Netherlands: Day 17 and 18 - I'm British now??
Day 17
Another lazy day. I spent the morning cleaning up a bit before we headed out to the city centre. The plan was to go up Dom Tower but unfortunately they were sold out for the day. No problem though. We walked over to the steps of the church to sit down and figure out where we wanted to go. While we were sitting there talking, two guys pulled up on a vespa. They both got off and one of them walked off to smoke. After a few minutes, the guy who was still standing by the Vespa said "Hey, are you from England?" Wait, what? "You sound like you're from England." We laughed a little and said "no, we're actually Canadian". He said "Whaaat? No way! That's crazy!" and "Do you guys actually say aboot? I heard you all say aboot." We told him that we didn't, and that it's more common on the East Coast but not really in the rest of Canada. He laughed about it and apologized because he said he gets most of his Canada info from American shows like South Park. After that he asked if we were from Toronto and started talking about Drake. "Drake's Canadian right? Oh man I still can't believe it. He's SO. GOOD. I can't believe he's from Canada!" The whole thing was actually really funny because he was so excited about everything. We ended up talking about Canadian celebrities for a little while before his friend came back. We said goodbye and got up to leave. As we were walking away, we heard his friend shout "they were Canadian? What?! No way! They can't be!" So in other news, I guess I'm British now.
We started walking around, still laughing about our encounter with the Drake fans. As we were walking down the sidewalk, I had my camera around my neck like I usually do. All of a sudden a guy on a bike rode past on the street and did the standard "are you gonna take a picture of me?" gestures. We laughed a little and waved as he went by but then he turned farther down the street and posed on the side of the road. It was kind of funny so I took a picture just to humour him.
it's here!! The infamous Bike Guy
After I took a picture, he biked back over and asked to see it. I tried to explain that it was a film camera, so I couldn't show him. His response was "that's okay, I'll give you my phone number and you can send it to me." Oh boy. While I'm here I'm using a temporary phone from work that I'll have to give back at the end to be reused. I didn't really want to give out the work number to a stranger and probably looked super uncomfortable. He said something along the lines of "Oh you don't want it? That's okay that's okay, it's all good." I thought I was off the hook but he started rummaging in his pockets and said "Hey are you two doing anything? I've got lots of time and I think I've got some cash on me. Let me take you out for drinks." Alright. This guy was really nice the whole time and probably a great guy, but I'm not gonna lie, I was having Taken flashbacks at this point. Not to mention the fact that I don't think he realized that we're under the legal drinking age. Like, buddy. I'm sorry but going out for drinks with me means getting water and lemon soda.
Annie and I both started on the "Oh you don't have to. That's so nice of you but it's okay, really" mantra, and he said "oh you don't want to go?" We tried to make excuses, because we did feel kind of bad about it, but he said "No no don't worry about it. It's totally fine. Have a great day." We said goodbye and he biked off. I do appreciate how nice he was about the entire thing. My biggest fear was that he would be annoyed or angry if we turned him down. Luckily it was the total opposite.
And that's pretty much the most eventful part of the day. Afterwards we walked around Utrecht, visited a few shops, and grabbed dinner.
I'll add the photo of the bike guy to this post as soon as I get it developed. It's at the store riiight now and should be don on Tuesday. Check back or subscribe to my email list for updates on this and other new content
Day 18
Today was a Monday, so not too much happened. We did find a really cool burger place in Utrecht called Meneer Smackers. They had all different types of burgers like beef, lamb, chicken, vegetarian, and Scottish salmon. Annie got a regular beef burger and I got a vegetarian burger with mango (!!) which was amaazing. It was a super cute place and they give all their burgers names like A&W. I think mine was called the Auntie Lieke. As much as this sounds like an ad, I just really love burgers and really love mangos so combine them and I'll probably talk about you forever. @MeenerSmackers please sponsor me!
That's all for now. Catch ya later
- Tiana Daniella
