"Friday Fails" NOW "Friday Foto Fun"

Last Friday I thought about beginning a weekly series called "Friday Fails" where I would feature aspects of our "Fail Days" from the week.  However, my intent was not to create a "whoa is me" series.  I didn't want to ruin your weekends. But instead I was hoping it would turn into a way to share experiences with others in an attempt that they could learn from our mistakes.

Well, I'm happy/sad to report that Vicki & I had a pretty good week here in the Netherlands so I don't have any material for a "Friday Fails" post. Instead let me say this week was filled with some fun firsts: our first Holland Flower Show & my first bike ride. I was also presented a great opportunity to volunteer with an expat website in a few weeks. In addition, Vicki and I are very excited about our upcoming adventure to Rome next week where we get to catch up with a good friend.  Fingers crossed we'll see some white smoke.  Even if we don't it will be wonderful to be in Rome to experience the excitement around the Conclave.  

I hope you all had a fantastic week too.  If not, I hope this picture can make you laugh.  Cheers to the weekend friends!

"I CAN'T GET LEFT!"

Bike with two rolls of toilet paper strapped safely aboard.

Today, I got to experience life as a member of the upper echelon of the Dutch transportation hierarchy.   That's right folks, I took my first bike ride. There she is to the left, kick stand and all.  Alright yes, I know it's a ladies bike, don't judge me.  It came with the apartment.

"But Dan, why have you waited so long to ride a bike?"  Well Internet, let me tell you....I was waiting for the snow to melt before I embarked on a cycling adventure.  Today was a gorgeous day, in Oss.  The sun was shining and I think temps got into the 5s (°C), a virtual heat wave!  Oh, and we also needed toliet paper. So, I thought the quickest way to the City Hotel, our toliet paper supplier/owner operator of our apartment was by bike.

I think it was a good first attempt.  However, I still have NO IDEA how to make left turns.  As a result, I took a reaaaaalllly long way home to the apartment since it was composed of all right hand turns.

I may have disobeyed some ordinances on my joyride around town. A minute into my ride, I blew a  red bicycle traffic light (they have them here).  However, the bus that was about to turn right as I was proceeding just stayed put and yielded to me.  That's power, my friends.  Apparently the cyclist always has the right of way.  My next challenge can be seen here:




Here's more from my journey around Oss.


SORRY FOR THE VERTICAL VIDEOS.  I'LL DO BETTER NEXT TIME.

Wordless Wednesday: My Dog My Guinness

 July 13, 2012

Two things I miss most about Ireland: walks with Bandit to Malahide Castle and the Guinness.

Windmills, Tulips & a Night in Prison: A Weekend in North Holland

Our cell.

This weekend Vicki and I spent a night in a Dutch prison.  You ever see that  Nat Geo Show "Locked Up Abroad?" It documents the stories of vacationers and/or expats that are hired as drug mules and end up in Thai prisions. Well, our experience was nothing like that but I'll pretended it was.

Before we get to our cell block story, lets take a few steps back. Vicki let me, "Mr. Logistically Challenged" plan our past weekend excursion in the Netherlands.  Vicki was trusting her weekend to someone who still has not mastered telling time on a 24 hour clock yet.  (Yes, Dad, I know you just subtract 12.) What was she thinking?

Moments after this picture the entire canal & my nose froze.

I decided we would tour the Province of North Holland. But I really should have consulted with the Weather Channel first before going north, it was COLD up there, temps in the high 20s(F) with a wind that stung you in the face.  But hey, we were hunting windmills, so we wanted wind right, right? WRONG.

We journeyed to "one of Holland's top tourist destinations," Zaanse Schans.  It's a charming village situated on the Zaans River with traditional Dutch green, wooden houses and historic functioning windmills.  This is all within walking distance of the Koog-Zaankijk rail station.  

Zaanse Schans in Nine Pictures

Besides the windmills & the clogs, my favorite part was the machine that dispensed free maps for pulling the lever (pictured).

So how did I end up getting us locked up? Did I try to ride on a blade of a restored windmill?  Did I try to put on some colorful clogs and quietly exit the gift shop?  Did I become a drug mule?  Well, I'd be lying if I didn't consider at least one of these scenarios, but alas, none of them landed us in the big house.

You can really find anything on the internet, even an old prison that has been converted into a hotel.  I booked us one night at the Gevangenis Hotel, Oostereiland Hoorn; translation 'Prison Island Hotel, Eastern Hoorn.' The old prision was now the home to a hotel, where guests can stay in actual "cells", updated of course.  There is also a movie theatre and a brasserie on site.  Despite, my temptation to see Ben Affleck's Argo, we checked into our "cell" then braved the cold and explored the town of Hoorn.



