Monday, October 24, 2005
The True Foreign Experience: Part I
Having Friday’s off is really quite nice. I get to enjoy that long weekend every weekend. Naturally, Thursday is still the new Friday and particularly in my situation. On Mar’s Friday, I took the metro to Spijkenisse after work. Hans lives in Spijkenisse; here I had a delectable Chinese meal with 11 family members. With coffee, we had a speculaas marzipan filled snoopje. It was made with roomboter, hence the deliciousness. Rink and Lettie brought Wesley and I met Hans’ kids for the first time. Oma and Opa were present as well. It was nice to see them again; the last time I saw them was when they visited the states and I rode around on Geert’s back. I was a bit younger and a brownie or junior in Girl Scouts if I remember correctly. The kids in my family are pretty cute if I do say so myself. Rink and Lettie drove my parents and I back to Rotterdam after the visit.
Friday morning, I awoke and went to my parent’s hotel to begin a day of shopping with my mom. After waiting for my dad to download pictures from his camera, all three of us left the hotel. The first stop was a shoe store with larger shoe sizes. We spent a good deal of time here, but no shoes were found. Apparently, the Dutch think people with larger feet don’t like fashionable shoes either. Some things are the same across all cultures. Next, we went on a search to find some wireless Internet for my dad. I think he finally came to the realization it is a bit more difficult to come by here or at least to find places to connect. After wandering with him for at least an hour, my mom and I departed and left him to do his work. Later, we found out he discovered a place to connect to the Internet but he had to pay a lot for it.
My mom and I finally ventured off to begin a bit of shopping so we wandered through the massive amount of stores Rotterdam Centrum has to offer. We spent a great deal of time in H&M where my mom bought me some warmer clothes for the changing temperature. Last week was a much colder week and my collection of warmer clothing was very minimal. After H&M, my warmer clothing collection drastically increased.
From here, my mom wanted to show me HEMA, a Dutch store. I will describe it as the equivalent of a Target. But, the food section of HEMA is far superior to any Target or any American super-store. We looked at the tart section; it looked lekker. We went up and down all the escalators to all the floors; the top floor is reminiscent of an IKEA with a place to sit and eat your lunch. (This is located in many major stores.) After walking around some more and showing my mom different places on the street, we met up with my dad again to see the cube houses.
My mom kept commenting on how she would not like to live in them. My dad tried to take some pictures and said they weren’t very photographic. (There wasn’t good lighting either; this didn’t aid in capturing a good shot of the cube house but man, do I know my dad tried. Let’s just say, he takes picture-taking seriously and is not afraid to shoot twenty pictures or more of the same object due to the technological advancements of the digital camera and the ability to delete poor pictures later.) From here, we walked across the street where I pointed out Plan C to my parents, a former blog topic. I decided to walk them by the Nieuwe Mass to show my parents a couple more places and things before going to the Euromast. We started at the Wilemsbrug and walked towards the Erasmusbrug.
Lucky for us, the rain started to pour. I stupidly left my good umbrella at home this day and was forced to endure the windy rain with a flimsy non-wind resistant tiny umbrella. We walked between the bridges, decided against going to the Euromast due to the weather and our water-soaked clothes and went on a search for a place to eat. The first place I intended to go to was closed. The second place I intended to go to wasn’t in the location I thought it was in. We ended up finding a Greek restaurant.
This was a bit difficult for my dad and me, although more difficult for my dad. We attempted to scour the menu in Dutch and order Greek. Service in the Nederlands is much much slower than dining at a restaurant in the states. So, if not ready to order when a waiter or waitress does come by without being waived over, you probably have a lot longer to wait until you are able to order until they come around again. A half hour later, I think we were ready to order.
My dad ended up getting the special, a mixed grill. My mom and I ordered something that entailed beef stukjes and another with a mix of things. I couldn’t decipher everything on the menu, so was a bit daring and ordered something that looked to be the reminiscent of good. My dad and I split a flesje rode wijn. When dinner was brought to the table, my mom and I didn’t know what to expect and didn’t really remember exactly what we had ordered. So, the plates were placed in front of us and we debated whose was whose. I ended up with the plate of beef stukjes and my mom had the other plate. My mom’s plate was by far the tastiest of all three of us. My plate was simply loads of meat; I can describe the taste no better than tasting like a serving of hamburger helper. The whole meal, my mom and I were trying to determine if we were eating what we had ordered.
After dinner, my dad and I decided to try dessert as they had a Dutch dessert dish my mom told us about and my dad and I wanted to try it. The waiter brought my dad a menu in English this time as it was pretty apparent that he could not speak Dutch. I had them fooled with my uttering of common words in Dutch. I received a menu in Dutch alongside my mom. With dessert, I ordered a cup of coffee in true Dutch fashion, my dad order white coffee off of the English menu which was koffie met slagroom (coffee with whipped cream) on the Dutch menu, and my mom decided to try Greek coffee. Two cups of coffee arrived. One was a simple cup of coffee, mine. The other was some kind of coffee, and so my mom took it. We thought they may have mixed up my dad’s order, so he did not get anything at this point. A little while later after the dessert had arrived, another small cup of coffee arrived as well. This was the Greek coffee. My mom gave back the other coffee to my dad after drinking a quarter of it and took her Greek coffee. She wasn’t a fan. She took a sip and a not very pleasant look came across her face. My dad laughed as he knew what Greek coffee was like and refused a sip. I tried it; it wasn’t that good at all. She forced it down over the next minutes leaving the thick grounds in the bottom. Three hours later, dinner was complete.
