As if You Need Another Reason

It's funny how one event can change a person's perception. If I were to do a free association of "Japan" just last week, I would have thought of the following: sushi, Shinto Temples, Tea-Ceremony, Ukyo-e Prints. Lots of happy, interesting thoughts.

Now so much has changed.

This disaster isn't just a shift in perception. The whole country moved eight feet. The earth's axis wobbled. The images and numbers are so staggering, it's hard for me to wrap my head around it.

Please consider giving to the Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders.

To sweeten the deal, United will give 500 miles for each donation to the Red Cross. You can even donate unused miles.

This is just too big to ignore.

Countdown

Whenever I have a large task at hand with deadline, I need to have a countdown device. Note the word, "need." Not "like" or "prefer." Need. For work, I plan out my entire semester in an Excel spreadsheet. The schedule for each course is combined in one master schedule, with monthly meeting dates highlighted. As time marches on, my schedule shrinks as I hide the passing weeks. Most of my coworkers are aware of my habit and will often ask me: "What week are we on?" and I'll reply, "Week five, only three more weeks until Spring Break." I've turned into a speaking clock.

Some (such as my darling husband) would argue that my hyper-scheduling is a manifestation of my desire for control. Sure, I'm a list-maker and planner. I will not disagree. However, my countdown also serves as a motivator. When faced with a dreary, soul-sucking task, such as grading research papers or cleaning out the refrigerator, I will visualize my next break, or better yet, my next trip. This is why on any given return flight home, I will start thinking of when I can sneak away again. Day hikes are nice, but longer trips are much better at subduing the "I-can't-not-bear-one-more-day-of-this" blues.

(I am certainly not implying that my job is more miserable than most. Rather, this tactic helps me with any monotonous aspect of my life.)

There are sometimes in life when the countdown tactic just doesn't work. In the Summer of 2009, my husband found out on a Sunday afternoon his boss was sending him to Madrid for two and a half weeks - leaving on Tuesday morning. He called me on noon at Monday to let me know that the company travel agent found a screaming deal, and bought a ticket for me. I literally had 24 hours to reschedule my life and pack for Spain. My countdown was boiled down to hours instead of weeks. Even without the long-term planning, it was a fabulous trip. It taught me to allow time for wandering, and that some of the best memories are made by having a long lunch in a restaurant not listed in any guidebook.

My constant planning also runs against the Buddhist thought of living in the present moment.* Can I really be present when I am so focused on the future? Maybe the everyday doldrums wouldn't seem so bad... Clearly this is something I have to work on.

The countdown is now 7 days until we leave for Istanbul. I do have some days planned. But there are some days that are open for suggestions and other ideas. I do not know how to count in Turkish, and have yet to buy a map. But that's ok. We'll figure it out.

Babysteps.

*I am not a expert in Buddhism. Rather I enjoy expanding my mind by looking at other religions and philosophies. 'Nuff said.

Waving Goodbye

My Wonderful Son (WS) is off on his adventure today. This morning he left for Singapore, a two-week trip on his own.

As with much of parenthood, this is a bittersweet moment. Yes, I'm happy we've raised a son who's independent and brave enough to discover the world. Just as with the first day of kindergarten, there is the achievement of reaching the milestone, but a reminder of how fast they have grown. Eleven years ago we took WS on his first trip to Europe; his first taste of escargot, playing in Sherwood Forest and skipping rocks in the Lake District. That trip was also the first time we travel out of the country as a family; something I had dreamed about, but wasn't sure we could achieve.

As WS was getting ready, it was hard setting aside the Mom-ness - "Do you have your passport? Did you pack your allergy medicine? Do you have enough sunblock?" Even though I know no matter how much you prepare, there will always be bumps in the road (or crying babies in the cabin). The most important travel skill is dealing with the unexpected. No guidebook or jet lag pill can give you common sense on the road. For just like walking, it's a skill you have to learn for yourself.

