Amster, dam look out!

After a record heat spell in Northern Europe, the weather finally started to change with the beginning of October, leaves were turning colors, sweaters were pulled out of our backpacks, and for a few days raincoats too.  So, naturally, after Belgium we decided it was a perfect time for a beach holiday on the North Sea.
For long distance travel we utilize the trains or buses, mainly Flixbus, which if booked in advance can be as low 5 euro.  It had worked well, until we tried to leave on a Flixbus on an early near freezing, very windy Friday morning out of Antwerp to The Hague, Netherlands.  Standing out on the street with loud construction nearby (actually, all of Belgium seemed to be under construction while we were there-it takes a lot of work to keep everything looking old and functioning), we waited and bonded with our group of fellow travelers heading north.  Soon, we all started getting texts indicating the bus would be an hour late, then two hours late, then 5 hours late, then a text do you want a refund-(yes, but we still haven\’t gotten it.) So, we rushed over to the train station to catch a much more expensive train, saying goodbye to the hardy few still deciding whether to wait it out.
Upon arriving in The Hague, which looked slightly more modern, but otherwise similarly clean and beautiful as everywhere we\’ve visited. We walked 6 miles from the downtown through pristine neighborhoods,

wooded trails to the beach in Scheveningen.  We stayed at a Skotel, which was a hotel run by eager students from a nearby Hospitality School.

Each room was decorated with donated furniture from hotel chains. We got Euro-Disney Newport Harbor!

Still windy and cold, we headed for the beach.  It was just like Santa Monica (minus 40 degrees) a long strand of sandy beach with a pier, ferris wheel, shops, restaurants plus viewing an endless stream of freights and oil tankers crossing the North Sea.  It was great!


Amsterdam

We haven\’t looked up the statistics but thousands of tourists must be hit by bicycles in Amsterdam every year.  Everywhere, everyone is riding at top speeds on the streets.  Bike lanes adjacent to sidewalks filled with bikes and motorcycles buzzing past. Each step requires a full 360 degree look before proceeding.  Between the bikes, the crowds, trams, cars and the canals splitting every other street,  it is a horrible place to jaywalk ( a favorite hobby for which Nick has  been ticketed in LA).  The canals created originally for flood control, are equally crowded with both local small boats and tourist cruises.  Holland is obsessed with the fear of flooding and water control, rightly so, since the great storm flood of 1953 which killed a couple thousand people. We watched an incredible movie at the Rijksmuseum about the building of the dykes in Zeeland the lower portion Netherlands which suffered the big flood.

Amsterdam was the first place we had reservations about, but it eventually grew on us, somewhat.  Tourists (including us) everywhere, and because of the canals and bicycles we were all cordoned/herded into narrow sidewalks.  We didn\’t think it was a place we would want to live, because although very exciting and lively with pretty areas, and non stop fun; it felt like if you lived in Disneyland (Main Street adjacent, because that would be more affordable). The hordes of people were exhausting.

Of all the different areas of Amsterdam-Canal-land, Pot-land, Museum-land, Red district land, bicycle repair-land, and ER land, we mainly visited Museum-land, although Pot-land like \”It\’s a small world\” is hard to avoid. The smell of pot is ubiquitous, there was even pot smoking canal cruises (may be Amsterdam is the happiest place on earth).  Museum-land was special, but again crowded, not only tourists but students, which was great, because most were little kids (in museum issued lab coats) that were granted special access to pictures, necessary since  often hard to negotiate seeing pictures due to the crowds.
We visited the RijksMuseum, The Van Gogh Museum, and the Microbe Museum which showed how bacteria and fungus are everywhere, kind of like the tourists and makes you never want to touch or eat anything ever, again.

Housing was a challenge due to our spontaneous travel and the popularity of Amsterdam. With limited lodging choices,  we ended up at a B and B canal houseboat.  It was a different experience then what we have been doing so far, definitely enjoyed the ducks and swans swimming up to the windows.    The longer we were here, the more we ventured outside the central tourist core, the more we enjoyed Amsterdam.  However, we again suffered bad Mexican food, fooled by the name- the California Burrito Company.

