10.27.07
Posted in Amsterdam at 11:11 by Staci
Well, now you know a little history about where we went on the excursion for school. Now for the details and a map to give you some perspective on just HOW MUCH PEOPLE BIKE HERE! If you read Jeff’s post about Amstelveen (the town we live in) you know we are about a 25-30 minute metro trip to Amsterdam central station. To date, Jeff and I have not rode our bikes into the city. We take the tram or metro. Well for the bike excursion we were told to meet at central station and take the ferry across the river to North Amsterdam where the trip would commence. Now we had to meet at 10am on the other side of the river, so trying to leave here and take the metro with my bike meant I would be traveling in peak morning commute and some rumors are that you CAN’T take bikes on metros at this time. I have not verified if this is true or not yet, but since other students were planning to bike from down in this area to central station, I thought I would earn my next Dutch merit badge and bike into the city like a true Amsterdammer. 
Read the rest of this entry »
Permalink
Posted in Amsterdam, General at 10:39 by Staci
So, for my second course in the ERM program, we did an excursion to a hazardous waste site north of Amsterdam that is currently being reclaimed. The site is called Volgermeerpolder. The city of Amsterdam began dumping waste here after the peat was harvested for burning at the turn of the century. Turns out household waste was being deposited along with industrial waste through the 40s-70s. Think lots of unlabeled drums and materials that years later would leak dioxins, PAHs, agent orange, benzene and heavy metals into the nearby canals and soil. The waste is 4-6 meters in depth across the entire area with an estimated 10,000 drums of unknown substances. Come the 1980s and residents nearby call on Amsterdam to close the site. After a year of public outcry, the site is closed. (This is a link about the site, it is in Dutch, but you can see some pictures: http://www.volgermeer.nl/ua.asp).
Read the rest of this entry »
Permalink
10.15.07
Posted in Amsterdam, General at 22:37 by Staci
Well if you know anything about Amsterdam (or the Netherlands) it is probably that people love their bikes. In fact, bikes are everywhere! You should be more scared of bikes than cars when walking through the city. You might recall from a previous post by Jeff that I get to ride my bike to and from school each day. Since we moved to the “nicer” apartment my ride has doubled. And despite Jeff’s earlier claim I actually bike 5.5km each way. Not that I am complaining. I figure my ass and thighs will thank me after a year of this exercise (and my ankle is holding up pretty well – thanks to my surgeon and physical therapists for preparing me for this!).
Read the rest of this entry »
Permalink
10.06.07
Posted in General at 10:57 by Staci
So, lesson #1 in Amsterdam was things here take time – develop patience or become a stress ball. Lesson #2: wine and laptops don’t mix. While I was living in our apartment sans TV and any decent radio stations I was using my laptop to play music. Curled up on the couch by the only bright light in our dark apartment (Dutch apartments have very limited lighting for some crazy reason) diligently reading for school, I turned to look up something on the internet and proceeded to knock my wine glass over onto my laptop. In case you were unaware, liquids and electronics do not go together very well! After standing there momentarily in shock, I ran to the kitchen for a towel and dried off my laptop. A frantic, ok hysterical, call to Jeff in Belgium concluded with me setting my computer on its side to dry out.
Read the rest of this entry »
Permalink