Bon voyage Son. Have fun and take chances. Show the world that some Americans love Al-Jazeera and won't let patriotism act like a blindfold. We're proud of you.

Crusing

After touring for so long, and buying the majority of our meals (and trying to stay on budget); being on the cruise felt decadent. Three full meals a day – plus tea-time! A pool! A gift-shop! A bar! But like every cruise, there is the somewhat goofy evening entertainment. The “highlight” was costume night, where we had to “dress-up” as an Egyptian. (I must say that this did bother me on some level. Is this not what the English did when they came to Egypt, the basis of Orientalism? Contrive a romantic notion of what Egyptians were, all the while as distancing themselves as being superior? Wasn’t the idea of this trip to understand a culture, not give a Western attitude of Egyptians being “the other”? Maybe I just think too much…)

So here I am on the Nile, in my Egyptian get-up. (That veil did not want to stay on my head; now I know why so many Muslim women use straight pins to keep them put.)

Here’s my roommate Peggy:

Dan and Kathryn looking good!

Now what do you do with a bunch of adults in costumes? Make them play silly games, of course, such as passing an empty water bottle around.

It certainly was touristy, but fun.

What's on TV?

What type of television shows our country is exporting to Egypt:

Pimp my Ride (from MTV)
Cold Case
American Gladiators (the new version)
Kojak
Las Vegas
Law and Order: Criminal Intent

And last but not least:
The Dukes of Hazzards (Yes, from the 70’s. I can not make this up.)

Response

Amy left a great comment, what do Egyptians say when they meet you? First of all, I can only comment on what they say to me in English, what they say in Arabic is something unknown to me. When you walk down the street many vendors and even children will call out “Hello!” and “Welcome!” I have had more conversations with people outside of Cairo which makes sense; in the States it’s easier to talk to a local in the Mid-West than New York City.

1. Where are you from?
2. Who do you like better, McCain or Obama?
3. Do you like Egypt?
4. You have family?
5. How long are you staying in Egypt?

On the question of the presidential candidates, this question comes from men right away. You will literally be meeting with someone for less than three minutes and they will pull that question out. Overall, the Egyptians I’ve met are Obama supporters; they’re afraid with McCain we’ll be in Iraq forever. Like a taxi drivers in Cairo said, “I love America, but not George Bush.” From the lectures we’ve been attending at the Fulbright Office, there certainly are some Egyptians who are not happy with America, but they’re not happy with their own government either. Just like we have stereotypes of other cultures, they have stereotypes of us as well.

One thing that took a while to get used to as a woman, are the men who stare, leer, and honk. This has happened mostly in Cairo, and it is grating on the nerves. What’s odd is that men will exhibit the same behavior to traditionally veiled, Muslim women, as they do to me, a Western woman exposing her arms and hair. This really bothered me the first week I was here, but now it doesn’t; you just ignore it. I will admit I do like the “women’s only” cars on the Metro. They’re much less crowded and there no chance for public groping.

Our group is made up of ten teachers from the Jeffo School System, six high school teachers and four middle school teachers. They mostly teach geography, history, civics, etc., and have various topics for their projects. There are four of us from Metro State; an Islamic historian, a criminologist, a scholar with an international studies background who teaches with the Women’s Studies Department and me, the art historian. The Criminologist, Allison Cotton, is studying Female Genitalia Mutilation (FGM) and has been surprised on how open and honest Egyptian woman are on this topic. It is illegal to perform FGM here in Egypt, but the practice still continues. Arlene from the Woman’s Studies Department has been looking at the portrayal of women in advertising and the media. Paul is gathering information on an article he is writing (I can recall what exactly it’s on; his specialty is the Fatimid’s.). We're all really sponges over here, just absorbing everything and anything, even if it is not directly related to our work.

