Fijne Kerst Happy Xmas from the Netherlands

Will anyone read this blog post? Doubt it, while you’re all enjoying your Xmas holidays already some of us are still working hard. Things I’ve learnt about working in the Netherlands:

1) 52% tax… what? Yes, I hadn’t realised how cheap the UK was until I moved away. My gross salary here is greater than my old salary in the UK but my take home pay is the same…?! Shocking. The UK is cheap but I figure you get what you pay for… the country is a bit of a dump in comparison!

2) Compulsory stuff… yes, pension and health insurance NOT optional.

3) BANK holidays…. If they fall on the weekend you lose them, so while you guys are all putting your feet up and getting all festive with your Fri 23^rd and Mon 2^nd bank holidays in lieu, spare a thought for me, slaving away!

So, as Xmas fast approaches, please take a moment to reflect upon these differences and count yourselves lucky. On the other hand, I’m having more fun than I was in the UK so that makes it all worthwhile :-p

As they say here "FIJNE KERST"... have a great break everyone x

What to do, what to do?

My blog post title reminds me of those vultures at the end of the jungle book... the ones that hop around going "whatchya wanna do?"  "I dunno, whatchya you wanna do?" and so on.  Gotta love them vultures.

Yeh, I've been really spoilt for choice this weekend (my last weekend in NL before heading back to the dready midlands for Xmas).  Here were my options:

 Deventer - they have a Charles Dickens festival once a year this coming
 weekend, looks weird but wonderful:
http://www.dickensfestijn.nl/

I'd love to go but it takes over 2 hours by train and I've heard you have to queue for over an hour to an hour and a half to get into the streets to see :-(



 Dordrecht - I'm going there on Sunday with friends, they have Xmas markets and it’s not too far away.

Valkenburg - this is near to Maastricht and they have what looks like a beautiful Xmas festival inside a real cave!  But again over 2 hours away and queuing to get in.


 Playing squash in Warmond - Sat they have a ladies day... I'm missing sport so much I'm genuinely starting to feel ill!

So I think the plan is Leiden market Sat, shopping, cleaning etc then squash, then feet up, then Sunday Dordrecht!

What a busy but excellent week

Had a fantastically busy week:

Mon - went to play ice hockey in the evening, the hockey itself was great (but I hate ice compared to wheels, too damn slippy and it made me miss roller hockey even more that I was already doing), but it nearly killed me getting there with my enormous hockey bag on my back (big enough for me to fit in and yes I have tried) and my hockey stick in one hand, precariously balanced on my bike, cycling for 15minutes in the rain.  15 minutes doesn't sound long but half way there I had severe back, shoulder and chest pain!  It only took 2min to kick in on the way home!  Won't be going again, too impractical to reach.

Tues - had my work Xmas meal.  Great night, we went on an outing (uitje) first to the university observatory where we viewed jupiter and it's moons, very cool.  Had a lovely meal (I really, really miss cider here tho, I'm not a beer drinker so I'm finding the pubs rather restricting) and I must remember to ask for my meat well done, everything comes rare and bloody as standard here, hate my meat half alive on my plate!

Wed - At work in the afternoon I had a FOUR hour web-editing course.  For all you guys at Warwick, you are never, ever, ever to complain about SiteBuilder ever ever ever again, Sitebuilder is literally a palace of dreams compared to whatever they call their old fashioned system.  I genuinely feel like I've woken up and it's 1998 and I have to try and use the internet... I was hoping I would learn new skills in this job but now I'm worried in my next job I'll look like a total Neanderthal from being used to working on this old thing... WYSIWYG?!  What's WYSIWYG they ask?!  Blimey!  Not only that, but they're all still working on office 2003.  It's nearly 2012 right?!  ARGH!

Thurs - I had my first actual proper Dutch lesson (I'll do a separate post all about language, this could be a biggy!)... After my weekend in Antwerp and practising in my drunken Dutch at my Xmas do where I feel I absolutely blew people away with my "would you like some water, it is cold" and "why is mummy washing the dog?" sentences (good huh?) I was BRIMMING with confidence.  That was until I turned up to my lesson on Thurs where the bloke talked to me in Dutch the entire time (what was he thinking?) :-p  More to come language wise, I'll check back into this later!  Right now, confidence not so brimming, perhaps I need some more gluhwijn?

