a kid in holland

Spain, France, Italy

2009-02-19T19:41:00.001-08:00

Alas, the European dream came to an end almost seven months ago.
The end was spent rushing around Spain, the South of France, and Italy.

Here is a little taste of every place I visited:

Madrid

Sitting in the police station after being pick-pocketed. My wallet was snatched from my bag in a supermarket Luckily, the security guard noticed and came running after me. The guy was still in the store. They tried to bring him down but he escaped. They called the police and within 5 minutes their were undercover cops on the scene, running and cycling and combing the area. They caught him. He had tossed the wallet but kept the cash, about 300 Euros. So other than the inconvenience of having no Visa or bank card, nothing of any value was lost. I had to go to the station and fill out reports to get my money back. I was very impressed by the attention I was given by the Madrid Police because this type of thing happens every minute of every day.

Madrid was okay but our time there was plagued by inconveniences.

Seville

Watched Spain beat Italy in a bar full of Italians in Seville

Fell off a communal bike on our way to the train station. We biked 30 minutes in sweltering heat and realized we were at the wrong bus station. We took a bus to the right one.

Many thanks to Anna, Juan, Léon and Linus for putting us up in Seville!

Nerja

Fresh Sardines on the Southern coast

Barcelona

Spain wins the European cup.

We were obsessed with the delicious mojitos.

Montpellier

Eating fresh figs at a medieval garden attached to an old monastery that produces delicious wine, which we tasted. and tasted. and tasted.

In an ancient walled town where they still maintain their own postal system and police force...despite a population of only a few hundred people.

I lost.

Ventimiglia

Day trip on my way to Florence. I was so excited to see actual waves for the first time. I bodysurfed for almost 2 hours. I almost lost my bathing suit bottom. This was the last picture I took before my camera broke. I desperately went to the 4 camera shops in town to no avail.

'Tuscany

Took a walk around the Tuscan countryside. The film from the first disposable camera I bought seemed to be tinged pink.

Firenze

Sitting on the triangle off one of the bridges. If you've been to Florence you know what I'm talking about.

We went into the Duomo and they threw paper shawls over our shoulders because we were wearing sleeveless shirts. Inside, however, we noticed that there were men wearing sleeveless shirts and they hadn't been given shawls. We brought this up on our way out, but they had no valid explanation. We cheekily asked if they allowed gay people into the church.

This was the state of my shoes about 3 weeks in.

Venice

Halfway into our first day in Venice the sky grew dark and the winds grew strong and we were forced to seek shelter from one of the biggest and strongest rain storms I've ever seen. We were especially surprised to see hail the size of grapes. Apparently, they have a storm season every summer. We sought shelter in a small tunnel.

Our camping ground outisde of town had overbooked the tents, so we were given a mobile home with a fridge, A/C and our own bathroom for the same price.

Apparently there's been a huge crackdown on the sale of counterfeit goods, especially purses. There were posters up everywhere discouraging tourists from purchasing these things. We were constantly seeing these guys, mostly illegal immigrants, packing up their wares in garbage bags and running when a policeman was approaching.

Cichetti-bar hopping in Venice. Cicetti are little snacks and finger foods
(salami and other cured meats, marinated veggies, little sandwiches, olives etc.) eaten with a glass of the bar's own wine or an Apero or Campari spritzer, usually cheap and sometimes free with your drink. If you eat enough you can replace dinner. Basically its a general city-wide happy hour where people walk around the bars and pour out into the streets with their drinks in their hands.

Best place ever. You bring your own plastic bottles (they have some there too) and they fill em up with local wines for a very fair price. We tried the sparkling red.

Chrissy left, and I spent my last few hours in Venice walking around the tiny Jewish quarter. There are about 50 Orthodox Jews left in Venice that run a few businesses here. I met and had drinks with an Artist from New Orleans and his globe-trotter friends.

Salerno

This was my favourite restaurant in all of Italy and the best and most memorable thing about Salerno. Deliciously simple pizza with fresh arugula tossed on at the last minute, wondrous little pots of vegetables simmered in the pizza oven with mint, basil, and other herbs, and it just keeps coming.

Salerno's a good base to visit Pompei and the Amalfi coast and it's right near Naples.

The Amalfi Coast

I thoroughly enjoyed the ferry ride from Salerno to the Amalfi coast.

Napoli

This city is walkable in a day or so. There is so much to see and do and best of all there are no tourists. Because of all the trouble they've had with garbage and garbage removal (something to do with the mob), it's gotten the reputation of being unclean. But now it seems fine.

In one 1/2 days I saw all four castles, climbed the hill, visited Virgil's tomb, visited the oldest aquarium in Europe, visited the opera house museum, ate at the most famous pizza restaurant Da Michele (only serve 2 kinds: Marguerita and Marinara. I got 1/2 an d 1/2), went to the Contemporary art museum (when I walked in I was informed in was 'free' day!), browsed through some junk sales, and got grossly overcharged for some drinks in the Piazza Bellini.

Rome

Besides forking out money for the touristy stuff (when in Rome...) I also saw my first opera, The Magic Flute, which I had a children's version of on audio cassette when I was little. It was splendid.

