It has been about a week and a half since I returned from my trip, and to be honest, I still haven't unpacked. Part of that is me being lazy and busy but it's also because the stuff in my suitcase and carry-on bags is pretty much all there is that says, "I was just in Europe." The jet-lag is gone, along with one of the chocolate bars and more than half of the candy. My postcard of Night Watch is on my desk at work and my skinny jeans and flats can only be worn so many times in a row. My photos have been sorted through and posted here and I've even completely finished the series of books I started reading on the return flight. There's not much left to indicate I just went on a trip other than my half unpacked suitcase.
At the end of my last post I mentioned my flights. As it turns out, Charlotte, North Carolina and the state itself got to remain on my "never been there" list. My flight out of Philadelphia was delayed (lord knows why, it was the same plane that I was on from Amsterdam and it flew fine) and I would have missed my connecting flight from Charlotte to SF, were it not for a US Airways clerk who found me a spot on a direct flight from PHL to SFO that left about the same time as my old flight to Charlotte. Of course, when I arrived in SF though, my bag was not with me. It followed my original flight path and arrived about an hour after I did. Luckily, the San Francisco baggage people are awesome and they delivered it to my house bright and early the next morning.
In terms of reflection on my trip... thinking about it that way makes me feel like I'm in high school. They made us reflect on everything. I guess it's habit or something. Anyway, generally I had a great time and I would love to do it again. I don't think I would change anything other than to make it longer. It was a great experience and I am glad I did it with the people I did. Next time, I will know how much longer I need in certain areas (Paris and Brussels in particular) and may be able to lead my companions through various others (The Hague and Amsterdam). I will probably not do much travelling alone in non-anglophone countries by myself in the future, but that's alright, because I've been to most anglophone countries already and I like them. That's not saying I won't travel, I'll just make sure when I'm going to an entirely new place that I take somebody with me. I'm braver when I'm not alone.
This blog will stay up, and the next time I go on an international adventure (which might not actually be that long from now) I will use it again. I've greatly enjoyed documenting my travels this way, and I hope the rest of you have too. Goodbye for now!
If you haven't found me already, I am on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Friday, August 5, 2011
A'dam Good Day
Today may have been my last day in the Netherlands, but I did not waste it lamenting. I got up at 9:30, got dressed and ready and was out the door at 10 to get to Amsterdam and get my waterborne adventure rolling.
When I arrived in Amsterdam at about 11:30 (it doesn't actually take that long, I just barely missed a train and had to wait around) I had originally planned to walk my way over to the Jordaan and find Anne Frank Huis by myself, but a lot of the area in front of Amsterdam Centraal (the train station) is under construction so the way I was going to walk was blocked. As I was turning around I saw a sign for the Canal Bus hop-on hop-off canal tour. One of my tasks for the day was to go on a boat in a canal. The Canal Bus would take me to Anne Frank Huis and the Rijksmuseum and whereever else I had time for AND take care of the boat-on-the-canal requirement for my trip. It was 20 Euro, but I did it anyway. It was worth it to not have to constantly be looking like a tourist staring at a map and possibly getting pick-pocketed.
The boats were nice, open topped long boats with cushy seats, tables and a multilingual recording that recited interesting things about the surroundings and Amsterdam in general. I learned a lot of things about the canals, the harbors and even the gables on the canal houses.
When I arrived at Anne Frank Huis, there was a line that most people less determined than I might forego. I had planned for this though (having been warned by my tour book and half a dozen people) so I didn't mind standing in line. Luckily, I was only in line for about 45 minutes. I had been expecting something more along the lines of 2 hours, so I was pleased. The museum itself is very interesting. It mostly consists of the house itself, which is bare of furniture as the Nazis left it, per the surviving Otto Frank's request. The various things that were plastered to the walls in the Secret Annex, both by Anne and her Father are all still there though, and that was really cool to see. There were also video interviews with various people who survived the war that told various portions of the story from other people's perspectives. For me, it sort of made it all very...real, I guess, which was maybe the purpose? Because, well, it was real, but being an American 22 year old female in the 21st Century, World War 2 and the terrible events that happened with it were always long ago, in a country far far away. I've always liked historical fiction, and I've read a reasonably large number of holocaust books for a non-Jewish kid, including Anne Frank's Diary, but it never really was a reality until today I think. Walking in that house and seeing those actual rooms, objects, writings and people. Videos of the real people talking about their memories of what happened. It's a good museum. Go stand in line and walk through it. It's not big, but it is worth the 8.50 and the wait. Especially if you've read Anne's Diary.
After that experience, which was concluded with a video of Otto Frank talking about his daughter and her diary, I walked back to the Canal Bus stop and rested by the canal for a while waiting for it. When it arrived I hopped back on and we continued our route towards the Rijksmuseum, which is right next to the Van Gogh museum I visited last week. When we arrived, I got off and decided that I was going to go into the Rijksmuseum and see the Nightwatch, since apparently it's important or something. So I did. And now I understand.