Belgium, part 1

Belgium held some strong allure and it was the first place we went after leaving Saarbrucken.  Was it because it functioned without a government for 541 days starting in June 2010? Was it the creep/disgust factor after reading King Leopold\’s Ghost (great book)? Rubins? The Brueghels? Belgium kind of seems like a middle child, wedged between siblings France, Germany, Luxemburg and Netherlands. We were intrigued, not disappointed and surprisingly effective tourists. Antwerp was the first stop, a central spot to explore the area.  Although we appreciated being allowed 9 nights on A and W\’s couch in the tiny dorm apartment, surrounded by small plastic farm animals, dog toys, a kitchen table and furniture waiting to be moved from their temporary to permanent apartment, we were longing for a more barren space to sleep.

p.

We found the ASH hostel in Antwerp. We like hostels (private rooms, not the dorms) because they usually are very simple, clean,  have access to a kitchen and hostels are almost always in great locations.  This was 2 blocks from an awe-inspiring central station and walking distance to almost everything, well for us almost everything is walking distance.

After the Lenten period of 40 days in quiet Saarbrucken seeing the same 10 people over and over, sidewalks full of people in Antwerp was actually a welcome sight.

Our first morning we left Antwerp arriving in Ghent at St Pietr (north) station. Thus starting here, and eventually leaving from Ghent Central (south) station to head for Bruges,  allowed us to walk from one end of the city to the other- residential, old, older, newer and University.   It was nice because, like Strausburg (https://thechosenfugue.blogspot.com/2018/09/day-trippin.html   ), this city with a rich gothic city center was still a modern vibrant city on the edges.  The Cathedral and other churches were, like most European churches, awe-inspiring for many reasons but Ghent\’s churches all had a twist, particularly the whale skeleton hanging in the Cathedral (part of the \”out of the box\” art installations).   Could this be the source of all those Mrs. Paul\’s fish sticks, eaten as a child on Fridays?

 Everytime you turned a corner in Ghent, there was something just waiting to be seen.


 Even Father Damian of leprosy fame in his home church. As we were leaving Ghent, another great thing happened, really good Mexican food.

Next up was Bruges, which was also really beautiful,

but we kept thinking of the movie \”In Bruges\” (very well liked) and were still kind of in-love with Ghent, but Bruges was still very much worth the trip.

Belgium part 2

Not sure what it was about Antwerp. The contrast of our monastic hostel room to the exquisitely tiled/painted/carved ceilings/walls/floors of almost every surface? Wide boulevards with huge, stately buildings with fingertips of narrow winding streets lined with delicately, detailed row houses? Waves of people- walking, riding bikes- there was a vibrancy with a super pleasant vibe.

Our second day in Belgium coincided with free museum day in Antwerp. We scored.
First stop, the Rubenhaus. A lovely tribute to Peter Paul in his own home.  His work, his student’s work, art and gardens that inspired him placed his art in context- all tucked away in a brick house  just off a major shopping street.  It was an intimate glimpse into the artist and the period when he lived.

Second stop, was up at the port, the Museum aan de Stroom (MAS), probably one of the most entertaining and imaginative museums we have been to, starting with the building. You start at the top and see the whole city and beyond, putting the city of Antwerp into it’s context.

Each floor considered various aspects of city life; from overarching themes like life and death as interpreted by the many different religions in the city- the chutes and ladders game included in that exhibit. Moving down the stairs, exhibits on shipping, on foodways- how the food is grown, how it gets to the city, how we digest and excrete the food with an impressive toilet exhibit.

original chutes and ladders?

Another floor focuses on celebrations, highlighting the history of the ommegang parades of giants (and we thought Ommegang was just another beer brand) and Pride celebrations.  Unsure if the way the Pride pictures were displayed were supposed to be like a peep show, but it did seem like it.  Finally, the last floor was an exhibit about museum storage, always fun.

No pictures of this but it was stunning.  https://redstarline.be/en The Red Line Museum is a museum about emigration- since Antwerp was the major port for refugees to leave for the US and Canada (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Star_Line) . It was pretty brutal. Combined with the Tenement Museum in NY, the Famine museums throughout Ireland  and any Holocaust museum and you have a very real, very tragic picture of the last century.

No pics of museum but you can see the port from the roof of the MAS museum

After that, we walked from the tip of Antwerp to the bottom, crossing through many different neighborhoods including the Orthodox Jewish neighborhood. It was the last night of Sukkot. There were no Sukkah but there were a lot of people out and a rather significant carnival. Although Belgium has had difficulties with terrorism, the only time we saw armed police were in front of a Jewish school. Impact was even stronger after just going to the museum. After a very long walk, we ended up at the University and just beyond the Middelheim Park, a huge sculpture forrest/garden.

