Well, let me tell you about that little trip I took to the Netherlands for work.

I have never traveled much outside of the US so I really had no idea what to expect. But early on, I had resolved myself to just take everything as it came and roll with it. I figured if I went into it with a good attitude, people should respond well to the foreigner in their midst.

My first bit of culture shock was when I got off the airplane in Amsterdam. Multiple languages. Whoa. Next was hopping on a commuter train to travel the 80 kilometers to the town we were staying in.

I have never in my life had the opportunity or the need to take public transportation. So hopping on a commuter train was way weird to me. (Believe me, I got over it and actually got pretty good at getting around on the train.) But the next bit just floored me. The train we were riding on was following a canal and I looked out the train window to see a barge going past. It was taller than I was. I had to look up at it! The one thing I learned though is town names are spelled the same even if pronounced slightly differently than what I might say. So switching trains at varoius depots actually was pretty easy.

Another thing I learned is the Dutch people are highly educated. I usually opened any conversation with, "I'm sorry, but I don't speak any Dutch. Do you speak any English?" And normally the answer was "Yes. A little." And that was enough to get by. I think my willingness to at least try to learn Dutch went a long way with the people I dealt with daily and they would treat me great.

One guy that went with us is a real "hill-billy". He was also very stuck in his ways. He just didn't understand "Why don't they just speak English? It's easier than this damn Dutch." Yeah, try to explain to him that this is a different country and they have thousands of years of history.

Over all, everyone was great to work with and those interactions out in town were very good.

The company rented us guys a old farm house about 11 kilometers from the plant. It was on 5 acres and had an apple orchard and a cherry orchard on the property. It was only about a kilometer to the nearest town and about a kilometer from the Rheine River. I ended up spending much of my free time fishing in the Rheine and a lake that was across the road from the house. I even got a fishing license, which was lucky because I was picked up by the police while fishing one day. I could have gone to jail without the license! But the cop was a cute blond woman who also liked to fish, so I ended up talking to her for about 20 minutes about were to fish in the area.

I arrived in the Netherlands on May 7th and M got there a week later. She was able to spend almost two weeks with me. We wanted to have her come nearer the end of my time there, that way I could have "scouted" the area and taken her around with more knowledge. As it was it worked out pretty good since we got to experience new things together.

We did the whole tourist thing in Amsterdam and rode the canal boats, saw the Anne Frank house, walked by the "coffee shops" (and no, I did not try any of the legal weed there. I figured I made it 38 years without it, I could live without a little longer. Which was a good thing. I later learned that the sophisticated culture of pot smoking had evolved some very potent weed, and the weakest stuff they had was like US weed times ten!), we walked through the Red Light district after dark and commented on the hookers.

On a side note about the hookers: While they were normally very beautiful young women, they looked like mannequins under those red lights. What I mean is they looked fake. I could get more turned on by the figures in the JC Penny's store window... Not tempting in the least.

After Amsterdam we rode the train and buses to Harlaam about 30 kilometers south of there. We had planned to go to the tulip fields but we were about two weeks late and they were closed. So instead we kicked back and relaxed there in Harlaam. Which turned out to be a fantastic way to spend a afternoon and evening. We hopped the train out to Zandvort from Harlaam and went to the beach for a few hours. The North Sea is VERY cold. Trust me! But the sun was out and I kicked off my shoes and shirt and walked the beach with my sweetheart.

Strangely enough it was my wife who pointed out that we were walking on a topless beach. Another first for me. I have never had someone have point out bare breasts to me. Usually I gravitate towards 'em like a compass pointing north!

We stopped at a beach cafe and she had a couple glasses of wine and I had a few beers and just enjoyed spending time together, kicking back and relaxing.

We hopped back on the train to Harlaam and the hotel room we had booked. After we got settled in we went out to eat. After supper we stopped at a bar just down the street from the hotel and ended up spending the rest of the evening sitting out at the sidewalk tables and talking, commenting on the passersby and drinking. I even got a cigar from a fellow patron and had my first smoke in years.

We then made it back to the hotel and a pleasent evening enjoying each others company. (Hint hint. Nudge nudge. Say no more!)

The next day was Monday and a national holiday. It was so cool! The town square was full of old calliopes. Steam powered, air powered and even one that was powered by a goat on a treadmill! As we sat outside eating breakfast all these old colliapies started up. It was like we were at 20 different circuses at the same time! We spent most of the morning wandering between these old time music machines and seeing how they worked.

Whew. I've wrote all of this on my phone and my fingers are tired. I have pictures at home on the laptop and I will probably put some up when I get out of work. So stay tuned!

Until then:

I'm Alive... So Far...