Sometime at the beginning of this year I saw this video on YouTube, which gave me a wonderful idea for documenting the things I do in my normal, every day life. Basically, you take an ordinary monthly calendar, and write on each day one thing you did that day. It doesn't have to be anything life-changing. In fact, it can be as simple as "I ate a taco" or "I went for a run"--just any one thing that happened. That way, at the end of the year, you can look back at your calendar and have some kind of idea of the things you did over the past 365 days! Sometimes you do things that are really cool or special, but they're not incredibly dramatic, so they might be forgotten when it comes to the end of the year. Maybe you went on a walk and had a nice life-chat, or you ate a really delicious piece of cake, or you saw a great video, or read a funny news story--all of these things can easily be forgotten, which is perfectly okay, but if you write them down, you can remind yourself of them years down the road, and have a nice little memory nostalgia reminiscing moment.
I decided this would be a fun idea, and once I saw a "Vintage Tractors" calendar on sale at a bookstore the very next day, I decided the universe was basically telling me I needed to buy the calendar, and at least try to fill it in! Two months later, I've been doing pretty well! Here's what February looks like :)
Note: This month's tractor is called the "Plantagenschlepper"
I'm also keeping track of which books I read, which wont help me remember the plots, but it's a step. I'm excited that I'm going to have a nice little souvenir of 2013 when the year is done, and hopefully I'll have nice little memories to look back on!
In other news: Tomorrow I leave for a weekend in Munich!! I'm celebrating my friend Michelle's birthday tomorrow and then going to see one of my favorite bands, The Lumineers, in concert on Saturday. I've never been to Munich, but always wanted to go, so I'm really excited! It should be a great weekend.
If you don't know who the Lumineers are, you should, so here's one of my favorite songs:
Every since the first time I saw the incredible grandeur of the Vienna State Opera House, I knew I wanted to go see an opera there, despite my general lack of enthusiasm for the genre. Nothing says "Classy Viennese Life" like a night at the opera, right!? My friend Meredith was entertaining a guest from the states this past week, which provided me with the perfect opportunity to check this item off my long Vienna Bucket List!
This is a pretty terrible picture of the Opera House, that I took on one of my first days in Vienna. The one below is from the internet.
Because normal tickets to the opera are mega-expensive, we opted for the uber-cheap, last minute standing room option (Stehplatz). These tickets are an excellent alternative that provide even those living on a budget with a chance to go to the opera! We had to get to the opera house around 5, even though the show didn't start until 7:30, and wait in a pretty long line, but luckily it was inside, because the weather was the very definition of miserable. Some people in line were clearly Stehplatz veterans because they had brought little folding chairs to sit on while waiting. Impressive. Once the box office opened (at 6:10), the line moved quite quickly and we were able to buy our 4 Euro (!!!!!!) Stehplatz tickets for the Parterre section. The Parterre section is on the floor, rather than the balcony, and we had heard that this was the best section, so even though balcony tickets were only 3 Euro, we decided a good view was worth the 1 Euro splurge :)
We were shuffled through a rather elaborate system of lines for a while before finally reaching our little section. Now, I was expecting the area to be like a "standing room only concert" kind of situation, where people can literally stand anywhere and you have to aggressively push your way to the front to get any kind of view. But silly Shiri, this is the Opera! Not House of Blues! Everything was incredibly organized and civilized and there were actually these little stalls with a railing on which we had to tie a scarf to mark our territory.
My scarf, marking my spot, and the little subtitle box that displayed translations of the Italian so we could understand what was going on
Our section, people stood in between these railings, and it was packed pretty tightly.
