Forget that last post - I’m not
as Dutch as I thought. The sun was out
again today, so I decided, like a typical huisvrouw that I would do the
grocery shopping on my bike. I’m lucky –
I’ve two medium sized grocery stores within a five minute walk of the house,
and up until now, I’ve walked to them. The limitations of grocery shopping by foot, or on a bike, are of
course that you can only buy what you can carry home. The typical huisvrouw will
have a set of fancy paniers on the back
her bike as well as a basket up front. I’ve only a small, by Dutch standards,
basket. Never mind, I thought, I’ve not quite got my head around food
shopping/meal prep yet and with stores so close by its easier just to pick up a
few bits every day.
As soon as I sat down on my bike
I realised my dainty English buttocks had not quite recovered from the weekend’s
trip to the beach. It’s me or the saddle, one of us is going to have to gain a
bit more padding.
However, I made it safely to the
store and back, although my trip was slightly marred by discovering a rogue bike
had been unceremoniously dumped on top of mine when I returned, laden with groceries
to the bike park. I’d been blocked in!
Spurred on by the semi-success of
the shopping trip, as the sun continued to shine, I decided to set out on a
recce to the local swimming pool. I like swimming, it’s non weight
bearing, calorie burning, and relaxing all at the same time. Haarlem has its own sports centre and
according to Google maps, it’s a mere 3 km or so from our house – or a twelve minute cycle ride.
Fantastic. I set off in what I
thought was the right direction. Twenty minutes later I decided I’d either taken
completely the wrong route, or the Dutch Google map guys cycle a lot faster
than me.
I had a moment of panic, despite
telling myself over the last week that the best way to explore my new home town
is to get lost, (OK when you’re on foot
and no more than a mile or so away from the house) I was
now on very unfamiliar streets. What if my chain came off? What if I
fell or got knocked off my bike? (If this was Hollywood of course, new girl in
town, lost, accident waiting to happen, the Dutch equivalent of Hugh Grant
would have dashed to my rescue.) Even if I found the sports centre, would I
really fancy swimming 40 lengths after a half hour cycle ride to get there? Plus
there was still the ride back. I wanted gentle exercise, not Triathalon
training.
I decided to call it quits. I’ll
seek out the sports centre another day, and tomorrow, I’m doing the grocery
shopping on foot.
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