Most of the Rijksmuseum is being renovated right now so they don't have their whole collection available, but they did have all the important pieces and some Dutch finery. The bottom floor was dedicated to Dutch history and had ships, some paintings, Delftware (thats the Dutch porcelain with the blue dyes) and some metal work. Nothing too intriguing for me. Upstairs was the good stuff. I'm not normally a huge painting person, but for some reason today I was (just like the day I went to Van Gogh, maybe I'm more interested when I pay?). Anyway, while walking through the rooms, there was one artist who had a few paintings up who I liked a lot: Pieter Jansz Saenredam. I thought his composition was cool, and sort of like my photography. I looked at all the Rembrandt and Degas stuff they had up and came to the conclusion that Degas was rather handsome and Rembrandt wasn't really.
Then I walked into the room with the Nightwatch. Most people are impressed by its size, I think. Having seen many large paintings in galleries world wide (the British National Gallery, for example) that wasn't really what surprised me. What caught me was the detail! I stood staring at the thing for what must have been 10 minutes trying to see it all. I don't think I had, until today, ever seen the image before, but now it might be my favorite painting ever. The print I bought of it (on a postcard) doesn't even begin to do it justice though. I'm not sure any duplicate could. There's just no reproducing the way the man in gold jumps off the canvas, or the glitter on each gentleman's hat, or the dimensionality of the rifles. Not happening on a print. I knew that when I was looking at it, which is probably why I stared for so long. Though now, I wish I had stayed even longer.
After the Rijksmuseum, I wandered around a little and eventually got back on the Canal Bus, which meandered it's way back to Centraal, where I caught the train back to Den Haag. My last train ride... followed by my last tram ride, followed by my last time keying in to the apartment. I will miss it here, I like it a lot.
I then set about helping Peter and Jen eat all of the remaining food, before we discovered we needed to go out to get more. Then we went out to one of the restaurants and Jen and I split some pasta. Then we got some ice cream and came back to pack.
I'm all packed now, all 3 of us are taking a taxi to the airport in the morning (their flight for Boston leaves very shortly after mine to Philly). I will tweet when I return to the states. I go to Philadelphia, then Charlotte, then SFO, but we'll see if that sticks.
A reflection post will come with my photo album links in a few days :)
When I arrived in Amsterdam at about 11:30 (it doesn't actually take that long, I just barely missed a train and had to wait around) I had originally planned to walk my way over to the Jordaan and find Anne Frank Huis by myself, but a lot of the area in front of Amsterdam Centraal (the train station) is under construction so the way I was going to walk was blocked. As I was turning around I saw a sign for the Canal Bus hop-on hop-off canal tour. One of my tasks for the day was to go on a boat in a canal. The Canal Bus would take me to Anne Frank Huis and the Rijksmuseum and whereever else I had time for AND take care of the boat-on-the-canal requirement for my trip. It was 20 Euro, but I did it anyway. It was worth it to not have to constantly be looking like a tourist staring at a map and possibly getting pick-pocketed.
The boats were nice, open topped long boats with cushy seats, tables and a multilingual recording that recited interesting things about the surroundings and Amsterdam in general. I learned a lot of things about the canals, the harbors and even the gables on the canal houses.
When I arrived at Anne Frank Huis, there was a line that most people less determined than I might forego. I had planned for this though (having been warned by my tour book and half a dozen people) so I didn't mind standing in line. Luckily, I was only in line for about 45 minutes. I had been expecting something more along the lines of 2 hours, so I was pleased. The museum itself is very interesting. It mostly consists of the house itself, which is bare of furniture as the Nazis left it, per the surviving Otto Frank's request. The various things that were plastered to the walls in the Secret Annex, both by Anne and her Father are all still there though, and that was really cool to see. There were also video interviews with various people who survived the war that told various portions of the story from other people's perspectives. For me, it sort of made it all very...real, I guess, which was maybe the purpose? Because, well, it was real, but being an American 22 year old female in the 21st Century, World War 2 and the terrible events that happened with it were always long ago, in a country far far away. I've always liked historical fiction, and I've read a reasonably large number of holocaust books for a non-Jewish kid, including Anne Frank's Diary, but it never really was a reality until today I think. Walking in that house and seeing those actual rooms, objects, writings and people. Videos of the real people talking about their memories of what happened. It's a good museum. Go stand in line and walk through it. It's not big, but it is worth the 8.50 and the wait. Especially if you've read Anne's Diary.
