Mission impossible

A meeting with other Finnish girls living in the Netherlands. Within the first half an hour, so many familiar items come up.

X: ".. And have you guys seen, that even in the middle of the winter the small children are not wearing mittens outside?"

Everyone: "Yes, in Finland you would get to hear it immediately if your child is not wearing proper winter gear."

Y: ".. And then - the small kids without helmets biking all over the place, while mom is having also one 1-year old without a helmet on her bike".

I think, regarding the above, a full assimilation to the dutch society might be simply unachievable for foreigners.

Library

An excerpt of a discussion one evening

Me: "I think I should finally get a library card"
Dutch: "Why do you need that?"
Me: "Well, they probably also have some English books there and it would be nice to check the selection and save some money when borrowing books instead of buying them".
Dutch: "Well you should see, which will be actually cheaper"
Me: "What??? Library is not FREE??"
Dutch: "What?? You have a FREE library in Finland?!"

So it turns out, that there is a yearly membership fee for the libraries. While it is around 50 euro's, it's the thought of having to pay that has yet prevented me to get the library card in the Netherlands.

Long time no update

It's been a while since the last post. Sometimes life takes over even the laziest of the bloggers. Instead of long stories, I am going now for a different approach - capturing small bits and pieces of the everyday life. Let's see what happens :)