of beers.

Now, dearest reader, you know how hard I am trying to be a good boy. To go on a system slut-down (TM). To be less, erm, easy. Well, it seems that I'm failing.

I appreciate that this next part may seem like it is coming straight from the realms of fiction, but really, it is true. Thing is, I started to chat to a lovely guy and it turns out he's from Tokyo, that he's a heart surgeon and that he's in the Hague on an internship. Yes, dear Reader, I did indeed end up in Holland with a gay, Japanese cardiologist.

He left fairly early - he had surgery the next day, I kid ye not - and I was left with Lovely Irish-Dutch Friend who told me how LPF had been found in the alley behind the bar, fast asleep. I didn't like to tell him that I'd already seen him there when I had slipped out with the surgeon for a bit of a 'ruck and maul' al fresco.

As LIDF and me headed to our favourite Den Haag bar, at three a.m., I reflected on how funny my life really is. Funny and marvelous at the same time.

The friends that I spent this weekend with are friends that I have met through this blog. Without this blog, this weekend would never have happened for me.

Blogging brings many things to many people. To some people blogging is an escape, a way to share their experiences, a window into another world. For others, it is therapy, giving them the opportunity to vent frustrations and / or anger with the world around them.

To me, blogging has brought lovely friends, Japanese heart surgeons and stuffed turtles.

There aren't many that can say that, I'm sure.