No more pictures after this point, but I will mention the lovely multi-cultural dinner in Genoa I somehow got convinced into getting off a train for on my way to Milan. I also ate some delicious but questionable berries off a tree. I learned how to make Satay, Kefta, and a Chinese seafood stew, before almost missing the last train to Milan, from where I was to fly back to the Netherlands. I realized I had to spend yet another night in the train station to catch my early morning flight. I made a friend, and we spread our sleeping bags out in the middle of a nearby park. We tried moving many times but couldn't get away from the urine smell. Because there were no trees, I had to go to a nearby strip-club to pee. Early morning came, and I boarded a bus.

I had managed to 'score' a day in Prague because it was the cheapest way to fly back to Amsterdam. I oohed and aahed at the fairy-tale city for a few hours and spent my last few euros to buy crowns to eat an unfortunately mediocre late lunch (I chose the wrong restaurant). Then I went back to my home away from home.

And 3 days later, I came home.

Westerbork

2008-06-15T05:55:00.000-07:00

Before the outbreak of World War II, Westerbork in the North-East of the Netherlands served as a transit point for Jewish refugees from Germany attempting to enter The Netherlands. After the occupation of Holland and the beginning of Jewish deportations, Camp Westerbork was a concentration camp used to collect and transport all the Dutch jews (as well as gypsies and resistors) to other concentration and death camps. A total of 107 000 people passed through the camp on 93 trains, only 5000 of which survived. Anne Frank and her family were on one of the last trains to leave Westerbork, headed for Auschwitz in late 1944.

After the war, Westerbork was used as a refugee camp for Dutch and Indonesians, as well as immigrants from the South Moluccan Islands to Holland. It was demolished in the 1970s.

Today some barracks have been partially reconstructed. Some original buildings remain: the commander's house, a storage building, and a guard tower.

Several monuments have also been erected.

Each of these stands for a camp to which Weserbork residents were transported. Of the 58,380 persons deported to Auschwitz from Westerbork, only 854 survived. Of the 34,313 deported to Sobibor, 19 survived. Of the 4,894 deported to Theresienstadt, approximately 1,980 survived. Of the 3,751 deported to Bergen Belsen, about 2,050 survived. And of the 150 deported to Buchenwald and Ravensbrück, fewer than 10 survived.

This memorial was designed by Dutch holocaust survivor Ralph Prins (who also designed the Amnesty logo).

(tour guide)

This engraved Jerusalem stone was donated by Israeli President Chaim Herzog in 1993.

This memorial, which stands on the former 'role-call' grounds, is made of small rectangular stones, embossed with a silver flame insignia for Roma and Sinti, and Star of David for Jewish victims. The stones make up the shape of the map of the Netherlands. There is one stone for the 102 000 people who passed through the camp to their death.

The grounds also partially house the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescopes.

New House

2008-05-25T11:25:00.001-07:00

I built myself a new house.

(click to enlarge)

Here's me enjoying the porch.

My neighbour is a bug.

what happened to Guess Who?

2008-05-19T09:23:00.001-07:00

Apparently the version we knew and loved no longer exists, having been replaced by a more 'politically correct' (i.e. racially diverse) version where all the characters look much more cartoonish.

This is England

2008-05-13T14:14:00.000-07:00

This movie came out in 2006 but it must have slipped past me (or Canada?). It is extremely affective (and HEAVY), about a boy who gets sucked into the skinhead scene in small-town England, 1983. Based on the director, Shane Meadows' personal experiences growing up. Really shows the two sides of the scene - the pacifistic, ska/reggae-loving anarchist kids and the white-supremacist appropriation of this. Historically spot-on (I think), interspersed with some (always relevant) real-life footage of English life and times, 1983. The kid, 13 year old Thomas Turgoose, is incredible, natural and commanding.

Also, a great soundtrack (including a cover of Please, Please, let me get what I want, by Clayhill, which I'd never heard before).

Just wanted to share.

Hungary and Germany

2008-05-07T03:21:00.000-07:00

Warning: this is a long one.

Here is my travel route:

Rather than a chronological account I have tried to organize things into subheadings…which makes more sense to me.

Transport

A large portion of this trip was spent traveling from one point to another. In all, I took 2 planes, 2 rideshares, 8 trains, 2 coach buses, 1 taxi, and various city buses, trams, undergrounds, U-Bahns, and S-Bahns. Including some waiting, I probably spent around 35 hours en route.

Of course having good books is a must in the cases of long train rides. I completed two books on this trip:

Everything is Illuminated, by Jonathan Safran Foer (see also Roots, Coincidence)
Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung, a collection of works by rock critic Lester Bangs, edited by Greil Marcus.

Roots/Judaism/Holocaust

The initial persuasion to go to Hungary and specifically Bonyhad was to see where my grandmother (my father’s mother) grew up before the Nazis invaded Hungary in 1944, (putting an end to both her childhood and her life in Hungary). However, I found that the themes of going back to one’s roots, which in my case led to Judaism and the Holocaust, continued to follow me throughout the trip.

