Vacationing among the Dutch (part II)

Besides women wearing leggings and men of all orientations and backgrounds wearing pink/turquoise/lilac shirts (really? I mean, really?), the one thing that really throws me for a loop here in Holland is the amount of daylight. And more specifically, the fact that there is so much of it.

Take right now for instance. It's 9:30pm, and as far as my brain is concerned, it's only about eight at night. After all, the light is only just now starting to fade, which in no way could ever take place anytime after nine, at least if you're used to my neck of the woods. And, just in case you're like me and you'd forgotten, but Georgia is a lot further south than the Netherlands. If I'm not horribly mistaken, I think its cross-Atlantic equivalent is Morocco, which is, as far as I know, not known for its short nights and long summer days.


So anyway, combine the long days with the fact that for the first few days of this week my body was convinced that the evening didn't really start until about 11pm, and you can imagine that I had really long days. And I did. And what made it worse was that it's not just the evenings that are all messed up, light-wise, but the mornings aren't much better either. As I'm sure you all know, the Netherlands is fully lit by about six in the morning, whereas in Georgia we don't really see full daylight until seven at best. So by the time I open my eyes around 8am, the sun's out as though it's one in the afternoon, and my entire body kicks into "Oh-My-God-it's-noon-and-I've-overslept" mode long enough to make any return to sleep pretty much impossible.

Now I'm not saying this is a bad thing. It's not. I've had a lot to do; lots of people to see, lots of shopping to do, lots of eierkoeken/drop/slagroomtaart/bokkepootjes to eat, and lots of running to do to make up for all that eating. So the whole sun-on-crack thing has really been, to use a southern phrase, a real blessing. After all, sleep is overrated, right?