OK, OK, we’ve listened to your nagging and put up photos from months five and six in our darling daughter’s life.
She’s growing well and weighed in today at the consultatiebureau at 7.120 kg, with a length of 64 cm. She’s now more than twice the weight she was at birth, which Sarah says means there’s now twice as much Eloïse for us to love. Awww!
She threw up onto the floor of the Volvo dealer yesterday. Today, she threw up in a furniture shop. Perhaps it’s time to get some liability insurance.
Sarah and I biked through the Vondelpark Sunday afternoon with Wiesje in the bakfiets, of course. It was an incredibly nice day, with a temperature much too mild for the time of year. The sun was shining, too, so we simply had to get out and do something.
After lunch, we headed down to the Amsterdamse Bos (or Amsterdam Woodlands, if you prefer) for the first time since moving back here. It seemed to be quite an effort to make it down there with the heavy bakfiets; am I getting old?
Because of the soft weather and the fact it was the weekend, the woods were very busy and it was something of a slalom to to navigate around all of the people. Eventually, we reached the children’s farm, where we introduced our little one to some goats. She didn’t quite seem to know what to make of them, but was attentive and interested, at least.
We had lunch there, after which we bought some goat cheese and eggs, all of which is locally produced by the animals on the farm, so one can ascertain for oneself that they have a decent life. The children love these animals and literally fall over each other to feed the goats from little milk bottles that can be purchased on-site. The farm must do a roaring trade with these bottles, as it’s sometimes hard to find a goat with any thirst! The chickens are similarly well kept and can roam very freely. It’s a shame this place isn’t just around the corner, as it’s a little too far to go to replace the local supermarket when one needs dairy produce.
We ended up at the Volvo dealer yesterday. I must admit, I’m very fond of the XC70. It’s rather like a V70, but then somewhat raised and with high quality four-wheel drive, which makes it a large estate (a.k.a. station wagon). It’s not large enough to qualify as an SUV (whatever the precise definition of that may be), but it does offer you a couple of the advantages, albeit in slightly diluted form. You wouldn’t really go off-road in it, but you might drive across a muddy field or drive along some hardened muddy tractor tracks.
SUVs are politically incorrect over here. Whilst this is a capitalist society, SUVs (or terreinwagens, asobakken or PC Hooft-tractors, depending on whether you want to be neutral or offensive) are seen by the majority of people not so much as a symbol and celebration of prosperity and pride, but more as a symbol of tasteless excess, contempt for the environment, and disregard for pedestrians and other road users. The left wing is even keen to start refusing to issue parking permits for these beasts, to punish the people who have bought them.
Owners of SUVs are understandably a bit miffed by all of this. After all, they’ve paid a shitload of tax in the form of BTW and BPM. They eagerly point out that the tax on their vehicle would easily pay for a couple of mothers to live on welfare for a year, so they make the argument that their vehicles are, in fact, amongst the most social on the road. It’s a simplistic and warped argument, but there’s a core of truth there, too.
For my part, I do appreciate the experience of driving (or being driven in) an SUV. In America, where just about the only car that is regarded as shameful is the Hummer, lots of people drive around guiltlessly and without feeling self-conscious in one of these things. If it weren’t for the environmental and safety concerns, you’d have to envy them that.
That goes some of the way to explain why, in spite of the appeal of some of these vehicles, we can’t seriously consider one. For one thing, there are only three of us, so by the time we’re able to fill the remaining seats, we’ll be buying our next car, not this one.
Secondly, Dutch streets and parking facilities weren’t meant for these. To park an SUV on the street without blocking traffic, it’s necessary to park with two wheels on the pavement, something that is illegal. So, either you stick out into traffic or you make it the problem of the cyclists and the pedestrians, a major reason the drivers of these vehicles are seen as seriously anti-social.
Add to that the poor fuel economy, the disastrous levels of pollutant emissions, and the damage these things cause to other people in collisions, and there’s no way we can justify storming around the lowlands in a demilitarised tank.
Today, we went looking for couches and other furniture again. I think we’ve found a likely source for a couch, but they have a three month delivery period, so we won’t be seeing it any time soon, even if we order it now. Oh well. We have a few more sources to check out before we make a decision.
This article , sent to me by Ome Geoff, demonstrates how the US is (ab)using the Patriot Act via the FBI to spy on its people.
Yet another reason that I sleep more soundly for having left the shores of that paranoid country.
We were up bright and early once again this morning for the twenty minute walk along the Keizersgracht to the notary‘s office. There, we met with our estate agent, the selling agent and the notary to run through the koopakte (deed of sale), which we ultimately signed.
We now have a three day cooling off period (or bedenktijd, as it’s called here), in which we can decide to abandon the purchase. If we were to do that, we’d owe the notary some cash for his services, but that’s all. Anyway, there’s very little chance of that happening, as we’ve had all the time we need to think about this as we waited for the day to come on which we would sign the deed of sale.
We have to hand over 10% of the purchase price by 25th November, with the rest to follow by the time we are due to take receipt of the house.
16th December is the agreed day on which we will receive the keys and sign the deed of delivery. At that point, it really will be ours, which even now somehow still seems hard to imagine.
Back home, I called the moving company who currently have all of our belongings in storage and immediately booked the delivery of our stuff for 20th December. That’s the day we’ll finally be reunited with all of the stuff we last saw being loaded onto a lorry in California on 10th August.
After Wiesje had had a nap, we went to Oost Slaapcomfort to place the order for our bed. We decided to kill two birds with one stone and simultaneously order a bed for the guestroom, too, so we placed an order for a 2000T and a Naturally, both made by Hästens. The funny Swedish ads on Dutch TV fulfilled their purpose, I suppose, and the DVD that accompanied the brochure appealed to me with its thorough description of how these beds are manufactured. Of course, the only real litmus test is to lie on the things, but in that area, too, they more than proved their worth.
In the evening, we met up with my old friend and ex-Sonera colleague, Bas, with whom we had dinner. Tomorrow, we’ll be hanging out with him and his wife, Kylie. It’s surprising to think how many of our friends have actually visited us here in the small amount of time we’ve been back in Amsterdam.
Tomorrow’s the day that we sign the deed of sale on our new house. That’ll give us something to celebrate tomorrow evening.
Another 42 days/6 weeks and then we can move in.