Fri - Was at a medical conference all day, felt a bit out of place, I've never heard anyone speak so openly and unashamedly about vaginas for a whole hour.  Other than that I'm now left wondering about a whole variety of diseases and also wonder how many mice the med. dept get through here each year?  The food on the other hand was brilliant (I will also post about food later, the food here (esp the snacks) are AWESOME (I wonder how much weight I've put on?)), I had a nice evening meal too.

Mijn fijn weekend met Rich

Had a brill weekend with Rich.  We went to Antwerpen for the day on Saturday.  The trains were jam packed, I think Belgium must be a popular weekend destination for Hollanders esp at this time of year.

I was expecting Antwerp to be a lot smaller but it's massive, like a capital city and the architecture was beautiful.

The Xmas markets were nice and the mulled wine (gluhwijn) much cheaper than back in the UK but believe it or not, although it sounds more exotic to head to Antwerp for Xmas markets, the Brum one is much bigger and better, the one in Antwerp didn't sell Xmas decorations or toys or trinkets or much food.  In fact watching this video made me miss Brum (which I didn't think was possible!!):

Other than that, bought an enormous Nepalese jumper as thick as a sheep and warmer than my coats, that ought to help in my freezing cold office, and I practised more Dutch in Antwerp than since I've been in the Netherlands ("hoeveel kosten de chocolade appels?" for example!).

Oh and also, I've never seen a "fresh" hot chocolate before (I imagined hot choc with fresh cream) but no... it's a massive mug of steaming hot milk with chocolate on a stick on the side.  If I hadn't seen someone else order one I would have assumed you ate the chocolate on a stick, but you stir it into your hot milk!  Never had the chance to try one (I was having a regular hot chocolate when I saw someone else being served this), can't wait to have one at some point tho, hope they do them in the Netherlands, suppose I could always dunk my twix into a glass of milk but it just wouldn't be the same right?!

Bikes

Ooooooh I could go on about bikes in the Netherlands for hours....

From the outside looking in you think, how lovely and quaint all this bike riding is... how novel, how old fashioned (even to the extent the "old fashioned" sytle bikes here are called "oma fiets" which means grandma bike, ah how sweet!)... but oh no, once you've spent a bit of time here, cycling in the rush hour traffic every day (yes, I had no idea there was such thing as bicylce traffic) you realise what aggressive nutters all these cyclist really are!

I've never, ever seen anything like it in my life.  It's dark right, it's winter, we're an hour ahead of the UK, so yes, it's pretty dark every morning and every night after work.  But do they care about being seen?  No, you wouldn't believe how many people cycle with no lights.  The cycle paths are amazing, the UK is totally rubbish in this regard, and I thought it would be confusing learning to ride on the "wrong" side of the road, but it only took about a day to realise that even the Dutch don't cycle on the "correct" side of the road, they cycle any old how... they cycle on the wrong side coming right at you and high speed with no lights, they jump out from everywhere and anywhere with no regard for who's right of way it is, they'll cycle side by side having a leisurely chat ensuring that this chain goes right into the path of cars or into the other lane of the cycle path (oncoming cyclists) and so that you have to overtake the gossipers on the "wrong" side in oncoming traffic.  They'll also spot someone on the pedestrian path and just abruptly stop causing you to cycle into the back of them.  Oh yes, and don't even get me started on the pedestrains who will also step out in front of moving bikes with disregard (it only took me a week to cycle straight into someone who despite being hit REALLY hard (I had to check my wheel for damage after the fact) just shrugged it off and said "sh*t happens"... well, yes, I thought, sh*t does happen if you just saunter on into the middle of flowing traffic.

You need the wits and reaction speeds of a jet fighter pilot to cycle here, you have to avoid other cyclists, pedestrians, and motorcyclists (who use the cycle lanes) whilst being blinded by car traffic all at the same time.  Also, being the "low" countries and incredibly flat, it is really, really windy, I was blown into the curb three times yesterday while cycling and even got blown off a roundabout.

Having said that I absolutely love it.  I'm just as mad and aggressive as the rest of them, in fact it's only taken me less than three weeks to wear out the brakes on my bike!

Also, I've got so, so, so used to cycling that I can't bare the thought of walking anywhere, it already seems a foreign concept.  Ricky is coming out to visit this weekend and I'm already putting an order in for a bike card (so you can hire a bike from the railway station for a fantastic 3euros for 24hours, what a bargain... Boris - take note!), because I fancied taking him around Leiden on Sunday and also to a museum and the thought of having to walk the whole 30min to the museum sickens me (even though by the time I chain, unchain my various locks, clip and unclip my ten million lights (they're all over me and the bike, I look like a Xmas tree) and tuck my trousers into my socks it probably takes the same amount of time)!

