Well, it finally happened. I knew it was doomed to happen to me sooner or later. My bike was stolen. And just right out in front of our house, too! Ok, ok, so I may have helped the jerk out by leaving my key in the lock for him! oops
But still, our neighborhood is so nice and quiet and friendly feeling that I can't believe anyone living around here stole it. Though it is quite possible that I am simply naive because the statistic here in Amsterdam is that there are roughly 600,000 bikes and that every year 1million are stolen. huh? Yup, every year almost all the bikes are stolen twice!!
To my credit, I did go almost 3 years before a bike of mine was ever stolen.
So now I am on the hunt for a new one. We are hoping something used from a friend turns up, but by Monday, if nothing turns up, then we will give in and get something new for me of off of Marktplaats (Dutch ebay).
SEIZE:
April 30th is the Queen's birthday (Koninginnedag)...or rather it is the Queen's mother's birthday (the current Queen's birthday is in January and that is just too cold a date for the Dutch to celebrate, so they all somehow decided to keep the 30th of April as the celebration day).
On that day the entire Netherlands is transformed into an orange (royal color) wonderland.
It is also the day that much of Amsterdam is turned into the Vrijmarkt (free market)=basically a glorified garage sale. Anyone and everyone can seize a peice of land that has been approved by the government for a selling area. And they can pretty much sell anything.
Since this was my first Koninginnedag to experience, I decided I wanted to go all out and be at the vrijmarkt when it opened at 6am and of course be wearing the mandatory orange shirt to display my Dutch pride.
I must say that I am quite proud of the fabulous finds I brought home. We needed some things to make our house a bit more homey feeling (I got some large cushions for our couch, some tall candlestick holder things that sit on the ground and are about 2feet tall, a large colored glass bowl for center peice, and a nice jacket which I couldn't refuse for a mere 5euros, oh yea and nice pair of tall brown leather boots).
The only challenge was brining everything home on the bike. Once I packed it up like a mule, I cautiously climbed on and attempted to balance while large cushions flanked me on either side, the candlesticks were perched on the back area, and I had a backpack on with the other stuff inside. Just at the moment I was taking off to proudly show my wares to Bas, the bike decided like a stubborn pack mule to rebel and the chain suddenly slipped off leaving my feet to spin rapidly about while going absolutely nowhere. After a short battle, I beat the bike into submission and I merrily pedaled home.
The rest of the day was spent with a group of friends who came into Amsterdam to celebrate with us. We braved the crowds and went out for a few hours to just wander around. In the evening we hosted a barbeque at our house. It was a great introduction for me as just what exactly Koninginnedag is all about.
A sad side note:
Every year the Queen visits a different city/town. This year as she was presented, some wacko in a car tried to run over her! Things like that basically never happen here. The Queen is very admired and loved, so the country's celebrations were a bit dampened by that. The Queen is fine fortunately.
CHEESE:
On our first anniversary, Bas and I got a photo taken of us in traditional Dutch costume
Hope you enjoy!
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