Hurricane Chauncey

Whadda month September was! I mean amirite or amirite or amiRITE, right? I mean you wouldn't know it from this blog and its recent silence but so much crap happened in my life that it was like I was swimming in a big, boiling pot of chunky stew, scaling the grooved in walls of large, square chunks of mystery meat, bearing down hard with ALL my teeth. Whoa, that was a really weird tangent. I don't even like meat.

You know it is going to be a good month when you start off with a weird tangential metaphor.

In the past month I saw my LITTLE brother get married, started a new full time job, visited umpteen new neighborhoods in NYC that I've never been to, lost about 20 pounds, saw some dear friends whom I haven't seen in years and learned that I can deposit checks through an app on my phone directly to my bank! This world is mad modern and I'm just mad! Mad, I tell you!

There is a new surge of energy in the air today, likely due to the weather. I read today that there is a hurricane in our midst and that his name is all espanish which just means conservatives will blame it for all of the country's problems. All kidding aside, I really have always loved the name Joaquin. It's one of those names that sounds adorable on a toddler and really creative and mysterious on a full grown adult. Like Harrison. Or Tristan. Or Chauncey. Hurricane Chauncey. That should happen.

Anyway, back to my energy. I walked to the bus stop this morning and saw two young men, both with scratch off tickets, both eagerly scratching away at them, both simultaneously walking and talking on their cell phones. I felt my mood lifted because if those two can multitask like that, then so much is possible. So I'm starting a bunch of new projects, some writing, some not writing and my calendar is already solidly booked for October. That's making me sound popular but I'm not. I just make plans ahead of time. Try it! You'll like it!

I'm also going to make yet another attempt at Blog Every Day October but seeing as I've failed a few times and really only succeeded blogging an entire month ONCE, I'll content myself with calling this an attempt, while giving it the college try. Ideas are swirling around my head in that autumnal way they usually do so you never know; I may have double the nonsense to share!

Do you have any nonsense to share? Please comment. I LOVE nonsense. Happy October! I'll just be over here like

Atlas me! (Now with footnotes!)

It has been a pretty intense and amazing year for me thus far. I am reflecting on it now, even though it is still September because there are two days every year that mean renewal to me: New Year's Day and Labor Day. One is for obvious reasons and the other is because of years of institutional brainwashing (aka going to school) has indelibly ingrained the end of summer with starting over, as though I should have sweated out all my physical energy (such as it is) and focused instead on working out my brain. I also tend to assign witchy sorts of activity to September since so many significant things have happened in my life during this month.

And maybe it's all the coffee or all the running around I'm doing of late, but I find myself reflecting and lost in my head more so than normal which, if you know me at all, is already a fuckload* amount of time. I've tried to get down on paper or make note of things I want to write about and we've now reached the point where the things I want to write about and the things I want to write through are catching up with my ability/time/desire to write them out. My brain most closely resembles every long suffering bookshelf I've ever owned: never enough space for all the things I pile on top of it. I find myself often wondering how most people cope with the hyper activity of the world and, after years of close study** what I have concluded is that we are all on Facebook or Twitter or Instagram staring and focusing on image after image and soundbite after status update after photo because it helps us whittle everyone (and ourselves) down to a more manageable size. I blame no one for getting lost down those digital rabbit holes. I do recognize that my life is whizzing by while I'm Facebook stalking you doing useless things. So I came here to blog. Because I'm definitely going to write about something meaningful any day now. Ahem.

In the spirit of having too much to talk about, I find myself typing frantically with nothing to say (witness my pointless diatribe above.) So instead, let me tell you about last night:

Nancy invited me to something via email earlier this week with an accompanying link explaining the event. I've made it a policy lately to accept invitations when offered, when possible; my hope is to quiet my restlessness through perpetual newness. And Nancy has never invited me to something I didn't have an awesome time doing so I accepted the invite and spent the next five days not clicking on the helpfully informative link and not knowing what I agreed to, only that we were to meet at a bookstore in Dumbo. Nothing bad ever happens at a bookstore so all was well.