Once we had put our scarves on the rails, we were free to roam about as we pleased. Now, let me backtrack for a second to tell you a little bit about the Staatsoper (opera house) itself. It was originally opened in 1869 as the first public building on the new Ringstrasse, the street which had replaced the old city walls, completely surrounding the inner city of Vienna. It was met with criticism because apparently it was "not as beautiful" as some other building across the street, and basically failed to meet everyone's expectations. Also, the architect thought it looked too much like a train station. How this criticism is possible of such an insanely gorgeous building is beyond me. During WWII, american bombs completely destroyed the building. However, the Viennese held the opera/opera house so near an dear to their hearts, and viewed it as such a symbol and treasure of the city, that they decided to put a high priority on rebuilding it quickly and in the exact style of the old one. What we have today is this unbelievably beautiful building that despite shaky beginnings has made its place as the heart of Viennese high culture. Now let's look at some pictures of the inside:
Huge chandelier on the ceiling of the house
The stage from my "seat"
Where the real people sit
Part of the lobby
How the other half lives
Now back to the opera experience: Luckily we had enough time after getting our places to run across the street to the grocery store and grab a quick sandwich so we wouldn't starve throughout the performance, and make it back in time for curtain! (although we had a true life near-death experience involving an angry Strassenbahn driver, which was literally heart-stopping).
The show itself was remarkable. We saw Madame Butterfly, written by Giacomo Puccini, which I knew next to nothing about before Tuesday. I did, however, know the name and the composer, so that's a start! You can read a synopsis here, if you really care, but all you need to know is that it's set in Japan, in the 1890s, and involves a jerk-face American soldier who marries a Japanese woman and then abandons her. Typical. I don't want to give anything away, but there's a child involved (a blonde child, which is rare in Japan, as Madame Butterfly tells us), drama ensues, and lots of intense things happen, all pointing to the conclusion that the American is a butt-head. To put it mildly.
The minute the curtain went up there was an audible collective gasp throughout the audience, reacting to how beautiful the set was. The costumes were also stunning, and the woman who played Madame Butterfly was outstanding. Her voice wasn't too shrill, as opera often is, and she was the perfect level of expressive and melodramatic that makes opera entertaining. I found myself really enjoying hearing her sing, which doesn't often happen when I hear opera. One part that actually had me laughing out loud (which is somewhat sacrilegious because the show is super super depressing and serious) was the little child. He comes into the show very dramatically in Act 2, and never says anything, but he had me cracking up BECAUSE he was wearing, I kid you not, the costume of a young Jedi knight. Like, the little robe he was wearing looked exactly like that worn by the younglings Anakin tragically slaughters in Episode 3 even though they are just adorable wannabe Padawans be who have done NOTHING wrong. And, to make matters more comical, he had on the most ridiculous blonde afro wig I've ever seen. My friend Rylee called it an Annie wig. I honestly thought it was Shirley Temple onstage. As Meredith said, "I know the child is supposed to be blonde, but couldn't they have found a child that is actually blonde, and avoided the wig?" This is Austria after all. This costume certainly brought some unintended comic relief to the show. Or perhaps it was intended, to lighten the show a bit? I guess we'll never know.
Despite the fact that we were standing for 2.5 hours, listening to a lot of very dramatic singing in a language we didn't understand, I really enjoyed the opera a lot! The subtitles certainly helped, the production was visually outstanding, and the atmosphere itself was just fantastic. I'm so glad I had the chance to see an opera in a place as grand as the famous Wiener Staatsoper, and I would actually love to go to another!! I never thought I'd say that about opera. How's that for growth and new experiences!?
Every other week I have the pleasure of working with a 1st form class. These kids are about 10 or 11 years old, and for most of them, this is their first year learning English. It's a bit difficult for me to plan lessons for them because they don't have many language skills to work with, but they are really great at asking questions. Each time I see them they have gained more vocabulary and thus the capacity to ask questions other than what is your favorite color, so each time I come to their class we do a pretty extensive "fire away at the teaching assistant with anything and everything you can think of to ask" time. They just learned more complex question words and how to say numbers 1-100, so today's session was extra fun, and as always, they asked incredibly adorable, ridiculous, hilarious, and poignant questions. Here's a sampling of my favorites:
How old is your mother? How old is your father?
Can you count to 10 in Japanese?
What is your favorite part of our world?
Do you like exciting clothing?
What do you think is the sweetest animal on the earth?