Throughout my time in Hungary I was reading “Everything is Illuminated” (see also Transport, Coincidences), the story of a man, Jewish, who tries to find the town his grandfather was from in the Ukraine and specifically the woman who saved him, Augustine. I began it on the train to Bonyhad and finished it before I got to Berlin.

But really the allusions began when I found out that my couch-surfing host, Peter, (see also Kindness of Strangers, Coincidences) was also of Hungarian-Jewish descent. His four grandparents had also survived the holocaust as Hungarian Jews.

But it might also have begun when I got out of the metro in Budapest and found myself about a block away from the Budapest Great synagogue.

My time spent in Bonyhad was somewhat disappointing in that it seems to be a completely different town than when my grandmother lived there and it was hard to find any connections, or follow her directions and tips about where to go and what to see. The city hall, for instance, has been relocated to a building that was built 4 years ago (managed to coax this information out of someone who was sort of able to translate to the person at the new city hall). The old building now houses a music school. But really the main problem was communication. Noone spoke English and when they found out I spoke English they were reluctant to even attempt communicating with me. The only words I exchanged were in broken German (broken on both sides, making it even worse).

I walked down a long, long street lined with semi-farmhouses. Each house had a dog and when I passed they would come racing up to the gate, snarling barking. I was now just walking, anywhere, because I had long since given up any hopes of finding someone to talk to who could help me locate things like my grandmother’s old house or school, or let alone the synagogue (mention of this word elicited blank stares, even though, I later found out, the Hungarian word is zsinagóga). I passed some sort of car mechanic. A man started speaking to me. When I didn’t understand, he called his friend over.

Man:Sprechen Sie Deutsch?
Me: Ein Bissen…
(he looked at me as if to say, what do you want. I didn’t WANT anything)
Me: Ich bin von Canada, aber mein grossmuter is von Bonyhad. Sie ist geleben hier nach vier un vierzig, ven … (I searched for the word for war but didn’t know it) ven Hitler…..
Man: Ich verstehe nisht.
Me: Vier un vierzig, pow pow (I made guns with my hands)
(man stares at me blankly)
Me: Sie ist judisch….verstehe?
(he shakes his head)
Me: Okay, danke

I came to realize that nothing remained of the Jewish community that once was. Hitler’s destruction was so complete that people in these areas don’t even know what ‘Jewish’ is. I did finally, by chance, stumble upon one of the old synagogues, a crumbling, boarded up edifice, only distinguishable by the almost invisible star-of-David over its door (and a sign nearby pointing, zsinagóga).

By the time I returned to the town center (a few shops, church, cafes) everything was closed. I had no idea how I was going to get out of there. I had been walking all day with my knapsack, and so I sat. And, by some miraculous chance, Audia, who was, I think, the only person who could speak English in the entire town, walked by (see kindness of Strangers).

I told her my story (grandmother, war, etc.) She didn’t know ‘Synagogue’, I showed her the photo on my camera.

Me: It’s like a church for Jewish people
Audia: I don’t know Jewish
Me: It’s a religion, you know, the people that Hitler wanted to kill during World War 2…
Audia: This is with special church you just show me?
Me: Yes, the Jews prayed in the synagogue. Hitler killed them because they were Jewish.
Audia: Yes, maybe I hear something about this….

Like I said before, Judaism was so completely wiped out that not only the Jews but the memory of them was lost.

I hope I'm not coming across as negative about Bonyhad. I had a pleasant day there just walking around. Mostly, I was just frustrated at not being able to communicate and not being able to find my way around and see/find what I wanted to.

On my rideshare to Berlin I told my car-mates about my travels in Hungary, and why I went to Hungary. Younger Germans love to talk about WW2, Hitler, and the Holocaust. What I mean is the country has greatly come to terms with their history and discuss it openly. One woman, aged 41, told me that her parents, who were only young children during the rise of Hitler and war, are part of the generation that hasn’t quite done this. She says that dinner conversations/arguments often culminate in them saying things like, “Oh, he wasn’t so bad, sure he killed millions of people, but look what he did for the economy”. Their parents had been avid Hitler supporters, as were most people during the time.

In Berlin there are constant reminders of the war, from the Jewish museum (a history of Jews in Germany since before the Middle Ages), which I visited, to the ‘Topography of terror’ exhibit, in the ruins of the government buildings of the Third Reich, which I also visited.