The big obstacle I’m hitting is that some museums I wanted to visit are closed (such as the Islamic Art Museum in Cairo and the Greco-Roman Museum in Alexandria) and those I am visiting don’t allow photography in the museum – at all. (The Egyptian Museum and the Coptic Art Museum won’t even allow you to bring a camera inside the building, even with pressure from the Fulbright office.) Of course, I can buy books in the gift shop, but many times those books focus on the popular pieces. The last thing I need is another image of King Tutankhamen’s throne; I want images of the odd, “unpopular” pieces that are not in the books. Of course, I’m still getting a ton of images I can use, but you always remember the ones that got away.

Question time

All right guys, this weekend I'll have internet access. So before I head to Luxor for the week (with questionable access), I want to hear from you. A shout out. A comment. A question. Stop lurking. I've got a little less than three weeks left of this trip and I need some interactions from home.

To get the ball rolling I've thought of some lists:

Top Five things I miss from the States (other than family or my dog)

1. My washer and drier. (Seriously, this doing laundry in the sink is getting old, and the hotel porters stop and count every piece before they take it to be washed. Ask my roommate how she liked her underthings being counted in the hotel lobby. Oh yes.)
2. Free and ample toilet paper at public restrooms. 'Nuff said.
3. My bed and pillow.
4. Wireless 24/7. I'm so out of touch with the rest of the world, it's not funny.
5. Mexican food. (I have stopped talking about all food from America, because it just makes me crave it even more. Do not talk to me about cookies.)

Top Five Things I miss about Europe: (This one is tough.)

1. Cappucino for breakfast in Italy.
2. Wine with dinner, pretty much every night.
3. Chruch bells ringing. In almost every place we stayed there was some type of church bell. For some reason I really liked them.
4. Really long, unrushed dinners.
5. Their public transportation. (Ok the trains in Italy weren't all that great, but they worked.)

Top Five Things I will miss about Egypt:

1. Fresh Mango Juice. (I've never tasted any better.)
2. Pitas and hummus. We get it almost every meal, and I eat it up.
3. Our tour guide, Selma. She's so smart and knows so much about people.
4. Snorkling in the Red Sea. I'm still amazed at what I saw.
5. The Egyptians themselves. Once you get past the lurkers and vendors, Egyptian people are very friendly. They are so happy to meet someone from America.

Your turn now - add your comments!

First Day

Our first day was to get over jet lag and later meet with the Fulbright office. It was hot walking around, and the city itself is overwhelming. As much as I wanted to stop and take photos, I had two things working against me. 1) I was with the group, who wanted to keep at a certain pace. 2) You can’t really look around to gain your bearings, or just look at the sites when you have to navigate a Cairo sidewalk. The sidewalk itself is very uneven, prone to pot holes, gaps, missing bricks, piles of garbage, and drop offs. Look around too much, and you’re apt to trip, which has happened to several group members already. You don’t see baby carriages here like you do in Europe or the States.

Seeing everything in Arabic is the first shock, then there’s the traffic. Before I go further, I must define what goes into this word “traffic.” In the States this would be mostly cars and SUV’s; some semi-trucks and motorcycles with riders (mostly) wearing helmets. In Egypt, there are mostly small cars, and delivery trucks that would be the size of American pick-up trucks; plus a good number of mopeds carrying multiple passengers with no helmets. And donkey carts. Witness a young boy who tied up traffic in front of a bank as he was calling out to sell watermelons.

We took a cab to dinner, which turned out to be as much of an experience as any museum. There are lane markings on the road, which are really just suggestions. Our cab rode over the center line, creating the forth lane, when there were really lines for two lanes. (There was another car squeezed into the other side as well.) The clearance between the vehicles is often measured in inches, not feet. (I took this photo from the backseat of the cab, the thing on the lower right is the cab window.)

During the cab ride, there was a lot of sucking in one’s breath followed by “Oh My God!” as the cab weaved through cars and carts, upwards for 40 miles per hour. Most large intersections are policed with traffic officers, who stop the flow one way to allow the opposite traffic to pass.

We'll save riding the Metro for another day. Did I mention there's a "women only" car?

