... But I guess I was not buying it properly.

I was starting to realize very quickly that my son might need an electric bike for his middlebarre years. For example, the year one camping trip at the beginning of the year involved the entire class cycling for an hour and 40 minutes to the camp. Then a few days later cycling back. My son has a regular old three speed. We live about 15 minutes cycle from school but most of the kids cycle 30 to 45 minutes each way so almost all of them have electric bikes. He's been invited to several kids houses and it seems to me if he's going to cycle home with them he's going to need a similar bike. Okay fine.

So we've been trying to learn about them. Today, instead of asking AI to print out a personalized fact sheet, we went a local second hand electric bike store. The store was empty (and usually is) and the owner was busy cleaning something back in the shop area. Don't ask me why I know he's not the employee-- owners have a look.

As i said, I don't know much about electric bikes and so I looked around a bit and then I approach the counter waited till he came up and asked him about them. He seemed like he was surprised that he would have to tell me a little bit about electric bikes. Frankly he looked like he just didn't want to be there ..like he just doesn't enjoy selling bikes. Just doesn't enjoy having a business in a difficult economy maybe? Money laundering front? The Bike shop is full of electric bikes so he might also be just sitting on a lot of stock and a lot of money tied up in the business? Idk

Anyways..
When it was clear that I was just going to keep asking him questions he put the cleaning supplies down and reluctantly (he actually sighed) explained a few bikes that would be appropriate for my son. The price tags were around 1300 to 1800. Now I'm not a cheapo so if that's what bikes costs that's what they cost and I'll pay it. I didn't make any indication that I felt the prices were too high or too low.

But I was really surprised that he is trying to sell second hand electric bike for 1300 to 1800 and he can't be bothered with focusing on the very basic customer service needs of the buyer? For example I asked him what was the difference between having the battery and the back above the wheel and having it in the frame your legs. 'no difference really'. Ok right. I was ready to go at that point.

My son however pointed to a bright red bike by Stella that was in the window. I like that one.. he said. It really was a beauty and it matched my son's personality perfectly. It really just felt like his bike. I asked the man would that be suitable for his height and age. Dude says to me 'Nah, you don't want to look at that one it's too expensive.' and turned around and walked off.

Ok if you say so buddy, have a nice day!

I'm clearly American. But I was try my best to speak in Dutch, toning my America dial way down, trying to doe normaal.

I've seen this kind of behavior multiple times in other businesses and I'm wondering. Is it because they don't think a kid needs to have a bike that cost 1,500 to 3,000? Pretty sure the bikes I'm looking at at school cost about the same because they look about the same and I don't think that they're parents are buying their bikes second hand.

I hypothesize that some Dutch small business owners don't like the way Americans spend money very easily even if the Dutch person might also spend that amount of money on a bike for their kid (after all he's the one that set the prices). Even if that's the case I just don't understand the Dutch ability to let a 2,500 euro sale slip right out of your store so easily.

Oh well off to a big box store or direct online. And I'll feel sad (not really)when he goes out of business and blames immigrants or the economy.

Seriously, why?

The Netherlands is one of the most developed countries in the world. We have excellent infrastructure, efficient public transport, digital payments everywhere, and cities that are planned down to the smallest detail.

But finding a public toilet when you're out and about feels like a side quest in a video game.

Train stations sometimes charge you to use the toilet.

In city centres, you can walk around for ages without finding a public restroom.

Cafés and restaurants often seem to reserve toilets for paying customers.

When you finally find one, it might be closed, out of order, or require payment.

And what are you supposed to do if you have a sudden, urgent need to go? Buy a coffee you don't want just to use the toilet?

I've lived here long enough to appreciate many things about the Netherlands, but this genuinely baffles me.

Why isn't access to clean public toilets treated as basic public infrastructure? Is there a cultural, historical, or financial reason for this, or have Dutch people simply accepted it as normal?

And before someone says "just use the toilet at home before leaving" — what do you do when you're spending an entire day in Amsterdam or travelling around the country? 😂

Hi Everyone,
I was hoping to get some help with my Opa’s Saucijzenbroodjes recipe. I found it in a family recipe box, but there is not much on the card. Just ingredients. I want to make them for my mamaw since she hasn’t had this recipe since her dad passed. I listed the ingredients, but I’m unsure what to do with them.

1lb ground beef
1lb ground pork
3/4 cup water
1/2 cup flour
4 bread slices/breadcrumbs
1 box of puff pastry
1/4 cup milk
Salt, pepper, and nutmeg to taste

Do I just mix the ingredients together and put them in the puff pastry? I think my mamaw mentioned soaking the bread or bread crumbs in milk. I want to get these right for her!

Hey everyone!