Unbelievably, after living in NYC for more time than I haven't at this point, the first time I ever set foot in Dumbo was earlier this year when I was sent on a work errand to what could be the coolest publishing house I've ever been to: Melville House. At the time, I was a bit lost and just kept walking toward the water and found myself surrounded by cobblestone streets and factory facades.  I remember thinking that Dumbo was a strange place. I also remembered being jealous of the people working in that converted factory loft because that is just the epitome of coolness to me. But I digress.

Last night I got out of the subway and it was drizzling and bustling and as I walked the streets toward the bookstore, I got the strange notion that I wasn't in New York but in a Hollywood, soundstaged version of New York. That's what Dumbo reminds me of: everyone's idea of New York. And, like most ideas of things, I loved it. I temporarily forgot about how expensive everything is here and how dirty and smelly the summertime is here. I forgot about my wanderlust and that blinking pilot light inside my head that whispers always what else is there, what else is there? was quiet for a moment. I just felt grounded and present inside a tangible, realized idea. By no means do I think Dumbo encompasses the reality of NYC but it does paint a pretty picture. It probably helped that I didn't know where or to what I was going to that night; the unexpected always quickens my pulse.

I got to the Power House Arena bookstore, something I wasn't aware existed until just then and it was closed for a fundraising event. Turns out, I was there for that event. I was early but Nancy's name was on the list and I got in and headed straight for the free bar. There were book displays everywhere and, still not fully grasping what the event was or what funds were being raised for what, I started browsing the books, cup of wine in hand. I was immediately approached by a woman who introduced herself and asked if I was a writer and whether or not I had been at the conference that day. Using my unparalleled powers of deduction, I figured out that the fundraiser was for the literary magazine that had sponsored a conference for aspiring writers that was taking place all weekend. The event was a game of Jeopardy between authors, literary agents, publicity people and editors. The woman who spoke to me was a very nice person and she told me that she was writing a book based on her Instagram account. I really don't understand that sort of thing but I nodded and smiled and checked the door for Nancy.

I circulated the room and checked out the book displays, doing that dork thing I do and counted how many of them I had read (12...it gives my brain distraction from feeling awkward) and contemplated buying several more before coming back to reality and remembering that I have one bedroom right now and that bedroom is literally covered in books all over the floor. I met another woman who is an independent book editor which is a job I didn't think existed but sounds pretty awesome to me. Nancy arrived and we chatted and drank and were the bleacher creatures of the Jeopardy game. I noticed the playful, yet cutting banter between the four groups of people and it left me wondering whether or not literary agents, authors, publicists and editors all secretly (or overtly) hate each other. I'm sure someone wrote a book about that.

A highlight of the game for me was when one author was contesting an answer in the "Literary geography" category and yelled out "Let's look it up! Atlas me, someone!" I want to use that in every day speech going forward, but only regarding reference books. Almanac me! Dictionary me!

After the game was over, Nancy and I stayed for another beer and I bought a little notepad set with the promise that I would write a poem in each page. I can get SUPER creative with my rationalization. On our way out Nancy said goodbye to a former coworker who was packing up the leftovers from the event and he gave me two beers to go. They sloshed around in my purse while we walked again through the evening movie set of Dumbo. Here's a photo I took:

And...action!

And that's what I did last night. I'm awake super early after doing a fuckload *** of things this morning, blogging being one of them. How are you?


















*An actual measurement.
** "Close study"= I just had that thought right now.
*** See "*".

Het Einde

And then I came to the end of my trip to Belgium and Amsterdam, something I haven't fully come to grips with since the craving for a street waffle bakes my brain and then covers it in sugar. I was able to bring some things home with me to tide me over but that's all gone. I did discover though that my local supermarket sells Orval! Wahoooo!

