I joined a press agency that covers court cases and wrote critical essays about lawyers, district attorneys, judges and the legal system in several Law Reviews.
Opera is one of my passions. Luckily I got the opportunity to interview some major opera stars like Edda Moser, Cristina Deutekom, Teresa Berganza, Huguette Tourangeau, John Bröcheler and Joan Sutherland.
For four years that felt like twenty I taught law at a School of Journalism. I met some nice people, learned some stuff about journalism that I didn't know before and discovered that teaching was not what I had hoped it would be. From then on I decided to become a full-time freelance journalist.
At the moment I write book reviews for one of the national Dutch newspapers, de Volkskrant. For several magazines I write about law and about the Internet. I have written two books about rape, another book about journalism, a book about penal law and a book about police behaviour. My first cookbook will be published this fall.
I have been living in the country for about eight years. Before that I lived in Amsterdam, but the big city lost its charm for me. In my life are three cats, sixteen hens, five roosters, a rabbit and a guinea pig.
I used to spend one month out of each year in the Utah desert, camping in remote areas and hiking in the canyons. Then my husband died and I couldn't see myself doing with someone else what we had always done together. And I am too much of a coward (or have too much sense) to do it alone.
Which is why I now confine myself to driving through Arizona and New Mexico, watching my beloved desert from a car.
But I miss waking up in the middle of the night to the howling of the coyotes. I miss the ravens that never failed to inspect a campsite. I miss the bats that came within inches of my face chasing insects. I miss the lizards. I even miss the snakes.
I am a member of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.
