But before I get into that, we go first to the tennis matches. Tim was to play a friend from Indonesia at his club, while Fabian and I were to play at his club twenty minutes away by bike. Court reservations are made digitally upon arrival. First the person scans their member card, and then chooses a thirty minute reservation on the court of his or her liking. This would also be my first time playing on a red clay (different from the real red clay, according to Fabian) We warmed up on a specially made "mini tennis" court, which is basically a very tiny version of a tennis court. Most people in the US will warm up this same way, but never have I seen a miniature court constructed just for this purpose. Like usual, my warmup went very well, but then, as we started playing, disaster struck. I lost the first set 0-6, unable to keep up with Fabian's consistency. Our court time had run out after this, so we sat down for a drink and waited to make another reservation. Once our time came, we played another two sets. I played better this time, although I still lost 1-6, 3-6. It is beginning to look like I may never defeat a member of the Meijs family, but I guess that is just a title that they can happily proclaim...
Fabian would join us for our excursion to Utrecht. The trip there was a hefty task in and of itself, but the most interesting part was that even though it is a fairly long distance, it is bike and pedestrian friendly the entire way. In fact, most of Holland is like this. For instance, if you cross a bridge on foot or bike in the US, you would likely feel out of place, as there is no path given for you to walk or ride on. In Holland, almost every street has its own paths on the side just for bikers and walkers. At every stoplight, there also exists a smaller traffic signal just for bikers and walkers. I will try and take a picture of this later. Theoretically, if I wanted to, I could bike the entire length of Holland just by using bike paths, although it might take several days. I'm sure my stepmom would love this, and even do it for that matter...
After a scenic thirty minutes or so, the countryside began turning into a downtown city, lined with shops, restaraunts, and other forms of entertainment. There were canals, with store openings there only accessible by boat. Hundreds of bikes were linked to all the railings, and we saw a vibrant little city. People having dinner outside, crowded walkways with people holding their newly bought possessions, bikers weaving in and out of these walkers, and all the noise associated with such activities. Take cars out of the equation and that's what it was like, because there were indeed no cars. We biked through this for about ten minutes and finally reached our destination. You might wonder, where would we park our bikes for such an excursion in the city? The answer is rather interesting, but not surprising either, given the already explained friendly-ness to bikers and pedestrians. Yes, bike parking garages do exist. Think of a car parking garage shrunk to about the size of a school gym, add bike posts instead of parking spots, and that's where our bikes would stay for the duration of our stay. Pretty impressive I would say.
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| Fabian, Paul, and Tim against a railing in front of a canal |
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| Bike against the railing along a canal |
Our plan was to meet with one of my German friends, Rieke, whom I met my junior year in high school. She arrived as planned, and we happily caught up, as it has been four or so years since I last saw her. She had travelled with her Dutch boyfriend, also a fluent English speaker (which is not uncommon for most people here). The five of us sat down and had some drinks while we waited for our tour of the highest dome in the Netherlands. It stands 368 feet above the ground, at almost the exact center of the city. We were to climb 465 steps to reach the top. Although very tiring, the result was quite nice, a panoramic view of the city. Far in the distance we picked out Tim's hometown of Bunnik, and we also admired the European forms of architecture that sat below us. It was quite beautiful.
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| Fabian, Paul, and Tim in front of the Dome Tower |
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| View from the Dome Tower |
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| Paul under the second loudest ringing bell in Western Europe |
During the tour, Tim saw a friend of his, who also had brought one of her friends along. Through discussion at the end of the tour, I found at that she was also going to Mannheim to study this coming semester. She will also be taking the same summer language course in August. What a small-world coincidence this was! We will be keeping in touch up until our arrivals in Germany. Afterwards, we bid farewell to Rieke and her boyfriend, but the other two joined me, Tim, and Fabian for dinner at a weirdly named Mexican restaraunt. It was just as delicious as any Mexican restaraunts in the US. We payed our Euros and headed back to our bikes, bidding farewell to the two girls in the process.
We rode back to Bunnik in the setting sun, passing more cows and fields along the way. The low temperature and occasional raindrops felt wonderful. We arrived back in Bunnik fourty-five minutes later and are now preparing to watch another movie. Another great day has indeed presented itself in this beautiful country. Tomorrow Tim and I will venture to Amsterdam, the largest city in the Netherlands. With all the commotion, I will likely be unable to post my experiences tomorrow, as we will have a late night...but I will try my best to convey the experiences to you when I am able. With that, have a good rest of your day and evening, and much love to the USA from the Netherlands!
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| Ik spreek geen Nederlands I do not speak Dutch |
-the blurred images were taken from my ipod touch, i will use my camera next time-
-for more pictures, visit my profile on facebook-
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