Den Haag

The next day my friend and I ventured out to Den Haag and to the sea-side resort of Scheveningen, located directly on the North Sea.  It being a particularly windy day, the clouds were moving fast and taking all sorts of shapes like they do in the paintings of the old Dutch Masters.


It was amazing to see the amount of traffic in the sea: big tankers moving across the horizon.  I was fascinated to see the oil rig standing alone way out in the distance.  From the shore (and in my zoom lens), it looks more like an alien spaceship poking out of the water.

Scheveningen has a boardwalk (and only the hardcore were out walking on it) that goes out to a pier.  Along the walk are several restaurants that were basically empty.  One provided us refugee from the cold and I had one of many Dutch specialities: a large flat pancake (more like a crepe) with chunks of bacon in it that one then pours a dark syrup onto it.  The dark syrup is somewhere between molasses in color and golden syrup in taste.  

One of the most impressive buildings along the beach is the Kurhaus, built between 1884-5.  It was always a fancy hotel that included a concert hall. Probably the most famous concert: the Rolling Stones on August 6, 1964.  The lobby is full of black and white candid photographs of the Stones.  At some point, it burned, was rebuilt, and then fell into disrepair, only to be saved because it was named an historic building.  It was completely renovated and the Queen reopened it as a very fancy hotel in 1979.

After our Dutch pancake treat, we ventured out on the beach and I dipped my shoe into the North Sea-- you couldn't have paid me enough to dip my actual toe.  It was way too cold for that, though we did see some crazy man in a water suit trying to surf.

We left the beach and rode the tram back into Den Haag to the Peace Palace.  Built in 1913, it is century old and built by Andrew Carnegie to house the International Courts of Justice (ICJ).  It was conceived at the First Hague Peace Conference in 1907 as the palace for world peace.  There is a fountain in the driveway area that has the word "peace" craved into the stone in all the world's languages.  I find it ironic that one year after it was built World War I started....

From the Peace Palace, we went to the Gemeentemuseum, having to cross President Kennedy Blvd.  It made me pause to think about JFK, as the 50th anniversary of his assassination is in a day.

The Gemeentemuseum is the art museum that has the largest Mondrain collection in the world, as well as several of the old Dutch Masters, including Rembrant's "The Anatomy Lesson" and the "Young Bull" by Paulus Potter.

And though we aren't supposed to take photos, I couldn't resist to snap a non-flash photo of Kandinsky, my favorite.

One of the special exhibits was on Coco Chanel and it was a frenzy in the rooms.  Women everywhere were looking at Coco Chanel's life and her fashion, her hats, her jewelry.  It was a fun exhibit that even included a place where you could put on some fake Chanels and do a photo shoot, complete with the big lamps and background.

 The exhibition ended with a room of Chanel's Little Black Dresses.    It was very fun to see how the LBD has changed over the years, while still retaining some of Coco's original elements: calf-length, simple, and elegant.

1926

2000

2008

Amsterdam + Risjtaffel!

The next day was a trip into the Netherlands, my fifth country on my European tour.  I have a dear friend there and she and her husband are kind enough to let me take over their second bedroom (her office) and monopolizes her time/take advantage of her to make her my tour guide.  

We raced into Amsterdam from Utrecht today so she could pretend to be a scholar at a meeting while secretly wishing she was with me.  Though, I think she would have preferred to stay at the meeting since I went to the Anne Frank House.  I missed it last time I was here (about 13 months ago!) since I arrived just as it closed.  This time I was there just as it opened, and avoided the lines.  Though, to be honest, I am not sure how many tourists Amsterdam has in mid-November.  

 What you see from the outside isn't the house where Anne lived in hiding for two years.  There is a protective facade on it so that the house/warehouse aren't harmed by the elements.  There is a quick biographical movie about Anne and her family and then you slowly climb the stairs into the Secret Annex.  Per Otto Frank's wishes, the rooms remain empty with just photos on the wall of what it was like with the furniture.  I can understand why he didn't want have the rooms exactly as they were during their ordeal, but at the same time, I feel that you can't really appreciate how claustrophobic it would have been with two families, their limited stuff, and constant fear of being discovered.  It is almost devoid of feeling because you are just walking through empty rooms.

