Always reach for the sky!

At age ten, as a student at the Nutsschool Wassenaar , I won a writing competition organized by the Municipality of #Wassenaar, open to all primary schools in the Municipality.

As a single child with chronic bronchitis, I was ill a lot, socially unskillful, but I read a lot, sometimes a book a day. I quess I had built up a large vocabulary for my age. I was immediately excited to enter this contest!

My parents didn't even know that I had entered this essay competition until we received the invitation to the official awards ceremony and reception.

During the ceremony, the 2nd runner up from another school (who we shall call S.B., for I still know her full Name), whispered to me that it wasn't fair that I had won the contest because, according to her, my parents had written my essay.?

Nowadays, I would maybe take that as a compliment and laugh about it, but at the time, as a shy and very honest child, I was too upset to respond.

Ultimately, it motivated me to believe in my own abilities AND to become (sort of) more prepared for these kinds of comments ! Becoming a pilot at age 16 helped me a lot in becoming more assertive AND Self Confident for sure!

Unfortunately, my parents did not honor my wish to become a journalist or photographer and it had to be a “normal” study.?

I continued writing my whole life though! For several years now I have been a columnist for the AOPA Magazine of #aopanetherlands and the All Clear Magazine of the KNVvL Motor Flying department.

Last week I had a nice journalism assignment to fly with the new Cessna Grand Caravan EX. Together with 7 others, we made a short flight around NV Luchthaven Teuge . After the flight, at the tarmac, I had a short interview with the Demo Pilot and Regional Sales Associate of Textron/Cessna.

I know that it's always the off-topic stories and details that appeal to me most, like the mascot giraffe on board! Every airplane has it's own unique stories!

Many thanks to Peter F. A. van de Noort , Michael Tefsen and Textron Aviation for this beautiful assignment! It was more than just a nice demoflight.

For those of you who are interested; my report of flying with the new Cessna Grand Caravan EX will be published in the Autumn edition of the All Clear Magazine!

I am looking forward to more of these Aviation writing assignments.

My next goal; publishing my first book! I'll keep you posted!

#chickinthecockpit #womeninaviation #aviation #journalism #press #pilots