Hoorn is a quaint harbor town, that apparently would be a great place to visit say, in the SUMMER.  Although it makes for some pretty unique scenery when the canals freeze over.

d' Oude Waegh, Hoorn, Netherlands

We found ourselves wandering through the town square before deciding on dinner at d' Oude Waegh. Beautiful restaurant set in a building dating back to 1609.  Here, we again conquered a Dutch only menu (read about our first all Dutch menu here). I had the "Beefburger ‘d’Oude Waegh’ Man's Size."  Vicki went with the "Gegrilde entrecote met rode port saus."  Both were delicious, and came with fries and a salad, the national side dishes of the Netherlands.



Perhaps, the highlight of our visit to Hoorn was, Cafe 't Schipperhuis. This nautical themed cafe featured a functioning bar fashioned out of the hull of an old wooden boat.  Upon entering the fairly empty cafe, we were greeted by a friendly Jack Russell Terrier.  We immediately knew we would love this place.  The bartender took a break from her game of pool to serve us a round.  We went with the local Amstel and "chatted" with the owners of the Jack Russell. By "chatted" I mean, smiled and nodded to Dutch phrases and showed them iPhone pics of our Jack Russell.

The red pin marks the Little Cafe by the Harbour.  Englebert Humperkink Not Pictured.

Learning Dutch #'s at the bar

At one point during the night the bartender decided to play a round of "Name that Tune" with us.  But the song she played left both Vicki and I stumped, it was in English that's all we knew. She informed us it was called "The Little Cafe By The Harbour" sung by Englebert Humperdink.  Then she went and played the Dutch version, the song blasted across the empty bar.  Vicki and I wondered what exactly was going on here, should we be asking for the check.  The bartender then explained that the original song was written by Pierre Kartner at the table directly behind us.  She exhibited a certain pride telling us the story, and we got wrapped up in the nostaglia of it too.  Sitting in this famous harbour bar with a Jack Russell, eating delicious fried cheese, sipping Amstels, Cineys & Jenever all while learning how to count to ten in Dutch from our bartender, was one of those nights we'll remember for a long time.  It was perfect.  But all good things had to come to an end, we excused ourselves and returned to our cell.

The next day's adventure included a trip to the Holland Flower & Food Festival in Bovenkarspel.  I found out about this festival through the website, iamexpat; great site for events around the Netherlands.  It was only a 30 minute train ride from Hoorn.  I thought a little taste of spring was exactly what we both needed.  It was a nice manageable event, no where near the magnitude of the Philly Flower Show.  The tulips were amazing and they were EVERYWHERE in every color imaginable!  I also had one of the best red peppers I have EVER tasted from the free sample vegetable booth.  Yes, there were free samples of vegetables.  Awesome!

The Holland Flower and Food Festival  in Nine Pictures

Vicki took so many great pics; it was really tough choosing just nine for my collage.

Oh look, a bike.

From the Flower Show our initial plan was to trek back to our home in Oss. However, since our train was scheduled to go right through Amsterdam Central station, we decided to make a slight detour to see the city during a lite snowfall.  We figured since we were there, we'd scout out some pancakes along the way too.  Our destination was the Pancake Bakery on Prinsengracht.  We went with a bacon, cheese, & mushroom pancake (savory) and a pancake with banana, pineapple and ice cream (sweet).   Yes, they were as delicious as they sound.

Wine bottle art on a houseboat in Amsterdam

Our weekend getaway in North Holland was pretty successful.  Well, if you take out the fact that at the end I fowled up the timing of our train from Amsterdam to Oss because I thought 14:00 was 4 o'clock.  Don't ask, it was a long weekend.

I hope you enjoyed the adventures of this "Sissy-Boy" and his wife.  Cheers!

Sadly Sissy-Boy Homeland was closed.

Friday Fails

Since it's just the two of us during the evenings; my wife and I spend the time talking about each other's day.  You know, like this Seinfeld clip....

There have been a few conversations where we'll describe a certain day as a "Fail Day."  Not sure how it started, but we just started using that term to describe a crappy day. Now, we all have bad days,  it's just life. But I got to thinking about how a "Fail Day(s)" might be different for an expat.  