We capped off the day with another lame attempt at Mexican food. This was not as successful as Ghent (See Belgium 1).

A lot of walking,

we were ready to put Antwerp to bed.

Brussels followed on the third day.  Brussels was beautiful, we spent the day enjoying the Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Magritte Museum and the Fin de Siecle Museum, a little overwhelmed especially with the first museum and pretty fascinated by artists we were not as familiar with in the Fin de Siecle Museum.  We found a wonderful diorama  (how could we not appreciate these after three daughters who each seemed to consider diorama the quiessential school project) 

We wandered through parks, around massive and ornate buildings, thinking about the Congo (you kind of can’t help it if you have read King’s Leopold’s Ghost) and then we stumbled on the Grand Palace Square, (not our pics- from UNESCO) so overwhelmed, we forgot to take pictures

This weeks photo of a topless old man looking out window contemplating his life

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Day Trippin

This one was done prior to WordPress update, it looks bad, sorry. And the ads make this free, no one benefits.

Saarland is a historically fascinating location, situated in an area that has been fought over for centuries, conveniently for us as sightseers, although inconvenient for generations of Saarlanders. During the month we have been in Saarbrucken our daughter A (and family -W and I) we were able to step out for a couple of day trips to explore the surroundings.  Two places, each about an hour away, Trier to the north, and Strasburg to the south.  A & W, also got away for a day to another spot just an hour away Metz (let’s go Metz!) .

First off, TRIER which provided a perfect over-view of Western Civilization. From the Roman rule and ruins in the 200’s to graffiti ruins today,

with many points in between

It\’s a city that is everything you expect in Europe, a mark from every ruler- from the Roman Amphitheater (fun fact- despite what we heard from all the old gladiator movies, vomitorium did not refer to a place to vomit rather it was the word for the large tunnel like entrance/exit you see at stadiums where people were “vomited or spewed out” after a large gathering, (thanks for missing this teachable moment Tony Curtis), to the Franks, the Holy Roman Empire, Napoleon, the Prussians and eventually the Germans. Now it is a beautiful melange .

It was also very jarring to see beautiful statues of Mary next to H&M signs and Doner shops.

  
Trier is also the birthplace of Karl Marx,  here is his large beautiful home near the town center (apparently, he was really into socializing).  His home is now a museum, which appropriately is now next door to a chain pizza shop and Karl Marx snow globes are sold under the Roman Arch.
As we entered TRIER we were treated to a lovely student concert at the Roman Gate
Next was on to STRAUSBURG, which we understood to be the jewel of the Alsace area.  It was a picture perfect French city with the huge and amazing cathedral made only better by the plethora of nuns framed by half timbered buildings taking pictures everywhere. In fact there were so many nuns we were unable to enter the cathedral.   Guess they couldn\’t find the vomitorium.
But beyond the cathedral there was lot a more. As with Trier, wide range of styles of buildings from middle ages through fin de siècle art nouveau to modern new European Union buildings.  There were canals and rounds of cheese.
Carousels and enormous stork nests (the symbol of Alsace, they migrate and nest here) throughout the city on chimney tops

 A fun botanical garden with frogs and squash tunnel and wonderful church bells

This week’s photo of topless old man looking out window contemplating his life:  at work in the Soma Factory.

Nightlife, Wildlife, Afterlife

Night life
Saarland University (Go Owls!?) has over 17,000 students, but because most students live at home (see last post on local housing issues) it doesn’t feel like a college town.
There is one popular pub with college students called SaarBrooklyn, but since the legal drinking age is 16 (14 when accompanied by a Custodial Person), most of the cool pubs are filled with that age group, so it’s maybe more of a high school town.
We hear them, the high schoolers, being less than rowdy on the weekends outside our window on the platz (square).   Guess it’s awkward to drink with a Custodial Person.
Wild life
In Los Angeles, it was not unusual to see coyotes at least a few times a week, raccoons, skunks, opossums regularly and rarely deer.  Unexpectedly, in more rural Eugene, Oregon we see lots of ducks (Go Ducks!), and sometimes, but rarely, raccoons and opossums.  Weirdly, in Saarbrucken, an area surrounded by woods, spotting animal life has been disappointing.   We’ve seen a few small bats at dusk, similar to the bats we would see in LA at that time of day. We’ve seen some Egyptian ducks, like we saw in Tel Aviv (Go Egyptian Ducks!). There are pigeons here that are bigger, prettier with longer necks (it’s an actual pigeon breed called the Saar pigeon), but they are not pervasive like most cities And, one sighting of a banana slug (Go UC Santa Cruz!). But we haven’t even seen any squirrels, except weirdly this painting in our Airbnb (that’s nuts).