How often do you drink a beer?
How often to you go to the disco?
How often to you go to the casino?
How many skirts do you have? How many dresses do you have?
How much money do you have? How many Euros do you have?
Do you have friends?
How many friends do you have?
Who is your best friend?
What is your surname? Do you have facebook? (this could be dangerous)
Who is your favorite teacher at our school? Do you like our school?
If you had a very crazy pet where would it live? (when asked for an example, the animal chosen was a tiger...I said I'd keep it in a hut in my backyard...)
Do you like FC Barcelona? Do you like Real Madrid? (apparently the correct answers to these questions were yes and no, respectively, because when I gave those answers, loud cheers erupted throughout the boys in the room)
How often do you wash your face?
Which is better: a Euro or a dollar?
What is your favorite thing on a mobile phone? (yeah, I don't get it either)
Why are you here?
and my personal favorite: What do you think about universal peace?
Aren't these kids great?
Also, after school I was walking through the Marktplatz in the center of town towards the grocery store. I noticed there were lots of political party people standing around, stopping people to solicit votes, because the Landestag election (local government) is coming up March 3. I had my "I'm not Austrian, so I can't vote" answer all ready to get rid of them when I came up to this one lady who was standing by a car handing something out. I tried to avoid eye contact and walk past quickly, but she shoved something in my face anyway. To my very pleasant surprise, it was not a pamphlet or flier, but rather a little thing of cookies! Manner Schnitten, to be exact: my absolute favorite!! True, there was a little thing stuck on there telling me who to vote for, but the important part is: FREE COOKIES! This is a great country.
**sidenote: I would never actually vote for this party because Frank Stronach is a crazy millionaire who decided to get into politics (Donald Trump, anybody?) but nobody actually knows what he stands for other than disintegration from the EU. Plus, he named his party after himself. Who does that? So yeah. I'll eat your cookies, Frank, but wont vote for ya.
Coming attractions: I went to an Opera last week so I'll have a blog post written about that very soon! But right now all I want to do is watch last night's Parks & Rec and weep from the happiness I am certain the Knope-Wyatt union will bring me. I literally can't think of anything else or do anything else before I watch it because I have not been this excited about television nuptials ever in my life. Not even Jim and Pam. I can't handle the anticipation.
After three full days in Amsterdam, we took a bus to Bruges with the
most adorable and hysterical bus driver to ever exist in any time or place. My friend Lizzy’s uncle lived there for a while and he recommended
going, and since Brussels is the only Belgian city I’ve ever visited (and I
certainly enjoyed it a lot) I thought Bruges sounded like a lovely place to add
to the Amsterdam trip!
Although the forecast for Bruges looked pretty grim, we
majorly lucked out weather-wise and ended up spending a lot of time outside,
wandering the picturesque canals and alleyways, enjoying blue skies and only
getting rained on a little (despite the freezing temperatures—we just combated
those with lots of hot chocolate). Bruges is another city of canals, and is
often called Venice of the North because of its mega-importance in the trade
industry during the 15th century. That was Bruges’ golden age, and
during that time lots of artists called the city home. I think it’s similar to
Amsterdam in that they had similar industries and similar cultures but just
peaked at different times; Bruges a little earlier than Amsterdam. I didn’t
know anything about that before visiting either city, so that ended up being a
cool way to tie the trip together!
Despite their similar pasts, the two cities could not be
more different today. Amsterdam is a big, bustling city with lots of energy
that never stops going, and Bruges is quiet, quaint, charming, and shuts down around
6:00 similar to the rest of Europe. The city has only 20,000 inhabitants, but
has been getting more and more touristy as of late, and I was glad that we
visited in the off-season, because I can imagine the city losing some of its
charm when it’s filled to the brim with other tourists!