Loneliness

I think the day in Bonyhad and the following night were some of the loneliest hours I ever spent. As I said, noone spoke any English, which would have been fine, but upon learning that I spoke English seemed reluctant to even try to communicate with me. I couldn’t tell if English is resented, as being this global language that impedes on individual languages and cultures, or more of embarrassment at not being able to speak it. So rather than trying to find some common ground, German, or sign language, most people continued on their way. Some people were downright rude. I mean I don’t blame them, who likes annoying tourists asking them questions, but it didn’t make me feel very particularly welcome or enlightened. As I said I found one girl who did speak English and she greatly helped me get back on track. It was that night which was probably the loneliest of all. I had a 5-hour ‘layover’ in…Fonyod? But when I got there the train station was locked and there was nothing else around. There might have been a town center somewhere but I had no idea if and/or where and it was the middle of the night anyways. So I bundled up and sat on a bench outside for a good number of hours. I may have dozed off, I’m not sure. But there was not a soul, anywhere. I did hear some music and laughter somewhere in the distance. By the end I was chilled to the bone and it took me quite some time before I Stopped feeling cold. The next morning after a few more trains I finally arrived in Keszthely. The hostility towards English speakers was even more pronounced here. The people working at the train station literally ignored me when I spoke to them, asking where my hostel was. I asked several other people. No one wished to help me, to at least try and see if they could. Finally I picked a direction and started walking. Luckily, it was towards the town. I asked every person I passed on the street where the street was, and maybe I was pronouncing it wrong, but they just looked confused and kept walking. Finally, starving, I went into a bakery and bought some buns. I physically showed the lady the street name and she pointed me in a vague direction. With the help of two more people I finally managed to find the hostel. And this is where things greatly improved. The hostel owner was very kind, let me check into a room right away (at 8 AM), which I had to myself. I went straight to sleep.

Which brings me to…

The Kindness of Strangers

The people I must mention here are Peter, my Budapest host, who gave me a bed, a roof, conversation, companionship, and made me tea. This was my first couch-surfing experience and it set the standards pretty high.

Second is Audia, the English-speaking girl I met in Bonyhad. She gave me the use of her Internet to find a train, some food for my grumbling tummy, and a ride to the ‘train station’ which was really just a small house with an outhouse building next door.

Third is the man at the hostel in Keszthely, who made such a great effort to communicate with me, gave me the opportunity to sleep when I most needed it, as well as hope. He turned my frown upside down.

Lastly is a man I never met who I assume owns the hostel I stayed at during my last night in Berlin. It was late, the desk was closing soon. He asked no questions, and gave me the code to get in. He gave me trust, and a place to sleep with no collateral.

This meant a lot because I had just had a not-so-nice experience. My other nights in Berlin had been spent at the apartment of a friend of Xavier, who I know from Montreal and who was in Berlin at the same time as me. He had offered me this place to stay, after checking with his friend of course, and I was grateful. But this girl turned out to be quitecruel and I was asked to leave for no particular reason on a Saturday evening in Berlin, almost impossible to find a hostel. There is not much more to say other than I was very shocked that a human being could be so nasty, having never really encountered anything like it before. But I regrouped and explored Berlin on my own for the remainder of my trip.

Coincidence

-First of all, as I mentioned, Peter was also of Hungarian-Jewish descent. What was strange was that his last name is the same as my grandmother’s maiden name, Kramer. His mother’s last name is Schwartz, which was my grandmother’s mother’s maiden name.

-I found ‘Everything is Illuminated’ on a shelf outside my room, left here by a former tenant of the building I suppose. I had heard of it, and knew there it had been made into a movie, but I hadn’t the slightest idea what it was about. And I just happened to grab it before I left, it was small, and looked like a good traveling book. So imagine my surprise when I’m on the train to Bonyhad and I read, “Father toils for a travel agency, denominated Heritage Touring. It is for Jewish people, like the hero, who have cravings to leave that ennobled country America and visit humble towns in Poland and Ukraine…who try to unearth places where their families once existed” and that turned out to be what the entire book was about.

-Pretty much every place I visited started with a ‘B’; Budapest, Bonyhad, Balaton, Berlin, Braunschweig, Bremen. The only exceptions were Frankfurt (where I stayed for 1 hour) and Keszthely (which is in the Lake Balaton region).

Other Stuff

-I got fined 12000 Forint (about 50 Euros) in the Budapest metro for accidentally reusing my ticket (it really WAS an accident). The policewoman was yelling at me in Hungarian, “Passport, passport” which I finally gave to her. She copied down my information as I pleaded with her and protested, trying to make her see that it was all a misunderstanding. She just kept repeating, “6000 Forinth, 6000 Forinth”. I said I didn’t have the money, so she gave me a written fine (which was twice as much). I looked at a nearby policeman, also guarding the exit of the metro, as if to say, “Can you do anything?” He shrugged, as if to say “no, not really”, but then he made some ripping motions with his hands. Just rip it up! I took the fine and left. I didn’t rip it up though, I kept it as a souvenir.

-I visited a bathhouse, the Széchenyi bathhouse. It contained small pools/baths of varying temperatures, the warmest being about 36 degrees. There are also various saunas (dry and wet) and outdoor jet-pools and this one part that just pushes you around and around in a circle.

I also visited a thermal lake/hot spring (which stays above 25 degrees Celsius year-round!) in Keszthely/Hevis near Lake Balaton in Hungary. Apparently the waters are both therapeutic and radioactive.

- There’s a really cool bar scene in Budapest. They set up bars in buildings that are set to be demolished, and move them to other buildings once/if they do. The buildings are old houses, so there are many rooms and floors and usually a courtyard. They are decorated with all kinds of junk and wacky/wonderful art projects and installations.

- Budapest is filled with communist era cement-apartment buildings. These are amazing to see. The biggest one houses 30 000 people.