There are two moments which made me catch my breathe: Seeing the bookcase for the first time it is the real bookcase, with the real files still on the shelves; and seeing pages of Anne's real diary and looking at her handwriting.  These  two displays made me stop and really think about how in the world they lived for two years in silence and darkness during the day and with only a bit more freedom to make noise and move around during the night.

It is heartbreaking when you realize that she died within the one month of Auschwitz being liberated.  It is devastating to think that someone turned them in and no one knows to this day who that was.  It is with utter horror you watch the films of the concentration camps and think about the pretty house in Wannasee where all this death was planned, where Nazi officials gathered to discuss the final solution and saw numbers and problems instead of people.   It is just another reminder that has to be constant: this can never happen again.

the bell tower of the Westerkerk

A few buildings over is the Westerkerk, the church mentioned in Anne's diary.  Under renovation, it was the first church to be built as a Protestant church, and not turned into one from a Roman Catholic church.  It was built between 1620-1631 and where Rembrant is buried-- though no one knows exactly where, as there is no headstone.  

lamppost on the place in front of Westerkerk

After leaving the Anne Frank House, I walked along the Keizersgracht Canal. It was a beautiful crisp Autumn day in Amsterdam,with the sun shining and the canals glistening.  I happened along the Homomonument, the memorial dedicated to all gay men and lesbian women who are persecuted for being homosexual.  It was opened in 1987 and has three pink triangles in the road.  I was standing on the bit that steps into the canal, where several photos of people who had died because of they were homosexuals/transgender were tied to whites roses.  These were all recent photos, which made it especially poignant.

I met up with my friend and we had a lovely lunch at this French cafe.  Afterwards, she deposited me on a ferry and I crossed over to the north side of Amsterdam to go to the Eye Museum, the film museum, where I went through an exhibition by Péter Forgács: "Looming Fire," which is all about the Dutch in Indonesia from 1900-1940.  It is 6 hours of home movies, letters, and original music that shows what daily life was like in the colonial era of the Netherlands East Indies.  The movies are home movies showing family vacations and trips, scenic views of the East Indies, and daily life of the colonialists.  These films are juxtaposed to audio recordings (in my case, reading the English translations) that describe the underbelly of empire. It is very interesting and worth spending an afternoon there.  Also, my awesome friend did the research for it and what she discovered was amazing.  

The south side of Amsterdam

my awesome friend and me

 To cap off my colonial day, we then went back to Blauw in Utrecht, that amazing Indonesian restaurant where I had my second risjttafel (rice table), with 18 dishes of deliciousness.

The dishes include: Kerris Chicken, spicy meat, turmeric beef, pork soy sauce, chicken satay, pork satay, lodeh vegetables, stir-fried vegetables, mixed vegetables with peanut sauce, perkedel, sambal goreng eggs, sambal goreng potatoes, oerapan, pickled cucumber, fried banana, sambal goreng tempe, and prawn crackers.

Yes, I took a photo of the menu as I would have no idea what I was eating, let alone remember it.

some of the vegetables dishes

All you need to know is that it is amazing, delicious, crazy flavoring, and the goat satay is my favorite. Yup the goat.  And after we stuffed ourselves silly, it was nice to have the short walk home in the cold November night so that our bellies weren't too full by the time we went to bed.

some of the meat dishes

Goat satay

Finished!

Antwerpen: A Day in Photos

on the train from Brussels to Antwerp

The clock at the old train station

the new section of the train station

the entrance into the train station

some of the buildings, walking along the main shopping fair

a hotel

entry into the city meeting house, now a shopping center

in the foyer of the Peter Paul Rubens House, with my dearest Eveline

a still life

the leaded glass windows of Rubens house

a self portrait with his son

on the balcony, overlooking the courtyard (which is being refurbished)

in his garden

peeping Thomasina

the spire of the Cathedral of Our Lady

the aisle

the Stations of the Cross, painted by Rubens and van Veer and de Backer

one of the chapels

the pulpit

the leaded painted glass windows

the windows of upper naive

turkey on the pulpit

different birds on the puplit

the choir stalls

the former bishops of the Cathedral 

self-portrait

the entry into the Cathedral

another street of cafes and small shops

marzipan!

Christmas marzipan

Antwerpen Town Hall

inside the train station

my lovely hosts and outstanding tour guides

the top of the station

a quick pic

Orthodox Jews in the rain, with protective hat gear

the local beer, a perfect ending to the day