Hmmmmm...This is the Netherlands?

I wrote this last night, but there was no internet so I am posting it now. I have really funny first day pictures, I will add them as soon as I can!

I suppose my adventure began when my flight left SFO and headed for Houston, but in all honestly, it didn’t get interesting until the second leg. The man I was sitting next to seemed to be an alcoholic, because he quickly consumed three Heineken’s within about 45 minutes. As he began to ask for a forth, I looked over at him, gave him my best 15 year old look, and in a little girl voice said, “Nothing like a few brews to ease the plane pain, huh?” My remark was met with a stare of hate and the prompt placement of noise canceling headphones over his ears. We weren’t friends; I can’t understand why. : )

Upon arriving in the Amsterdam airport, I quickly proceeded to the immigration station. The immigration officer decided it was his job to harass me, and forced me to practice pronouncing the name of my college in perfect dutch before I was allowed to move on. I finally found Lyle, my travel buddy, and we jumped on a train to Wageningen. The Dutch railway is poorly marked, so knowing when you have reached your stop is hard. Our huge suitcases didn’t make it much easier. Lugging those things up and down the stairs was a constant pain in the butt. Luckily Lyle is a nice guy and helped me; we traded suitcases cause mine was huge and full of random gear.

Once we got to Wageningen (finally) we were greeted by the idea that we had to walk a bazillion (it felt like that many, anyway) blocks to the student housing office with all of our luggage. And, when we got there, we began a long, tedious process for housing that resulting in the general understanding that our keys were lost. I am not kidding. How a housing office looses keys is beyond me. Two Canadians, Matt and Tif, seemed to in the same situation and equally confused. The result? A hotel for us all. Yay. (super sarcastic) One would think this was a good thing, but in reality, it kind of stunk. I mean, we didn’t have internet (except for a happy ten minutes), couldn’t unpack, and couldn’t fully relax like one can in his/her own room. Whatever though, we make the most of situations.

After checking into the hotel, the four of us headed into town to find some food. Dutch people eat small dinners and big lunches, so at 6:00 pm the town was dead. We grabbed some super sketchy gyros that came with French fries and mayo (whoever came up with that combo was disturbed) and ate them in a restaurant loudly and proudly playing the Backstreet Boys. Upon finishing we headed to a supermarket. Dutch supermarkets are awesome. Seriously. Beer is awesomely cheep; we got a 12 pack of Heineken for $8 (us dollars). Food is super different in the Netherlands. Yogurt is drunk from a milk carton type container and cheese is plentiful. There is even a chip flavor called “cool American”. We didn’t buy it.

There are a few things I have noticed about the country is general. First, people stare. Like really stare. You know when you are a little kid and you stare at others and then your mom yells at you to stop? There were no yelling moms in the Netherlands. People have no issue opening their eyes as wide as possible, dropping their chin to its lowest position, and cranking their necks to fully stare at you with a seeming look as if to say, “What the hell are you doing in MY country, retard?” It’s just the greatest feeling on the receiving end. Secondly, the Netherlands is old and dirty. Not in a cute England way, but in a seriously dirty way. It kind of seems as if the whole area just needs a good power wash. 

I forgot to mention that it is only light outside between the hours of 9:30 am and 4 pm. It is always dark.

This blog makes everything seem really negative. It’s not! The people I have met are all nice and fun. Lyle is crazy and awesome; he is stranger than me (I know it doesn’t seem possible!). Also, the farmlands are beautiful. You have elegant countryside that runs right into rustic urban. The houses are not in developments and don’t have similar makes. There are canals run through everything and there are cute hidden restaurants in back corners. I think tomorrow will be an awesome day. I hope.