Saturday, August 21, 2004

Three months down, nine to go

Well, today marks thirteen weeks in the Nederlands, or three calendar months, or 25% of my contract. Not much of a cause celebre, but a significant milestone in my Neder experience nonetheless. The thing is, every time I think I’ve finally got my head around the whole culture thing, I come across some other weirdness that the Nederese regard as normality, and it just throws my whole perspective again.

Last Saturday, for example, was another Nederish special day, although it wasn’t mentioned in the press or on television (as far as I’m aware, not that I can understand a word of it). It was National Bad Hair Day, and they obviously take it very seriously because almost everybody had made the effort; indeed, some people had clearly put some serious time and energy into their follicle stylings. Mind you, the whole issue of style out here can best be described as some kind of time warp: the music reminds you of everything that was good about the 80s, the clothing, meanwhile, only serves to remind you what was so wrong about the 70s

Far scarier, however, was Sunday. I have already mentioned that Kampen is considered to be the Christian capital of Nederland, but I myself had no idea what that meant. A recent conversation with one of my neighbours gave me a clue, as it included me being asked if I had any plans for the weekend, which led to the following exchange:

“Nothing special. I’ll probably just pop over to the pub.”
“Oh, I’m a Christian, so I don’t go to pubs.”

Right… now, I’ve never been one of the most religious people in the world (apart from a perfectly natural unhealthy interest in Revelations in my late teens), but I don’t recall anything in the Bible (certainly not in the films) about not going to bars. It’s a strange thing, in fact, because Christianity isn’t actually a religion out here, but more some kind of a cult. For example, on Sunday everybody goes to church, but really dressed up (men in suits, women in dress suits, little girls in dresses with bonnets and pigtails, little boys in short trousers and shirts with ties), and they march there without talking to each other, or speaking at all, or even acknowledging people, or smiling, or anything – it’s like Dawn of the Dead meets The Little House on the Prairie, really quite, quite unsettling. Mind you, with all these vampires about, who can blame them?

Anyway, this week I decided it was about time I joined a gym and tried to do something about getting back into shape, so I went across the park by my flat (well, house, but it’s really just a small flat on two floors) to the Sports Centre. Gone. Just ashes and bricks. Guess that’s what all the sirens and flashing lights were about the other night. Will try to be more careful with cigarette butts in future.

Anyway, still not really having a love affair with the food out here. We keep having things in the canteen which I don’t recognise, and when I ask my colleagues what it is they just tell me that it’s better not to know. I mean, what’s that about? Even the soup has funny, mini-meatball looking things in it that nobody can tell me what they are or where they come from.

Beyond that, there’s still the whole difference of culture thing. People out here don’t seem to cover their mouths when they cough (ugh), and everybody talks with their mouth full. I’m telling you, you can really tell when you're in a country which the English didn't invade (or which the Germans did, come to think about it).

Then there’s the job. And suddenly it all falls into place. Grontmij, it transpires, has only been in Railway Signalling for thirty months, and has only had MicroStation systems for the last eighteen of those. Now I understand the appalling drawings I’ve been seeing, the partial and inaccurate cell libraries, and the blank looks I get when I express my consternation and frustration at these failings. Railtrack, I’m sorry I ever complained about your rigorous standards and insistence on minutiae.

Anyway, I’m off to launch another crusade on the creepy crawlies which seem to invade my house daily (pouring rain alternating with brilliant sunshine at a constant 29 degrees seems to provide perfect breeding conditions for flies, midges and mosquitoes – no wonder all the spiders out here are so fat). Meanwhile, any and all news from Blighty and the outside world will be gratefully received.

Saturday, August 14, 2004

Signalling Creatures

So, the end of the twelfth week and the end of the holidays. Next week everyone returns and the Nederlands come back to life, kinda like Bagpuss and the mice, only backwards. It’s now Monsoon season over here, which means still uncomfortably hot but now very, very wet as well. But even in this weather, which is pretty much constantly drizzling or pouring or tipping, you still see police on the streets, talking like it was in the UK in the late seventies/early eighties; and there’s no crime over here. Mr Blunkett take heed.

Work is slower, but still quite busy, and I’ve discovered that our department, Seinwezen, translates literally as Signalling Creatures. I mean, I’m aware that as a group signalling designers are a little quirky, but that’s just taking it too far in my opinion. I can’t wait to find out what they call testers.

I decided to try more local dishes this week, so I had a Fillet American (curiously, a Dutch speciality unavailable in America), which is essentially raw liquidised beef in a bread roll with onions and mayonnaise (trust me, much nicer than it sounds) and inspired my second, much less popular, song adaptation, to the tune of Stand & Deliver:

Soured Milk and Herring
by Adam And The Ants & Julian Self

Soured milk and herring!

I'm the Crazy Englishman
Who you so often mention
I spend my cash on pie and mash
With ketchup for convention
The Devil take your mayonnaise, your pickling obsession
The way you eat you'll qualify for lifelong indigestion

Soured milk and herring
You consume them all your life
HWOAH!
Try a different menu
‘Cause your cold meats give me strife
HWOAH!

I'm the Crazy Englishman
So sick of menu trashing
The deep-fried dish and cold raw fish
That people think so smashing
So what's the point of restaurants when nothing is worth eating?
It's just too much to tell the Dutch their meals keep on repeating

Soured milk and herring
You consume them all your life
HWOAH!
Try a different menu
‘Cause your cold meats give me strife
HWOAH!
And even though you fill your mouths your taste buds have resigned
Maligned

We're the Drunken Englishmen
Who you so often mention
We spend our cash on getting smashed
And making bad impressions
We’re the Crazy Englishmen and here's our invitation
Throw your cheeses overboard and join our roast beef nation!

