Casual Saturday in Maastricht

After a few weeks of staying in, sickness, frustrating laundry experiences, and just plain business, Dan & I decided to get out on Saturday to run a few errands in town and go see an archaeological exhibit.
 
Actually the archaeology exhibit was my main reason for getting out. I had read about a free exhibit in the Hoofdwacht on the Vrijthof about the archaeological work done when they put in the underground parking. Being a lover of dirt and finding things in it, I didn’t want to pass it up. Unfortunately it didn’t open until noon, so we had some time to kill.
 
I’m very American in the sense that I am most comfortable shopping in a grocery store for all of my food stuffs, but there are occasionally things I can’t find at Aldi and Albert Heijn. The big ones are baking powder and baking soda. Baking powder can be found in a regular grocery store, but so far I’ve only seen it there in little packets. I’ve been told that baking soda (bicarbonaat) can be obtained at a pharmacy but I’m not really comfortable with that. So instead I found both at an Asian grocery store on Markt square. They are products of the UK, but cheap and in decent sized containers. Arm & Hammer, my go-to baking soda in the US, costs over 7,50 euros here. Craziness. I’m not that brand loyal.
 
The other thing we like to get at a specialty store is loose leaf chai tea. Chai is almost always better loose leaf, so we occasionally stroll across the bridge and pick up a bag at Simon Levelt. They have a wide variety of teas, all loose leaf, as well as many sweets, gifts, and coffee beans to boot.

Saturday also introduced us to another Dutch snack: oliebollen. Oliebollen are like a puffed donut the size of a man’s hand and deep fried in oil. Sometimes they are filled with fruit or creme. The one we had was from a cart on Markt square and was filled with banana (a banananballen) and dusted with powdered sugar. (I think the Dutch put powdered sugar on nearly everything.) I doubt it’ll take the place of chocolate filled waffles as my favorite Maastricht snack, but it was certainly tasty.

After a quick stop over at T-Mobile for the nth time to get my voicemail fixed we discovered that the Chocolate Company was open. We’ve been trying to get in there for months now, but they’ve always been closed. Today we went in and had coffee with a chocolate fondue for two for lunch. The dark chocolate fondue came with cake, cookies, strawberries, and bananas for dipping and was a fun and tasty lunch; even if it was terribly unhealthy.
 
Of course this all brings us up to noon and my much hyped archaeology exhibit. How disappointing. I had hoped from a through discussion of the history of layers they’d found under the Vrijthof along with some interesting artifacts and maybe a description of the project as a whole. Instead we got a single room with a few small objects, one picture of the dig project, and several photographs of artifacts with little or no description. A real pity after anticipating an exciting exhibit for so long.
 
We whiled away the rest of our afternoon working on a variety of projects as we are wont to do on a Saturday. Dan worked on his comic, I editing his comic and worked on an article about Maastricht. We even managed to avoid the short hailstorm in the afternoon. A nice, casual day in Maastricht.

Episode 14 of Maastricht Minutiae

Mmm…Doesn’t Dan look like he’s enjoying that olieballen? They are a traditional News Years treat but the cart is out now on the Markt square for anyone who wants an early taste. You can now listen to episode 14 of Maastricht Minutiae by clicking here and using your preferred podcatcher.
 
 
 
 
 
This week we chat about:
Autumn
Amanda’s Doctor Visit
Visiting the Vet & UTI in cats
Our laundry struggles
Olieballen
Chocolate Company
Archaeology Exhibit
 
And a reminder that the Pecha Kucha Event in Maastricht takes places Oct. 20th at 8 pm at the AINSI building. If you’re local, check it out. We’ll be there.

Trading One InnovationCon for Another

Life conspired against me Thursday and I ended up missing the Creativity & Innovation Conference at the AINSI building. Lucky me, the other Innovation conference happening in Maastricht this week has a LiveStream feed; allowing me to listen in on the day’s activities.
 
The European Journalism Centre’s Innovation Conference is one part of a greater series trying to address the “field of innovation ecosystems”. This Thursday & Friday, the topic is “Innovation in Youth Media and Next Generation Classroom” and speakers from a variety of backgrounds discussed the effective of the “innovative ecosystems” on education. Based on what I heard on the live feed, “innovation ecosystems” refers to the changing world of media, information, and entertainment, and the technologies used to access same.
 
