Oh the Humanity!!!

Yep, it's true. I've gone through the time-tested right of passage that apparently everyone must go through before they can truly call themselves an Amsterdammer. My bike got STOLEN! Thieves! Bike stealing is aparently a favorite pastime of the underbelly of the Amsterdam community. This is why the trick is to ride around on the shittiest looking bike you can find so nobody finds it in any way appealing. Preferably it should be in such bad repair that any attempted thefts would result in the theif impaling themselves on it mid-heist.

I got my bike about 8 weeks ago. Never having caught the mountain bike craze, the last bike I owned had a bright yellow banana seat and an orange flag on the back - all going very well with my winged hair and muppets t-shirt so that gives you an idea of how long it'd been since I'd "cycled" anywhere. Mind you this is a Dutch bike that I bought so there are some differences.

First of all - it's massive. These things are big so I have to stand on my tippy toes to touch the ground when stopped. This does however help with the shock absorption which is a blessing since most canal streets are cobbly brick.

Second the handle bars on a dutch bike are both higher and narrower so you don't hunch over, you're sitting perfectly upright but your elbows are right in at your side. Disconcerting at first, but you soon learn it's a necessity for riding along the narrow canals and not getting hit by car mirrors when they pass you.

A bit of getting used to (and after I stopped getting off to walk my bike whenever I saw a car) I was biking to work everyday rain or shine. After 4 weeks I'd even mastered biking while holding and umbrella in the rain and biking while talking on the phone - one handed cycling certainly has it's challenges! I'd reached record status for a new biker having not fallen ONCE even coming home from the bar - this compared to my friend and fellow newcommer Brad who is soon going to be moving into double digits on the fall meter. (I should confess that I have thus far fallen down TWICE while just walking on the sidewalk...no drinks, no hazzards...I just bit it.)

How I loved my bike. It was big, shiney and fabulous. I had a great long ride to dinner and back meeting a friend on Tuesday night. It was an especially nice night out. I parked the bike outside my house and was horrified to see an empty space in the morning. very sad. So I've spent the week taking public transport again being very jealous of the bikers I see along the way. Tomorrow I go to buy my next bike, and while I will love it, it just won't be the same as my first trusty bike that saw me through the granny-slow turns when I was just starting out :(

15 Minutes of Fame Among the Dutch!

Going along with my ridiculously fortunate entree into Amsterdam, on the third weekend I was in town I went to a party of a great girl, Rebecca, who I met in a cafe in Washington DC 2 weeks before I moved over to Amsterdam. She was so nice and invited me for a fab 4th of July BBQ with other American expats wanting a slice of homelife. At the party we talked with a reporter who was there researching an article she was writing on expats living in the Netherlands. Enter the new, wide-eyed American...

A few days later we all got an email from the reporter telling us her editor was expanding the story and wanted to do individual interviews with us and then send a photographer around to each of us to get some photos. So I had the interview which was fun...and then comes the photographer. My fourth week of work I'm asking my boss if it's ok if a photographer comes into the office to follow me around for the day. Thankfully he didnt' have the "what the hell are you talking about" reaction and agreed. So in comes the photographer - who is fantastic by the way and does really nice work. I was supposed to just be "acting natural" and going about my day but come on - who's acting natural when they know they're getting their photo taken? Most of the time I was thinking "don't blink...don't blink...don't...DAMNIT I blinked!" The day went well despite my tendancy to laugh everytime I saw the camera, but it was fun having a photographer follow me home on the train. ha!

So now the article has appeared! It's in a magazine called Boulevard - a trendy fashion and lifestyle mag which was a welcome relief as I realized when I got into this I had no idea what publication this was going into and feared I was inadvertantly making my foray into Dutch porn!

Check it out - I'm in the online edition as well as the printed mag! www.blvd.nl By the way Rebecca is also in the mag - the sassy one in the red top. I'm going to buy it right now and walk around with it. I wonder if this is a good way to get dates? "Yes, that's me...I'm in a magazine!" Of course I can't read the article as it's in Dutch so it could be about how expat women are ruining the Netherlands and there I am smiling brightly.

So I'll say I knew you all when I was a mere minion! If you'd like to call to congratulate me you'll have to talk to my people...