Marion's Miscellaneous Musings

Life is different in the Netherlands, even though a number of us are descended from them (including my Husband.) Space, for one is a factor that we tend to ignore here in the US. (out side the cities, that is.)

We are married to our cars. Everywhere I go, I hop in the car. I have to force myself to walk the half mile to Starbucks or the mile to Hastings. It almost never occurs to us to use anything but the car.

In the Netherlands, the trains and the busses were crowded. There were automated ticket machines for the trains. Utrecht, the central train station for the Netherlands, had some 30 tracks, and a couple of billboards for determining just where you go. (It helps that nearly everybody speaks English and could reassure us that we were waiting for the right train!) We were really impressed by the acre of bikes outside the train station in Leiden. (Until we got to Amsterdam -- there is a 4 story parking garage for bikes! Pictures available on google earth; the batteries on my camera were dead by this time.)

The middle picture is part of "The Maze" in Volendam. Small houses, close together, bricked over pathways, well defined gardens. In this part, there were no cars, but it is amazing just how small a space is needed! I grew up in one suburbia and moved to another; these houses are just too close for me! We are used to space in the US; in the Netherlands there is no place to go where you do not see something man made. (perhaps the beach).

The top picture is Utrecht at dusk. Street level is a whole story above canal level, which was also true in Amsterdam. Looks like a daylight basement to me! Just how far back do they go?

Those lines in the street in Leiden do not mark the lanes. They are for the bicycles -- and you better get out of their way! The cars have to figure out their own place.

At the end of the street, a friend and I wandered into a coffee shop, and it looked so seedy we decided to wander out again. It turns out that is where you buy the drugs. If you want coffee, do not ask a Dutch about a coffee shop. Ask for coffee. One of my guides (a former exchange student) told me that some shops will advertise basically "anything you could ever want...and coffee and tea." Towards the end of the week, I asked one of my Dutch hosts if there were any coffee shops that actually were better than others. She gave me a really quizzical look, and finally said "Some have better quality drugs than others." What I really meant to ask was if any sold good coffee! You don't go to a coffee shop for coffee. You go to a cafe or a bar.