Today I left Liam with Oma for the first extended period while I went off to do an intake test for the inburgerings. Liam and Oma went for a long walk around Utrecht and Liam slept the whole time, which was good because I hadn’t managed to pump any milk so we were going to try formula. As it worked out, I got back just as he woke up and it was all good.
The test itself was actually 6 tests – a placement test to see which level of test to give, an IQ/learning test (unbelievably easy pattern recognition stuff, but I’ve been testing for a long time), and then I got the advanced level reading, writing, listening and speaking tests. They were hard, but I guess that’s to be expected since I still do need to study. The speaking test was the worst – it was done with two tapes – one with the questions and then one for recording. The questions were not too bad, but there was never enough time – it would be like, these are the three candidates for babysitting – tell your partner what the differences between them are, what you find important and which one you like and then the tape would give you 20 seconds to answer. There’s a lot of me saying a worse word for frick after the beep, and then saying (in Dutch mind) – not enough time! But everyone seems impressed by my level of Dutch after only 6 months here. Wow, I’ve been here for 6 months.