It just confirms LA has the best wildlife, unless maybe you’re a high schooler in Saarbrucken without a Custodial Person.

What we have seen a lot of here are wasps, but I guess it’s been that way since Martin Luther.




Wild Night Life
We have heard fireworks at night, randomly in the middle of the week, weekends, not sure of the origin, maybe some magic does occasionally happen at one of the brothels?

















After Life If you don\’t survive the nightlife or the wildlife, not a problem as you\’re well taken care of in the afterlife.

This week’s photo of topless old man looking out window contemplating his life. “Damn, I’ll be 50 next year!” 

House-Hunters

Our daughter (A) and family (W and I) have been living in temporary housing provided by W’s work, the Max Planck Institute and it ends this month. Surprisingly, for a university town, housing options seem to be limited.People, in general, live in their rented apartments for decades.Like HGTV House Hunters, our daughter’s family considered; three housing opportunities.  However, unlike an episode of House Hunters, the decision was made before the opening credits finished, preventing the mid-episode discussion over coffee at a cute cafe/beer at the hip pub. Of the three options; one was already rented, one didn’t allow dogs, and so it left them with one choice
So we have made the rounds of the German equivalents to Home Depot (Hornbach’s), Lowe’s (Bauhaus), Walmart (Real) and Kmart (TeDox).Nothing extremely inspiring with the exception of wall of toilet seats;

plus the cheesecake and the best milchcaffee yet at the exceptional Hornbach’s cafe and bakery 

Ultimately, they probably will just go buy everything at the local Ikea (an actual Ikea) in neighboring Saarlouis.

 
This week’s photo of topless old man looking out window contemplating his life.

Saarbrucken down

Staying in the same place for an extended period of time, like we are in Saarbrucken while Alivia gets settled, gets you in a rhythm.  You start to see the same people on their own daily routines of going to work or school, walking their dogs, and shopping. We  see the same cashier at the local Reve grocery store who recognizes us because we’re there almost daily to refill your tiny college dorm style refrigerator. At least she doesn’t ask us for ID anymore with our credit card.You start to notice other things in the neighborhood as well like litter and recycling.  Litter=very little, in Los Angeles and Eugene the second most common litter we would see (the first being those small plastic marijuana canisters) were individual dental floss picks which made us wonder how someone so plaque conscientious could be so environmentally unconscientious.  We finally saw one here on the street.Recycling is pretty good here with multiple communal drop off sites for paper, clothes and glass separated by color.

The remaining home trash goes in to trash box with a lock, because you are charged by the trash’s weight So you can’t put your dog’s poop bag in your neighbor’s can if it is locked. .There is a fair amount of graffiti here, but it is more sophisticated to us because it is in a language we can’t understand. “Tut” is German for does, and “Smor” is Swedish for Butter. 

  
From what we can tell, Saarbrucken has a large Catholic population (due to its proximity to France?).  We’ve noticed almost every house on the front door has this- which represents the year 2018 and CMB stands for  Christus Mansionem Benedicat, the Latin words meaning, “May Christ bless this home”.
The parish we are staying in is St.Thomas Morus (More in English). We went to the big church flea market last weekend.  St. Thomas More is the patron saint of difficult marriages, large families, stepparents, adopted children, widowers, politicians and lawyers.  With that lineup it was appropriate that when we went on a gray dreary drizzling Saturday morning, there were only a few pathetic booths and an anemic turnout.  We were looking for something for Alivia’s new apartment but all we got was a little Morus depressed.

Speaking of politicians,  there’s also a refreshing calmness here away from the constant tension and bombardment of Trump/US political news.   Everyday in the US, it felt omnipresent and palpable. We try to keep up but it feels less stressful because it’s not a shared experience with our neighbors.  The nine-hour time difference and lack of MSNBC contributes to the weaning.  Combined with our last minute frantic packing and locking up of our valuables it felt like we have escaped Nazi America for Germany. We’ve only spoken politics with two people here, both very anti-Trump, so it wasn’t surprising to see this piñata at our local Woolworths’s (yes, we still shop at Woolworth’s)

This week’s photo of topless old man looking out window contemplating his life -waiting for his yellow bath towel to dry while he endures a room temperature beer in his darkened room.