Insights into a Bimbo's Mind

NL Diaries: Last stories from Holland

Sunday, July 03, 2005

I’ve been in Holland for more than a week now. Tomorrow, Narrrling and I will be jetting off to Italy for another week or so. As a closure to this chapter in Holland, I must say there are a few things I’d like to pen down so that in the future if ever I have the need to recall the highlights of this holiday, I’d remember them by reading this blog. So forgive my lazy writing style in this one as this is truly meant to be a diary more than the usual exhibition of writings.

Bikini galore
As mentioned in my earlier blogs, it’s truly bikini heaven here. After at least 5 long visits of scouting the shelves, hunting, trying, queuing and grabbing, I finally managed to get myself at least 4 pieces of swim garments and 3 other for bimbotic friends of mine. Honestly, as much as I am a self-proclaimed bimbo, I never thought I’d get so excited over bikinis on sale. Before I met Narrrling, I didn't even dared to wear them. So if I made a simple cause and action deduction, I wonder if I can blame Narrrling for this bimbo phenomenon. I thought I have always been too fat to wear bikinis?

..of wheels and bicycles
The highlight of this holiday revolves a lot around cycling. I’ve seen a lot on tv where the hero effortlessly transports the heroine around, sitting also effortlessly at the back of his bicycle. If it was an Indian movie, they would be singing something that sounds like, “Piar…” while doing some sexy snake arms hand movements…. If it was an Italian movie, the hero would be shouting at the top of his voice, “La vita e bella!”… If it was a Chinese movie, Leon Lai and Maggie Cheung would be humming some romantic melodies from some Theresa Teng tunes. For me, although the scenery was beautiful and I almost felt like I wanted to hum some romantic Barry Manilow songs, but there is always a constant worry that if I didn’t hold on tight enough, I’ll roll off the bicycle into one of those deep canals and Narrrling would happily peddle on without knowing that the big sack of potatoes he’s transporting behind him is somewhere drowning, trying to thread water helplessly. To improve holidays of this kind in the future, I think I’ll need to learn how to cycle and swim.



The language barrier
Have I ever mentioned to you that my in laws only speak Dutch? Although I work in a Dutch company, the only words I learnt from my mass of Dutch colleagues were some Dutch foul words and some pleasant words that men typically like to use on girls, for eg. “Lekker Wijf” = “Hot/Yummy Chick” and “Kut” = “Cunt”. My in laws are awfully nice people so I’m not sure if they’d appreciate my knowledge of the Dutch language thus far. So in most of my times here, I’ve confined myself to that sweet smile I’ve reserved specially for them, which mostly means, “Sorry, don’t understand”. This can get quite frustrating sometimes, for eg. Mother in law bursts into room and says something that sounds greatly urgent and runs off, does it mean there’s a fire? A dyke has burst and the country’s declared national emergency? The Spanish are attacking again after four hundred years? Do I run after her or was she suggesting I take the necessities before running after her? Narrrling is nowhere in sight to translate so what do I do? Most of the time I run after her to see what’s happening. Ohh.. Come see the wedding dress of my sister in law. That’s what she was saying. Then there’s also, the door is stuck! I couldn’t open it. Father in law keeps giving me instructions in dutch from the other side of the door, how to open it. So to me, it’s gibberish, gibberish, gibberish. Father in law very concerned about me being stuck in the toilet and me very eager to get out but we can’t help each other. Thanks also to my lucky stars, I always land myself in the most goofy situations ever. Sometimes because his parents are so nice to me, I’d like to say something nice in return but how do you expect Narrrling, a 35 year old tough guy to express some mushy stuffs? Right here as I am typing this, mother in law just walked in with some jewelries and showed them to me. I’m not sure if she wants me to have them or she just wants to show them to me, but I just said, “Mooi, mooi” = “Nice, nice”. Yeah, that’s all I know how to say for now. “Ja = Yes”, “Nee = No” and “Mooi = Nice”. The 3 Dutch words I used to survive through the whole week.

