Last Day

Well today is my last day here.   It has been so wonderful! Rob and I are heading over to an antique mart to search one last time for something "military" for Trev.  We will have some lunch and then, if the weather is nice, we will try the canal boat ride again. I am glad to be going home to my kids and dog, but this place is pretty special, better than I imagined.

Saturday and Saturday night

It is Sunday morning here, happy father’s day to everyone. Today’s plans are one last museum; finish up the gift shopping and a cruise on the canals this afternoon with wine and cheese.  I have had more wine here in the last two weeks than over the last year (not complaining). It is not raining now, but the sky looks like it wants to.  Last night we ate dinner in the apartment with all the left overs from our week and Barbara and Rick (Taylor folk from upstairs) brought theirs down as well; it was a feast. We listened to music, drank wine and watched a very cool electrical storm from the beautiful front window.

Yesterday was a blast.  We headed out in the car, in the scary Amsterdam traffic.  There are separate traffic lights for the bikes, cars and people, oh and the bikes really pay attention to none of the lights so it makes for very interesting driving.  We headed out to a town called “Haarlam.” We had a lunch of French onion soup and sandwiches in a little café across from a cathedral that construction began in 1390, no really!  It was magnificent. The little town was bikes and people only so we walked with no real purpose over the whole thing.  We knew we were close to the coast because the large canals had giant, beautiful sailboats docked in them.

We saw a group of men fishing with large ropes and sort of a hook at the end, there was no reel and they simply hurled the rope out into the canal, it was pretty cool.

Next we headed out “The North Sea.”  Wow and very big and angry ocean.  The goal, or rather my goal was to try smoked eel, yep smoked eel.  We used the wonderful navigation system in the car and headed west.  The wind at the shore was so strong it kept closing the car doors with its force.  We found a little (aka: scary) fish stand right on the water’s edge and we bought 4 euro of eel, Rob thought I was nuts.  It was cold and chewy, like smoked pencil eraser.  Rob tried it and settled on the description, “smoked booger.” It was pretty awful. Hahahah

Then it was back to the apartment and our wonderful night of tapas (leftovers) with our neighbors.

Well its 11:00am here and we are off again.  Life will sure seem quite in El Cajon.

Friday and Saturday Morning

It is 9:00 am on Saturday, it is raining and cloudy.  I have detected a pattern: rain, cold wind in the morning and then the afternoons are nice, no sun mind you, but none-the-less nice. Yesterday I went to a small museum with a small collection of modern art.  I’m branching out here. I had a class last semester and we covered lots of post 50’s art, “I can handle this, I can walk through the white hallways and appear as if I am part of the cool crowd.  Still not for me, sadly; apparently I am not a fan of “Kinetic Art.”

I found another book fair along a canal in the Jordaan.  There was a stand up bass player and a saxophone player in the middle of the book stalls playing wonderful music and the booksellers all huddled around a middle table with coffees and cigarettes. The scene was all very 1920’s.  I would have stayed all afternoon, but Rick (the husband of another Taylor employee) and I had to get to the Taylor plant for Friday night happy hour, (A very cool tradition).

I’m back; I was taking a break and doing my favorite thing: watching people on the street below. A very tall man walked under my window with what looked like his weekend groceries.  Everyone appears to pick up what they need every few days.  It’s a very cool system.  The apartments all begin on what they call 1 floor, and 0 floor is filled with shops and restaurants. On our block we have: a fish store, cheese, bakery, a coffee shop, a sandwich shop, a restaurant (with very good soups and bread), and a couple clothing stores (fancy). Every Wednesday and Saturday, the residents simply place their small bags of garbage at the foot of the tree in front of their flat; there are no big trash cans or any big trucks, very organized. Recyclables are taken the market at the end of the street and placed in bins (I watched several people one day dropping their stuff off from a nearby bench, a lot of wine bottles, nice!).

Today we have the company car and we are heading out for a day of adventure in Delft (Vermeer lived there and “The Girl with the Painted Earring” painting is there, then off to see The Hague and we will have seafood on the coast for dinner. 

I will post more when I return. I miss my kids o much, but this place is sure going to be hard to say goodbye to.

Car repair, AAA anyone?

A car broke down out front.  The man sat on the hood until a motorcycle “repairman” for a better word pulled up and they began talking about the car (in Dutch).  The man starts messing with the engine of the broken car, he turns the key, nothing. He goes back to his motorcycle, gets some cables and proceeds to jump start the car.  By the size of the tool box on the back of the bike, this guy must be McGyver. (pictures were posted yesterday)