After that experience, which was concluded with a video of Otto Frank talking about his daughter and her diary, I walked back to the Canal Bus stop and rested by the canal for a while waiting for it. When it arrived I hopped back on and we continued our route towards the Rijksmuseum, which is right next to the Van Gogh museum I visited last week. When we arrived, I got off and decided that I was going to go into the Rijksmuseum and see the Nightwatch, since apparently it's important or something. So I did. And now I understand.
The building behind the wall with the panels on the side is the Rijksmuseum
Most of the Rijksmuseum is being renovated right now so they don't have their whole collection available, but they did have all the important pieces and some Dutch finery. The bottom floor was dedicated to Dutch history and had ships, some paintings, Delftware (thats the Dutch porcelain with the blue dyes) and some metal work. Nothing too intriguing for me. Upstairs was the good stuff. I'm not normally a huge painting person, but for some reason today I was (just like the day I went to Van Gogh, maybe I'm more interested when I pay?). Anyway, while walking through the rooms, there was one artist who had a few paintings up who I liked a lot: Pieter Jansz Saenredam. I thought his composition was cool, and sort of like my photography. I looked at all the Rembrandt and Degas stuff they had up and came to the conclusion that Degas was rather handsome and Rembrandt wasn't really.
Then I walked into the room with the Nightwatch. Most people are impressed by its size, I think. Having seen many large paintings in galleries world wide (the British National Gallery, for example) that wasn't really what surprised me. What caught me was the detail! I stood staring at the thing for what must have been 10 minutes trying to see it all. I don't think I had, until today, ever seen the image before, but now it might be my favorite painting ever. The print I bought of it (on a postcard) doesn't even begin to do it justice though. I'm not sure any duplicate could. There's just no reproducing the way the man in gold jumps off the canvas, or the glitter on each gentleman's hat, or the dimensionality of the rifles. Not happening on a print. I knew that when I was looking at it, which is probably why I stared for so long. Though now, I wish I had stayed even longer.
After the Rijksmuseum, I wandered around a little and eventually got back on the Canal Bus, which meandered it's way back to Centraal, where I caught the train back to Den Haag. My last train ride... followed by my last tram ride, followed by my last time keying in to the apartment. I will miss it here, I like it a lot.
I then set about helping Peter and Jen eat all of the remaining food, before we discovered we needed to go out to get more. Then we went out to one of the restaurants and Jen and I split some pasta. Then we got some ice cream and came back to pack.
I'm all packed now, all 3 of us are taking a taxi to the airport in the morning (their flight for Boston leaves very shortly after mine to Philly). I will tweet when I return to the states. I go to Philadelphia, then Charlotte, then SFO, but we'll see if that sticks.
A reflection post will come with my photo album links in a few days :)
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Hangin' in the Hague
So, the past couple days have been somewhat rearranged from plan and been a bit less eventful than planned, therefore, I don't have much to report.
Yesterday Jen and Peter returned in the morning from their trip to Georgia. After a chill morning Jen and I ran some errands, went out to lunch at one of the restaurants on the boardwalk and then went out to the water to put our feet in. For something called the North Sea the water was warm! I mean, it was still cold, but compared to the usual temperature of the Pacific at home it was much warmer. It may be because it's late summer, so I'll have to go to the beach again at home and do some comparison.
Last night we went to a dinner party with the interns at one of their apartments. It was a good time :)
Today Jen and I went to Leiden and Wassenaar (aka places Jen has lived in Holland). In Leiden we went to her favorite Pannekoeken house. I think the pictures will speak for themselves:
Said pancake as large as my torso had cheese and ginger in it. I know that sounds like a weird combination, and I was skeptical at first, but actually it was quite tasty! Which was good, because I never would have been able to decide between the two separately.
Anyway, after the pancakes, we walked around the center of Leiden a bit. There were windmills.
Then we caught a bus towards Wassenaar, which is situated between Leiden and the Hague. We got off first at a place near the house that Jen lived in when she was in 6th grade. (Bethy also lived near there in her youth, for those keeping track). We walked around a bit and passed by Jen's old house, and then sat in a park for a bit. Then we got back on the bus and went to the center of town where we walked through the shopping area and stopped at the famed candy shop that Jen has brought me candy from. I got a whole lot, so those of you at home can have some. We then returned to the apartment and rested for a while before we went out to dinner with Peter and an old intern who is currently living in the Hague. We went to a really tasty chinese restaurant (it helped that said intern is from China and knew the restaurant well). After eating, Jen and I had a meeting with a friend at a nearby Irish pub called O'Casey's, where they were having a trivia night. It was a lot of fun! We met a lot of other interns from the various tribunals in the Hague. It was fun :) I sort of like hanging out with lawyers to be. I still don't want to be one though... too much rule following I think.
Tomorrow I am going back to Amsterdam tomorrow to go to Anne Frank Huis and possibly also the Rijksmuseum. We'll see. Going to try to be brave and get a water taxi too. Then I have to pack :( I'll be all trip summary in my post tomorrow night.
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