The Best Parts
Dinner and view at the top of the Euromast tower:
The friendly people who went out of their way to help us with directions.
Drinking coffee-coffee again.
The North Sea:
We had just gotten to Shelia’s home in Wassenaar and she was describing the area when she said something like “oh and the North Sea is just a little way down that road—” “Wait. The North Sea? … Can we go there?” “Of course. We’ll have lunch there.”
>
Trying to imitate Dutch. “Glaabin-Schlaabin, Schnaapin Waapin.” and just listening to the language. It sounded just like English all mixed up.
Living in a beautiful home with the most adorable dog:
Watching the crazy Dutch biking through snow as if it’s nothing. Viewing the world’s largest bike parking lot:
Stumbling upon a small bar in Amsterdam away from the tourist areas with my friend David. The bar was entirely full of locals, everyone knew each other, everyone knew the bartender, everyone was speaking in Dutch. It was some of the best people watching of my life and we were both just so content to be there. It was my favorite part of the entire trip.
Sleeping in a little boat in Amsterdam docked in a harbor. It was a “bostel”, a boat-hostel. The owners were so nice and the free breakfast was delicious:
Eating waffles in every form for nearly every meal.
Feeling like I look like a local. People would just walk up to me and start speaking in Dutch. I don’t pass for a local ever in Italy.
The Worst Parts
Holland doesn’t get much snow usually because the temperature is stabilized by sea. But, we went there during a rare period of snow. I didn’t mind this because it was beautiful. But, since the city isn’t used to snow it wasn’t prepared for snow. No sidewalks were shoveled or even salted. The roads weren’t being plowed. So public transportation was breaking down everywhere. It was incredibly difficult to get across Amsterdam and we missed some of the things I was most excited to see because of it, such as Anne Frank’s house. But you do what you can do, and now I guess I just have to return someday.
The national holiday of Sinterklaas day was going on while we were there. Sinterklaas (similar to Santa Claus) gives good children Dutch letters and puts all the bad children into bags and sends them to Africa where they turn into “black petes”. In order to celebrate this holiday parents put their kids in little old-fashioned orange costumes and blackface. It’s cultural. It’s also racist. And disturbing.
But I'm really not trying to leave this on a bad note because other than that I loved the Dutch culture and the Dutch. Everyone was so friendly. The canals were beautiful. The food was delicious. I had such a great time discovering where my ancestors come from!
And thank you so much to the Van Wyk family for being such great hostesses to us in the Netherlands!! The trip would not have been the same without you!
I leave for home next week. I'm so excited to see my family and celebrate Christmas there!
No comments:
Post a Comment