Arrival in the Netherlands

After arriving in the Netherlands (and being absolutely dwarfed by all the extremely tall Dutch people), we managed to find our luggage, the bathroom, and a taxi (in that order). Our taxi driver, of course, had minimal English (but seriously, that’s the same as at home anyway!). After a stop-off at a giant city map, we finally pulled up outside our apartment building.

It’s not exactly the Hilton, but it’s got two bedrooms and central heating and will do us just fine, thank you very much. Other than the fact that there was no toilet paper, and we had no idea of how to get to a supermarket to buy any, it seemed to have most of the things you’d need. Luckily, Kinga (a workmate from NZ) had arrived the day before us and had already staked out the local pub for a number of hours. We hightailed it down there for a hot meal and may have slightly raided their bathroom stash of TP.

The view from our apartment is a canal which is most frequently used as a duck-pond. In the background you can (vaguely) see the tram lines, and the tram stop.

This is my room…

The only major issue from this point was the issue of the invisible flatmate – Cherilyn was due to fly in on the 31st but missed her flight and got stuck in Vegas for New Years (bummer, huh).