-The night I got to Berlin was May 1st, which is labour day or worker’s day in Germany. In the past there have been huge riots and uprisings, so they cover the city with riot police who block off certain areas. The police come from all over Germany. This year though they appeared quite useless as everyone seemed to be behaving themselves. But really, if anything, their presence provokes conflict and confrontation.

-We went to a show in Berlin at this place called the Magnet Club. It was Xiu Xiu with ‘Petula’ and Chris Garneau as openers. Was not too impressed with Xiu Xiu, but really liked Chris Garneau, sort of reminded me of a male Joanna Newsom or something.

-Really great flea market in Berlin. Bought a bunch of singles, old photos/postcards, and a few other knick-knacks. Great way to spend the morning before to Braunschweig to visit my friend Marlen for the day who I met on an orchestra exchange in 2003-2004. Also met up with another guy I know from then, Pascal, who I went to Potsdam with (the town right next to Berlin, location of Frederick the Great’s Palais Sans-Souci and its impressive grounds).

More photos:

Budapest

Bonyhad

Balaton

Berlin

an assortment of monuments and statues

Spring? Summer?

2008-04-24T13:13:00.000-07:00

On Monday, Spring came quite suddenly. And it wasn't just the temperature, though for the first time (other than one freak day in February) one could indeed walk around in a T-shirt. I don't know if it was because of the weather or just some sort of coincidence, but every restaurant and cafe put out their terraces on exactly the same day. They fill the streets and squares and in turn are filled with people. It feels like there's a festival going on all the time (and there actually is a national party/holiday, "Queen's Day", next week). There are red lanterns strung over all the main streets, there seems to have been this surge of people...

Where did they all come from?

Don't they have jobs?

Or other places to be?

muxtapes.

2008-04-20T12:12:00.000-07:00

http://bootsmcgee.muxtape.com/
http://bootsmcgee2.muxtape.com/

make your own and share @ muxtape.com

Schiermonnikoog

2008-04-13T07:32:00.000-07:00

Schiermonnikoog ('Island of the grey monks') is one of the Frisian islands, an archipelago at the eastern edge of the North Sea that spreads along the coasts of the Netherlands and Germany. On these islands, and along the coasts of both countries, they speak Frisian as opposed to Dutch or German.

(it is the 5th one from the left, not counting the two small dots)

To get to Schiermonnikoog from Groningen, you take a bus to Lauwersoog, then a ferry. The bus arrived at 11:30 and the ferry didn't leave until 1:30. There is nothing in Lauwersoog except one restaurant. We decided that the restaurant was paying the bus company to strand people there.

I had been invited by my friend Zdenek and had in turn invited another friend, Wymer. But at the last minute Zdenek decided to take a later bus. I didn't hear from him until later on. Apparently, they had taken the wrong bus and had no idea where they were going. They never did make it is Schiermonnikoog.

I don't know about these ones, but I was sure I saw Canadian Geese in a field later. Apparently, they were introduced into Northern Europe and have established populations in Great Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Scandinavia.

this is a pheasant!

These are from the inside of an old Nazi bunker...the islands were captured during WWII and the Germans had fortification on all of them to defend the Nothern frontier of Europe. It was pitch black inside and really spooky.

(click to enlarge)

Belgium

2008-04-06T04:26:00.000-07:00

Brussels: skyscrapers, modern, new vs. projects, run-down, old.

Jamie and I spent the afternoon in the botanical gardens in the North of Brussels waiting for Chrissy, who had gone to her father's birthplace Morlanwelz, for the day. Cut through the entire city of Brussels en Route to the South train-station from our hostel (apparently Van Gogh's old studio), which was also in the North. Completely missed any of the tourist areas, or anything lively at all really...the North is all fancy telecom buildings and hotels, while the South is kind of crumbling, lots of immigrants, and interesting juxtapositions like a skate-park right outside a church. At night we tried to find what was labeled as the 'hip' area (always be wary of that word!) but found only a two-block concentration of strange Asian restaurants (Shamrocks: a Smart Indian Restaurant), some pubs, and a few nice heated terasses. Had a few beers before trekking back up to our hostel...where someone had stolen my already-made bed.
While Brussels (and Brugge as well) is situated in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium (the Flemish region), we got by with French which almost everyone seemed to speak. We did notice that, in contrary to the Netherlands, noone really seemed to speak English.

Brugge/Bruges (pronounced Bruche, Broogs, Bruje.....): old, quaint, chocolate, beer, tourists, umbrellas, canals, snacks.

Beautiful town, if a tad touristy. Unfortunately it rained quite constantly. Our hostel was a mighty cozy little place with a nice variety of games including Stratego, a favourite of Chrissy and mine, which we indulged in after a hot shower (where you had to continuously pull a handle for a flow of water). Visited the chocolate museum, an unremarkable journey through the history and production of chocolate (with some free samples), and dined at the local burger joint "Pickles", where the employee was kind enough to let us drink the cherry beer we had bought earlier. Went out a bit later for some mulled wine and cherry pie.

