Posted on Thursday, October 13, 2005 5:11 PM
Arrived safe and sound in good old Netherlands, and for the journey to Rotterdam I took the train. That was a fantastic experience. The wagons roll along the flat country side with a whisper, almost without a single bump. It's like flying, but then with less noise. Amazing, because I know people in Holland tend to complain alot about the service. They're always late, the security is bad, you name it.
Then I experienced something that might be considered Dutch, or rather Western. My Dutch bicycle needed a quick fix, so I went to a repair man. 'No it's impossible. For today only we still have to fix 25 bikes, and I am not even sure we make it.' Squeezing in my small job proved to be impossible. Borrowing some tools and do it myself? Impossible. So I went to a next repairman, one of the old days. He was busy fixing a children's mountain bike, but without a blink he stopped, and went over to my bike. He didn't complain at all, and just fixed it. Furthermore he was complimenting the quality of the bike that I borrowed from my mother. We had a nice discussion about bicycles nowadays in Holland, that they had the flair of a car. It didn't even cost him five minutes, and I paid him three Euros. Maybe he still had to fix more then 25 bikes today. Adding a small job proves to be quite profitable, three Euros for five minutes is not bad. This flexible way of handling things, that's what I am experiencing in Africa every day. It saves you at least a lot of stress.