Trash Rules

Last week we received a letter from the City of Haarlem. They've changed our trash day to Thursday. No problem. The next part was hard core, though.



In order to keep our streets beautiful, we are to put our trash out between 5:30 and 7:30 AM on the day that trash is collected (Thursdays). Should we choose to put our trash cans on the curb earlier, like the night before, we may be fined by the milleupolitie - the Environmental Police. (Some Dutch information about the fine folks in Zeebrug, for example) The fine for putting your trash out early is 50 Euro. That's expensive trash.



A friend of mine had house guests a couple of years ago who wanted to help out by taking out the trash while he was out. Unfortunately, the trash went out on the wrong day and he ended up with a 70 euro fine. At least we don't live in Amsterdam!

Aberdonian Petrophysicist

Does this even exist? Some people claim it does. Aberdonian... Is that what they call them in South Dakota, too?

Films for Class

One of my quests lately is to find interesting films to show my classes, something that shows different concepts of "normal" and how those concepts clash. Two I've enjoyed are Not One Less and Fear and Trembling. Another one that I enjoyed but probably wouldn't use for class is Eve and the Fire Horse. But I've already blogged about that one.

Not One Less is about young girl who becomes a substitute teacher for a month in a rural Chinese village. The scene that I get a kick out of and want to use for class in one in which the students are figuring out how many bricks they have to move in order to earn money for bus fare. The students work together to solve the problem in a way that would seem totally out of place in an American classroom (or most European classrooms, for that matter).

Fear and Trembling is the story of a French woman who was born in Japan and left when she was five years old. As an adult, she returns to Japan and works in a large company. Her work experience reveals the cultural gulf between her and her co-workers and employers. This films careful pacing lulls you into thinking everything is going to be fine. In fact, emotions run high and her career goes in unexpected directions.

While these films are both great, I would like to find some that are not east/west comparisons. Any suggestions?

Two Posts in One Day

Clearly, if you're reading this you have some extra time on your hands. So check out Miranda July's genius website. It's a book promotion. If her book is half as entertaining as her website - I want the book. Just a shame I missed her Amsterdam book tour date.

I have to go try writing on my appliances now. Surely F. won't mind...

After that I'll have to start working on becoming fabulously witty and original. Imaginative and productive would be nice, too.

Swedish Yahtzee

In addition to discovering internet Scrabble, I was recently introduced to Swedish Yahtzee. It might more appropriately be called Scandinavian Yahtzee because it has four languages - Finish, Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish. Serious entertainment - when it's not your turn you can try to pronounce words in Finnish!

But there are a number of important twists. The bonus is worth 50 points instead of a measly 35. There are "one pair" and "two pair" categories. That would be "1 Par" and "2 Par" or "1 Pari" and "2 Paria". A small straight ("Liten Straight" or "Pieni suora") is 1,2,3,4,5. A large straight ("Stor straight" or "Iso suora") is 2,3,4,5,6. It's a whole new world of Yahtzee fun!

In case you end up playing poker in Finland, three of a kind is "Kolmoisluku", four of a kind is "Nelosluku," and a full house is a "Tayskasi."

The Challenge of Presence

Yesterday evening, after a long day of US Consulate visits, dental appointments, work, and wedding dress fittings, my friend and I sat down in a Haarlem cafe for a beer. It was the best moment of my day. Finally there was nothing else that had to be done and for the first time all day, I got to be present.

It's a unique challenge to ignore the nagging feeling of all the things that have to be done and pay full attention to whatever is at hand. My abilities in this department are nearing an all-time low. There is a lot to be done right now and instead of learning to focus on one thing at a time, multi-tasking is all the rage. Feels more like a handicap, at times.

In the meantime, in this break from my paper correcting, I decided to share a very nice beer with you. It's the Maredsous 8. They had it on tap at Bruxelles a few months ago. It was yummy then and last night's glass confirmed that it's delightful. My recommendation is to stick with one on a work night - it's fun stuff. Originally comes from a real Belgian abbey, too!

Defining "Dating"

Over on Lars' blog, I've responded to a non sequitur comments question about dating.

Anyway, it's interesting to me that dating is such a phenomenon to most Europeans. It's not uncommon for people to ask just what we (Americans) are doing when we date. And there are explanations for our mysterious and strange mating behavior. We move around a lot. We don't tend to have friend groups in the way that people do here. It isn't uncommon for someone in Holland to have their friends from growing up, high school friends, university friends, sports group friends, and so forth. These aren't groups that mix well or easily, either. However, they are resilient. Going from friends to relationship is a smaller step than stranger or acquaintance to relationship.

Besides, dating in the United States has provided plenty of fodder for gossip magazines, movies, and sitcoms. Not to mention all the forms of dating - the speed date, the blind date, and even double dating! Someone should research this. Someone probably already has - and gotten a degree. Maybe even written a book. Probably someone who does Cultural Theory or Sociology. Imagine the dating dissertation. Would one rely on field research or questionnaires? What kinds of ethical issues would come into play? Can you date a study subject?

Plastic Bag Free Town

Back when I was visiting home on the wedding planning trip, one priority was loading up on my NPR (National Public Radio). As I've said before, podcasts of This American Life are great and help me feel in touch. It doesn't matter how you slice it, though, they're not the same as sitting in the car listening to the familiar voices of WUNC and good talk radio. Shouldn't neglect Car Talk, which I just discovered (no really, a moment ago) that I can get on podcast. Life is just getting better and better, I tell you!

But the wonderful news I heard while I was at home was that there's a town in the UK called Modbury that has gone plastic bag free! It's superb. I put a serious effort into not using extra plastic bags if I can avoid it and it's a challenge. Sadly enough it is especially true in places where you do your shopping at a variety of smaller shops. Instead of getting one bag for a number of items, customers are offered a bag with each individual item they buy. Often I have to ask sales people to take items out of bags. They can bag much faster than I can fish through my coins.

A plastic bag free town is a move in the right direction. It's the kind of broad based community effort that we are going to need to fight global warming or otherwise change the world. That's what it's all about, really, changing the world a little bit at time.

Mail Seed

Over at Inhabitat, they posted about a flower postages stamp that the Dutch postal service has developed. Kinda cute, actually. Too bad they didn't advertise it here. This reminds me of the scratch and sniff postage stamps I heard about to celebrate the Chinese New Year this year. I think it was China who came out with a scratch and sniff stamp that smelled like barbecued pork! In that case they should just switch to scratch and lick - the front side, of course.

It must be a cool job, to sit around and dream of funky things to do with postage stamps. I read an article in the New York Times last week that suggested that (my) daydreaming might not actually be wasting time. This was fairly reassuring since I think I was reading it in the middle of the day with my ever present pile of work to do. The gist of the article is that productivity cannot always be measured in terms of number of hours worked. It's reassuring for those of us who are not particularly talented in the sit-in-a-chair- and-get-it-done department.

There are a lot of people out there blogging and writing about productivity. It's a popular topic probably because the people who are writing about it are the same people who are having a hard time figuring out how to measure their own productivity and think that maintaining a blog is one way to do that. I don't know that I agree, but it's another thing to think about. Far more entertaining than thinking about that pile of exams and assignments. ugh.