Michelangelo's Madonna with Child
This is the chocolate one

This is the real one

Indische Buurt

2008-03-13T10:18:00.001-07:00

Today I walked up to the Indische Buurt, which sort of means Indian neighbourhood, just north of the center of Groningen. While it does seem to be home to at least a small Asian community (some Asian grocery stores, Surinamese restaurants) it doesn't really 'live up' to its name in that way....no Samosa stands on every corner or anything...which would have been delicious. It's very quiet, with a lot of nice big parks with big ponds in them, and rows and rows of residential flats, one main street going through that had a lot of sports specialty stores for some reason.

two blokes I met on the street who really wanted me to take their picture. the one on the left is from Suriname and the one on the right is Nigerian.

swingin'

people had really nice little gardens and shrubbery outside their homes....

digging up the road

peeked into the hospital...looks like an airport! didn't feel like a hospital at all.

tobacco

2008-03-11T11:44:00.001-07:00

Every so often, in the evenings, there is a strong smell of tobacco throughout the entire city, or at least the city center. I guess it's when the wind is blowing in a certain direction.

The reason for this, apparently, is:

...the Tobacco Museum (Tabacologisch Museum) of the Niemeyer company, with a unique collection of material on the history of tobacco-smoking ranging from 3,000- year-old American Indian pipes to the present day, illustrating the manufacture of pipes and displaying pipes, snuff-boxes, spittoons and tobacco jars of porcelain, silver, meerschaum, crystal and ivory....

Treasure Hunting

2008-03-01T09:53:00.001-08:00

Every time there is a market (Tuesday, Friday and Saturday) boxes of produce that is deemed unsellable is left in the square. I found out about it one my way home from class one day. It was about 6PM (the market closes at around 5) and I saw an older gentleman rummaging through what looked like trash. Slowing my bike to investiate, he handed me an avocado, in perfect condition, and I was hooked. Since then, I have been going after almost every market. You would think that the students would pounce on this stuff, but they don't seem to care. They pass by on their bikes, often looking judgmentally at the people who are doing it, who tend to be young hippie couples, older anti-establishment types, and other intelligent people in general. My grocery bill has been cut substantially since I discovered this ritual.

Here's some of the loot I've picked up:

6 red peppers, 1 Canteloupe, 2 Avocados, 1 apple, 1 tomato, 1 mango

1 cucumber, a box of cherry tomatoes, 1 tomato, 2 potatoes, 1 orange, 1 red pepper, 2 chilis, 3 canteloupes, 2 papayas, 3 peaches, 1 apple, 1 kiwi

2 boxes of blueberries, 1 box of rasberries, 2 bundles of white asparagus (there were crates and crates of these!1), 3 heads of lettuce, 4 tomatoes, 2 onions, 1 box of mushrooms, 2 potatoes, half a zuchinni, 1 banana, 1 mango

Amsterdam.

2008-02-26T13:05:00.000-08:00

Spent a glorious weekend in Amsterdam. A reunification of sorts of several different characters I've known throughout my life, Chrissy of course being among them. Gotta love Amsterdam, though, walking along the canals at dusk, the rows upon rows of warmly lit curtain-less windows, where every so often you see someone going about their evening, reading a book, cooking; they must be so used to being watched by the people walking by.

Two museums (and a purchase of a Dutch museum card, 22 Euros and good for one year for entry to almost any museum in the country): Anne Frank and Van Gogh, two prominent figures of Dutch history, but forewent the zoo (it was too near closing time) to instead hang out in a park of geese and ducks. Sore calves and knees from all the walking (next time will bring bike!) and quiet evenings in playing chess in Jamie's 2-floor flat, conveniently equipped with 4 single beds.

Bike Ride to the Lake

2008-02-16T07:42:00.001-08:00

There are two lakes just 20-30 minutes South of the town. I believe you can swim in them come summer. I biked out there to check it out.

Also visited a houseboat for the very first time the other night. Sometimes they are rented out to students. The bedrooms are very very small but the living spaces are quite large.

This is the tiny toilet which you have to pump by hand to flush.

This is house from outside...

In other news, I finally saw No Country for Old men here:

Kind of what I expected, a slick, violent, good vs. evil thriller, about crime, revenge, heroism, and doing the right thing, from three perspectives: the 'law', the conscienceless criminal, and the guy who accidentally gets caught up in it all. With western tones, thoughtful performances (Javier Barden, Tommy Lee Jones), and the usual Coen brothers sharp wit, it is thoroughly entertaining and suspenseful...out of the (somewhat bizarre) nominations for Best Picture this year, it definitely stands a chance and probably deserves to be there.

Also, I discovered last.fm, a 'radio' station where you type in an artist and it will play similar artists for you until you type in something new! Fun.

Past the one week mark...