Van Eyck Square, with a statue of the painter in the middle
Market Square, with a horse, how picturesque
I don't know what this is, but it's pretty
We spent our first day wandering the streets, getting a lay
of the land, and stumbling upon all sorts of beautiful things that we had no
idea how to identify. One thing we did identify was this store advertising “The
World’s Best Hot Chocolate.” Now, normally, when a store has some kind of sign
like that, it basically screams “I want you naïve tourists to come give me money
because you are tacky and I am smart” so we were pretty reluctant to buy into
the scheme. However we did REALLY want some hot chocolate…and it was cold…so went to inside. Now let me just explain to you exactly what it was that we
experienced inside that little hut of magic. We sat upstairs in their tearoom
and ordered one hot chocolate each, but were greeted with SO much more than
that. I took a video because I knew words couldn’t describe it.
HOW AMAZING IS THAT!??!?!?! ANDDDDD it was less than 4
Euros, which is the going rate for a cup of hot chocolate pretty much anywhere
in Europe. What is this sweet madness!? To top things off, the waiter was super
attractive (like basically single other waiter/bar tender we encountered…what
is it with Holland and Belgium and attractive service people?) Needless to say, having
such an enchantingexperience our
first day set the bar quite high for the rest of the trip.
We started Day 2 at the Historium, an interactive museum
that involved this walk through exhibit, complete with audio, videos, interior
decorating, smells, music: it was advertised as an experience that engages all
5 senses, and it certainly was. The exhibit was supposed to teach about Bruges
in the Golden Ages, and it did so by following the story of a young apprentice
of Jan Van Eyck as he falls in love with a young girl who has been
sent by the artist’s patron to be a model for his latest painting. There is a
green bird named Frederico involved, and lots of things being lost and found
and a rosary and a sensual bath house and some serious drama, but it all works out in the end, so don’t worry. It’s
difficult for me to explain what exactly this whole thing was, but just trust
me when I say it was not worth the money we paid for it. It was, however, a
really well-done technological feat, and a hilarious experience that provided
great material for mocking later on in the trip. There's a "trailer" for the exhibit below. In case you're interested...
"cast photo" from the film
We had heard that the thing to do when in Bruges is a canal
tour, so that was our next activity of the day! Luckily we stumbled upon one
that was still operating, even though it’s February, and it turned out to be
really fun. The boat took us all through the various canals, as the driver pointed out
important monuments, and terrified us every time we went under a really low
bridge. At several points we were swimming next to swans. It was
delightful.
We also spent some time just wandering around the city on our own, stopping for several photo shoots along the way.
Old City Hall, with the flags of the EU, Belgium, Flanders, and Bruges
Old Courthouse, and the square in the middle was used for executions, so that's nice.
Zooming in on these faces is great fun
Because we had some time to kill before our evening walking
tour, and because it was cold outside and our feet hurt from walking so much,
we decided to hang out at the hostel for a few hours in the afternoon, and
ended up playing Trivial Pursuit. So that happened.
This board is ancient. Also we're terrible at this game.
Our walking tour was really cool because it ended up being
just the five of us plus one other guy, who turned out to be awesome, and our
super cool but kind of intense and at times questionable tourguide Kai, who had
an incredibly un-PC sense of humor but was informative and funny and absolutely
entertaining. I loved seeing the city at night, because I’ve always felt that
the way buildings are lit up at night really does make them beautiful in an
entirely new way! To be honest, I can’t remember much of what I learned on the
tour, so I don’t have any fun facts for you. Sorry.
We spent our next morning at the Saturday market, which was
not as cool as we’d hoped—it was just your typical market—and because the
sun was out, we decided to take a long walk along the canal that runs completely around
the perimeter of the city.This
walk was absolutely gorgeous, and included a series of windmills that are no
longer in operation, but are still beautiful. Because of this walk, I think I
saw more windmills in Belgium than I did in Holland! This was one of those
situations where I wouldn’t shut up about how beautiful everything was. It was
so great.