Soured milk and herring you consume them all your life
HWOAH!
Try a different menu‘cause your cold meats give us strife
HWOAH!
And even though you fill your mouths your taste buds have resigned
Maligned

Raw fish
Cold meat processed cheeses
Cold meat processed cheeses
Cold meat processed cheeses
Raw fish
Cold meat processed cheeses
Cold meat processed cheeses
Cheese cheese cheese cheeses

Think maybe I’ll give the whole song adaptation thing a miss for a while now.

Anyway, I’m teaching the locals correct use of English. For example, there are fifteen types of tea in the office: Sterremunt (absolutely foul, Spearmint), Rooibos (quite nice), Groene (Green), Mango, Blackcurrant, Zoethout (no idea, odd taste), Cherry, Melon, Strawberry, Southern Fruits (what were they thinking?), Peach, Cinnamon, Raspberry, Vanilla (starting to sound like an ice cream shop now) and what they laughingly refer to as English. Anyway, I ask my cellmate (cubicle sharer, whatever) if he wants a drink and he says ‘tea’, so I ask which one and he says everything but Rooibos, then wonders why he gets a mug with fourteen tea-bags and not much water. So, now he knows the difference between anything and everything.

I’m also trying to teach them about sarcasm, which is proving to be more of a challenge, especially for Shahram, who Amey veterans would recognise as effectively the Grontmij Dharmy, only louder (I know, I didn’t believe it either).

Coffee, by contrast, is much better out here, but with so many coffee shops that’s hardly surprising really. All that caffeine, no wonder everybody seems so wired.

Oh yeah, and the most amazing thing happened today, you could never re-produce it. I’m stood chatting to Schuart, and Egbert is practicing his putting in the office. Egbert taps the balls back towards the tee, which is next to the cupboard I’m leaning on, and it hits the lip at the base of the shelves and takes off, shoots up and lands in my shirt breast pocket. Unreal. I just wonder what he was aiming for.

Anyway, looks like a break in the rain, so I’m gonna make a run for the station, try to get home still dry.

More news as it breaks.

Monday, August 02, 2004

Neder Neder Land

So, ten weeks now, and the time seems to have flown by (or maybe that’s just because I’ve been flying a lot). The job continues to be interesting, and ProRail seem to be quite impressed with the Speed/Train Profile we’ve been producing. It’s now a twelve metre long A0 drawing including gradient profiles, headway curves, points and signalling in both directions and it’s, frankly, awesome. Well, I think it is but, then, I’m easily pleased.

I’ve still only managed to eat in one place I would go back to (Thor, a restaurant in a boat moored in the moat which surrounds the centre of Zwolle), though I am assured there are many very good restaurants about; but I have come across a fair few decent drinking dens (and have learnt to rely on my watch – there are no licensing hours out here, they just close when they run out of beer, so I have to be careful not to run over my alcohol tolerance threshold, which has never been terribly high anyway). On the other hand, everywhere I’ve been does wonderful things with fish; though, for a country technically below sea-level, that’s hardly surprising.

Summer has finally arrived, and it’s glorious: clear blue skies, high twenties temperatures and cool, soothing breezes – perfection. Consequently, people are spending more time outside and I’m getting to meet my new neighbours. The Nederish (Nederese?) love to practice speaking English, so once they realise where I’m from there’s no stopping them. It might be worth a study into why it is that they find the language so easy but making a decent cup of tea is frankly beyond every last one of them as a nation.

As I said, this Schiphol feasibility study we’re doing is currently one of the most high profile jobs on the railway in the Netherlands, so obviously, this being the Sunday afternoon before the Monday morning when ProRail come to collect it, I am, once again, the only person in the office finalising the drawings and getting all the documentation out. Some things just don’t change, do they?

Observations:
All the people here seem to be tall and thin.
Nobody goes out until really late, like ten or eleven o’clock.
The platform at Zwolle has a whole bunch of photographs of missing persons stuck up around it.
The country is called Nederland, like Never Never land in Peter Pan, where the boys never grew up.
Vampires, man, I’m telling you, bloodsuckers the lot of them.

Other observations include general levels of fitness, which are generally really good – men, buy your woman a bicycle, you won’t regret it, I promise you.

What else? Oh yeah, I’m going to be in the Grontmij magazine for writing a song about working here. It’s not all that, but it goes to the tune of Streetlife by Randy Crawford, and when Shahram (my Persian colleague) and I sang it we got applause from neighbouring departments and Martin (the boss) asked for a copy and sent it to the magazine people in De Bild:

Grontmij
By Randy Crawford and Julian Self

We work for Grontmij, because there`s no place we can go
Grontmij – it’s the only life we know
Grontmij – and there`s a thousand tracks to lay
Grontmij – until we work our lives away

We let designers see
Just who we wanna be
And every night we sleep,
And dream of working more
That’s how the rail gets laid
In Euros we are paid
We CAD, drink coffee, talk
We’re who you think we are

Grontmij – we get to work on time
Grontmij – to help run the railway line
Grontmij – do whatever we are told
Grontmij – for like slaves we have been sold

There`s always track and rail
A signalling fairytale
Pro Rail always smiles
As silly deadlines loom
And if we make it fine
Connections run on time
Your train will chuff away
Beneath the silver moon

Grontmij – Grontmij
Grontmij - Grontmij

We work for Grontmij, because there`s no place we can go
Grontmij – it’s the only life we know
Grontmij – and there`s a thousand tracks to lay
Grontmij – until we work our lives away - ooh

Grontmij - Grontmij
Grontmij - Grontmij

I guess they’re pretty easily impressed, huh? Anyway, best check on the printing situation. Next weekend, thankfully, I’ll be back home relaxing. More news as it breaks.