peter in holland

When Peter travels to Holland he feels like it’s necessary to speak broken English with a Chinese accent to Dutch people. One day we were doing some shopping in a small town outside of Amsterdam and I saw Peter with his arms flapping at his side. I thought "Oh no. What the hell is he doing now?" Then I heard him telling the shop owner “We come here on big bird. Big bird is big plane. We come here on big plane.”
“Oh, really? What airline did you fly?” she replied in perfect English.

Before leaving the little town Peter took us to a cafe so he could use the bathroom. He told us the place was famous for their tomato soup. Famous? Really? I had to try it. The waitress told me sorry, that they didn't serve tomato soup.

On this same trip to Holland Peter and I decided to go visit my great aunt and uncle a few hours from the town we were staying in. We rented a car and after Peter joked to the Dutch guy about there being cigarette butts and condoms in the back seat of rental cars in New Orleans and the Dutch guy having no clue what he was talking about, we were on our way.
Peter must have gotten pretty distracted while trying to tell me a joke about an alien and alien’s wife and getting frustrated with himself for not getting it right and yelling “f*ck it! I won’t even tell it!” because it was right after this that we realized we were lost. Well, I realized we were lost. Peter swore he knew exactly where we were because he recognized the cows and windmills on the side of the road. Seriously though, think about how many cows and windmills there must be in Holland. After a few lefts and rights I realized that none of the signs were in Dutch anymore. Peter drove us all the way to Germany.


Hours after our estimated time of arrival and after Peter stopped more than once for Doritos and peanuts, we made it to my great aunt and uncle’s house. We had a wonderful time, but knew it was time to leave when Peter obviously had Henieken on his mind and couldn’t stop calling my aunt Tenieke “Henieke.”

In the station waiting for the train to Amsterdam my brother and I notice Peter staring blankly at a pile of dust between his feet as he unrolled his crushed pack of rolaids. Then he looks up at us and says in a very serious tone "Welp, folks, my rolaids died."

In Amsterdam Peter wanted to show us a beautiful canal and he knew exactly where it was. Before we knew it we were lost in the red light district and all Peter could say to us was "Well kids, that's just the way life goes sometimes."

Thank you in dutch is "dank u wel." When they bring Peter his coffee he says "donkey!"

One second Peter and I are walking side by side down a crowded street in Amsterdam. The next second Peter is nowhere to be found. I’m turning around in circles looking for him when I finally spot him with his face up against the front window of an oriental décor shop, doing his best Chinese impression.

Honestly though, both of the trips I took to Holland with Peter were probably some of the best times I've ever had and are certainly the most memorable.