June 18, 2007

Another country, another blog.

FlightKL18 is intended to be a genuinely new creation.

Partially, this is due to some format changes—a shift to a monthly schedule (though I reserve the right to incorporate special news, announcements or musings between publication days)--and a desire to seek more editorial contributions from readers in addition to the frequent comments.

More importantly, FlightKL18 comes from a much different place than did its predecessor. Not just geographically, though some of the content will focus on my encounters with life in the Netherlands. But also from a sense of perspective—having spent the last four years holding onto a dream of returning to Europe, FlightKL18 will be an account of the highs and lows of the life that transpires as that dream is fulfilled on a day by day, moment by moment basis.

The Netherlands is no nirvana—it is a real, gritty place with a personality and some major problems and deficiencies. But the process of encountering those problems and deficiencies can be invigorating as well as irritating—and there are some things I am enjoying immensely.

To be sure, FlightKL18 won’t just be a travelogue—not with a US presidential election, the buying and selling of players as the teams English Soccer’s Premiership beef up for the coming campaign, and Coach Bret Bielema’s second season as the gridiron coach of the University of Wisconsin at hand. So without further ado (or as DC United would say, without Freddy Adu), here is the launch of FlightKL18.

(PS: In case you were wondering, the airline shorthand KL stands for KLM, the French-owned Dutch national airline, and 18 indicates that FlightKL18 will appear monthly, on the 18th.)

THIS IS NOT MIAMI

As many of you may know, I love house and dance music, even when it’s cheesy and has weak or even semi-intelligible lyrics. So, while on a tram in The Hague recently, I heard a thumping, pulsating beat, and the lyrics: “This is not Miami…This is not Bangkok…This is not Geneva…This is not New Yawk…” were unforgettable both for the inanity and for DJ Sander Kleinenberg’s ability to find semi-credible urban rhyming pairs. (This is not Chicago…This is not Dubai…This is not Sao Paulo…This is not Shanghai). So, in the spirit of Dutchman Kleinenberg, here are some bits and pieces from my first few weeks in the NL:

This is not Miami…This is not NC

By northern European standards, The Hague is a strange city. In a nation known for its historic sixteenth-century town centers, The Hague (or Den Haag [Den Haaaaakkhh] as the locals call it) is a 19th and 20th century creation, with a center relatively free of tourists, marijuana coffeehouses, and characteristic Netherlandish charm with a few exceptions like the supposedly spectacular Mauritshuis (Mauritshouse) museum in the genuinely historic parliament complex. But while The Hague is the functional capital of the NL (Amsterdam being the official one), what makes The Hague special is that it has a substantial beach.

Coming from an official capital where the multi-hour trip to the North Carolina beaches was a pilgrimage of epochal proportions; being able to hop a city bus or tram and feel warmish sand between my toes twenty minutes later was quite pleasant an unusual. Add a limited selection of Belgian beers and the “Standard Dutch Menu” to the equation, and the experience becomes priceless. Not quite Miami—but well worth the price of admission.

This is not Brussels…This is not Paree

For a long time, I saw the Netherlands as an extension/soul mate of its neighbor to the South, Brussels. But from a culinary perspective, nothing could be further from the truth. To be sure, one can eat well in the NL, but it genuinely takes an effort, either to find good ethnic cuisine (good Indonesian, Turkish and Surinamese are thick on the ground), or to find local restaurants that prepare their own dishes and sauces rather than relying on MSG-laden mixes and sauce preparations which are otherwise de rigeur here.

Indeed, one thing I noticed immediately is the existence of “the standard menu”, which can be found at 75% of the restaurants or eetcafes (atecafes) I’ve encountered. It tends to include the following items:

Sate (chicken or pork) with fries
Entrecote (a tiny steak) with fries and occasionally
Varkenshaas (some kind of a pork cutlet with mix gravy) with fries
Schnitzel (some kind of a fried pork cutlet) with applesauce and fried
A pasta dish
A vegetarian dish
Fish of the day
Special of the day
One or two house specialties

Prices range from 12.50 Euros to 17.50 Euros almost uniformly, with the Entrecote usually seizing top position.

