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My six insights on The Netherlands

When one thinks of The Netherlands the first images that comes to mind may be bicycles, flowers, windmills and cheese. In fact, it does make sense and I was imagining exactly these kinds of things before coming to live here, but the truth is I have learnt that this country is way much more than that. As I had never thought about living here, I wrote a quick list with six things that was only possible to understand after moving to this foreign land.

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Bicycles and traffic for the newly arrived

It’s the time of the year a lot of people working in sync with the academic school year have just found themselves relocated in the Netherlands. A new wave of people arrives every summer and face similar challenges every autumn after the sparkling, upsetting, amazing period of settling in. One of the things that fascinates and often intimidates most newbies in the Netherlands is the bicycle culture and the unique traffic in general.

I have met a number of newly arrived parents in the last couple of months. They have been equally curious about many things, but especially about things to do with traffic. Can you keep your foreign driver’s license and if so, for how long? How different is it cycling between the cars than on a sidewalk? Where do you get your bike and more importantly how do you lock and store it? What are the general traffic rules?

colorful-bike

You can always decorate your bike to make it easier to recognize when you need to spot it in a sea of bicycles.

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