Amsterdam: Transitions, Transitions — Finkel Family Adventures

Aug 30

Aug 30 Amsterdam: Transitions, Transitions

This emotionally charged week felt inevitable, but that didn’t make it easier. After three experience-of-a-lifetime this-is-the-best-decision-we’ve-ever-made sort of weeks, our time in Amsterdam got off to a bumpy start.

Maybe it was because I have so much love for Amsterdam that my expectations were too high. Maybe it was just the timing of being on the road now for almost a month, away from family and friends and all things familiar. Maybe it was the inevitable back to school blues.

It was definitely logistics: our apartment is great but has some quirks that needed to be ironed out (The shower smells like sewer! This chair is broken! We need ice trays, clothes pins, and dish detergent!) Our visa appointment filled an afternoon and nothing says fun like trying to entertain your kids in a government office. Eli shipped two boxes for his research to the University which were confirmed as delivered, but which nobody can find.

Norah and Ben outside our apartment on the first day of school.

Biking in Amsterdam, which is the best way to get around and is very safe with dedicated bike lanes everywhere, is still daunting for and with kids. In particular, they are not used to trying to stop/start in a pack of thirty commuters stopped at a red light, nor are they prepared for a scooter to zoom past them on the left. On Friday night we took a ride during rush hour which ended with (nearly) everyone in tears and Norah’s first full on “I want to go home. I want to get on the first airplane to Evanston and see Mimi and be in a place I understand.”

Plus, the kids started their new school year. It’s a new school in a new country with a new teaching style and a longer than anticipated commute. That alone, even if we had been settled in for weeks would have been enough to knock us off our game a little bit.

All this to say, I’m trying to keep the perspective that it’s just been a bad few days and bad days are inevitable on a journey like this. I’m trying to share that perspective with the kids, particularly Norah who did not immediately make that one friend who will anchor her time here and help her feel more secure at school.

As an aside, Ben has had a great time in school this week and spends most of the walk between school and the metro stop calling out to his friends. Names are still elusive to him though, so when I ask him his friends names he says, “This one is buddy. That one is girl.”