On our last day, we had booked an all day excursion to see windmills, cheese, clogs and the area just outside the city. It was a mission of mine to see at least one windmill before I left the land of windmills and no one ever needs to convince me of the virtues of trying cheese in foreign lands. This tour included the bus ride, a bunch of stops and lunch and it was what you would expect an organized tour in Europe would be like: a bus full of American and British tourists. Some highlights of this tour were the oil mill we got to tour. This mill was hundreds of years old and is still in use making peanut oil. We got a chance to climb inside it and watch it make the oil which was very cool. There was a man standing in front of me who was probably about 60 years old and he made a point to touch EVERYTHING. He was pretty much caressing all of the stuff, even the highly dangerous clampy type things and while that was weird, it was also giving me anxiety because why are you touching everything? You are a grown adult! Anyway, I was going to include a video I took of oil being made but after trying to upload it on here and failing a few times (compyoootors) I have given up. Just know that peanuts got all crushed and crap and it was powered by wind and had been for last few hundred years and it was cool. And then some dude molested all the equipment.

The mill was located in a little touristy town with lots of little cheese, chocolate and waffle shops. I'm going to repeat that: lots of cheese, chocolate and waffles. In fact there was a shop there that had some of the most delicious cheese I've ever eaten spread out all over the store for you to just taste. I'm pretty sure I had a cheese sandwich there with an appetizer of cheese dipped cheese. The cumin gouda is the stuff of legends.

I also, and here is a major surprise for everyone involved, ate a waffle here. So let's recap: cheese, cheese and waffle. We traveled a bit more by bus to a small factory where they made wooden clogs. What was fascinating about that process is that it has remained essentially unchanged, apart from the addition of a few mechanics, for hundreds of years. I did try on a pair but couldn't really see myself ever wearing them for anything other than gardening and I have never gardened anything in my life.

After the shoe making demonstration we stopped for lunch at a restaurant that overlooked water and had a lovely conversation with a couple from Pennsylvania. They seemed just as traumatized by being a pedestrian in Amsterdam as we were. The diet of champions continued here where I ate something fried and chased it with some beer.

After lunch, we boarded a ferry to Volendam, which, while very pretty and peaceful, is also very touristy with souvenir shops lining the streets mixed with beautiful cottages and picturesque facades. If weren't for the heavy tourist foot traffic, it could be called "sleepy"and I sort of wish I could visit in wintertime. We saw a cheese making demonstration and ate more cheese like the dairy savages we all are.

We then drove a bit more in the bus to Edam and strolled around for a bit. The sun had come out for this day and it was a lovely afternoon with postcard views.
 Here's a selection of photos from that day, with the order all random and not organized, really:

In front of our lunch spot.

View from a bridge.

Edam

We had a good lunch here with, what else? Beer.

Did you know that women want these clothes?

The view from the top of the windmill.

Peanut oil mill.

Little alleyway

CHEESE!

We got back to Amsterdam feeling sleepy but also feeling the need to go out since it was our last night. The previous evening, we had passed a bar that was local to our apartment and decided to check it out. Turns out it was one of the chillest, hipster bars in the city...according to a few lists. Cafe Brecht had mismatched, vintage looking furniture everywhere and the vibe was very low key, a perfect place to spend our last evening in such an undeniably cool city. By the way, that bar is on a street called Weteringschans, a word I will never be able to pronounce properly, no matter how many cab drivers correct me.

The next day we took the train to the airport. I may have already mentioned this but Amsterdam has the best setup with the train and airport being connected. Genius. It was a Friday morning so we shared the train with commuters and schoolkids. I saw a child who was about five years old with the most stylish outfit I have ever seen and now I know how grown men in that region of the world are so stylish: they learn early. Our flight was smooth and we came back to NYC pretty seamlessly, visions of cheese and waffles and beer and bicycles and waffles and waffles and waffles and wafffff...

And now we arrive at the end of my blogs about this great trip. That only took me, what...two months? I recommend a visit to these cities and I really would love to return and live in Belgium, marry a well shoed man with a vague accent and unlimited access to Orval. By my own personal account, it is filled with lovely people and beautiful scenery, and did I mention the fucking WAFFLES yet???

I'm in the process of pinpointing a trip for a very big birthday I have coming up next year. I'm sure after I plan and get back from it, I'll write about it so look for my next travel blogs in 2076.

