Leiden life story #1

Summer was counting itself to finally end in the north part of the world. It was August 25th 2019, when I first landed at the Schipol Airport. As I walking towards the immigration line, I was surprised by the crowds in front of me. It was around noon at the time. I was flying with Emirates from Indonesia on 24th around 6pm, then having an 8-hour transit at Dubai. From there, I was flying to Schipol with one Indonesian friend I'd just met at the Dubai airport. He is a man. Although we might know each other at some point, I just found it awkward having to fly with someone I do not close to. But, I remained quiet most of the time because I do not like to start a conversation and respond necessarily when my (undesired) travel company asked about something. But, since that was my first international travel, I convinced myself to enjoy the surroundings. 

I thought my first culture shock would be seeing bule. You ought to be in my shoes to understand how I felt at the time. That was my first time seeing that many bule in my life. But, of course, being surrounded by a homogeneous community where people features were so much alike, its height, feature, complexion, you got to be astounded seeing so many gigantic people. But, rather than being astounded by it, I was surprised by how humid the temperature that day was. As far as I am concerned, the Netherlands has a typically mild summer where the temperature would go no any higher than 30s degrees. Plus, summer was already walking towards its end. So, I think it was the crowds that caused the temperature in the room to sticky. Having lived all my life in a tropical country, of course, it did not bother me that much. 

I think we were waiting for a good one hour before I finally made my way to the arrival gate. Learning from past experience, when I checked at the immigration office in Soetta airport, the officer was so indifferent and rather vexed when he interrogated the purpose of my travel. So, I thought it was the nature of every immigration officer to be acting like sort of a jerk. But, to my surprise, the immigration officer at Schipol airport was very nice. As I handed him over my documents,  he quickly noticed me and shouted Indonesia? I quickly learned that to be Indonesian in this country, you would get easily recognised.

I found my luggage as soon as the conveyor started to rolling over. The whole process of waiting and picking up the luggage was completed in less than thirty minutes. Then, my friend's luggage came not long after mine. I forgot to tell you this, dear reader, my other friend had promised to pick me up from the airport and bring me to my lodging. Although I was not that close to him, we were in the same language class for three months, so I would not be awkward around him. He also the one whom I asked for inspection of my new accommodation. I only met him twice during my stay in the Netherlands; first, when he picked me up at the airport and the second, also the last one when we bumped into each other at the Leiden University Library (UB). 

The journey to Leiden from the Schipol airport only took about 45 minutes-ish. We first boarded the train to Leiden Central then continued our journey with bus number 3/4 to Merenwijk, Leiden. My apartment located not too far from the nearby bus stop. In fact, it was only a two-minute walk. Furthermore, I had notified my landlady as soon as I landed at the Schipol airport that I would arrive at the apartment around noon. So, when we hit the apartment bell, my landlady was already expecting our arrival. 

My landlady is an Ambonese. She had lived with her husband in the apartment for almost 26 years. Meanwhile, my landlord was an Indo. He was born in Bandung, Indonesia and had spent a considerable amount of his youth in Indonesia. Unfortunately, dear reader, you will have known if you read my previous post that my landlord passed away in March 2021, a week before I left for Indonesia. My landlady, which I always called her Tante, had a bubbly personality.

The apartment I lived in for a year and a half is located on a second floor (in Indonesia, we call it the third floor because the Dutch floor system counts the first floor as the ground floor, and the number adds up afterwards). The room was quite small, but considering the price I paid, it was quite reasonable. After I said thank you to my friend, I bid him goodbye. The jeg lag was only hit me when I hit the room. I was so exhausted because I barely slept on the plane, partly because I was so conscious that I was thousands of feet away above the ground and turbulence scared the hell out of me. So, I was wide awake most of the time I was on the plane. 

Although I was forcing myself to sleep, I could not fall asleep. It has always been like this whenever I moved into a new place. My body and my psyche would keep me wide awake. But, once the fatigue hit me and my body could not resist it anymore, the next time I remember was I wake up in the middle of the night because of the cold. Later that morning, when I recounted this story to my landlady, she told me that she forgot to tell me that the upper window was opened the whole night. Because she saw my lamp was already out, she was reluctant to wake me up.

I even forgot to eat. Because I was still jet lag. I remember having only eaten instant noodles on my first morning in Leiden. However, I later found out that supermarkets were so close, only a 3-minute walk from my apartment. So the very next day, I went to university to pick up my university card by myself. 

Please do expect my very first exploration in Leiden city. 

Doei!!