Destination Unknown

It's that time of year when everybody resolves to eat better and exercise more. To be a better housekeeper, or keep a better lab journal (well, that's me, and that's a weekly resolution of mine). To go skydiving once, fly a glider, ski a black diamond, try a totally new food, go to church regularly. To lose those final 10 lbs (or start with losing 10 lbs), to become eco-conscious, to just be better people than we all were in 2011.

Behavioral experts, however, say that change only happens when you have a measurable metric with which to measure progress. If you resolve to spend less money, for instance, you'd be better off with a concrete goal along the lines of "not spending more than €20/week on lunch". Eating better would be rephrased to "having one vegetable with every meal" (broccoli for breakfast, anyone?). So in keeping with the science, my resolutions for this year don't include eating better and exercising more, though that is implicit in the first one, which is to run the 10k Marikenloop in May of this year. It's a 5k race with a 10k option, in case you're interested. It's also a women's only race (sorry, guys). It's no Zevenheuvelenloop, certainly not in terms of scale or grandeur, but it's a nice way to ease back into running, I think.

Another resolution of mine is to finish a rough draft of a book. I'd started writing a few bits and pieces of it while I was unemployed, but I couldn't get very far. I didn't have any plans as to how I wanted to structure it, which was problem number one. Problem number two was that, between my job hunt and my other little writing pets, it became more of a drag to work on, probably because of problem number one. My NaNoWriMo novel this year ran into the same problem. I am not a seat-of-my-pants writer--I really don't know why I keep acting like I am.

My final resolution this year is to improve my Dutch language skills. This will be awkward, but I think I should be able to get my lab mates on board, as far as the speaking bits go. Fear not, international readers: Outside Looking In will continue to be written in English, though perhaps I will introduce a "word of the week" column. That, however, is not a resolution. I've never been very good about weekly things, whether it's photos or posts or things like that.

But really, the goal is to make it through 2012. Beyond that--where we'll end up, what we'll be doing, who we'll be--the destination is beautifully vague. Enjoying the way there--that's the real treat.

Day of Cats

The Netherlands has the fewest national holidays of most of the countries in the EU, so while Americans may grumble and roll their eyes at the luxurious holiday benefits most workplaces offer, you need to remember that there is no Martin Luther King Junior Day, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, or Thanksgiving. And not to mention the host of other lesser holidays--Presidents Day, Valentine's, Halloween, St, Patrick's, etc. None of these get so much as a token observance here, except via the seasonal decorative kitsch that appears in the Blokker.

 But there is one international holiday that is routinely noted, if not observed: Dierendag, or World Animal Day, as it's officially called. It falls on 4 October every year, the day of Saint Francis of Assisi (yes, the guy with all those cats). It's supposed to be a day to appreciate what animals do for us, and consequently it's no surprise that it's virtually unknown in the US.

 In the sixty-odd years that it's been celebrated in the Netherlands, Dierendag has lost its religious connection to St. Francis and gained a host of animal rights activism that tags along with any sort of "thinking about animals". On academic campus centers with animal facilities, picketers will demonstrate their opposition to animal research, and you might even get a few crazy souls preaching the virtues of a vegetarian diet. For clarification: the Dutch don't eat much meat compared to the quantities that are common in US restaurants (nobody would order a triple-burger, for instance), but they would never think about eliminating it from their diets entirely.

 It's also evolved into a day where you spoil your pet, and to make that task easier, the pet stores all have their sale-of-the-year during this time. The flyers for Dierendag appeared in our weekly junk mail assortment this week (and yes, we do go through our junk mail, because you never know when kitty litter and cat food will go on sale). Yesterday, having learned that it's a bad idea to try to haul 2/3 of your own weight in kitty litter on a bike, I took our little trusty shopper and walked to the Intratuin, with the intent of getting 40 kg (that's 88 lbs) of cat litter.

 Imagine my shock, then, to see the store getting outfitted for Christmas. Now, the kruidnoten and pepernoten (seasonal, spicy cookies) are always out early, so it didn't surprise me to see them at the grocery stores. But the Intratuin--where we get our Christmas tree ornaments--was setting up a full-sized carousel, taking down the deck chairs, and putting up Christmas ornaments. In September. Dutch culture purists can't blame the US for this one--Christmas doesn't start until Halloween.

Calender Gurl

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I spent the Fourth of July having perhaps one of the worst job interviews, one of those interviews that gets cited for "How NOT to Have an Interview" articles on job-hunting sites. To be fair, what the people were looking for wasn't clearly expressed in the advert, so I didn't feel too bad about losing it once I realized they wanted someone with a lot more chemistry in their background. It was not a celebration, unless you count the beer I had at the end of a draining day as my version of a drunken orgy, and it most emphatically did not have fireworks.

I had a few problems adjusting to holidays in the Netherlands. Because Karel works shifts, he has a very irregular schedule and is just as likely to have to work a weekend as he is to have Wednesday free. When I lived in the US, holidays were a way to mark the passage of time: New Year's was the start of the new year; St. Patrick's meant spring was just around the corner; Memorial Day meant I could start wearing white; July 4 was the midsummer; Labor Day meant school started; and Thanksgiving meant that I was in deep trouble if I hadn't gotten together my Christmas list.

Most of the holidays in the Netherlands are religious, with the exception of New Year's and Liberation Day. And as such, it is impossible to set them to any date, as Easter Monday, Ascension Day, and the second day of Pentecost are X days after Day Y. These are more-or-less universally Christian holidays, and thus are recognized by the entire country, but Carnival and St. Maartens are more regional. Carnival is mainly in the south--in Nijmegen we have a token celebration, but most of the shops don't even bother to close--while St. Maartens is observed in the northern provinces as well as Maastricht. The latter is explained by the fact that Sint Maarten coincides with the harvest; the north is largely agrarian. The Dutch version of the Wiki page says the tradition (making lanterns, singing songs, getting candy) is spreading throughout the rest of the Netherlands, but it could be that the writer is getting confused with Halloween celebrations, since some small enclaves of expats rig trick-or-treat routes for their kids.

The funny thing about holidays in the US and in the Netherlands: in the US, people purport to be Christians and say "God Bless America" and all that stuff, but they don't celebrate the Ascension, or the Pentecost; and indeed, unless you're a priest, I doubt you'd know when to do so. In the Netherlands, religion is one of those things you're expected to have but not to share, lest you be mistaken for an evangelicizing prick, and yet the Ascension and Pentecost are marked holidays.

*This jellyfish shot is the only one that has red, (a little) white, and blue.