I haven’t been addicted for long, but I fear it’s going to take over soon. It started innocently enough. I saw the bottle in the local Asian grocery store when I was looking for a big bottle of soy sauce. I recognized the bottle and brand from the U.S., but had never tried it before. Curious, and since I was cooking a lot more than I had in a while, I figured I’d give it a try. I was hooked. It was love at first taste. It was hot and spicy that left my mouth tingling and my forehead and scalp all sweaty. (I used way too much that first time. It closely resembles ketchup and I think subconsciously I figured it wouldn’t be too spicy since I was in The Netherlands, home of the bland)

And the best part: no heartburn. I like spicy foods, but they don’t always like me. For some reason, Sriracha hot sauce loved me. No matter what I put it in or how much, no heartburn. Hell, I haven’t even had a any butthole-burning. (I know, TMI.)

Unfortunately, this addiction is just a gateway to something else: Asian food. I’ve always liked Asian food. I have an unhealthy appetite for chicken lo mein. But here in Amstelveen, my desire for Asian food has become almost an obsession. I’ve gone long streches where I had some kind of Asian food every day. Usually it’s stir fry with chicken, veggies, rice, ginger, garlic, soy sauce and of course, Sriracha hot sauce. Sometimes it’s ramen noodles. I even learned how to make my own teriyaki sauce (which is awesome, btw.)

Occasionally I’ll eat the stir-fry noodles from a place called Wok to Walk near Liedseplein in Amsterdam, which is okay, but always needs help. It’s typical of what I’ve found with Dutch food: bland. Not horrible, but it’s like they’re afraid of too much flavor. Fortunately Wok to Walk is easy to fix: just bring it home, heat up a wok, add some sesame oil, then toss in the food with some soy sauce and Sriracha hot sauce, cook for ~1-2min to get everything heated up and the flavors mixed in, and enjoy.

Anyways, for Trivia Time #2 we’re going to talk about fall weather, location and daylight.

Fall Weather

In the fall, it rains. A lot. Not torrential rains or constant down pours, though that happens, but more light rain and drizzle. It’s overcast most of the time, too. It’s a lot like Ohio, but not as crazy. Where in Ohio it’ll go from 40°F to 65°F to 38°F over the course of 3 days, in Amstelveen it’ll go from 6°C & overcast to 7°C & sunny to 7°C.

Location

On the globe, Amstelveen is located:

Altitude: -4m (-16') ¹
Latitude: 52° 17' 60N (52.3000)
Longitude: 4° 52' 0E (4.8667)

Latitudinally (yes, that’s a word), Amstelveen is roughly the same as Berlin, Germany; Shannon, Ireland; Warsaw, Poland; and Birmingham, England. Longitudinally (yup, this is also a word), Amstelveen is roughly even with Brussels, Belgium and Lyon, France.

In comparison, Columbus, OH is located:

Altitude: 234m (770')
Latitude: 39° 57' 40N (39.9611)
Longitude: 82° 59' 56W (-82.9989)

Daylight

Because Amstelveen is ~12.5°N of Columbus, in the summer we enjoy more sunlight. However, as expected, we get less in the winter. A comparison² of the longest and shortest days of the year reveals:

And that concludes today’s lesson on fall weather, location and daylight. Next time, we’ll be talking about recycling, marijuana laws and booze.³

1. Yes, that’s a -4m (-16') for altitude. Below sea level. When global warming melts the ice caps and raises the oceans, this place will probably be underwater baring some great engineering achievements. ↩

2. Information found at sunrisesunset.com ↩

3. I’m pretty lazy, as you can tell from the length of time between each of the trivia posts thus far, so don’t think that I’ve actually planned out the next Trivia Time post. Those might be the topics or they might not. (Ooh, suspense!) You’ll have to come back to see for yourself. ↩

Amstelveen (pronounced Am-stel-vein) is a suburb to the south of Amsterdam. It is the international headquarters for Team McLennan, as well as professional services firm KPMG and communications technology giant Cisco Systems.

It’s a small, quiet community, with just 79,000 inhabitants, but it’s close proximity to Amsterdam and Schipol airport, it’s an ideal location. We’re located ~2min (walking) to the nearest Metro line, which makes getting to and from the city relatively easy.

External Resources (all links open new windows):
http://www.amstelveen.nl/ Amstelveen’s Official Website (mostly Dutch, some English)
http://www.amstelveenweb.com/english An Amstelveen Website with more information in English
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amstelveen Amstelveen’s Wikipedia page