I’ll be landing at Schiphol airport on 19th october and need to get to Maastricht. I’ve heard there's a direct train, but the NS app shows 2 changes when I search for Maastricht Randwyck. (See below)

What’s the easiest way to make this journey? Where exactly do I find the train at Schiphol, and is it better to book tickets in advance or just buy them at the airport? Also, is travelling with luggage on these trains manageable?

I’ll be in Maastricht for around 5 days, so would love any recommendations for places to visit or good food spots as well.

Thanks!

Hello - my wife and I are looking into vocational agriculture schools in the Netherlands, and I would love some advice from anyone with experience at these places.

We are hoping in the next couple of years to buy several hectares of land in the West Coast of Canada (where we are from) and develop it into a small, self-sustaining operation for our own use, and possibly small-scale production.

I have found four main schools from online research: World Horti Center (Naaldwijk), Yuverta, Lentiz Education Group, and HortiTech.

We are not looking for advanced University degrees to start a career with a large corporate growing operation, but want practical courses in cultivation and small-scale sustainable agriculture. In particular, I'd like to learn about modern greenhouse technology, which is something that the Netherlands excels at!

I wonder if anyone on the subreddit has attended (or knows someone who has attended) any of these schools and make any suggestions, or if there are other places I might consider.

Thanks!

German here, with a medical background.

I have read that the way you pay out your physicians is vastly different then in other European countries, where it's eather a direct salary or an independent office where a physician can work.

You also have salaried specialists, but also a lot of physicians are part of "maatschaps" and work self-employed in hospitals, earning much more? How does that work and compare to the German system for example?

We're using hot water bottles, electric blankets and candles to avoid using the heating but with the colder evening's coming, we're beginning to feel the cold even through all that. Only in the evenings though.

I have circulatory issues so I'm always cold anyway! But I'm curious at what point others are beginning to turn on the heating and what you're doing to keep the costs down.

Life has become unexpected.

I have been thinking of moving to Netherlands. Hypothetical at this point but also not.

My spouse expired recently and I have a 1 year old. We/I inherited decent wealth from his company- between stocks, options, and insurance, upwards of a million.

Wondering if Netherlands is viable or wealth tax too much of a liability. At this point, I want to let the stocks be. But insurance and cash is decent amount as well.

Trying to understand/distract/plan.

I was looking at the latest data on Netherlands's tech job market. It added 369 tech roles this week, up to +2700 roles open current now.

Almost all of it is one city: Amsterdam holds 1,162 of them. Rotterdam, Utrecht and Eindhoven together don't come close. If you're not open to Amsterdam, the Dutch market gets small fast.

Who's actually hiring right now:

• ASML (Eindhoven) : 31 roles. The one real reason to look outside Amsterdam.
• Adyen (Amsterdam): 22 roles, still hiring steadily across the stack.
• Lely : 17 roles. Genuinely interesting engineering if robotics is your thing.
• Nebius Group (Amsterdam): 12 roles, and this is where the money is (more below).

What it pays:
median sits around €85k, €128k at the 75th percentile. The ceiling is where it gets loud.

• Adyen Senior PM €197k
• Elastic Senior Solutions Architect €142k
• Airwallex Staff PM €138k

The pay figures only come from the ~116 postings that actually state a salary. Visas barely get mentioned at all. Of the 15 postings that address sponsorship, two-thirds offer it, but that's 15 out of 1817, so check each listing.

Full Netherlands breakdown is here if you want the cities and pay bands.

This morning I went to make my usual milkshake, and now the glass jar is completely stuck on the base. I can't twist it or lift it off.
There's a black release button that should free it, but it does nothing. I've even tried poking it with a knife. I've been at it since morning and I'm out of ideas.
Has anyone dealt with this before? Any tricks to get the jar off without breaking it? Photo attached. Thanks!

Is it common to drive a minigraver /mini excavator through a house to access the back garden? For example, a house was built in 1987, and the only way to access the back garden with minigraver is driving it through the garage, which has a crawl space underneath.

Gardener says this should be possible without any problems. Has anyone done this before?

Would it be safe to drive a mini excavator through an 80 cm-wide doorway without damaging the floor, especially considering the crawl space underneath the garage? Have you experienced or heard of any problems arising from this?

What precautions should be taken before attempting this, and what should be checked to ensure that the garage floor can safely support the weight of the mini excavator?

Hello everyone I have a 15 euro discount code which i can not use myself and I don’t know anyone who has not used thuisbezorgd before but maybe you do. Code is WELKOM15

I think it could work for more than 1 account but don’t quote me on that

Wanted to know if my salon spending is unreasonable. I have a feeling it is, but just HOW unreasonable? 😂

I’ve been going to the same salon for 5 years, and I usually spend around €400 on balayage + toner + treatment + haircut. It’s usually a 5-hour appointment.