One of the old gates to the city
After a quick lunch (which included a sandwhich called the Humpty Dumpty, described as a "ribburger"--amazing), Michelle and I split off from the group
and went to De Halve Mann Brewery, the only brewery still operating within the
city of Bruges today. Belgium is famous for its beer, and we learned that it’s
because they’re allowed to add special ingredients, unlike in Germany where
there are rules about this kind of thing. We learned all about the beer making
process, from our incredibly dry and monotone but somehow incredibly hilarious
tour guide (she made lots of jokes about feeling "hoppy"), and got to see their facilities, including the roof of the brewery
which had a perfectly wonderful view of the whole city. As one of those
family-run-for-five-generations kind of places, the brewery itself was quite
small, but charming, and we got a free beer at the end which was actually
delicious. I recommend this place for a visitor to Bruges!
Aside from a little more window shopping and wandering, that
pretty much concludes the highlights of the few days we spent in Bruges, except
for the most important part of the whole experience: THE FOOD.
Of course, when in Belgium, you must eat Belgian waffles.
Many times. Literally one of the only things I remember from my time in
Brussels several years ago was how amazing the street waffles we got were, and
I have been dying to get another one ever since. I would be lying if I said
this wasn’t the main thing I was looking forward to in Bruges. The waffles of
Bruges did not disappoint. They were every bit as delicious as I remembered. In
fact, maybe even more so. I really do not understand how it is possible for
these waffles to be as amazing as they are, and maybe it’s all mind games, but
I don’t care. I just want another one.
whipped creme and chocolate
chocolate and bananas!
Another an incredibly necessary food item when one goes to
Belgium is, of course, Chocolate! We pretty much consumed any and every form of
chocolate imaginable during our few days in Bruges, and while I’d like to say I
was sick of it by the end, that would be false. I don’t know how it’s possible
for so many chocolate shops to stay in business because literally every other
shop is a Chocolatier. This included Dumon, the one advocated by Rick Steves,
because I actually do anything Rick Steves tells me to do. When asked where we
were from in the chocolate shop, and said America, the guy working goes “oh, so
you know Rick Steves?” My response was “Man, I wish.”
Finally, another Belgian specialty: Fries. They were
invented in Belgium, which is a little known fact, and they are readily available from
street carts offering a plethora of sauces to go with them (but not barbecue
sauce—is it really so much to ask for, Europe!??!?!?!). There are two stands in
front of the Belfry in the main market square in Bruges that have this
legendary battle about which has better fries. If that’s not an invitation to
try both and make the decision for yourself, I don’t know what is. So, Rebecca
and I each got an order from different stands and then had Meredith and Lizzy
do a blind taste test. All results came up the same, the stand on the right was
better. So, now you know.
warring fries
Oh! And there was that time my friends got pulled into a quasi flash mob (which was more like some high school boys dressed in women's clothing, trying to do the macarena but failing at it)--I feel kind of bad that I didn't join, but someone had to videotape, right? Also, my memory ran out halfway through, so the video comes in two parts. Enjoy!
Now for my usual concluding thoughts: I LOVED BRUGES! It was
beyond charming, the food was amazing, it has a rich history, the people are
friendly, and of course everything is so so beautiful. I highly recommend a
trip there if you get the chance!
Last week was my semester break, and I spent the vacation traveling with four friends to two beautiful cities: Amsterdam and Bruges! I've wanted to go to Amsterdam for as long as I can remember, especially after seeing pictures/hearing stories from family and friends who have visited in recent years. I was even more excited after reading a WONDERFUL book that is partly set in Amsterdam just a few weeks ago! So, backpacks in hand, we flew from Vienna to Rotterdam, and then took to the train to Amsterdam to begin our adventure!