Trip to Egypt, A Visual Essay

(Note: Yes, I'm way behind, my apologies. Since I'm now in Egypt, I'm jumping over the time in Italy, basically to let me family know that I'm surviving. I will be going back to update the Europe part of the trip.)

A picture essay of my trip to Cairo.

Evidently, people are still using Telegrams in Italy.

There was a service where for 8 Euro ($12US) you could have your bag wrapped with green plastic wrap. I'm not sure why, the bags that looked like they were getting wrapped were not old or falling apart. Maybe to keep your bag clean?

I love that in Europe you see ads with movie stars who would never lower themselves to doing ads in the States.

Lunch at Heathrow. Ploughman's lunch with Pimms and lemonade. (I know my Mom and aunt are jealous.)

Little Shopping.

Finally on the plane.

This was one of the best lamb dishes I've ever had. (I'm sure after 5 weeks in Egypt, I'll have better lamb, but this was amazing for airplane food!)

On the back of the seat, there was your little TV screen, where you can watch different videos or tv shows, or check the electronic map to see how much farther to go.

In the Cairo Airport. (Ok, I didn't take too many photos, it was after midnight, there were a lot of armed guards, and I didn't want to piss anyone off.)

It was after 2 in the morning once we got though customs, found our tour bus and got to the hotel. Our room was 402. (On the 14th floor). The plaque on the doors had both the arabic symbols and numerals, so off we went. We found 401, 403, 404, 405, 406... etc. No 402. I felt like Harry Potter looking for a train station that didn't exist to muggles. We went back down to the reception. "We can't find 402." The porter looked at us like we were crazy. Back up we went, with him. He pointed at room 403, "There." "No, our number is 402." Thankfully our program director was there, "It says 402 in Arabic, even though the number is 403." Oh - of course.

No this is not a bad photo. It really is that yellow.

Here we go.

Parle ingles?

I’m going to rant now, you’ve been warned.)
We’ve been in Italy for a couple days now and I’m starting to get cranky and some of my fellow citizens. I’ll be the first to admit, I don’t speak Italian. My background is in French, and I can barely put together a sentence in Italian with my phrasebook. I get by with a lot of pointing and charades. For buying the train tickets, I used the phrasebook and wrote down “Please may I have reservations for Rome, on Wednesday, June 18th?” in Italian. (This got a chuckle from the ticket man.) I buttress everything with “Per favore” and “Grazie” (Please and Thank you). I can count up to five, and then I guess using Spanish (Italian and Spanish numbers are somewhat close.) Again, charades are helpful. I’m in Italy, not in America. While 99% of the Dutch learn English in school, not all Italians do.

It drives me nuts to see Americans walk up to Italians, either in the train stations or stores and just start speaking English. No “Do you speak English?” no “Per favore” – nothing. Their culturally insensitivity is embarrassing. You’re telling me they can spend thousands of dollars on airfare, hotel and food, but can be bothered with a ten-dollar phrasebook? They won’t even say “good-bye” in Italian, like “Ciao” is so hard to remember. (I’ll bet half of them are fans of the Sopranos.)

And people wonder why other counties don’t like Americans.

Enough with the soapbox.

You want me to go where?

(I will admit up front this entry is a bit on the crude side to illustrate some cultural differences. My apologizes.)

When you are in a foreign country, you start to realize how we Americans are accustomed to free, somewhat decent, restrooms. One you get over, here you have to hunt them out. At the train stations, expect to pay half a Euro (roughly 75 cents), to have an older woman wipe and spray stalls between patrons. (DH had to go in front of a female attendant in Avignon.) You learn when you pay to get into a museum or church, better use the facilities while you are there. I was shocked to see this in Florence’s Palazzo Medici (mind you, at one time this was the largest private house in all of Florence.)


This is known as a “Long Drop. See those two ribbed areas? That's where your feet go. I thought I would be dealing with this in Egypt, not Italy. This museum had a state of the art exhibit, where you literally point to a huge screen with the chapel’s frescos (your hand never touches the screen, cameras read your body to see what section you want), and it will explain it to you in the language of your choice. (DH loved it.) And you’re telling me that I have to squat, hover and balance to go?