My mom and I discovered when the menus arrived to order dessert that we had in fact eaten each others orders. The hamburger helper was my mom’s order and the tastier meal was mine although I had eaten the hamburger helper and my mom and eaten the tastier of the two. Oh, well.
The next morning we met Rink to go to the Delta Works with Hans and the kids. I will write about the remaining part of the weekend shortly as the true foreign experience continued. And now, for a short break...
Friday morning, I awoke and went to my parent’s hotel to begin a day of shopping with my mom. After waiting for my dad to download pictures from his camera, all three of us left the hotel. The first stop was a shoe store with larger shoe sizes. We spent a good deal of time here, but no shoes were found. Apparently, the Dutch think people with larger feet don’t like fashionable shoes either. Some things are the same across all cultures. Next, we went on a search to find some wireless Internet for my dad. I think he finally came to the realization it is a bit more difficult to come by here or at least to find places to connect. After wandering with him for at least an hour, my mom and I departed and left him to do his work. Later, we found out he discovered a place to connect to the Internet but he had to pay a lot for it.
My mom and I finally ventured off to begin a bit of shopping so we wandered through the massive amount of stores Rotterdam Centrum has to offer. We spent a great deal of time in H&M where my mom bought me some warmer clothes for the changing temperature. Last week was a much colder week and my collection of warmer clothing was very minimal. After H&M, my warmer clothing collection drastically increased.
From here, my mom wanted to show me HEMA, a Dutch store. I will describe it as the equivalent of a Target. But, the food section of HEMA is far superior to any Target or any American super-store. We looked at the tart section; it looked lekker. We went up and down all the escalators to all the floors; the top floor is reminiscent of an IKEA with a place to sit and eat your lunch. (This is located in many major stores.) After walking around some more and showing my mom different places on the street, we met up with my dad again to see the cube houses.
My mom kept commenting on how she would not like to live in them. My dad tried to take some pictures and said they weren’t very photographic. (There wasn’t good lighting either; this didn’t aid in capturing a good shot of the cube house but man, do I know my dad tried. Let’s just say, he takes picture-taking seriously and is not afraid to shoot twenty pictures or more of the same object due to the technological advancements of the digital camera and the ability to delete poor pictures later.) From here, we walked across the street where I pointed out Plan C to my parents, a former blog topic. I decided to walk them by the Nieuwe Mass to show my parents a couple more places and things before going to the Euromast. We started at the Wilemsbrug and walked towards the Erasmusbrug.
Lucky for us, the rain started to pour. I stupidly left my good umbrella at home this day and was forced to endure the windy rain with a flimsy non-wind resistant tiny umbrella. We walked between the bridges, decided against going to the Euromast due to the weather and our water-soaked clothes and went on a search for a place to eat. The first place I intended to go to was closed. The second place I intended to go to wasn’t in the location I thought it was in. We ended up finding a Greek restaurant.
This was a bit difficult for my dad and me, although more difficult for my dad. We attempted to scour the menu in Dutch and order Greek. Service in the Nederlands is much much slower than dining at a restaurant in the states. So, if not ready to order when a waiter or waitress does come by without being waived over, you probably have a lot longer to wait until you are able to order until they come around again. A half hour later, I think we were ready to order.
My dad ended up getting the special, a mixed grill. My mom and I ordered something that entailed beef stukjes and another with a mix of things. I couldn’t decipher everything on the menu, so was a bit daring and ordered something that looked to be the reminiscent of good. My dad and I split a flesje rode wijn. When dinner was brought to the table, my mom and I didn’t know what to expect and didn’t really remember exactly what we had ordered. So, the plates were placed in front of us and we debated whose was whose. I ended up with the plate of beef stukjes and my mom had the other plate. My mom’s plate was by far the tastiest of all three of us. My plate was simply loads of meat; I can describe the taste no better than tasting like a serving of hamburger helper. The whole meal, my mom and I were trying to determine if we were eating what we had ordered.
After dinner, my dad and I decided to try dessert as they had a Dutch dessert dish my mom told us about and my dad and I wanted to try it. The waiter brought my dad a menu in English this time as it was pretty apparent that he could not speak Dutch. I had them fooled with my uttering of common words in Dutch. I received a menu in Dutch alongside my mom. With dessert, I ordered a cup of coffee in true Dutch fashion, my dad order white coffee off of the English menu which was koffie met slagroom (coffee with whipped cream) on the Dutch menu, and my mom decided to try Greek coffee. Two cups of coffee arrived. One was a simple cup of coffee, mine. The other was some kind of coffee, and so my mom took it. We thought they may have mixed up my dad’s order, so he did not get anything at this point. A little while later after the dessert had arrived, another small cup of coffee arrived as well. This was the Greek coffee. My mom gave back the other coffee to my dad after drinking a quarter of it and took her Greek coffee. She wasn’t a fan. She took a sip and a not very pleasant look came across her face. My dad laughed as he knew what Greek coffee was like and refused a sip. I tried it; it wasn’t that good at all. She forced it down over the next minutes leaving the thick grounds in the bottom. Three hours later, dinner was complete.
My mom and I discovered when the menus arrived to order dessert that we had in fact eaten each others orders. The hamburger helper was my mom’s order and the tastier meal was mine although I had eaten the hamburger helper and my mom and eaten the tastier of the two. Oh, well.
The next morning we met Rink to go to the Delta Works with Hans and the kids. I will write about the remaining part of the weekend shortly as the true foreign experience continued. And now, for a short break...