2008-02-10T15:50:00.000-08:00

I have now been here for 9 full days. I did end up participating in the Introduction week and while most of the activities were not really my...style...there were a few interesting things, like today we did some mini workshops: model united nations, debating, and film basics (didn't really learn much except where the best video store in Groningen is). It's funny that I chose this town to come to. It's really a student town, and I'm not really the type to appreciate that aspect of it. It's probably like Kingston or London, Ontario, but in Holland. But I do like it, and I'm sure that in time I will discover the finer things it has to offer. I liked the idea of a small town, but just wasn't prepared for all this student madness. I am, however, a great fan of Dutch society. They seem to be a liberal, tolerant people and I have so far only had positive encounters with native Hollanders.

Not much in a writing mood, so this one will be mostly photos:

this guy was just hanging out in the middle of the sidewalk

my bike!

this beer was given to me in a bank...as a refreshment when i opened an account. they wouldn't let me take a picture of the bank but i'm not lying!

this is the main clock tower here, useful for finding your way, and also the biggest one...in holland...or something

the synagogue in Groningen, very old. There are bronze moons and stars in the cobblestone leading up to it.

the Groningen red light district. there are prostitutes here too, i just found out.

a terrible 'Japanese' restaurant where there was a dinner for all the International kids.

this is the biggest bar in Holland, Drie Gezusters, which means Three Sisters. 4 buildings, 3 floors, and revolving bars apparently.

I think this guy might be on a South American soap opera. this girl is from France and is really sweet.

@ the museum

played a few games of pool with this American guy, Greg.

the organ grinder. he's there every market day (Tuesday, Friday, Saturday)

here is a couple of Internationals...from L to R: Julien from France, Mia from Finland, Massimo from Italy

5 Days in

2008-02-06T13:38:00.001-08:00

I have been in Groningen for 5 full days and it's beginning to feel a bit like home. I have visited my University a few times now, finalized all my courses, and gotten my schedule. I have Mondays off, and end at 1:15 on Fridays which is great because I have a long weekend, perfect for weekend trips to Paris or Amsterdam or...
My classes are....intl. communication, the news interview, pop music: theories and discourse, and international human rights. I'm quite content with all of them, in theory at least.
This is my school...

I have been cooking all my meals at home. I still get a bit frightened every time I light the stove. I ran out of matches and had to start using a lighter today, which is terrifying, but I'm actually cooking a lot more than I did at home. One small disaster trying to make rice pudding but otherwise successful.

I bought a bike! It's a kids mountain bike (rare in Holland) and I got it for 50 E. It has changed everything. The city seems to have shrunken. It take me about 5 minutes to get anywhere, such as school. Though people say you don't need to lock your bike up here, most people do, but just with a thin chain locking the wheel to the frame. If someone went through this town with a big truck they could grab every single bike. But noone does. I guess everyone already has a bike, so bike thieves wouldn;t have much of a market. Though they could bring them over the border....to Belgium...hmmm

Staring tomorrow, there is an introduction-type week for International students. Still trying to decide whether to sign up or not. Paying 30 E will get you a tour, museum visit, 3 dinners, drinks....but the rest of it seems kind of 'froshy'... so I may have to not participate in the evening activities, and then determine whether its worth it paying 30E for the other stuff. I hate organized group activities though! and Icebreakers! So.....

The Groningen train station, sunset

My big accomplishment today was buying an alarm clock. There is this huge electronics story called Mediamarkt. They have anything that plugs in, from computers to vacuums to blenders to stereo systems. I bought alarm clock because I've been going to sleep at 5AM and waking up at 1PM almost every day and that clearly needs to change before I start school. Unable to sleep last night, I turned on the television for the first time. I get almost 50 channels, and one or two of them are in English. At 4AM, most of them were quite...sexy....but the most interesting channel was playing movies while a man stood in front signing the entire movie out for the deaf. I wonder if he is an actor.

I heard someone playing cello on the floor above me. When I went to investigate, I realized that I only have access to my floor. So the cellist remains a mystery. Maybe I will leave her a note in the lobby....

Day 3

2008-02-03T08:52:00.000-08:00

Had a lovely evening in last night. This feels a bit like camping; I have a 2-element propane stove that I have to light with a match, I have to bring my own toilet paper to the bathroom...but it is actually quite homey, which is nice. But I made a nice dinner of rice and some sort of mystery meat (chicken? beef? pork? horse?...not sure).

Here is the hallway of my building....

I downloaded Skype and it is amazing! You just add credit to your account and you can call anywhere and it's cheap! Except to European cellphones. To Chrissy's cell in Paris it cost 2.50 E for an 8 minute call, but only 1 E for an hour-long call to a Montreal landline. Amazing!

Went out for a walk as soon as I got up....which was not early. There were a few things I needed to get...some essentials like shampoo, soap, a sponge for the dishes...but apparently this entire town shuts down on Sunday. Nothing, NOTHING was open....except McDonalds and a few other cafes and restaurants. And there is this almost eerie but peaceful silence throughout the town. The only sounds to be heard are footsteps, bicycles, and talking. Barely any cars (there are many roads where cars aren't allowed), no music...but a lot of people out on the street despite everything being closed. Is it people going to/coming from Church? Just walking around? Groningen is also very clean
Here is the town square where the market was on Saturday....empty on Sunday

There are a lot of canals here, and people live in houseboats...I guess most of them are anchored and never leave that one spot.

