No matter how many times I've done it, I've found that the transition from continent to continent, culture to culture, is a difficult one. I have to keep reminding myself that I will not feel "normal" for quite awhile: weeks or months, if not days. Even so, it's tough being swept up in the middle of the whole transition thing (and no amount of reminding myself will change that fact!).

Today, I thought I was doing pretty well.  I had managed to stop by the kids' school and make sure that everything was a go for starting up again with classes at the beginning of the new school-year next week (our previous adventures with the Dutch bureaucracy made it less than 100 percent certain).  Then I picked up a replacement tube for our bike pump, which I needed to pump my bike tires back to full strength (three months' absence left my bike in need of some TLC).  And by 11:00, I had even managed to secure a European power cabel for our new notebook computer (though I had to stop by three places before finally succeeding).  Not bad for my second full day back in the Netherlands, if I do say so myself...

But then, on my way back from the grocery store around lunchtime, the wheels fell off the proverbial cart.  Or, to be more literal, the chain fell off my bicycle.  And I couldn't manage to get it back on.  And it was raining.  It was raining hard.  So I ended up trudging the last kilometer back to my house, with a backpack full of groceries, pushing my bicycle alongside me, and getting very, very wet.  And as I walked, I realized that I had spent the whole summer in the United States of America without ever getting wet (except for the times that I was in the swimming pool -- in the sunshine).  Getting wet is a very common experience in the Netherlands -- both because it rains a lot more often, and because one is exposed to the elements (walking or on bicycle) a lot more often.  And yet, I had spent an entire summer without getting wet.  I honestly can't even remember if it rained all that much (though I can vaguely recall the swish of windshield wipers at various occasions).  But in my second full day back in the Netherlands, I found myself getting profoundly wet again.

I hope I'm not sounding too whiney about all of this -- because I was actually able to enjoy the experience (at least a little bit) and laugh at the situational irony of it all.  But it was a reminder of the trans-continental transition in which I am now immersed.

Another point of trans-continental amusement is the cultural coverage of the Olympic Games, which are starting (have started) today.  At the time of this writing, I imagine that most Americans have not yet witnessed the Olympics' Opening Ceremonies.  Part of this, I'm sure is related to the time zone differential.  But part of it, I think, is indicative of a cultural lens.  The Americans save their Olympic coverage for prime-time -- choosing tape-delayed comfort and ease-of-viewing over immediacy.  The European broadcasters, on the other hand, chose to broadcast the coverage of the Opening Ceremonies live, in their entirety -- at two o'clock in the afternoon.  And although this is cool in a certain way -- to be seeing everything live -- it seems there is very minimal coverage (a one hour summary broadcast) of the Olympics in the evenings' peak viewing hours (when our kids are in bed).  I guess this had never been an issue before, during the other Olympics that I've seen since living in Amsterdam -- because the Games in Torino and Athens took place in the same time zone (though, come to think of it, I seem to recall the the Salt Lake City games weren't broadcast in the wee hours of the morning).  It just seems to be an interesting clash of cultural values...

Of course, this is not even mentioning the substance of the Olympics coverage in Europe!  If I were in America, I'm sure, I'd be getting to see plenty of coverage of basketball, gymnastics, swimming, and track (along with plenty of other clips from various sports and lots of human interest stories).  But Dutch television seems to focus more on sports like swimming (which I enjoy) and field-hockey (which I do not enjoy).  And British television rounds out the coverage with plenty of track (which I enjoy) and equestrian events (which are probably about the most uninteresting events that I could imagine watching).  These differences are logical in a certain way.  But they're also very unusual to notice on the emotional level...

Particularly for someone who is still jet-lagging and transitioning between continents and cultures.