This article is classified "Real"
The Netherlands are flat. There is no word that describes this country better than "flat." The largest hill that I have seen in the Netherlands was an artificial one used for raising part of a motorway junction. You may arrive in Amsterdam airport and then go to your final destination by train or taxi. The Airport's train station is quite unusual compared to British train stations. There was almost no advertising posters. The first advertising posters I saw were tasteful black and white jobs of a man and woman in bed. I think the advert was for the "Donor Codicil." The instituiton concerned is an organ transplantation service but I first thought it was a sperm bank. I saw my first double decker trains here. A train journey though a strange country is a good way of getting to know its landscape. Unfortunately the Netherlands has none. I thought I might see Amsterdam on the way out, but no. All I saw was a few skyscrapers (with mirrored windows) seperated with green fields full of cows and sheep. Everywhere there were small canals or brooks (for drainage I suppose). Although I took the train halfway across the country I could not tell when the cities finished and the countryside began. It all seemed to be a mixture of buildings and pasture with a changing ratio between the two. Sometimes more houses, sometimes more fields. I can confirm that there are windmills in the Netherlands. This is not a myth. Though I think my collegue buying a windmill inside a plastic ball with a pretend snow storm in it was a bit over the top. Dutchmen are tall. This may be of no consequence if you are tall yourself, but if, like me, you are one of a relatively small race of people and you are considered not oversized amongst them then you may have a problem. This has been alleviated slightly by the Dutch habit of wearing garish jackets and ties which give you something interesting to look at instead of getting a crick in your neck by looking upwards all the time. The hotel I stayed had an amazing selection of satellite television. Twenty channels of stuff I couldn't understand - and a few more that looked encoded so I couldn't watch it. I wonder what it was. The highlight of my television viewing was "Star Trek: The Next Generation" on BBC2 which I would have watched in England had I been at home. I must admit to watching the encoded satellite stations for a while. These subscription only channels are distorted electronically so that only customers who pay for the correct hardware decoders can view them. Every so often you get the impression that you just might see something - and then it goes away again. The feeling is something like trying to focus on a random dot stereogram. The dutch have that amazing European ability that gets on alot of English people's nerves. They are able to speak English. The only reason why this is disturbing is because no Englishman I know can speak Dutch. However they all seem to say the word "routing" (finding the path to take - pronounced like "rooting") as "routing" (beating an army in battle so that they have to flee - pronounced like "outing"). Of course this is of no consequence since in modern business it is hard to envisage a situation where the two meanings could be confused. After watching most of an abominibal film called "Shock Treatment" (the dire "sequel" to the brilliant "Rocky Horror Picture Show") I discovered that Americans also say "r-outing." Very strange. The highlight of my visit to Baan Headquarters in Barneveld was the discovering that the urinals had buttons which would start a flush. Luxury knows no bounds.