I ended up walking around for hours. At first I just wanted to walk around, and then I just got very very lost. But I did get to see a lot more today then I did on my last few walks. I even found a mini red-light district (sex shops, "koffieshops" (very different from cafés), tatoo/piercing...record stores...and the lingering scent of 'grass'), as well as two movie theatres. One is just a big commercial chain (Pathé) but the other was a really cute small one with a nice café inside. Today was the last day of the Rotterdam film festival and they were playing special movies all day...also found the University, or part of it. I guess Groningen is quite a bit bigger than I thought. Quick fact: the population is 185 000 people. I guess sizewise it would be somewhere between Sherbrooke and Quebec city.

university...right outside the library, that's why there are so many bikes!

What I figured out is that there are two town squares that have markets in them on Saturdays. Because when I asked people where my street was, and they didn't know, I said I could get home from the square, and I kept getting pointed to this other weird square which wasn't MY town square...I must have asked 5 people for directions and I just kept going around in circles. I think some people just pretended they knew:
Me: do you know where Eendrachtskade is?
Dutch woman: What is it?
Me: A street...
Woman: In the city?
Me: Yes...
Woman: go straight, then right, then left.

Finally some helpful young lads in a 'Koffieshop' were able to procure a map and point me in the right direction. Since I have no watch I had no idea how long I had been out. I thought it had been something like 7 hours, but it turned out to only have been about 4 1/2.

To finish, here are some of the words I have learned so far:
kaas/cheese
broodje/bread
kippen/chicken
vis/fish (learned this by accident when I accidentally bought fish broth instead of veg. broth)
sinaasappel/orange (that one is weird...shouldn't it mean apple or pineapple?)
huis/house
let op/pay attention
koopjes/bargains
schoenen/shoes
winkel/shop
kortingen/discounts
hypotheken/mortgages? (from dictionary.com) (there are 'hypotheker' everywhere...mortgage brokers? banks? I don't know.)

Days 1 + 2

2008-02-02T06:21:00.000-08:00

Amsterdam.

Arrived at 8:30 AM on Friday morning, which I thought was too early to call my elementary school buddy Jamie, in Amsterdam on an exchange. So I just walked...and walked. Bought some boots for $20.

Finally called Jamie around 11:30. He was meeting another friend at the train station in 10 minutes, so I headed over there. Had to use a few strangers' cellphones to figure out exactly where to meet him....

We went to a tea shop for lunch - this place had 'high tea' options - but we just got a pot and some rolls with cheese and meat.

Since I hadn't yet found the red light district, we went there. It was maybe a bit early for prostitutes (though there were a few in this one alley who all looked under 16) so we just headed to a café - the Greenhouse Effect - for a...beer. Strong stuff. Music playing in café: the pixies.

After that we headed to Jamie's 800 E/Month 2 floor suite (he has four beds, so I'll be staying there some time), then back out to play a few games of pool (music playing in bar: TLC's 'No Scrubs') and a snack at Febo, this bizarre fast food restaurant where all the hot food (little cheese and meat filled fried things, small burgers) is in little dispensers and when you pay they open...and they have people working there just filling the dispensers up.

Then I decided to walk around a bit more before catching the 4:11 train back to the airport (where all my bags were and where I was due to catch the 5:18 train to Groningen). A bit more red light dstrict - more prostitutes out now - and a Cannabis garden, which I had to pay 3 E to get into and which turned out to be just 3 plants in a room.

Apparently it is disrespectful/not allowed to take pictures of the prostitutes, so this is from across the street

look closely at the decorative cast iron fencing...

the unremarkable 'cannabis garden'

Bad Luck: I broke my glasses 10 minutes into my plane ride
Good Luck: I found a photo on the street (I collect found photos)

Groningen.

Cab driver abandoned me at the door of my apartment. I was supposed to call this girl to get my keys but I didn't have a phone, and couldn't figure out which apartment she lived in. Finally after 10 minutes a girl came out and let me use her cell. The apartment building is not what I expected at all. The bathroom and shower are shared, but otherwise I feel like I am living alone. Not at all like the 'house' I was expecting. I have my own room, kitchenette, keys...and also haven't seen a soul in the building (an old school, perhaps?) since I got here.

What I see from my window

The first thing I did was blow the fuse for the entire apartment except one light by plugging something into the converter. Then I just decided to go to sleep.

14 hours later and the power was miraculously back on. Was able to plug in my poor dead computer. Went out in search of some food. After walking for about 10 minutes, I found a market. The beautiful weather (about 5 degrees C) was interrupted briefly by a surprise blizzard that lasted about 5 minutes. I bought some fruits and vegetables, then passed by the grocery store to get some essentials. Bad idea. They didn't have any plastic bags and I had come empty handed, so I had to use the thin little ones for fruits and vegetables. And I had a lot of stuff. 4 broken shopping bags, 1 broken bottle of wine, 1 broken bottle of oil, and some bleeding fingers later, and I still wasn't home. A woman kindly stopped and gave me one of her shopping bags, so I was finally able to get home.

ps. this blog is chopping my photos pretty much in half...will figure out how to fix that.