I Woke Up « En France »: November 2016

1. The Netherlands is the lowest country in Europe. In French, it is literally called Pays-Bas, or low country. 26% of the Netherlands sits below sea level, including Schipol Airport, which is 3 meters below sea level.

2. The Netherlands is home to more bikes than people. Bikes = 18 million, people = 16.8 million. Dutch people cycle an average of 2.9km per day and use bicycles for more than a quarter of all trips.

3. In Amsterdam, there are more than 8500 homes which date back more than 250 years. About a quarter of them can be found along one of the canals. Additionally, many of these old home are adorned with a hook at their gable. In the past this was to lift flats of goods to the top floor, but today it is used for lifting up washing machines and couches.

4. The Netherlands is also home to the narrowest house in the world. The house is 2.02 meters wide and 5 meters deep and was built this way to evade façade tax back in the day.

5. The Netherlands is largely secular. Up to 40% of Dutch people say they do not practice a religion, while 30% are Catholic. A highlight on our tour was a 17th-century hidden Catholic church that was built during a time when Catholics did not have the right to worship.

6. The Netherlands is the country with the lowest incidence of lactose intolerance at a shocking 1%. It is also the world's biggest exporter of cheese with a market worth 7 billion euro.

7. The Netherlands is home to the Anne Frank museum. This young Jewish girl is perhaps Amsterdam's most famous inhabitant thanks to her diary, which has been printed in 63 different languages. The secret annex at Prinsengracht 267 has been converted into a museum attracting more than a million visitors each year.

8. The Netherlands is the healthiest country in the world for diet. I don't know if I quite followed this fact. I did, however, find a restaurant that made gluten free bagel sandwiches. I liked it so much that I ate there twice over the course of a weekend.

9. The population of the Netherlands is 1/5 foreign. In culturally mixed Amsterdam, there are more than 150 nationalities represented. The country is know for its tolerance.

10. In the Netherlands about 3500 kg of waste is fished out of the canals each day. It ranges from plastic bags to entire refrigerators. Most things that are dragged up from the bottom of the canal, however, are bicycles: about 65 thousand every year.

11. The Netherlands welcomes over 3.5 million foreign visitors a year. That's us!

Bonus photos:

Bonus thoughts: I would move here without a question. The city has a great ambiance, the food is good (at least the bagels are) and the people are very kind.

These sites were liberally used in the making of this list:
www.expatica.com/
wonderfulwanderings.com/

blog.mendo.nl/

www.amsterdam.info/

For fall break I visited a long-term dream country, Morocco. I think the desire to travel there started when I ate some "Moroccan" couscous in Disney World's EPCOT, and grew when I learned it was a francophone country in French class. Thus when plans were being tossed around, I was a big proponent of forming a group for Morocco. Final plans included going to Fez, Morocco and then Madrid, Spain for the second half.

Day 1

We arrived and headed straight to our Airbnb, which was the coolest place I have ever slept in. I think we all freaked out about the place when we got there. At least I did. The Airbnb was a riad, a traditional Moroccan style home with rooms surrounding a square courtyard.

For lunch I took a moped ride with our host to buy kebabs from a small market. I found that in Moroccan traffic especially it is a good idea to hang on! We were also treated to some Moroccan mint tea (store-bought "Moroccan mint" will never be the same):

Soon after that we took a guided tour of the medina of Fez, which boasts 9,000 streets and countless stalls and shops. Without the guide we would have certainly been lost!

As Fez is known for its craftsmanship, we visited several artisans' shops. First, wood carving:

And then a tannery that makes products out of the skins of cows, sheep, goats and camels. Read more here about their process, it's really interesting! (hint: pigeon poop is involved):

Some leather products

Prize purchase of the group: a camel leather jacket

We also went to a spice shop (not shown) and a fabric shop:

They even tied up scarves for us!

(They must have learned that white people like this)

Close up on the ladies

More around the medina:

There are also more than 100 mosques in Fez, and while we couldn't enter any of them since we aren't Muslim, they were quite lovely even from the outside:

Dinner was a traditional tajine:

Day 2/3

The second day in Morocco we set out to the go to the Sahara. We packed up our things, met the camel company's drivers and set off on our voyage. We had anticipated a 2-hour car ride, perhaps 3.

What we didn't realize, or perhaps what we didn't learn in geography class, was that Fez is nowhere near the Sahara. The trip ended up being 9 hours!

This was full of scenery and broken up with several stops and lunch, however, so we had fun with it:

Wild monkeys!

We were pretty obsessed

Familiar snacks in Arabic!

Then, finally, we arrived at the camel company base. They tied us up in scarves again (of course) and helped us mount our camels. It took a bit of getting used to! We watched the sun set during our ride to their camp in the Sahara:

At the camp in the Sahara we were able to eat some tajine after our long voyage by car and camel. They treated us to some traditional Moroccan music and invited us to try our hand at it, but we were slightly less successful than the locals. Nighttime in the Sahara was also perfect for playing in the sand and stargazing without the hindrance of city lights.

In the morning, we set out early enough to catch the sunrise in the desert:

Arrival back to the base meant hot showers, which felt great and helped get all the sand off. The drive back went much more quickly, as we made minimal stops.

Day 4

On our last day in Morocco we took a tour of the exterior of the medina and visited a pottery shop:

To compare our two destination, I found Morocco to be fun to visit, whereas Madrid would be a fun place to live. After getting off the plane and settling in, we went to a tapas event in which many of the restaurants of the city were participating. We also took a city tour, visited a church and toured the palace. The best part about Madrid, however, is all of their parks. For a major city they have a ton of green space: