July 21, 2008

For the Love of a Water Cooler

This particular blog entry has been sitting incomplete for several months, so I will now post it!

My recent journey to the Netherlands and Poland (summer 2008) has taught me several lessons, the most important being how backward Europeans can be. Allow me to list their peculiarities, starting with the first and most evident:

1) The Curse of "Room Service" and the Infernal "Mini-Bah":

On our flight to Europe, I had the misfortune of sitting next to a passenger who hacked and spewed driblets of fluid into the air. I knew, since she refused to cover her mouth or to even turn that offending orifice away from me, that I would soon fall ill. Sure enough, I spent the first week in a hotel in Den Hague six months pregnant and full of self pity.

Now it's one thing being stuck in a hotel room, ill, as it rains outside. It's an entire new level of misery when you have Dutch room service. Hoping to rest, I stuck a "Do Not Disturb" sign on the door and locked the deadbolt. "Do Not Disturb," in the Netherlands, translates roughly to "Please Disturb to the Extent of Your Capability." The next thing I knew, two employees were in the room itching to provide clean towels. "No thank you," I said firmly. They reluctantly left.

The next day a different employee entered the room. "Just clean towels," I said. "Yes," he said, and then proceeded to wipe the bottom of the shower dry, clean the sink and bathroom floor, empty the garbage, and provide, at long last, clean towels. I sat on the bed watching his efforts. It was awkward to say the least.

Relieved that I would finally have some privacy, I settled into sleep. Soon, in the distance, I could hear the cry of "Mini-Bah!" ring out. Again and again, I heard these words, and when the dreaded knock came to my door, I said, "No thank you!" Moments later, an eight-year-old barged into the room and repeated, "Mini-Bah."

"We haven't used the 'Mini-Bah,'" I said.

"I just check Mini-Bah," he explained, and counted the items within the Mini Bar.

"You no use Mini-Bah," he said, finally satisfied, and left.

I decided to avoid these overly hospitable intruders by lingering over breakfast during the "Mini-Bah" and bath towel checks--eating from 10:00 am to 11:15.

However, my plans were soon foiled. The straw that broke the camel's back came when, at 9:00 a.m. the next day, I was showering naked in the glass shower in the glass bathroom with no solid walls. In other words, my pregnant body was completely exposed, when the Room Service knock came.

"NOOOOOOOO! DO NOT come in!" I shouted. For once--and for this I am grateful--the Dutch understood English.

The list of European oddities will continue tomorrow . . .