Biggest differences so far

I thought it would be fun to tell you something about the biggest differences between the USA and the Netherlands I've seen so far. Even though I've only been here for 10 days, I can tell that there are many!

1. The food

I love the food here! I've tried many things so far: Reese's, twinkies, Chick-fil-A, hamburgers (of course), Chipotle and El Jimador (both Mexican restaurants), bagels, frozen custard, P.F. Chang's (Asian food), cream soda... My two favorites were Reese's (peanut butter cups) and Chick-fil-A! In general, the food is not as healthy as in the Netherlands because there are many fast food restaurants. The dishes are also bigger. Another difference is that they take leftovers of the food in restaurants with them, so they can eat it another time. I think that's a good thing because the food doesn't go to waste.

2. The weather

It's so hot outside! Every day it gets warmer than 30 degrees and that's totally not what I'm used to, but I really like it. It will stay warm here for the next months so that's great :) Even though it's hot outside, it's freezing cold inside because there's air-conditioning everywhere. So when I go inside I have to put on some more clothes to avoid getting cold. Another difference is that people here are really used to the heat, but when it's this hot in the Netherlands it's on the national news and many people take the day off to go to the beach.

3. The transportation

I'm used to cycling everywhere, because that's a 'normal' thing in the Dutch culture. The country is flat and everything is close to each other, so that makes it really practical. People don't cycle here, but they take the car. I don't even want to try cycling here, because no one is used to it and everything is far away from each other. I think it would be really dangerous!

Walmart!

4. Everything is bigger

This is also one of the reasons I don't want to cycle here: almost everything is bigger than what I'm used to. The houses, the streets, the cars... Especially the stores are huge here! In stores like Walmart and Target you can buy almost everything you can imagine and they are really big.

5. The people

In my opinion the people here are really friendly. They are all interested in the Netherlands and ask a lot of questions. They don't know a lot about the Netherlands here though, which isn't strange because it's such a small country. Normally I don't go to church, but church in the USA is a lot of fun and I met many nice people there! Everyone makes me feel welcome and there's no one who hasn't been nice to me.

Eastside High School

Today was my first day as a Junior in Eastside High School! I really like all my classes and met some nice people. I won't tell a lot about my first day here though, because I'll make a separate blogpost about that. Hopefully you liked reading about my first experiences here in the USA and I'll update you very soon!