First Impressions of the Netherlands

I've always found that the word Europe evoked a very specific image in my mind, an image halfway between Renaissance Rotterdam and World War II.  For all the pictures I've seen of modern twenty-somethings strolling through shopping malls in skinny jeans and sunglasses, I've seen just as many pictures of the men in white clothes with red scarves who carry the cheese wagons.  And though I've seen many pictures of the Dutch countryside, most of them most of them were close ups, most of them were close pictures of an item of specific interest (windmills, anyone?)  I knew that my assumptions were based on limited information.  Still, shaking them off and embibing the reality that is Eindhoven, NL (and various other places) was kind of unsettling. 

A tired girl.  That's what comes from doing roughly two days on four hours of sleep. From the looks that we were getting at the pub, I begin to suspect that Dutch children don't cry in public.   

What was my first impression of the real Netherlands?  It's wet.  I joked to a friend that I've never seen a sunny picture of the Dutch countryside.  Well, I think there's a reason for that.  It's so humid here that it makes Portland feel dry.  As soon as we got off the plane, I felt like my clothes were sticking to me, not in a hot Southern states sort of way but in a cool, clingy sort of way for which I really have no American comparison. 




The view from our front door.  Eindhoven, NL.

It's also flat.  And before you say that everything looks flat to a PNWer, this place makes Iowa look mountainous.  The ground between dikes is so flat, it looks like they graded their cow pastures with a flat rule.  The combination of tall buildings (we're on the sixth floor) and flat territory means that the views really do seem to go for miles, and out in the country, the only thing that breaks the horizon is the orderly rows of trees that line roads and farmsteads at random intervals.  It's like the country in Mississippi and Louisiana around New Orleans, except the green is fresher and the Dutch don't seems to have a kudzu or wysteria equivalent. 

The view from our balcony.  Are you jealous yet?  Oh, right.  Silly question.   

The people are polyethnic, which shouldn't be a surprise.  Any country with erstwhile colonial habits is going to have a polyglot society. Still, most of the people look Dutch, which means that they look vaguely like someone I went to school with at some point or perhaps like somone's parents.  I think that there is something different about the face of the European Dutchman as opposed to the Dutch-descended American: something about the way they hold their eyes and mouths.  Seth says I'm imagining it, transposing what I know into what I see.  Still, he agrees that there is something that makes one feel different in this sea of almost familiar faces.  Perhaps it's demeanor or the set of the shoulders, but I feel like I would know an American in the crowd before I spoke to him. 



Orange ice cream at the Trafalgar Pub.  A highly approprate desert. 

On the other hand, I've already been mistaken for a Dutch person once.  A woman tried to tell me that there was no toilet paper in a bathroom stall, and I had to admit that I don't speak Dutch (though I have been learning some key phrases).  She smiled and repeated herself in English.  Everyone speaks English, and they seem to expect to use their English regularly. Some of the businesses even state their names in English and put the Dutch in subtitles. And inspite of the pervasive old Dutchness of the architecture, American influences will creep in. 



Dining at the Trafalgar Pub, Eindhoven, NL.  Notice the Spiderman in the background.  Boogaloo's juice bottle says 100% juice in English, even though the words "apple juice" are in Dutch. My Coca Cola had no preservatives, and you know, I think I liked it better that way.

Tomorrow, we're going to try to hunt down an open church (about 2% of Dutch people actively attend church;  most churches are now musesums), and then we are invited to a birthday party for Seth's great-uncle in Helmond.  We brought him Marionberry-flavored licorice as a birthday present.  I thought it was a neat blending of here and there.  Then we spend a week in Armelo while Seth works up there.  I'll try to blog as often as possible to keep the impressions genuine. 

Love from Eindhoven.