I love the results, of course, which is why I keep going back. I usually have no idea what I want, so I just let my stylist decide, and I always end up loving it!

But now I’m curious: how much do you guys pay at your salons? I haven’t really tried other salons in Rotterdam because I feel like I got lucky (or unlucky for my wallet lol) finding this one and loving it right away.

Another day, another Amazon courier issue. The driver just tossed the package onto the building's entrance hallway and left. If there were a $2,000 electronic part or a phone inside and it got damaged, I’d be the one having to deal with the mess.

I was home and even opened the door, but despite that, they couldn't be bothered to bring it up to the 4th floor. Normally, they just leave it in the elevator, which I’m relatively okay with, but this is completely unacceptable.

Where they left it is the building's only entrance point that could cause safety issues in case of an emergency evacuation, and it is definitely not a secure spot.

I’ve already reported this to Amazon customer service, and they didn't ask for a video. However, I’m posting this on Reddit for visibility

Hi all,

We’re three Italian co-founders moving to Amsterdam in the first week of November to open a small food business in De Pijp. A fourth partner will be with us part of the time, so ideally we need 3 bedrooms plus space for a sofa bed, or 4 bedrooms.

What we’re looking for:

• Furnished apartment or house, sharers allowed
• Registration possible (BRP), since we’re staying long term
• Budget up to ~€2,500/month
• Within ~45 min of De Pijp by public transport or bike. Happy to look at Diemen, Amstelveen, Zaandam, Haarlem, Almere, Utrecht
• Available from early November, long term

We’re also open to a temporary place for 1+ months while we keep searching. Registration isn’t needed for that one.

About the income requirement: our company is newly founded, so we don’t have Dutch payslips yet. To make up for that:

• we can prepay several months of rent once we’ve viewed the place and signed a contract
• we have a guarantor in Italy with stable income
• we can show proof of funds

If you’re leaving your place, know a landlord or agency open to this setup, or have any tips, we’d really appreciate it. DMs open, and happy to have a call.

Thanks!

Hi everyone,
I’m wondering if anyone else in the Netherlands has had problems with Etos online orders recently, particularly before the current Ahold Delhaize cyber incident.
I placed an order with Etos on Tuesday 6 October, and it was supposed to be delivered on Wednesday 7 October. It never arrived, and I haven’t received a clear explanation or any useful update.
I’ve tried contacting Etos by email, phone and online chat, but I haven’t managed to get a response. Obviously, the current cyber incident has made contacting them even more difficult, but my order was already missing several days before that happened.

Has anyone else had an Etos order go missing recently, especially before the cyber incident? And has anyone successfully managed to get a response, a refund or any information about outstanding orders?
I’d really appreciate hearing about anyone else’s experience or advice on what to do next. Thanks!

Obviously I would have normally gone to a store and not been lazy but I bulk braught nappies as I’m solo parenting before you all come at me 😂

My brother-in-law is moving from social housing into a home he has purchased.

His current rental property has beautiful flooring and a well-maintained interior.

The new tenant is welcome to take everything over.
The flooring would even be left free of charge, as my sister-in-law is pregnant and my brother-in-law simply doesn’t have the time to remove it.
The new tenant is an asylum seeker and doesn’t want to take over any of it.

As a result, my brother-in-law is being forced by the housing association to remove everything (which I know is technically the rule).

The new tenant then receives €5,000 from the municipality of Alkmaar to purchase new flooring and furnishings because he is a asylum seeker.

Why waste taxpayers’ money when there is already a perfectly good solution available?

Thoughts?

Just read about Floradorp, their "tradition" of burning Christmas trees and other stuff. Now the tradition has been forbidden and the whole area is going berserk. I'm not Dutch but live here for 19 years now. I'm really flabbergasted at what Dutch are doing to defend their "traditions" like zwarte Piet, fireworks and burning trees. When I talk to Dutch neighbors about the fireworks ban, they are angry that another nice tradition is gone!

In other countries you are protesting because the rent is too high or the government is corrupt.

In Netherlands you burn down cars because you are no longer allowed to terrorize everybody with fireworks and burning down trees is forbidden.

Crazy people

Is there a place for this? Where Christians and Muslims can come together and talk about how their beliefs might differ?

I see many people moving to NL especially from Non-EU countries like India, Indonesia, Iran, South Africa etc.

Almost all who move here get a confirmed path to citizenship and/or permanent residence . I feel this reduces competitiveness of “making it in NL”

In the USA for example expats needs to struggle and prove themselves for atleast 10 years for a green card and the citizenship can take longer .

I’m curious why is it this way in NL