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First and Foremost, I need to shout-out to Serrrrruh Canosa because through all of my decision making and planning process for this trip, she has been there for me with never ending support. Thank you, Sarah for helping to encourage me to follow my dreams and go with this new adventure in life.
Now, onto Day 1:
I really didn’t listen TSA or whomever tells people things to go by when they are going on international trips for two main reasons: 1. Whenever they say something about new 3oz supplies and what not, I don’t care because I don’t pack that stuff. 2. I have one of the most skewed senses of time of all…time. If you were to ask my dad about my time-keeping abilities, he will without a doubt say” he has to speed up to slow down”. And he’s right. I usually think I’m doing fine, but don’t consider the small variables when travelling. Namely- traffic. Or forgetting things. Or just being ignorant of things. But I digress, my time is almost always skewed in my favor. Why? Because I haven’t had that ‘wake-up call’ that tells me otherwise. I’ve never missed a flight, never been kicked off for not checking in on time, etc (though one time I almost missed it, but that’s cause I confused a “something:45” with “something:15” Honest mistake.
Note: To any one who reads this that might employ me, my skewed sense of time is surprisingly applied only to my personal life. When I am employed, I am very meticulus with deadlines and timing in general. Know this.
Back to it: I thought to myself this morning, Feb. 6th- “I don’t need to be 3 hours early. 2 hours will be fine. Suck it, TSA”. Lonnng story short, when you’re flying internationally, be prepared for LONG ass lines of people who STILL don’t understand new flight regulations [yes, YOU, lady in the red dress, your high-heels, golden hoops, and freakishly small watch need to be scanned]. I am not hating on anyone specifcally, but honestly, flight regulations are going to be eerily similar throughout the world, so the fact that you can’t really speak English shouldn’t trump your abilities to get through security quickly. Just saying- I got through Dutch security pretty quickly using common sense.
FAST FORWARD: Amsterdam , ho!
I got quite lucky, all things considered, for I was sitting next to a quiet and very nice Dutch woman. I’m saying she’s Dutch, but to be honest, I am going off of 3 words, her accent for said 3 words, and how relaxed-yet-supremely excited she was to be in Amsterdam. I know the feeling everytime I fly into SeaTac. Anyone else can probably relate to the feeling as spending a long day shopping and finally coming home, the last stretch into the garage. Yeah, it’s a good feeling; however, I was not lucky for several other reasons. Instead of complaining in great detail, here is a small power-note style bitchout:
1. Four babies. Use your imagination;
2. Grown men punching and kicking the back of your seat. Seriously, how old do you have to be to not act like a small child on a public school bus?
3. Sitting behind a 12 year old. First thing the kid did was recline his chair to capacity.This act of ridiculous nearly decapitiated me when I was reaching for my bag;
4. Number 4’s buddy using your chair to pull himself out of his chair. This is simply irritating and doesn’t deserve any more of my time wasting complaining.
Good Things about my Flight to Amsterdam:
1. Aforementioned Dutch woman. I didn’t really talk to her much, but she had a nice ‘grandma’ atmosphere about her and I enjoyed sitting next to her;
2. Modest collection of on-board films. I started watching Inception, but felt that I needed to pay more attention and the inconsistent volumes didn’t give me the abilities to do this. I watched a few movies (will review later) and they weren’t bad choices-why? Because they didn’t censor them. This = happy mike;
3. Free beer. For anyone who knows me, my reasoning should not surprise you- ‘Nuff Said.
4. The Food. It wasn’t all that bad. I had the chicken and rice pilaf, with limited mixed greens, a roll, cheesestick and crackers. Dessert was a cookies ‘n’ crème brownie. Breakfast was weak in comparison [egg mcmuffin with some odd condiment] and a banana. But I reiterate- free beer. Heineken makes all poor breakfasts better
At first, my arrival was absolutely surreal. I never thought that I’d be standing there, in the Netherlands, on my dream trip to Norway. So what naturally was the first thing I did upon setting foot in the Schiphol? I deuced. I know, I know-MONDO inappropriate, but it’s true! I took a picture of the Schiphol sign and then did my deed. Am I proud of it? Yes. Would I do it again in that order? In a heartbeat. Anyway, Schiphol wasn’t too confusing, however, the overwhelming desire for the Dutch to smell good was. From gate to gate, I saw at least -at least- 4 fullsized perfume stores. Ralph Lauren was EVERYWHERE! And by Ralph Lauren I mean the pungent odor of hundreds of perfumes and colognes mixing together to make this all-encompassing smell that was nothing I’d wear on the first date and probably could be found in my grandfather’s bathroom cabinet [sorry, GPA, but it’s true] i.e. Ralph Lauren.
I’m not sure if every international airport makes you go through security (once) while leaving your origin country and (again) in the transfer country, but The Netherlands do and I’ll tell you huwaht- they do not want to be there JUST as much as you don’t. The lines were built up akin to a scene from 28Weeks Later when everyone realizes there is a zombie in the room so they all run and crowd by the only exit; Unfortunately, we were all running towards the zombies. They were alright once we got up to the window, but like a teenager working the McDonald’s drive thru, saying the same line over and over had gotten to them and it showed.
[copy and paste this into your computer’s automated voice – “microsoft sam” for PCs]
“Hello. How are you. Good. Where are you travelling to. Kristiansand? Why? For how long? That’s neat. Enjoy.”
Like I said, I doubt they meant to be drones and hold up thousands of people from an ill-desire to be working there, but I get it. I mean, c’mon, I worked in customer service for over 4 years (collective), I feel them. I think what they needed, though, was something AWESOME to happen. Like, have Johnny Depp from Blow come in with some cocaine in his suitcase and totally get busted. I bet the guy that helped me would have been the first to pop him just so he could feel alive [editors note: I find this sentence interesting because in order for the guard, in my hypothetical situation feel alive, he would have to kill. Hmmm]. In any case, standing in line wasn’t all that bad because I had plenty of time before my flight and it gave me a chance to listen to all the languages around me. I was able to soon enough discern Dutch from the different dialects of Norwegian, so I felt pretttty badass, just sayin’….
I eventually got through and was able to connect to the local wifi and do the customary Facebook message to mother. I would have called, but you needed this special phonecard and I honestly did not want to waste my small amount of Euros on it. Sorry Mom, you can wait until I get a prepaid phone in Norway. When my flight arrived, I boarded easily and tried sleeping, but everytime I got close, the two kids in the seats in front of me would jibber-jabber about random things and I’d perk up realizing that I could understand them. Mostly they were asking about driving and how long it was going to take to get home, because they missed their video games…BUT…I could understand them and I felt proud. My next challenge: speaking my rusty Norwegian with the natives.
Fra Norge med Kjærlighet
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