Observation #1: Everyone (or at least everyone who has asked where I'm from) thinks I'm British. I'm not sure why this is. It's not a bad thing, though--I'd much rather be mistaken for a Brit than an American.

Observation #2: Europeans love public space. I'm so jealous. I want to move here.

Observation #3: This is not a cheap country.

I started today (Friday) off on a... not-quite-right foot. I slept in until 1:30. Oops. But it's understandable--I could get to sleep until 7. Tonight, I'm going to try to stay up fairly late (but not as late), and set an alarm so that I'm at least out of bed in time for the hotel's breakfast.

Since I missed the breakfast cut off today, I went to the little pancake place on the Leidseplein and had their pancake special--a pancake with chocolate sauce and vanilla ice cream, with a free shooter. That was a bit weird, a shooter with my breakfast--and no choice about it either. She just brought me some green apple concoction. It was pretty good. The other funny thing--I was totally expecting some weirdo piece of crap for pancakes, because some American website I'd seen said that Dutch pancakes are 'for the adventurous, nothing like you'd find a IHOP'... so I had no clue what to expect. But it's just a crepe, folks. Nothing really out of the ordinary. I guess they don't have them at IHOP that I've ever noticed though, so that's fair enough.

I spent the day (the afternoon, really) wandering around the Dam Square area and Jordaan. Then I came back to the hotel to get out of the sun for a bit, checked my e-mail, and then headed for the Vondelpark, which is like Amsterdam's answer to High Park. Except that it's a really bad comparison, but this park is actually downtown and people use it in droves. It seems like people here are way more apt to meet up, hang out, and lounge around in public spaces than in North America, and I don't think it's that we're less social or more private, just that we don't have public spaces worth hanging out in. Ugh.

Anyway, that basically takes me to dinner--I got Wok to Walk (Chinese takeout) and ate it on the Prinsengracht (canal my hotel is on). And now, I write this. Woohoo, fun times... Now it's time to go out and find a place with beer and soccer.

So my trip maybe didn't get off to the best start. My flight was delayed, and although lounge access kept me happy until midnight, it closed, and when didn't end up leaving until 1:30am. The flight itself was fine, I slept. Are late-night flights usually rerun marathons? Seriously, they showed Big... Tom Hanks was young back then.

Since we were so delayed leaving, we were also quite delayed getting in. Which was problematic. I was supposed to meet a group of people from IICD in the Hague at 3pm, which would have made for a leisurely afternoon, according to my original schedule. Getting off the plane at 2:30pm instead of noon made this schedule a bit more hectic.

So I called to say I would be late (a feat in and of itself--I'm not good at phones in Europe, although I've gotten much better!) and head down to the Hague. EU customs is amazing... All the woman did who first took my passport was make sure I sort of looked like my picture, and then stamped it, no questions asked. Then, leaving the baggage claim area, they asked me where I was from (no need to show ID) and how long I was staying. I have a harder time getting back into Canada!

So anyway, then it was time to navigate the trains. After battling with a ticket machine, I decided to pay the extra 50 cents and buy a ticket from a person. After I finally got my ticket, I asked three different employees which train to take to get to Den Haag Centraal, and all three gave the same response. So I got on that train. And it stopped at Den Haag HS, so I got all ready to get off at the next stop. But the next stop never came--until I got to Rotterdam. It's only 10 minutes down the tracks, but by the time I got myself turned around and on the proper train, I was seriously late. Awesome way to start off a trip.

I eventually got there, and had a great meeting. And the Hague seems like a cool spot--but I was exhausted and needed to get to my hotel. Back in Amsterdam. Oh yay, more trains. Way less eventful this time, though.

My hotel is a great little spot. Just a small inn, something like 20 rooms, just off a canal, with a restaurant instead of a lobby, on a street filled with similar buildings. Nice bed, nice bathroom, mad stairs, but what can you do? Most places look like the stair situation is pretty similar (I'm on the top/fifth floor, so it's particularly bad with my heavy luggage.)

After I showered and got settled, I wandered around town. It's so great. Really. I had some falafel, watched a dance party in a plaza, wandered around some neato neighbourhoods, and bought some Fanta. Long live Fanta. Now, it's time to get to sleep. I'm exhausted.

Photo: everyone in the Netherlands rides bikes. Everyone.

Note: I wrote these blogs while I was travelling, but had pretty bad Internet access for the first few days, and then was busy throughout the week, and didn't ever get a chance to post them.... so here you go, finally!

So my adventure starts... in Toronto. There's a ton of lightning, and my flight's been delayed (finally, officially, delayed.) We're now not leaving until 12:30am or so (hopefully--only 1.5 hours late).

Despite the delay, I'm actually not doing too terribly badly. Mike gave me a lounge pass, so I'm nice and cozy in the near-empty Maple Leaf Lounge at terminal one. The downside: dead tired. I could literally curl up here and go to sleep. And likely miss my flight if and when it does happen. Other downside: I scheduled a meeting pretty tightly for when I get off the plane. So I'll be pushing it to get to that on time. But we'll see--perhaps it'll work out well somehow. I don't know how, but somehow.

And on that note, I'll conclude my first (boring) trip blog and... start thinking about my presentation tomorrow.