Our hostel was nicely centrally located, on the edge of the Red Light District, and just a few minutes form Dam Square, the main central square in the city. We spent our first day on a free 3-hour-long walking tour with the fabulous tour guide Kendra, who led us all over the city, sharing lots of history, fun facts, and great jokes! Some highlights of the tour included Dam Square (with the Royal Palace, New Church that is still hundreds of years old, and the National Monument), the New Market (a large square with a building that at one point held scales used by merchants, a public execution center, and the place people examined the bodies that had just been executed), the famous "I amsterdam" sign, alleys of the Red Light District, one of the narrowest houses in the city (since you had to pay taxes based on how wide your house was, lots of houses were built very narrow), old Dutch East India Company headquarters, many churches, and of course lots and lots and lots of canals and bridges. According to Kendra there are 1,281 bridges in the city! The canals were important back in the days when Amsterdam was a huge port city, and although it's not as prominent as it once was (Rotterdam is the biggest port in the Netherlands toady), the city still relies heavily on its importing/exporting business and the canals continue to be used for both business and tourism.
A few fun facts I learned on the tour:
Since the buildings in Amsterdam are so tall and narrow the staircases are very steep. Amsterdam was a city of merchants, but none of them wanted to carry their goods to the top of their homes using those awful stairs, so they built these hooks on the top of the houses, and then threaded a rope through the hook to pulley their goods up to the top through a window. However they didn't want the rope to swing and break their windows on the way up, so many of the houses are built on a bit of an angle--they kind of lean outwards, so that if the rope swings, it swings parallel to the fae of the house, rather than perpendicular, and therefore the windows don't break! You can see the hooks on some pictures below!
The city is basically artificially created so the foundation of lots of the houses is pretty weak. Therefore lots of houses are falling down/leaning against their neighbors for support. That seems safe.
The Queen of the Netherlands is stepping down this year, so the very last Queen's day will happen on April 30. Her son will take over, and apparently he's known as Prince Pils because he liked his beer when he was in school...sounds like every other monarch ever.
When Louis Bonaparte was crowned King of the Netherlands by his bro Napoleon, he tried to speak to the people in Dutch but only learned one phrase, "I am your king." He then pulled a JFK-like move and accidentally said "I am your rabbit." Thus he is called the Rabbit King.
Red Light ladies usually charge 50 Euros for 15 minutes...in case you were wondering.
Prostitutes in the Netherlands are registered in the Chamber of Commerce as "self-employed" and they have healthcare, biweekly check-ups, and they are unionized.
Catholicism was outlawed in the Netherlands for several hundred years so there are a lot of underground Catholic churches (some literally underground, some hidden in attics or back rooms of people's houses)
Dutch people are uncharacteristically tall.
You can see the hooks on those beams sticking out of the tops of the buildings
Royal Palace
New Market--Rembrant painted the Anatomy Lesson in this building, which kick-started his portrait career
Old VOC (Dutch E. India Trading Company) headquarters
Dam Square
One of the narrowest houses in the city
The crown on the top of the steeple in the back was given to Amsterdam by Maximillian I (Hapsburg!) because he was thankful to the Dutch for something...I can't remember what
so many bikes everywhere
We spent most of our time wandering around the city, dodging bi-polar weather, eating wonderful food, enjoying the beautiful buildings, and getting lost amongst hundreds of identical canals. Many of the canals are home to houseboats, some more beautiful than others.
One of the highlights of our time in Amsterdam was a visit to the Reypenaer Cheese Shop, where we did a wine and cheese tasting! We sampled 6 different cheeses, paired properly with the appropriate wine. We learned, among other things, that Gouda is not the name of a cheese, but rather the name of the shape of the cheese. So you can have many different cheeses, with very different tastes, but they are all called Gouda! All the cheeses we tasted were goudas: 2 made from goats milk, and 2 from cows milk. We had this little "cheese guillotine" to slice the cheese, and a handy little worksheet where we could record the color, smell, taste, texture, age, and other notes on each cheese. At the end we got a certificate proving that we are all "Expert Cheese Tasters," a fact that we of course are all putting on our resumes right away. The girl running the tasting was adorable and hilarious and we all felt super classy and had so much fun with the whole thing. We had free reign on how much of each kind we wanted to eat or sample, so needless to say that in the period of that hour we ate a LOT of cheese. It was magical.
