If you've not had the pleasure of sampling authentic Dutch bread, let me tell you that you are in for an experience you didn't see coming.

If you're a conservative/romantic when it comes to bread, you probably slice your bread with a knife. This means that a) it's hard enough to be sliced and b) it's a loaf, not pre-sliced. Well, if you come to Holland, both of those terribly reasonable assumptions are unapologetically cast aside.

When you buy bread here, it's a soft sponge. And it's pre-sliced. In fact, natives are so terrified of bread that isn't sliced that if you actually find it in the supermarket, a rarity in itself, it has a big label saying not sliced. :scared: Yeah, take your chances, buddy.

This presents a real practical problem, because the bread gets deformed before you get home. If you apply the classic 7-loaves-to-a-plastic-bag formula, you'll notice that you can fit many more loaves into a bag, just like you can fill a bucket with untold amounts of cotton. But the result is that the bread doesn't restore its original form, as a sponge would. It's permanently deformed. So now instead of putting bread at the bottom, you have to handle it like the most fragile piece of fruit, silk gloves treatment.

But that's not all. The bread here just isn't very good. Although there is plenty of choice, it's a choice of mediocre products. Sure enough, they may appear to have all kinds of different flavors, and different grains, and embellished packaging, but when you actually try it, you often realize that the most fancy looking products have an aftertaste you can't stand. They also smell funny. On the whole, the bread gives the impression of being manufactured, rather than baked.

Predictably, it's not just the bread. A rich culture for bread products tends to show in all kinds of pastry. One that Holland apparently doesn't have. And the pastry here is truly bad. There really isn't anything you would buy to say serve to guests, or for a snack. For instance, you'll find croissants, but they're far from the real thing.

In Poland the bread is certainly a lot more authentic, although it isn't that great. But not this mushy spongy stuff. Meanwhile, the pastry is very good, there's lots of choice and tradition.

In Norway the bread culture is very high, and just about any bread you can find is better than anything you'll find around here. The pastry side of things is less prosperous, there are a few trademark traditional products, but not too many of them. Then there's a tradition of imported products like Wiener-rolls, which is a cornerstone in Norwegian pastry. Not native perhaps, but embraced as one's own.

Theme

Children have very strong reflexes and often react in a clear, unambiguous way. When you're a kid, even though you are one of them, it can still come as a bit of a shock at how paranoid and over reaching some reflexes can be. To start off, the concept of sharing, which is advocated by parents as such an amazing thing, is very problematic, for kids and adults alike. But with kids it's a lot more obvious. Say you're with another kid, you both have toys of your own, and of course you're most curious about the other kid's toys, cause your own you know inside out. Just the same way, the other kid is interested in your toys. So you pick up one of the toys you want to examine, and just like that, out of the blue, a siren goes off. Mine, mine, mine!!!! You look up, the other kid is yelling at you. You're caught off guard, not knowing what to do, you drop the toy to make this bastard (no pun intended) stop. Just as you do that, he clutches the toy (which 4 seconds ago he was not remotely interested in) and holds it to his chest. Is it time to send the little critter to therapy? Relax, I wasn't about to take it from you, I just wanted to pick it up and have a looksie. Just because I'm holding it right now doesn't mean I'm not going to give it back to you in a second, doesn't mean I'm going to keep it forever. Although that is what your reaction would have been appropriate to.

Of course, as an adult, you will laugh it off. Hahaha, kids...
Contrast

A caravan is a fairly practical and inexpensive way to travel. You need a car with enough horsepower to pull it (so compact cars are out), but other than that you are your own master, go anywhere, sleep anywhere. That's the beauty of the car&caravan. You can go from campsite to campsite, but you don't have to. You can just as well pull over at a parking lot and spend the night there, quite comfortably. A caravan is bliss.

Unless you're in England. The English countryside (and allow me to generalize here) is not welcoming to caravans. In a classic caravan holiday scenario, you've driven for hours, you're approaching that landmark/city you're heading for, and it would be good to find a place right now to spend the night, so that tomorrow morning you can stroll into the city and check it out.

Normally, this is the easiest thing in the world. There's always a parking lot, a designated "sleep over" lot in the back of a gas station, a rest stop, or even just some side road where you can spend the night. Not so in England. Very hard to find that place to stop. Why? Because everything is private. Every side road is marked private and sealed off, you can't stop anywhere.

Variation

Rome is a very dense city. Parts (especially those of historical interest) are very old, with buildings planted very densely, narrow streets between them. This makes navigating (on foot) uncomfortable; yes, it's charming, but you start feeling like you can't get any space, everything is so cramp.

Because it's so dense, they tend to maximize the space they have. So when you look to the horizon and see this hilly terrain (because it is that as well), with these small pieces of property very close together, the land owners tend to leave no space between one piece of property and another. This is not the historical center, this is just plain 21st century Rome as it is. What you often see is a cascade of land property, every piece sealed off with a fence, and they're almost on top of each other. Some are small pieces of cultivated land, some are gardens, yet others are tiny football pitches.

Yes, football, the very reason I found myself in Italy the first time, what sparked my interest. Seeing that terrain arranged in that particular manner, I couldn't help thinking that boy it must be a pain to play football around here. There isn't one piece of land in sight that's actually open to the public, everything is sealed off with a fence, in these cramped little sections. So either you're blocked out (most likely), or you're at the mercy of someone to use the football field (not likely), or you're sneaking in to play hoping to not get caught (not such a great idea). Everything is private, there is no public space. How odd, how sad.