It seems when you're living abroad the smallest stumbles can really break you down.  When something goes wrong, it just hits an expat harder. I think there are a number of reasons behind this:

1.) LIMITED SUPPORT SYSTEM.  My wife and I haven't been here long, so we really don't have a support network to share and compare our frustrations. It's just us. Blogging, expat websites (see below) and twitter, has allowed me to compile a small network, which has been useful for venting, sharing and learning. Thanks to @Momofthreeunder , @escapebrussels & @gjamh ! Give their blogs a read here & here.  

2.) EXPERIENCE.  You've done a task like the one before you hundreds of times back in your home country. So why is it so hard to do now?  Examples like: paying for groceries, making  bank transactions and doing the laundry are all routine things.  But for an expat these activities and others must be relearned all over again with the little nuances that come with your host country.

3.) FAST FORWARDING  While we were in Ireland, a co-worker presented a unique observation about the life of an expat.  When you are growing up, everything happens in stages. You learn to walk,  you learn to talk, you learn how to interact with others. Then you learn more complex tasks, like shopping, eating, banking, driving etc. All of these activities span the course of some 15-16 years.  However, for an expat all of these events occur again, only this time, they are in fast forward and you have to do them all in the course of a day or a week.

So I'm going to play around with the idea of a weekly post, called "Friday Fails."  But this post and future posts are not meant to be "whoa is me" like stories.  I'm not into that.  More like, here's where we screwed up and here's how we tried to correct it.  Hopefully there's something here that future expats can learn from.  Sound good?  Alright, here I go.  Hope you enjoy. 

This Week In Fail Days

• Learning that our Dutch bank charges €7 Euro for direct deposits.  I thought I was pretty clear in my question when we opened the account about any associated charges. And the Dutch banker was very clear in his response that there were no charges with the account.    LESSON: Always read the fine print, even if it's in Dutch

• Having your debit card denied at the Albert Heijn (grocery store) This has the be the worst, especially when the line behind you continues to grow and the stares feel like lasers on the back of your neck.                                                                                                                   LESSON: Make sure you have cash on hand at all times.

• Spending days and days researching; translating, and tweeting to figure out how to apply for a discount train pass.  Only to find out after purchasing your subscription that it's not valid until weeks later.                                                                                                                           LESSON: The National Rail Company of the Netherlands, NS (Nederlandse Spoorwegen) is extremely responsive and loving via twitter, @NS_online.  Just read their profile:  "This is the official NS Twitter account. We love you 24/7 at the height of the current situation. Monday / Friday from 8h to 18h we live for you."  For international rail travel questions try tweeting @NSHispeed, equally as responsive.  The funny part was I tweeted them both in Dutch with the help of Google Translate.  I never thought about writing them in English. 
  Another great reference for figuring out public transport is AmsterdamTiPS.com .  These guys run an up to date and well maintained site with helpful information for visitors and expats.  They were also very responsive through email to my questions.  

To the denied credit card user goes the whiskey.

• Watching powerless as your VISA card does not work at a restaurant that advertises they accept credit cards. LESSON:  This has happend twice and both situations really ticked me off.  When it happend the first time I begrudgingly accepted the machine failure and forked over all my cash. Even though I had used my card successful two days before at this very restaurant!  But I wasn't going down so easily when it happened again at another restaurant.  I noticed that a customer ahead of me paid with credit and it worked fine.  But when I confidently put my card in next, the machine decides to go on the fritz.  I was going to wait this one out and demand that they take the card.  Looking back, I felt bad for the young waitress, she did her best and was on the phone for 20 minutes trying to rectify the situation.  Seeing her struggle, my black heart softened and I told her I had enough cash to cover.  BUT!  "How about a glass of Jameson on the house?"  She obliged and proceeded to give me the largest pour of whiskey I'd ever had.  Moral of the story: If your card doesn't work, see if you can get something on the house!

• Thinking train tickets for a trip to Cologne, Germany would be cheaper if you buy them a day before the trip?                                                                                                                      LESSON:  Buy early and save.  This is sort of a universal truth right?   

Feel free to describe your own fail days in the comments below.  

Ending on a depressed note is NOT something I want to do on a Friday. So, to use another Seinfeld reference,  I'll try to "Always leave on a high."  So here's a picture of me and a giant Lindt Truffle.  

Cheers to the weekend!

Some Great Expat Websites:

Wordless Wednesday: King Bandit

Bandit & Malahide Castle; Malahide, Co Dublin.  July 5, 2012

Unfortunately, Bandit could not accompany Vicki and I on our latest expat journey to the Netherlands. He's still back in the States.  We certainly had a blast with him in Ireland.   Miss you Bandito.  

Has this ever happened to you?

"Come on Apple Maps, where is the Cologne Cathedral?"