We also visited a few different museums. The Anne Frank House is an absolute-must for any visitor to Amsterdam. It was beautifully-done and made me realize that I definitely do not know nearly as much about Anne Frank as I thought I did. The museum is housed in the office building that she and her family hid in from 1942-1945. The building was Otto Frank's office, and some of the people who worked for him helped hide the family during those years, at huge risk to their own lives. I was really struck by how large the area they hid in was. I had a vision in my mind of a little attic, in which all 8 people were stuffed together for years, but there were actually separate rooms, a small kitchen, bathroom, and two different levels. Now, it wasn't a mansion, and they had to stay completely silent inside that area with no windows or anything for so long, so it was by no means comfortable, but it was rather impressive how well-equipped this hiding place was. Once Anne's father heard about the things happening to Jewish families throughout Europe, he started plans for this secret annex in his office building (this was around 1940). They built it little by little and by the time the family had to move in, after Anne's sister was called to a German work-camp in 1942, the whole place was ready. I was amazed at how such a large area went completely unnoticed by the Nazis, who were known for such meticulous record-keeping. Walking through the exhibit and then actual rooms themselves was of course incredibly emotional, especially when we got to the end and learned about Anne's father's mission to make Anne's writing known to the world. Anne had written all about how her dream was to be a journalist and write novels (she wanted to publish her diary after the war, and had even started writing a novel). Once Otto came back as the only survivor from the group of 8 in hiding, and found the diary, he worked tirelessly to make his daughter's dream come true. It's crazy trying to imagine how difficult it must have been for the father to read everything Anne wrote, even the teenagery "I'm angry at my parents for such and such" kinds of things.
This story was certainly remarkable and inspiring, and becomes even more so when you think about the fact that the Franks were by no means the only Jews to go into hiding during this time. In fact, hundreds of Dutch people went underground after the German invasion. Perhaps the most memorable part of the exhibit for me was a picture of Anne's school class from before the war--there were about 30 students, half of whom were Jewish. The picture had numbers next to the faces of the Jewish students that corresponded to a placard that told the student's name and what happened to them. Many went into hiding, some were found, and a total of 9 died. I was really struck by two students, both half-Jewish, one with a Jewish mother and one with a Jewish father. The one with the Jewish father was not listed as Jewish, so he was spared, but the other had a Jewish mother so he was taken and killed. That was a crazy crazy time.
Of course I wasn't able to take pictures or anything and I learned a whole lot more about this period of history so if you're interested, the Anne Frank House website has a ton of info!
Another favorite site was the Portuguese Synagogue, built in 1675 and still in use today! Somehow it was miraculously spared from destruction during the second world war, and it now includes a museum that houses lots of old manuscripts, textiles, and other cool stuff from throughout Jewish history. Fun fact: during the Spanish inquisition, many Jews came to the Netherlands, where they were welcomed because they had lots of money and mercantile connections. However the Netherlands were at war with Spain at the time, so they called themselves Portuguese! History is fascinating!
Outside of the synagogue
Manuscript collection with lots of super old Torah scrolls
Silver Repository
On our last day we visited the Dutch Resistance Museum, a super fascinating and informative museum about the way the Dutch people responded to the German invasion. There was this incredibly vast network of Dutch underground resistance operations, including church groups, student organizations, publishers, government officials, laborers, and tons of other people. There were mass strikes, violent sabotages, and lots of other crazy stuff. I knew pretty much nothing about anything covered in the exhibit so I learned a whole lot and found everything to be really interesting.
The rest of our time was spent, as I said, wandering the different neighborhoods, window-shopping, sampling the food, and taking in all the energy the city had to offer!
A brewery in a windmill?? Sold.
Most delicious apple pie ever!
Rainbow on our last day!
This blog post is super disorganized and long...so sorry about that. Amsterdam is beautiful and historic and has a kind of energy you don't see in many other places. No matter what time it was, the city was moving. I really enjoyed our time there, and almost wish I had gotten to spend more time exploring everything the city has to offer, because I feel like we only just scratched the surface! I can't wait to go back!!!
From Amsterdam we took a bus to Bruges, a city of completely different character, with it's own blog post coming soon!