A Dutch wedding

My sister in law got married yesterday on the 2nd of July 2005. I come from a culture who’s very used to the rowdy wedding scenarios where the groom bargains his way into the bride’s room on the wedding day to pick her up, the guests of the dinner shouts at the top of their lungs, “Yaaammm Seeeeng!” to toast the bride and groom. I mean, ofcourse I am not ashamed of that because I think it’s fun in a way but as a starry eyed girl who’s received lots of external influence from western television and movies, I can’t help but dream of having a beautiful wedding with candlelights, white drapes and exotic cuisine dishes. For the first time yesterday, I experienced one of these weddings myself. The wedding was a beautiful one, starting with a wedding march at a beautiful castle-like mansion by the countryside, followed by a boat cruise down a peaceful river with close friends and families. The boat takes us to a restaurant to attend a reception to receive some casual friends and colleagues of the bride and groom, and finally dinner together with a small party of the closest friends and family. It was a total of 12 hours of entertainment for us and for me, a total of 12 whopping hours hearing ‘yadda yaddi yadda’ in dutch. Honestly, It was a really different experience for me, being in a foreign land, being kissed and hugged by at least 50 of the bride and groom’s family members who also congratulated Narrrling and I for our recent marriage, listening to everyone in the room speak dutch simultaneously(yadda, yaddi, yadda), eating dutch finger food like ‘kroket’ and ‘bitter balls’, hearing my mother in law say “Something something Miki, Something something Miki” to her 75 year old sister, then burst out laughing and hugging me followed by 3 kisses on my cheek. The great mysteries of having dutch speaking in laws. I guess I’ll never know what they said about me.


Things that caught my attention
In my past week of trying not just to live among the Dutch but also to live their lifestyle, I’ve came across a few incidents that totally caught my attention.

Wounded
Once Narrrling and I were driving down a busy, fast moving highway. Cars were moving at the minimal speed of 110. I was busy looking out of the window trying to absorb every little detail that passed before my eyes when I suddenly saw far ahead, a car parked down the side of the road and a casually dressed lady running down the highway, looking very concerned and eager to get to whatever she was running towards. After all, it was a busy highway so I was super curious to find out what she was risking her life for but I couldn’t see anything. Narrrling, who always has better eyes and maybe being dutch knew better what to look out for, to my amazement, told me, “There’s a wounded pigeon on the floor of the highway”. Wow! That is pretty amazing, people would actually risk their lives, running down a busy highway to save a wounded pigeon? I was thinking, from where I came from, people might risk their lives running down a busy highway, to pick up the pigeon for an extra dish for dinner. Or if it’s not worth the danger, just drive over it to stop the slow painful death.

Graduation

Driving through some small villages in southern Holland, I caught sight of some houses who’s hung the NL flags from their windows. Well, hanging the NL flag is no big deal but what I found strange was besides the usual NL flag, there was also a school bag, school shoes and some books attached to the end of the flagpole. According to Narrrling, it’s a sign that someone from the house have just graduated from school. Interesting. Maybe next time when I graduate from swimming, I’ll dry my bikinis over the Malaysian flag under that same disguise.

Dutch sauna
Many of you have probably heard stories of dutch saunas before. Yeah, everyone is expected to go in naked, walk about naked, swim naked in a pool, sit in some Jacuzzis naked with 10 other strangers, float on salt water naked with your private parts exposed to everyone who walks past, who’s probably also naked, lie in a steam bath naked, take a hot foot dip naked, eat naked, lie around naked and so on and so forth. For the perverts, it’s heaven. For the dutch, it’s normal. This isn’t my first time in a dutch sauna. In fact, coming back to Holland this time, I looked forward immensely to coming back to a sauna. In a sauna, I feel such liberation that I am able to walk around bare naked without my private parts being used to feed some erotic fantasies. No one oogled at my breasts, no one walked around with a big hard on and basically, no one can be bothered if my breasts were big or small, or if my butt was skateboard size or surfboard size. Everyone was just relaxed and I thought to myself, this is truly one of the luxuries of life, spending the whole day pampering only what God has given you and nothing else.

posted by Miki-C @ 1:29 PM