Exercise

Tonight I went with two women to a gym. One of the women was a spouse of someone Dan works with, the other works with Dan. They invited me to go to Body Balance class with them and since I have not been working out since I got here and I didn't want to spend another night alone at home, I went. Something you should know about the Netherlands. It's a very small country, about the size of New Jersey but it is VERY densely populated, as in 17 million people live here. So what this means for us is that everything is narrow and built up. We had to climb 4 levels of stairs to get to our work out room! But before that I had an interesting encounter I'd like to share. 

I had to fill out some paperwork and actually got to use a little bit of the Dutch I've been learning! I was able to fill out most of the first page about my name, address, etc. When I started having difficulty, I asked the gym guy to help me. He started translating One of the questions was "Are you currently exercising?" and I opened my big American mouth and said, "Do you mean besides all the biking and walking I have to do to live here?" . It's no wonder they think we're lazy. Anyways, the gym guy then asked where I was from. I told him the United States and then he told me was from. . .Aruba. That is when I noticed his last name was "VanDerSloot" and I took off running out the back door...ok well that last part didn't happen but he WAS from Aruba and it took every bit of self-control not to ask the man if he knew/was associated with/had thoughts on his guilt or innocence, Joren VanDerSloot. For those still trying to think where you've heard that name before...Dutch guy who lived between Aruba and the Netherlands, killed Natalie Holloway and most recently killed another girl and is sitting in an Arubian prison. Anyways, how random is that? OH! and when I got home, I was perusing Foxnews and saw an article about Mr. VanDerSloot himself. Weird, considering I haven't heard anything about him since before the wedding. Coincidence? I think not. My doors are double locked tonight folks.

So, after that encounter, we headed up half the stairs to the locker room. Hmm, if you've never been to a European spa, I think you are really missing out;) The majority of the people in the locker room were naked. All women, but still naked. awkward. Then we head up the second half of the stairs to start our class. Think Yoga mixed with Tai Chi, mixed with Pilates. It was tough but the best thing was the meditation at the end. For 10 minutes, we laid in the dark and meditated. Well, I prayed  and I'm assuming she was telling us to think about certain things or relax certain parts but she was speaking in Dutch so I couldn't understand her. And yes, in case you were wondering, you can even be tortured by exercise instructors who don't speak your language.When we were finished, we headed back down to the locker room where I had to carefully reach over a naked woman to get my stuff out of my locker before we headed downstairs to have tea. They also served beer. At the gym. For your post workout refreshment. Then we biked home. The End.