Quarter of the way through my Amsterdam experience! Wait, what?

It's hard to believe that I've been in Amsterdam for one whole month now. If feels both like I've been here for a year and like I just got here last week all at the same time. Things are still going well though! I hope I don't jinx anything by writing this, but the weather has been quite decent - chilly (but what can you expect from Amsterdam in March), but with much less rain than I had mentally prepared myself for coming over here. I don't have any major events to talk about since my last post, so I'll just talk about bits and pieces of random things that I've glossed over in previous posts.

1) My Dutch class. I'm enrolled in a pretty intense Dutch class - the course is only 6 weeks long and we meet Mondays and Thursdays from 18:30 to 21:30 (6:30-9:30 PM - along with Celsius I've converted to military time. I also write my dates backwards now. Today is 1/3/2012.) I had to take a placement test and tested into the advanced level because of my prior knowledge of Dutch/Flemish. When the first class started and we were going around just speaking and introducing ourselves I was feeling pretty confident, like "Yeah, I can totally ace this class!" And then we did a grammar exercise. Now my grammar is usually pretty good, but definitely not perfect. Just speaking though it's easier to get away with small mistakes, and some grammar elements only come out in writing, so I never learned those at all. When it came to doing grammar exercises out of a book though and having them corrected in front of a class, well, that's just a whole 'nother story. Not that I'll let it faze me! Learning and practicing Dutch was one of my primary reasons for coming here, and though I know I'll be overwhelmed at times, I'm excited to improve and then use my skills around the city and with the local people I meet. Even though it's three hours, the class goes by quickly, there's always so much to do. It also helps that my teacher is nice and keeps the class interesting and varied.

2) Bikes. I know in one of my previous posts I said I'd talk about biking at a later time and now I've got room for it! The prevalence of bikes here in Amsterdam is insane, but it's a really great system. Not having a bike here or having a car instead would both be incredibly inconvenient. I knew I'd be getting a bike when I came over here but I was a bit nervous, because I was picturing the American biking system. If I'm biking around town in the US I can only bike on the sidewalk (where pedestrians hate me and I am at constant risk of running into trash cans, telephone poles, etc.) or on the street (where cars hate me and I fear for my life). Here though there is ALWAYS a bike path that is completely separate from both the sidewalk and the street. Every once in a while it will combine with the road but then there's still plenty of room for cars and bikes to ride side by side. Parking here looks like it'd be even worse than in Clifton, and the government makes it tough to own a car what with taxes and all. The easiest way to spot a tourist is if somebody is walking on the bike path like it's a sidewalk. The first rule of Amsterdam is: You do not walk on the bike path. Locals do not care if you are in the way, they will ring their bell and continue at normal speed and you have to get out of the way or you will get run over. Since I'm living here for four months I consider myself an honorary local so I can do this now too :)

3) Food. If I could pick two foods to describe the Dutch diet it would be bread and cheese, and not necessarily at the same time. For example in one of my classes I saw someone who I knew to be a native Dutchman pull out a bag of what appeared to be hamburger buns. I was waiting for him to pull out another bag with toppings (you know, because he didn't want his bread to get soggy before he ate his sandwich, which is perfectly logical) but no. He just pulled out a hamburger bun and started eating it. Now don't get me wrong I love bread, a lot. But unless it's a baguette or something, I like my bread to have something on it. It doesn't have to be much, just some Nutella or a slice of prosciutto. I haven't had too much other food shock though, since carbs and cheese are two things that I thoroughly enjoy so for the most part the Dutch diet and I get along just fine.

And now since that was a lot of text here come some pictures!

 

The view from my room again, minus ice and plus swans!

One of my friends and I visited the NEMO Science Center over the weekend. Technically it's a children's museum, but that didn't stop us from having a good time! 

The science center was near a pier

 

I was able to get my nerd on here.

 Panoramic view of the city