Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Arrival
Said marching orders came on Friday morning, for a flight on Saturday afternoon. Seatac to Schiphol, non-stop, World Business Class. A UN rule says that staff members flying on UN business are entitled to First Class or Business Class if the flight is for longer than a certain number of hours. My nine-hour, forty-minute flight qualified. Much about Business Class is silly, like the piped-in string quartet music that plays during boarding and after arrival and the obsessive use of silverware and porcelain. It's like rich-people kitch or something. Much about it is worth every penny, however. Namely, the seats that fully recline and the extra legroom. I'd consider World Business Class a bargain even without the use of the personal video monitor (I watched "The Interpreter," "The Full Monty," "Kingdom of Heaven," and most of "A Bug's Life" during the flight).
Here in The Hague, I've landed at Chez Dominguez, the house of a friend in Zeeheldenkwartier, near the Peace Palace. Jason is a former L.A. County D.A. who came to The Hague last year when I was an intern. He rented a huge place, and rents out rooms to the sizeable community of transient internationals floating around this place. Between the ICTY, Shell, the International Criminal Court, the International Court of Justice, the OPCW and the various embassies, there never seems to be a lack of young people looking for temporary accommodation. My new roomies are Jason, Isaac (who works at the ICC but is home in New York right now) and Nina, also at the ICTY.
This is temporary while I find larger and more permanent accommodation suitable for the arrival of the family in November, which will not come soon enough. On this rare, gloriously sunny day in The Hague, I'm actually wishing it were already November, even though the weather will by then be suicidally dreary.
On my first day back, I did a few of the things I always do with my family. I walked (down the tree-lined Scheveningseweg) to the Centrum, bought a bag of frites at Polleke (the best frites stand in town), then strolled over to Haagsche Bluf, the shopping plaza, to enjoy them.
My friend Keith Scully was in my orientation group. He's from the same office back home and started on the same day in essentially the same position, working for a different team. His family is already here, and just starting to get a taste of the soul-crushing Dutch and UN bureaucracy. God help them. God help us all.
Here in The Hague, I've landed at Chez Dominguez, the house of a friend in Zeeheldenkwartier, near the Peace Palace. Jason is a former L.A. County D.A. who came to The Hague last year when I was an intern. He rented a huge place, and rents out rooms to the sizeable community of transient internationals floating around this place. Between the ICTY, Shell, the International Criminal Court, the International Court of Justice, the OPCW and the various embassies, there never seems to be a lack of young people looking for temporary accommodation. My new roomies are Jason, Isaac (who works at the ICC but is home in New York right now) and Nina, also at the ICTY.
This is temporary while I find larger and more permanent accommodation suitable for the arrival of the family in November, which will not come soon enough. On this rare, gloriously sunny day in The Hague, I'm actually wishing it were already November, even though the weather will by then be suicidally dreary.
On my first day back, I did a few of the things I always do with my family. I walked (down the tree-lined Scheveningseweg) to the Centrum, bought a bag of frites at Polleke (the best frites stand in town), then strolled over to Haagsche Bluf, the shopping plaza, to enjoy them.
My friend Keith Scully was in my orientation group. He's from the same office back home and started on the same day in essentially the same position, working for a different team. His family is already here, and just starting to get a taste of the soul-crushing Dutch and UN bureaucracy. God help them. God help us all.
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