Later the same day, we went to a café for an afternoon cappuccino and encountered this.

Bidet attachments in a café. That’s takes the idea of popping into the restroom to “freshen up” to a whole new level. (FYI - as Rick Steves’ says, a bidet is to clean the parts of your body that rub together when you walk.)

Ying or yang, all or nothing.

Two Hours in Nice

What would you do with two hours in Nice? That’s about how much time we had between trains, so we decided to head to the water. (Most European train stations have huge lockers where you can stash your bags. The one at Nice was horribly expensive, 8 Euros – but what’s the other option?)


Yes, the French Riviera is an unbelievable shade of blue; colors you wouldn’t think would be found in nature.

Just looking at the water wasn’t enough for us; we had to get our feet wet. No, we were not wearing proper beach attire; DH rolled up his jeans and took off his shoes and socks. Unlike the beach in Holland, this one was mostly rocks, which was neither easy nor comfortable to walk on. The waves came crashing and our pants got wet, and we really didn’t care. We were in the French Riviera.

When we were walking along the beach in Holland, DH and I were talking about shells and rocks, and I had mentioned that I never really found any sea glass. The only place I ever found it was in a Nature Preserve in La Jolla, California, and no one is allowed to take anything from the park. Well, guess what I found here?

This trip has been just full of surprises.

Avignon

Here we are in Avaginon, in an Ibis Hotel (think Holiday Inn, with smaller beds.) So far things have gone well. Wish us luck for our train rides (!!!) tomorrow.

Detour

I’m currently riding in a TGV, going to Avignon; listening to the Talking Heads:

And you may find yourself in another part of the world,
And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile,
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife.
And you may ask yourself, “Well, how did I get here?”

With all my planning, there was one thing I neglected: making train reservations for the overnight train from Paris to Florence. (This is where all my friends from Europe gasp. Yes, I know, I should have done this weeks before. Yes, I guess I am crazy.) So like hopeful (and naïve) fans trying to get tickets to a concert that was sold out months ago, we head to the train station. The very kind man behind the counter did indeed try to get us on that train in any possible manner (first-class, second-class, cargo…). No luck. How about Milan? Ok, we would just continue on to Florence in the morning. Nope, that one’s full too.

We then started with the creative solutions. We could go to Frankfurt, and then down to Milan on the overnight train. No, our Euro-rail Pass doesn’t cover Germany. What about Switzerland? Nope, only the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Italy are covered with our pass. Maybe we could get into Turin…An hour of searching and nothing was coming up available.

Then came the desperate solutions. Well, let’s try for the south of France tonight, and then carry on to Florence in the morning. After more vigorous searching by the ticket agent, a solution slowly became to materialize.

June 12 (today)
Leave Arrive
Bruges 1234 Kortrijk 1312
Kortrijk 1322 Lille (Flanders Station) 1354
Lille (Europe Station) 1557 Avignon 2011

Hotel in Avignon, to be determined.

June 13 (tomorrow)
Avignon (743) Nice (1101)*
Nice (1339) Ventimiglia (1418)
Ventimiglia (1458) Genova (1706)
Genova (1748) Pisa (2012)
Pisa (2029) Florence (2133)
*We tried to get on a later train, but it was booked.

I was doing ok with the whole thing, trying not to get overwhelmed and keep the “glass is half-full” mentality. David is reading “Angels and Demons” and I bought along knitting (plus this blog) so it won’t be like we have nothing to do on the train. It’ll be a break from all the sightseeing.

Since we had time in Lille, I went to the information booth, for, well, information. (Out came the rusty French.)

“I need a hotel in Avignon. Can you help me?”

“Ahhhh….”

“Do you have a phone number for their tourist information?”

He types on the computer, “Here is their phone number.”

“Thank you. Is there an internet café here?”

“No.”

“Do you have wireless here?”

“No.”