I have to say that while I am interested in the way people discover and use information, as well as new media technologies, I don’t really care about the activities of teenagers. Despite my own biases, the presentations & discussions were still informative and insightful.
 

This is a trailer for the conference. I like the bananas but think that the comment about innovation equals money to be short-sighted.
 
I missed the introduction and most of the keynote speaker, but I did catch some of the later presentation and question and answer sessions. Day one was primarily focused on the way teens (and by inference older people) interact with media, technology, and information. Here are a few impressions:
 
- Nicholas Covey, of the Neilsen Company, presented some pretty compelling data about what teen media consumption is really like. My thought is that young people are choosing other news outlets than TV news because they don’t trust the traditional sources. The biases (Fox News) and the unwillingness to cover certain important issues fully (CNN) mean people who want news on some subjects have to find it elsewhere. Blogs and alternative news sources do that. I also thought it was condescending to refer to teens as “little people” (as opposed to big people who are the adults I suppose).
 
- I liked the image of the classroom presented by Prof. Anne Balsmo, from the School of Cinematic Arts & Annenberg School. Multiple screens with students providing “Google-jockeying” web searches and chat “Backtalk” during academic lectures sounds like it would add layers to learning and help rein in students who need a more interactive learning experience. I know I Google constantly during lectures to look up websites or mentioned subjects of interest to me.
 
- Stephens Sayers, from FutureLabs, sang a song familiar to any of the librarians out there. We need to teach information literacy that will last into the future. Students have “high confidence, but low competence” when dealing with information technologies (such as Google) and when they learn to evaluate online sources for value they will also start questioning the status-quo resources. Good stuff.
 
- Jeanne-Emmanuelle Hutin-Gapsys, from Ouest-France (the largest French newspaper), spoke about an initiative to get 18-24-year-olds to read newspapers by giving them free subscriptions. This seems rather like forestalling the inevitable. It’s the content that should be focused on, not the medium. But maybe there is a cultural issue here that I’m missing. Me, I might take the free subscription but that doesn’t mean I’m reading.
 
- Grzegorz Piechota, from Gazeta Wyborcza (Poland’s largest daily newspaper), was by far my favorite speaker; both funny and insightful. His paper clearly is making a connection with the younger generation by addressing issues important to them, publishing on the web, and creating opportunities for social action. The Q&A seemed to have some, relatively polite, knee-jerking from other newspapers’ editors/employees about methods, money, access to talent, etc. I’m no specialist in newspapers, but I do know that in the US there is a perception that they are dying and that news in dying with them.
 
I wonder if there is a cultural divide here between Polish newspapers and other European and American papers. In the US, we expect at least a perceived neutrality from our newspapers. For example, the Boston Globe can report on a grassroots movement to stop some governmental building project, but it would be frowned upon if they were instrumental as a paper in starting said movement. The Gazeta Wyborcza sounds more active, but probably less neutral (in that weird news-outlet sense of the word). But it’s working for them.
 
- Finally, you may be interested to hear that I actually am using my Twitter feed to jog my memory writing this post. How’s that for new media use?
 
There should be another LiveStream today of the second half of the conference starting at 9:30 AM. Day two is dedicated to innovative teaching techniques being used now in classrooms. Once the final videos are made available, I’ll try to link those as well.

Culture Surprise at the Doctor’s Office

As someone who suffers from a variety of chronic, but not debilitating medical woes, you’d think I’d be better about getting my medical care set up. Not so much. My general dislike for going to see the doctor and the learning curve of a new system gave me ample excuse to take my time. Still, after procrastinating for several months, my chronic wrist problems finally forced me to finish filling out paperwork and make an appointment.

Finding a Doctor
I’ve written a little bit before about medical insurance in the Netherlands and how it operates somewhat like an HMO. One of the key components is finding your primary care physician (huisart) since this is the person who will handle all your medical care from now on. Even when you are in an emergency situation, you are supposed to call your huisart’s office first and they arrange an ambulance to pick you up (there is the 112 number if you’re in a really dire situation; a la 911 in the States).

It is generally suggested that you ask a friend or neighbor to recommend a huisartspraktijk (doctor’s office) or huisart to you. You’ll want someone near by and insurances are universally accepted, making other people who live in your area the best source of information. This is tricky for an expat who hasn’t marrying into a Dutch family and may not have made many friends yet. Most of the people we’ve met don’t live in the area, but we asked around and got suggestions. I also found that our insurance company has an online database of doctors that we could search by location and that is ultimately where I found the office I applied to. They have several doctors, which increased my chance of finding a woman.

