Amsterdam

After a buttery, delicious bakery breakfast (during which both servers commented on how much we were eating - that's European customer service for you!), we walked through outdoor organic produce markets and the canal network to the city's top museums. One museum featured Dutch artists like Rembrandt, Vermeer, and Jan Steen. There was also a "tulips on paper" room and a collection of Delftware. We noticed the lack of nudity in the artwork and read many allusions to Protestantism in the art guides. The clarity and detail of faces and gauzy lace was just spectacular.

"Flowers in the shoe?"

The next museum was devoted entirely to Van Gogh (which is supposed to be pronounced gutturally: "Van Gochhh." (Which reminds me of the way they say Gouda: "ChhhOWda.") We loved this museum because it traced the development of a single artist, especially since Van Gogh transformed his style so drastically. For example, we saw a still life of a pair of shoes which he painted during his early, Dutch period. He was actually once a "normal artist!" The colors were brown and dark. Displayed next to this painting was another pair of shoes from during his Paris years. These colors were bright blue and purple. I am a huge Van Gogh fan, so we got up close and savored the brush strokes, bits of empty canvas, and bold colors. Daisy slept!

Below, I captured another image that I would have never dreamed up. Anything goes in this city. We then saw a jogger wearing white socks on his hands to keep them warm. And then a shopkeeper plop down a chair and stool in the middle of the pavement to enjoy her coffee and newspaper in the sunlight. Our theory is that the legality of things like prostitution and marijuana trickles down to smaller things: you can ride a bike without a helmet and even sit on a couch on a bike without a helmet; you can make your own sidewalk cafe; you can make do with what you have and no one's going to shake their finger at you. (Unless you order too much at a bakery.)

We then visited the Anne Frank house. We could see the cramped, make-shift rooms where the families were kept hidden and there were videos, quotes from Anne's diary, and objects throughout the rooms. In Anne's old bedroom, sweet pictures which she had pasted on still clung to the walls. There were head shots of movie stars, postcards, and other clippings - I particularly remember a nature scene with a caption, "The Lark's Song." Seeing this last image, with the black curtains shutting out light in her small room, and remembering her years without freedom and her ultimate death in a concentration camp moved me to tears.

We bought a copy of her diary, which I've never read. I've learned that there are different versions: Version "a" was her first go at the diary. Version "b" is her edited copy, which sprung from a news announcement requesting 1st hand accounts of the occupation, to be published at a later date. Anne added pseudonyms, rewrote certain sections, and left out what she thought would be uninteresting. I can just imagine her dedicating herself to this project! Finally, version "c" is Otto Frank's version (her father, who alone survived). He left out unflattering family tales and other things he deemed too personal to publish. Our copy is version "b" with the original names from "a" and 30% more "c" than before!

The exterior of the Anne Frank House

We then met my old friend from Anaheim Vineyard, Brooke Christensen. Brooke moved to Ohio (the Columbus vineyard) during high school, but then we reconnected as freshmen at Wheaton. She is now helping to plant a Vineyard church in Amsterdam and has been there almost 2 years. We learned from her that only 5% of the city attends church. She is learning Dutch and is actually leading a small group in Dutch! That sounds way harder than teaching a kid piano lessons. Daisy was overjoyed to play with Brooke and swing from our arms down the streets of the Jordaan neighborhood.