So bikes... I may well moan but it really is amazing here... you've never cycled until you've cycled in the Netherlands.

What I've achieved so far

I recently sent an email to a friend summarising the stuff I've been up to since being in the Netherlands and thought it would be a nice idea to post that here, so here it goes (in a nutshell):

• Eaten far too much unhealthy but very tasty and interesting Dutch snacks especially with the lead up to Xmas (and they celebrate Sinterklaas on Dec 5th/6th)
• Got sent home early to celebrate Sinterklaas today
• Celebrated ThanksGiving with new English, American and French friends
• Tried the Italian spirit Genepy for the first time, quite nice!
• Celebrated an early Sinterklaas last week which involved trying lots of Sinterklaas related biscuits and reading Dutch poems that I couldn't understand or pronounce!
• Played table tennis twice
• Played badminton three times
• Played squash and even had a go at doubles (I'd heard of such a thing but thought only suicidal people would play)... foruntately not only did I manage not to kill anyone, I also remained injury free.
• Met a new friend from China.
• Bought tickets to Anwerp for when Rich visits this weekend!
• Sorted out a bank account, a train travel discount card and a mobile sim card.
• Went out for Friday drinks with work people
• Went around Leiden market on the last two Saturdays (lovely)
• Got chatted up by a random African guy who told me he wanted to be my lion (can't work out if he was just being friendly or was a potential rapist)
• Ohhh, and am off to Zurich with work in Feb!
• I also got published in Library connect, check me out on page 8 (http://libraryconnect.elsevier.com/lcn/0903/lcn0903.pdf)

Confirmed stereotypes so far

Dairy products:

Yep, the Dutch really do like their dairy products, I've never seen so many different types of milk, buttermilk and yogurt in my life... they take up isles and isles of supermarkets and people drink gallons of the stuff at lunch time.

Laws:

We don't seem to have coffee breaks in our office and when I was telling people at work about the regulations in the UK (i.e. 15min coffee break is provided if you work for more than 4 consecutive hours) the reply was simpley... "we don't like laws".

Health and safety:

What health and safety?  On my first day I was toured around my office building and shown the emergency exit.. followed by the statement "oh yeah, but if the alarms ever go off, don't go this way because we keep the door locked"

Windows:

Oh yes, they like their windows here, the bigger the better and they keep their curtains open into the night so that people can admire their houses through them.  They also enjoy getting their windows cleaned as often as possible!

This week's take on exercise

So what have I learnt this week in the Netherlands? It takes me 12min to cycle to work along the beautiful canals but somehow it takes me an hour to half cycle and half shop my way home along the high street!!! Gotta stop going that way home, my purse can't cope!

I also attended my first Sinterklaas evening on Tuesday night, we swapped presents and poems (yes, I was even forced to read a Dutch poem out loud to the group despite the fact I only understood about 2 words on the page and ended up getting a poem about 24 lines long!).  We drank wonderful chocomel and I was introduced to all the traditional Sinterklaas biscuits.  My office has also been full of these everyday so I'm getting really unhealthy especially as I still haven't had any exercise.

So far I went along to a badminton club a few times... despite being a popular sport in this country and the club I joined were in a league, the standard was fairly low and I don't even play badminton regularly.  After spending two hours without breaking a sweat I won't be signing up long term... means I still need to find a sports club to join.

Went along to table tennis, probably more exercise than the badminton but still it's not a sport, it's a game!  Still need to find some exercise.

I cycle around everywhere but the country is so flat and I have a 27speed UK mountain bike so I literally have to pedal twice every 20minutes or so.

May pop along to a squash club this weekend... it's a 40min cycle ride away so even if the squash is lame, I should get a bit of exercise getting there and back.

So, the sport and exercise is the thing I miss the most about the UK.

Food here is also rather unhealthy (but wonderful).. the snacks are every where and absolutely delicious, but if they're not beautiful waffels and biscuits, they're various deep-fried reconstituted meat products... but oh yes, they're tasty!  I got free lunch in the canteen on Thurs and ate about 3 lunches and tried all the snacks.  Also had a lunch meeting with free sandwiches today, was much amused to see that you can even order a "hagelslag" (chocolate sprinkle) sandwich for your lunch meeting if you're so inclined.