A Love-Hate Relationship

As we write this blog, we realize that a "love-hate" relationship could well describe much about our life here in Amsterdam. This particular post, however, is specifically aimed toward Erin's bicycle. Living in a place where a bike can get you almost anywhere you need to go has tremendous advantages. 1. It's much better exercise to cycle around town than it is to sit in a car. 2. Since we only have one car, normally used by John during the day for work, biking is a much faster alternative to walking. 3. In a city as crowded as Amsterdam, parking a bike saves both time and money over having to park a car. Usually to park a car takes 15 minutes of driving around in circles waiting for a spot to open up and anywhere from €1-5 per hour to park the car in the spot once said spot is found. A bike, on the other hand, can be parked almost anywhere for free. We say almost anywhere since Erin has been scolded by an older man, in Dutch of course, for parking her bike (ever so briefly while she runs into the green grocer for all of 2 minutes, really just 2 minutes, to buy a squash) too close to an apartment window. Apparently near windows is one of the only places one cannot park their bike. 4. With bike bags, we can go shopping and buy a whole lot more stuff than if we were having to walk or take public transport back to our apartment. 5. So far all the maintenance we have had done on our bikes has been absolutely free.

This brings us to the reasons Erin hates her bike. 1. Though maintenance is free, it is apparently not very effective. The headlight on Erin's bike continues to work only sporadically. After a tune-up the light will seem to work properly only to refuse to operate correctly the next time Erin has to ride her bike after the sun sets (which, by the way, is now as early as 4:30 or 4:45 in the afternoon). Erin can choose to continue riding her bike once the light stops working, but there is always the risk that the police will be out and hand her a €30 ticket for no headlight. Unfortunately the headlight seems to opt for a vacation when it's raining. And speaking of rain... 2. Riding a bike when it's raining is a miserable experience made all the less pleasant by cold temperatures. There is no way to avoid getting wet while riding in the rain. Legs become soaked to the bone, rain seems to pelt directly into the eyes, and the face is absolutely dripping with water during the entire ride.

Last night Erin had the exciting experience of arriving at her bike (after waiting an hour for a client to show up who never arrived nor called to let Erin know he/she would not be coming for his/her appointment) just as it started raining. Then afte peddling a few feet Erin realized, not only was it raining, but the headlight on her bike, which slowly started flickering on, had decided to discontinueue its efforts and remain unlit altogether. Despite the threat of a ticket for having a nonfunctioning headlight, Erin decided to just keep riding in the rain so as to get home as soon as possible to change out of her soaking wet clothes. Yesterday was not Erin's best day.

Oh, another reason to hate the bicycle mode of transportation: 3. While bikes function well in the city, it is most difficult and time-consuming to go to places farther away, outside the city, by bicycle. Tomorrow night Erin has to join the choir she sings with in a city about 20 miles away at 6 p.m. Another choir member has offered Erin a ride and now it turns out that this choir member wants to leave Amsterdam at 4:30 in the afternoon to make it through the horrendous traffic to be in Almere by 6 p.m. Getting to and taking the train, followed by a bus, followed by walking to the appointed meeting destination barely takes less time.

What does Erin do during the day? Well, when it takes her an hour or more to get to some places by car or other public transport, you can bet she spends a good part of her day in transit. Oh well. No one can absolutely love everything.