Musings in Schipol

An anachronistic post from December.

There’s nothing more annoying than being in a really interesting foreign city for 4 hours and being stuck in the airport because it’s 5:30 AM on a winter’s morning. But the joy of having a blog is that when you don’t really feel like eating or reading or buying souvenirs, you can always share your boredom with others!

My plane left SL at 6 AM – this meant I needed to be at the airport at 4 AM (I’m sure I could have got away with going later, but I’m obsessive about being at airports on time). I decided (still debating the wisdom of this) to stay up all night, thus obviating my least favourite thing to do – getting up early. My kind friend Arthur called me at 12:30 and talked to me until after 3, with me drifting in and out of consciousness (all nighters were a LOT easier to pull in college). At one point I woke up and she was humming some tune down the phone at me, so as to wake me gently.

The flights were fine, and I like the novelty of flying Royal KLM, with the flight attendants in their retro blue suits, and the unusually handsome men. I arrived in Amsterdam the next morning, bleary eyed and furry-toothed. The airport looks like Gatwick with more Dutch, and rather cool Christmas decorations.



Must admit I was a bit confused to see the signs saying “Holland” because a) I thought it was called the Netherlands now, and b) Even if it was Holland, shouldn’t it say it in Dutch, something like meerskierkegaardschnerken? Sort of feel like Joey in Friends in the episode where he thinks Chandler is teasing him about a Dutch girl being from the Netherlands, and says to the girl something like, “the Netherlands are this made-up magical place where Peter Pan lives.” Note to self – learn something about one’s continent.

Wish I knew “good morning” and “I would like a pastry” in Dutch. Also sort of feel like it is a big scam that they are all pretending to speak Dutch here (sort of like going to the obscure Scottish isles where they are desperately (and worthily) trying to keep the languages alive when only two people speak them, one of them is Prince Charles, and they both speak fluent English anyway. Please don’t tell any Dutch people I said that.

Was quite pleased to see Paul, yummy Euro bakery. Less pleased to find it closed due to being the middle of the night. Only other option was a deli, but even I can’t face a bacon sandwich in the wee hours.



Look, Dutch tulips! Now I just need to see a van gogh and I’ll be ready to leave.



One more thing – I know we Europeans like to make fun of the American “bigger is better” attitude, but let’s not take it to extremes, més frères, i.e. how about making those security gate plastic trays for laptops and coats big enough to hold, say, more than my socks? Love the multiple colours though. Very chic.