It was recommended to me by a Dutch neighbor that I should walk into the huisartpraktijk to become a new patient. Many doctors already have full dockets, so they may be more receptive to a face-to-face request rather than a phone call. It also meant I got to scope out the waiting room and pick up the starter paperwork: a couple of contact forms with a few medical questions. I filled out the paperwork, dropped off copies of my US records and made my first appointment.

The First Appointment
The first appointment is really a consultation with your new huisart before you are added to the system. That way you can meet and decide if you’re comfortable with your physician before taking your clothes off. It also provided my new doctor with the chance to discuss my medical history a little and to talk about my chronic issues.

I really appreciated this appointment. I’ve never had a consulting appointment with a primary care physician before and it helped to set me at ease a little. I was surprised that unlike in the US, and even at our Netherland’s dental office, I did not have to fill out a form with 50 questions about my medical history. The doctor just asked about the health of my direct relatives and if cardiovascular problems, diabetes, and breast cancer had ever cropped up in my immediate family. She also inquired as to the age of the person who suffered from these ailments. My questions were answered and while the meeting was certainly formal, I didn’t feel rushed.

I was a little surprised to find that I would have to make a separate appointment to have my wrist looked at. I guess there will be no making an appointment for one thing and then discussing other problems here. The receptionist also told me that I would have to call them this afternoon to make my appointment because I wasn’t in their system yet. When I called I was able to get an appointment lined up quickly; less than a week from today.

Non-Intervention Medicine
There is clearly a non-interventionist attitude towards medical care here in the Netherlands, or at least here in Maastricht. My doctor told me that there is no regular exam necessary until age 30 for women. At age 45 is when they start watching your risk factors for things such as cancer or cardiovascular disease (unless you have some really strong risk-factors at a younger age of course). This is so very different from the US where risk factors are frequently monitored quite close and at an early age. My expected interaction with my huisart appears to boil down to one thing: “Only when you are sick.”

There is less of a tendency to prescribe medicines here unless absolutely necessary as well. When I spoke to my new huisart today regarding my eczema, which I’ve been prescribed copious amounts of cortisone for in the past, she said she’d write a prescription but “only if absolutely necessary”. This is a huge change from my last doctor who would give me anything at the drop of a hat. And probably a change for the better. There is no point in getting antibiotics or something else that won’t help. On the other hand, I will probably be slower to see my doctor for ailments since I won’t want to visit just to be told to sleep and drink lots of fluids. We will see.

Most of my questions actually stemmed from a gynecological angle, as I am accustomed to having a regular, separate gynecologist for my annual exams and other treatments. Gynecologic concerns are, in fact, my number one reason to have a female doctor. I learned that women in the Netherlands only have an annual pap smear every 5 years (provided that their previous one was normal I assume), and that I am not expected to start them until I am 30 years old. Also, nurses rather than doctors usually do pap smears. That never happens in the US expect maybe at a free clinic.

Talk about a huge change from the yearly exams I’ve had ever since my period started. I was very surprised. I suppose the Netherlands does not see higher rates of cancer than the US, but the attitude feels a little too casual to me. Perhaps more frequent exams are considered invasive or a hassle relative to their perceived benefit in younger women. Fortunately, I’ve always had normal annual exams, so I’m not too worried.

I am calling this culture surprise rather than shock because the differences are significant but not necessarily negative. I can get behind less frequent use of drugs and medication when not necessary. It remains to be seen how well I handle a less intensive gynecology program and having direct access to only my huisart.

Pecha Kucha Maastricht: Sampling New Things

On October 20th, at 8:20 PM, the most recent Pecha Kucha Maastricht event will be held at the AINSI building here in Maastricht. I missed the last event, but I won’t be missing another chance to catch this interesting and English-language event.

Pecha Kucha is a series of 6 minute and 20 second presentations that present new ideas in a variety of fields from art to science. Each presenter is permitted 20 slides and 20 seconds per slide to keep the presentations fresh and snappy. In a lot of ways Pecha Kucha is really about giving people the change to sample new ideas and research direct from the creators responsible.

The previous Pecha Kucha head in Maastricht was a success and there is every reason to expect this one to be even better. The event is 5 euros to attend.

Banner is (c) Pecha Kucha Maastricht

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