My first 3 weeks in Europe

Wow. I’ve put this off for a while, mainly because the first two weeks here were incredibly busy and honestly I was just trying to survive. So, apologies to the three of you who have been looking forward to this (hi mom).

I’ll briefly recap my travels to Europe for you since it happened nearly a month ago, but was incredibly fun and memorable all the same. My 14 hour layover in NYC was a dream, I cannot wait to go back one day. My friend Shelly and I managed to get to the Empire State Building, Ground Zero, Central Park and Times Square. Ground Zero was incredibly sobering. Volunteers placed flowers on the names of the people whose birthday was that day and it was equally as touching as it was sad. It’s somewhere I’ve always wanted and felt a need to visit and it’s not something I’ll forget soon.

After sleeping nearly my entire seven-hour flight to Amsterdam, we were immediately faced with the challenge of European transportation, which is not easy for an American used to driving everywhere. Also, it’s all in Dutch. Which reads like someone dragged their hand across a keyboard and called it good. So we made it from Amsterdam to Utrecht by train, but the biggest challenge for me was figuring out the bus system in Utrecht.

First of all, stops were nearly impossible to remember because, again, Dutch. To top it all off, I had no service on my phone for the first couple days because I hadn’t gotten a new SIM card. So, I was left to my own wits to get myself around, which was not entirely successful. There were more than a few bus trips that started out on the wrong bus, the wrong way. My first grocery trip took two hours. But after a few trips and a new SIM card, navigating the bus was quite easy. One step closer to being European, right?

Classes have been keeping me busy, especially with extra “excursions” that our professors schedule for us. I have six classes right now including my beginners Dutch class and there’s plenty of assignments to go around. To add onto that, there’s a student group called Erasmus Student Network and they put on events for international students. So some of my friends and I did their introduction week which was fun, but packed full our schedule.

I feel settled in now this week, going to classes, running errands in the city, getting a bike. I feel like I’m finding my way around and my new way of life and honestly, I love it. It’s almost scary to me how fast I can adapt to a new way of life, but I guess it’s a good thing.

The one thing I truly despise here is the wind. Holy sh– is it windy here. All the time. And I’m not just talking a breeze, legitimately 20 mph winds that blow you backwards when you walk. Rarely is there a day when it’s not windy, rainy or both.

Back to the bike thing: everyone here rides bikes. The bike to car ratio is probably 20:1. I have no idea if that’s accurate, but I’ll put it this way: there’s a ton of bikes here. There are red brick bike paths all throughout the city and it’s actually quite fun–and nice not to pay a bus fare to get into the city.

Safe to say, I love Utrecht. The highs have outweighed the lows in these first couple weeks and I am beyond excited for the next four months.