Ok, stay positive. There was a big, beautiful mall right near the station; they must have to have an internet café. Oh no, they don’t. (But people are allowed to bring in their dogs who can crap anywhere they choose. That was odd.) So then I get a phone card, wrestle with the public phone, call the tourist information and got their *$%& voicemail – twice. Alright, let’s call the hotel in Florence so that they do not give out our room since we’ll be coming in so late. I asked a very kind French woman what the international dialing code was since it was no where to be found on that phone. (She looked too, so I know it was not just me being dense.) She went to the information office and got the number for me. (00 – remember that, you too may one day need to know that.) So I call the number I have for the hotel in Florence and explained the situation. Reservation – what reservation? Evidently two hotels worked together for their reservations, but have now decided to take separate reservations; and I was calling the wrong hotel. So he gave me the number to our hotel. It was their fax number.

And you may ask yourself, where does that highway go to?
And you may ask yourself, am I right or am I wrong?
And you may say to yourself, “My God, what have I done?”

And that’s when I started crying in the train station.

DH feels my pain, but is unfazed by this situation. He claims his favorite trip to Europe is when we went to England for two weeks without one hotel reservation. (We stayed at a friend’s house the first part and the very last part of our trip, but other than that, we flew by the seat of our pants. It drove me nuts.) He asked me if I had ever been to Avignon before, and I said no. “Well, guess what? You’re going there today. Surprise!”

The one of the positive in all this craziness is that our Euro-rail pass is first-class. Though we will be on an ungodly amount of trains, most will be first-class with a little more leg room and overall a nicer experience. (In the TGV, DH and I are facing each other with a small table between us, there’s even an outlet on the side of the seat, so my laptop can charge as I type.)

Before I left the US, I had lunch with a dear colleague who was telling me about a road trip she was planning this summer with her four-year old daughter to Iowa. I told her about the times we took road trips to visit family in Wisconsin; Nebraska is a pain to drive though, but Iowa is so pretty. I love looking at the farms on the rolling hills; it can be a very picturesque drive. While we were talking about I was almost jealous – I want to go on a road trip. Listening to music, looking out the window, eating Twizzlers – such good times. She looked at me as if I was crazy, “You’re going to Europe and Egypt and you’re jealous of me going to Iowa?” Yes, in some ways I was. And now what am I doing? Sitting, listening to music, looking out the window at the picturesque countryside, and eating Haribo cola gummies, because they don’t have Twizzlers here. So maybe, just maybe, in some weird, twisted way, this is what I wanted all along.

5 random things

Five things that have surprised me so far:

1. Crocs – they’re a hit over here. I’ve seen two shops with nothing by Crocs, and our innkeeper in Bruge was sporting a pair.
2. Chips and salsa are popping up more in cafes. We say them in Haarlem and Bruges. No, I haven’t tried them, and don’t intend to.
3. How difficult it would be to get Internet connection. I’m wonder how difficult it will be in Egypt.
4. How women in Amsterdam can ride a bike, in high heels and a short skirt, with a small child in the front, groceries in the back, and talk on the cell phone and not kill themselves.
5. How fast time is flying by.

They're alive!

Our first night in Bruges, we called WS (Wonderful Son) to see if they were still in town and wanted a beer. The reply was yes on both accounts.


Obviously all are doing well.

The guys picked a café/bar they had been to the night before, with cheap beer with the Euro-cup game on the big screen TV. We drank and listened to their stories of Amsterdam and Bruges, everything from flat tires on rental bikes to loving the VanGogh Museum. They already adopted other football (soccer) clubs because “Well, the US teams just sucks.” WS was sporting the colors of one of the local Bruges club, and his friend had on Holland. (This will be an important point later in the story.)

After the beer, I personally was starving and the guys said they were hungry too. So we went to look for a place that was still open. (Restaurants close early in Bruges. We barely got a table at 9pm.) As we sat down, the owner looked a little grumpy, I thought due to a large party of five late in the evening. We ordered, and tried to be as polite as possible. While serving the table next to us, the owner said something in English and the other table laughed. DH nudged me, “They’re talking about us.”