Da capo

It is with astonishment I notice the same culture in Holland. People are only too eager to put up signs telling other people to keep out of their property. It's mine, mine, mine!!! all over again. You come to a road that leads up to someone's house and there's a sign there saying private road, keep out. Relax, I wasn't about to build a cabin on your tiny stretch of road. I wasn't even going to park here, I just wanted to pull in so I could turn around and go the other way. You see this everywhere; there isn't one stretch of road or piece of land that doesn't carry a sign like this. Relax, I'm familiar with property.

Why are people so obsessed with marking their property, putting up fences, demonstrating in such a paranoid, over reaching way what is blindingly obvious?

Let's turn back to football. To the best of my knowledge, there isn't one, I repeat, not one football pitch in all of Utrecht that isn't sealed off with a fence. I can't say this for sure, but I know I've seen plenty, and all of them were sealed off. Why is this? Obviously, you won't leave your best grass pitch, that requires plenty of upkeep, open to the public for prompt destruction. But why isn't there anything that isn't restricted? (Short of those concrete-jungle playgrounds for kids in inner cities that are completely useless. Just to leave no doubt, you do not play football on concrete, case closed.)

Coda

Back in Norway, casual recreation is very big, and although the majority of kids start out in some sports club at age ~7, most of them quit pretty soon. These clubs are inexpensive for parents, they pay some fee, but sports clubs are also subsidized by the government to an extent. The property these clubs own is strictly speaking theirs, but it's usually not restricted in any way. We are not talking about professional clubs here, we're talking amateur clubs that (most of them) don't even have a senior squad.

The pitches are not surrounded by fences, anyone can come off the street any play, as you damn well please. That is, unless the club is using it, in which case they will shoo you away. (Which, of course, they do a lot, so you have to adjust to their schedule.) But basically, whatever pitch they have, gravel (standard in the 90s, phased out now), or astroturf (introduced en masse in the last decade), they use it, you use it, everyone's happy.

Of course, the clubs probably would prefer if you didn't play there. Any use will degrade the pitch, the goals, the nets, everything. But that's just the way it is. You pay taxes, they get a cut of it, the system works.

In Holland, no such thing. You wanna play some football? Love to. Where???

Ps. In the Baroque passacaglia you would have one theme and then any number of variations on that theme. In the Classical theme and variation it would be the same structure. In minuet and trio from the same era you have a theme, a contrast to the theme, and then the theme again, with each of the three parts further subdivided into smaller atomic pieces. Finally, in a rondo you would have a theme, then a contrast, then the theme again, then a development on the theme, then the theme again (and possibly more variations). There are codas to be found in quite a few of these structures, not strictly just at the very end, but also serving as interjections. However, the formula I concocted: a theme, a contrast, a variation of the contrast, a da capo and then a coda, does not fit any of these structures and is a non sequitor by all accounts, to either the Baroque or the the Classical era of music. Just so you wouldn't feel compelled to point out the obvious, I'm being quite frank about this.

I was playing basketball at the campus last night. The court is actually atop a kind of bar, right outside the main building. It was probably around 8pm, so dusk was setting in and there weren't many people about, mostly those heading home.

As the laws of physics dictate, once in a while your shot comes in at an angle such that the friction is sufficient and your ball gets caught between the rim and the glass/board, stuck. This is no big deal, it's happened to everyone lots of times. As a kid, you can't reach up there so you have to improvise. If you have a second ball you can hit the ball that's stuck and dislodge it. Or you can find something else to throw up there. Or you can climb the basket. Or you can fix your bike next to it and reach up from the seat. There are all kinds of possibilities.

Last night, before I had decided what to do, a guy came up the stairs, approaching me, threw down his backpack, muttering something in Dutch with a smile, and jumped for it. It was quite the shocker. Then he said "I saw from down below that your ball got stuck". First he used his super vision to see, then his super leap to get up there. I was amazed. And just like that, hadn't asked him or anything, didn't even have a clue what was going on when he came up the stairs. I mean if he'd been right there, sure I would have seen it coming. But he wasn't even in the vicinity. And yet he both saw it and decided to help out. Fantastic.

If you're wondering why he could reach it and I couldn't, it's because Holland is a country of giants.

The main police station in town is right near my house. That doesn't bode well, does it? Apparently not, because first my bike gets stolen, now someone thought it would be fun to steal the valves off of all the bikes parked in the area, so my rear tire is completely flat and there's no way I can inflate it. And since I'm not a bike mechanic with a stash of spare parts, and it's a holiday, I can't get it fixed until Tuesday.

There's scum on the block alright.

I wouldn't be surprised at such a thing in Poland, you hear about this crap all the time. But just when you think you live in a civilized country...

"Okay, now don't forget today at 5pm is the deadline for the last lab exercise, Friday I want your reports, Tuesday at 5pm is the deadline for your submissisons for the Big Assignment (and no later because I have to run them all on my laptop) and then I want to see you back here on Wednesday."

Gah :D

That's Easter in Holland for you. Good Friday and Easter Monday off.

Back in Norway Wednesday was the last official day, people would exchange "Happy Easter" greetings. I would normally take those few days off for a 10-day break, the Saturday before Palm Sunday to Easter Monday. It's a nice time to get away, in 2003 I spent it in Rome, in 2004 I did in Spain.

This year I'll spend it working on the Big Assignment. Adding to this week which has been all about the lab exercise, starting last Friday morning and all through the weekend. :/