As I said, there is good food to be found, but the Calvinist background and the residual damage done to the national palate by the Nazi “hongerwinter” of 1945 (a concerted effort to starve the troublesome Dutch as the “Tweede Wereld Oorlog” [WWII] drew to a close) mean that people don’t see it as much of an entitlement or focus as the more “burgundian” Belgians. As for lunch—let’s save that for another edition.

This is not Detroit…This is not Osaka

Forget about your car (if you can park it). Public transport is king in the NL. Not only do they have a tightly interconnected network of buses, trams, light rail, metros and intercity rail lines, they also have the best transit information service I have ever seen.

The 9292 site (www.9292ov.nl) offers users door-to-door travel information between any two addresses in the NL, offering a minimum of four options based either on desired departure or arrival time. Options include different modes (with cheap monthly passes for local trams and buses, some users may opt not to pay extra for a national rail ticket that shaves five minutes off a journey), and the comparative fares for the respective alternatives are shown. And for the most part, the information is accurate—trains run fastidiously to schedule, buses less so but with still-reasonable punctuality.

This is sorta like Dublin…This is like Milwaukee

The Irish speak of something called “craic”—to describe the atmosphere of a place and of the people drinking therein. And when I asked myself to think of European and American cities The Hague most closely resembles, I think of Dublin and Milwaukee. Partially, it’s an issue of size: The Hague is the NL’s third largest city at 450,000 in the city limits and 1.3 million in its truncated metropolitan area (as it is hemmed in by the Rotterdam and Leiden metros in two directions). Partially, it’s an issue of age—Den Haag, Dublin and Milwaukee are mainly 19th century cities in style and spirit, though Den Haag has seen a flurry of ultramodern skyscraper construction that give it a skyline of similar depth and density to…Milwaukee!

Just as the construction of a state-of-the-art baseball stadium in Milwaukee has failed to improve the local team’s fortunes, the construction of a state-of-the-art soccer stadium in Den Haag actually caused on-field performance to deteriorate due to budget pressure; the brand new stadium will be the most expensive in the Dutch second tier next season as local heroes ADO Den Haag were relegated from the top flight..

As for the “craic”—Den Haag is a city filled with “gezellig” (cozy) watering holes, and the locals will often speak to a stray English speaker in the language of Shakespeare (or at least its current form). Their menus are quite limited, with usually four-eight kinds of beer, including one or two brands of standard pilsner like Heineken or occasional variants like Grolsch (true pronunciation: Khrolssss), Brand, a southern regional champ, or InBev brews Dommelsch or Hertog Jan, usually served in tiny 250ml glasses that resemble wide cigars or very tall shot glasses. (The small glasses keep the beer cold say the aficionados).

(I know Milwaukee doesn’t rhyme with Osaka. Please humor me.)

This is the NL

Here are a few more tidbits—I may elaborate on them in future issues:

1) There are great things about working for a top-tier energy company—working with good people and working for good people
2) I went to three highly picturesque small towns this weekend as my Dutch online dating jihad begins
3) I am feverishly looking for an apartment capable of handling guests, and I’ll let you know when I’m ready for visitors
4) What American Jews call corned beef and British Jews call salt beef is called pekelvlees by the Dutch and its consumption knows no sectarian bounds
5) I’m coming to London on 29 June through 3 July to attend the book signing of a former boss
6) I joined a gym where the ‘health beverages” have cyclamates, a sweetener long-banned in the US (though clearly less evil than Aspartame or NutraDeath)
7) Who needs sushi when you can get a whole salted herring for E1.50, with or without onions (without onions, the buggers are already one of my top-10 favorite foods)
8) The Netherlands has a massive natural gas field which makes the country self-sufficient in the fuel, and some oil as well.
9) A major reason why The Hague became the country’s political center (it’s nickname ‘Hofstad’, or ‘Court City’ is a pun on ‘Hoofdstad’ or ‘capital city’) is that it was unincorporated for most of its history and thus considered neutral by the barons and counts making the decision to convene there.
10) Finally, the NL has no designated hitter rule—but has a surprisingly rich baseball history for a European country.

I hope that you’ve had a pleasant flight…until next month, thank you for flying FlightKL18