“Huh, why do you say that?”

“Trust me; I know they were talking about us.”

I wasn’t sure what to do. The guys weren’t being that loud; I was speaking French, so we weren’t being rude Americans demanding he speak English – what was ticking this man off?

It finally came clear when the owner came to remove our plates. He stared at WS’s football scarf, “You two are rooting for the wrong team.” The owner was a fan of the OTHER team in Bruges – the ones that have a horrible record, and the fans cheer louder the worse they do.

That’s why he was being cranky! The other tabled laughed, and the guys quickly took off their scarves. Nice to know Americans aren’t the only ones who go crazy over their teams.

Hup Holland!

(Can someone explain to me the logic of having an Internet café and having zero computers with a USB-port? I’m supposed to type everything at the café? How do I upload my photos? I am not happy. I just got access to the internet, hence the fifty posts at once. Sorry, I’m playing catch up. Scroll down to the last entry you recall reading and go up.)

Holland has gone football crazy. Holland beat Italy (World Cup Champions) in the Euro-Cup, 3-0. Purely by chance, I packed an orange shirt, so I now can blend in with the locals.

Who, me?

One of the happier moments for me so far on this trip took place at the Hague train station. I was standing outside with the luggage, while DH went to get the tram tickets. A woman came up to me, with a clipboard, and starting speaking Dutch to me. I stared at her, “Um, I only speak English.”

“No? You don’t live in Holland?”

“No, but you have totally made my day if you’re telling me I don’t look like an American tourist.”

She looked me up and down, “Oh no, you look like a perfect Hollander.”

YES!

Haarlem

One of my son’s friends reminded me about the Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem. DH was up for a day trip, so off to Haarlem we went. Less than 20 minutes by train from Amsterdam, we came to a bustling central market square. Cafes spilled out beer-drinkers, merging shoppers and people watchers under the warm sun.

Frans Hals was an important 17th century portrait painter, typically known for emphasizing the merriment in children and the warmth in the sitter’s soul. The museum was small, yet had a special exhibit on Dirck, Jan, Joseph and Salomon de Bray.

Afterwards, we were ready to eat our picnic lunch (extras from our breakfast, need to stretch the Euros where we can.) We asked the museum guide for a recommendation, and she pointed us to a park outside the city center. It was indeed a lovely spot, which happened to be having an antique market. It was fun to look, but I just couldn’t buy anything knowing that I would need to haul it around for three weeks.

While the picnic was good, there was still room in our stomachs to sample the local fare. We were happy to find these:

We snagged these happy Belgian Fries, five minutes before the stall closed. Now if your mind is thinking “Eww… McDonald’s fries and Miracle Whip?” I can tell you that it is nothing like the aforementioned (vile) combination. First of all Belgian Fries are made from fresh potatoes, and fried twice, once at a lower temperature, and then at a higher temperature. The result is a crispy fry, with a tender, fluffy interior. The mayonnaise is a creamy contrast. Reflecting cultural influences, there are other sauces as well, including ketchup and curry; but I like to keep with tradition. And if you’re thirsty after the fries, then you need to drink this:

Local Beer. DH had a darker larger, I had a “white” beer with lemon. The Dutch, like so many European cultures, have mastered the café life; drinking a beer (or wine, or coffee), meeting with friends, and watching the world go by. I will admit that it was almost hard to “just sit there” and drink a beer. My mind was still easing into vacation mode. Shouldn’t I be doing something? (I really wanted to break out my knitting, but I knew this would not be blending in.) I think this is something I’ll have to work on.

We wandered some more, finding a windmill, and later getting lost on the way to the train station.

We can now say we’ve walked the streets of Haarlem at 11 pm, totally unafraid and unharmed.

Say Chesse

When we visit DH’s (Darling Husband's) family in Wisconsin, we bring a small cooler, to fill up with cheese curds and cheese we just can’t get in Colorado. Image my joy to find this: