Amsterdam and Observations

Including Europe

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I have decided to make this a separate article (well whatever you would call it) since I am not keeping dates and just keeping note of my general observations. They are in a nominal order, not ordinally- if that’s a correct form for of the word. Not everything in the list is a rant, but you will have to look for them!

1. Amsterdam Weather- I have only been here for about three months, but the weather is either abnormally warm or dismal with constant rain. There have been plenty nice days, where it isn’t too warm or too cold, but when the wind comes it is very windy! I have ridden my bike a couple of times in the wind and I literally have to use all of my strength to keep the bike going at a snail’s pace or to keep form going backwards. I don’t dare give up so I can keep from looking like a non-Dutch. This happens when I have my t-shirt, sweatshirt, and raincoat on so that by the time I get to where I am going I am so sweaty.
   1. Also, if it is a nice sunny day, you will be warm, but always take a light sweater or jacket. If the sun goes behind some clouds then it will get chilly, not just relief from the sun, but actually chilly.
2. Bicycles: they are everywhere with no regard to pedestrians, cars, sometimes trams. I have read about this over and over again in books, but you will never understand until you are here. There are very nice bike lanes, which I like to stay in and follow the rules- you ride in one direction on one side of the street. James seems to like to ride any which way and people crossing the bike lanes obviously are looking in the direction that they expect a bike to come, but of course there is James coming form the other way and running others over. This is typical. Also, as a bike rider you can disregard the red lights for the most part, just listen carefully for the bells.
   1. You can chain your bike to pretty much anything and there are special rails for taking your bike down/up the stairs or for locking them up on the streets. There are many different types of bikes too, but most look like they could fall apart any minute and still cost a lot!
   2. Mine was stolen, I am not happy. There are two locks: one around the back tire and a chain that goes around the frame and whatever you hook it too. If you leave the key in the back tire lock, then you are pretty much asking for someone to take it and the nice chain lock.
3. Miniature cars- smaller than a Smartcar. I will have to find a picture to post. These cars, either red or white, are smaller than a golf cart and can hold 1-2 passengers. They ride in the bike lanes and come at you very fast.
4. Pancake, Poffertjes, and syrup: We have been to a couple of pancake houses and like the first one we went to in Weteringschans. It’s supposed to look like an old Carousel, it is round. Inside there are some stationary horses around a mirrored pole, that is broken and duct taped. Everyone smokes, even the waitress while she is sprinkling a pound of powdered sugar on the pancakes. Here we has poffertjes for the first time. They are like mini pancakes and sooo good! We also discovered Dutch syrup. It is syrup make from some sort of beet root and tastes like burnt molasses. Unfortunately we had bought some at the store before tasting so maybe we will save it for visitors. Now we stick to the powdered sugar though some friends sent us a bottle of Aunt Jemima from home!
5. Service: actually there is no service here. The waiters are paid more than those in the US and therefore have no need to provide customer satisfaction. The standard tip is no more than 10% of the bill. The Dutch people seem to take their time eating and the wait staff never hurry anyone out the door, which some people might find nice, but when you are used to receiving a bill as soon as you are done eating, ti can get tiring. You have to ask for the bill, which takes 15 minutes to get, and even if you have your money ready it will take another 10 minutes for them to get back to you. I have seen several restaurants that have portable debit card and credit card machines which is actually very handy. They can swipe your card right at your table.
6. Ice: there is none so do not bother asking for it and be happy if you get one piece.
7. Water: water comes either as bubbly (with gas) or still (no gas). You will pay for water if you do not order something else. You will also get a strange look if you do not order coffee after every meal. Back to the water, if you order a soda, coffee, tea, beer, or wine, then you can ask for tap water.
8. Beer: beer is cheaper than water. You will only find Heineken, Amstel or sometimes Juliper on tap. The whitbier- usually Hoegarten from Belgium can be found and the Dutch seem to really like Corona. There are other beers sometimes, but might as well drink the Heineken.
9. Cheese: there are so many sliced cheeses at the grocery store, but I have no idea what they are except for being Dutch cheese. You can get young, old, very old, and something else. I like to get my cheese at the open market. It seems fresher and they will let you taste it. James and I really like the garlic and herb edam rounds.
10. Other food: eggs do not come refrigerated, but on the shelves next to the cereal. We just take it home and then refrigerate them, except if they are in there for more than a week James will freak and throw them out. Some OJ is refrigerated some is not. I thought this was strange, but I guess apple and cranberry juices are not refrigerated back homed.
    1. Many Dutch drink buttermilk called karnemelk. It is in a red container- stay away! The butter is usually unsalted, but there is some that is salted. For baking, the butter will come in what looks like if you take four sticks of butter and press them together, you must figure how much is 4 tsp on your own. The Dutch also seem to really like yogurt, as do other Europeans. There are so many kinds, but I try to stick to the American Dannon. There is also some sort of yogurt that comes in small glass jars, I might try on the next vacation when included with our hotel, but I won’t buy it.
    2. They have some sort of packaged hamburgers and hotdogs next to the sausages- like Slim Jims. I don’t know if they are dried or like regular burgers. Kind of reminds me of the packets of tuna you can now get and then they put shrimp in the packets, just as gross.
    3. There is not a large selection of frozen foods. Maybe one or two unites with a few frozen pizzas, spinach, broccoli, chicken nuggets, ice cream, and coquettes. I miss the variety of Lean Cuisines, fruit like berries and peaches, and pancakes.
11. I am reading a book called ‘My Dam Life’, it is about an Australian husband and wife and their time living in Amsterdam in 1998-2001. There are many similarities that I have found, but one is something the author points out about the toilets. It is something he called the ‘Inspection Shelf’. If anyone has been over here you will understand. I have to agree with this since James and I have noticed it ourselves. The toilets have an odd shape where there is this sort of shelf just above the water line, it is slight, you know, not a sharp shelf. But he calls it this for when you do your business everything seems to land on the shelf for ‘inspection’ then down the pipe when you press the button on top of the tank! Gross, but hey, it’s what happens.
12.  Washing Machine/Dryer: Don’t get me wrong, I am ecstatic to have my very own washer and dryer and tend to do laundry just because I can. They are small and stacked, which is fine. However, it takes so long to do laundry that you really need to dedicate your day, unless, like me, I have given up on the ‘omigod the house might burn down if I don’t watch it the whole time’ factor and just go on about my business. On the dryer there are these numbers- 20’, 40’, 60’, 80’, 100’, and 120’. I assume this means minutes of drying time, but if I choose 100’ at the end of the time I will still have to turn it on to about 40’ or 60’.
13. Recycling: The Netherlands are known to be a very green country; however, they do not seem to make it very easy. In the grocery store there is a place where you can return your wine bottles, plastic liter bottles, pony kegs, and case of 24 beer bottles for a refund. Twenty-five cents per large bottle, €5 for the keg, €0.10 for beer bottles and €4 for the case that carries. This is nice, but remember that you paid for it when you purchased the item. Then there are these bins for your glass and paper items on random street corners. They seem about the size of a postal box, maybe a little smaller. I don’t know how they get the trash out, but I wouldn’t want that job.
    1. I had a lot of wine bottles and decided just to put them there, but each time you drop one you hear a big crash! I have been told by another American that I will have to find a way to put my large cardboard boxes (that have been sitting in the corner since our stuff arrived the first week of April) into these recycle bins. If we leave them out for the trash men, and our info is on the box, we could receive a fine. I have no idea if there are larger recycle bins, but I might just take all of our info off and drop it out in front of someone else’s door on trash day!

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