Amsterdam: the Penultimate Edition

Writing these blogs about my trip has made me a little bored within my current pinball machine of part time jobs. I feel sometimes like I just zip around crashing into things under the flashing lights and noisy near accidents of everyday life. And sometimes I long for the din to quiet for a handful of hours and to close my eyes and open them and be in a new country. Sigh.

Amsterdam greeted us on our third day with overcast skies and just millions of bikes, all narrowly skirting collision. It was another chilly day but if I'm being honest, I prefer chilly to hot and sweaty any day, particularly when you are standing in line for hours, which is exactly what we did in order to get into the Anne Frank House. The weather was actually very strange that day because it shifted so dramatically from overcast to sunny to rain to warm...Amsterdam in June is bipolar.

I did not get any photographs in or around the museum but I will say that it is a place everyone should visit at least once, even if you've never read the Diary of a Young Girl, even if you only know peripheral information about Anne Frank and her experience. Being in that space, reading about her life and her family and roommates was striking and poignant and more than once I found myself overcome with emotion. There was a palpable feeling in the museum among all the visitors which I'm certain happens each day the museum is open, which is apparently nearly every day of the year. I was told that the wait to get inside is almost invariably hours long and after going inside and spending time among the rooms where Anne lived and wrote and seeing and experiencing what it must have felt like to be trapped in a small space for years, I have to say that waiting that long is the easiest and most worthwhile way to spend time. I will never forget that experience.

After we got done there, we were both ravenous and decided to try The Pancake Bakery which was just up the road from the museum. I had a very delicious savory pancake with lots of little salty bits in it that I'd like to have a again right now as I type this, and an Orval, of course.

We had booked an all day excursion for the next day so this was the day to see the Van Gogh museum as well since we were leaving the day after next. The sun had come out and the weather had been growing hotter so our journey from the restaurant to the Museumplein was a bit slow going.

Our visit coincided with the 100th anniversary of the children's character, Miffy and all along the Museumplein were commissioned versions of her which I thought were all pretty cool. Here's me standing next to (and looking blobby beside) the Delft inspired one, with the line of others behind me.

We made it to the Van Gogh Museum about 2 hours before it closed. To be honest, I was a bit tired and worn out from standing in line for Anne Frank, eating a heavy lunch, walking in the heat, etc so I was a little relieved that we were forced to accelerate a bit through this museum. I appreciate the art of Van Gogh in the way that someone who didn't really study art and knows a particular artist more for his pop culture status on the walls of 1990s dorm rooms. I did find that I liked his pastorals way more than I expected, considering my limited impressions of him were mostly biographical and mythological; I didn't expect the down to earth portraits and the muted colors of some of his work.

While walking through the exhibits, I overheard a lot of conversations over the art work that were, how shall I put this, enhanced by what I'm assuming was, how shall I put this...legally obtained marijuana. And I thought that was pretty entertaining and something I had forgotten to notice. Frankly, the streets of NYC smell more like pot than any neighborhood I walked through in Amsterdam. Could be the baked goods angle, though. Not that I'd know anything about, say, enhanced brownies, for example. I just know what a friend told me. Yeah. A friend. That same friend went outside and ate a brownie in the sunlight and then went home to nap and when she opened her groggy eyes the first thing she saw was a summer sky marbled with clouds. The blue in between the clouds looked like faint little veins and for the briefest of moments she had the distinct, warm feeling of being on the inside of a ready to be hatched egg, all tucked in and safe. She had the sincere notion that if she lifted her index finger and lightly tapped, the sky would crack lightly and beyond would be the galaxies that she could lie still and observe from a secure and cozy distance.

I mean I don't know firsthand or anything. I just know what she told me.

Ahem.

Anyway, inside the museum, they have these wooden booths for visitors to sit in, should they become "overcome" by the art work. I have no idea if these are tongue in cheek or if they are actually there for their stated purpose but I do know that Lauren sat in one and I took a photo of it.

Overcome?

After leaving the museum, we stopped to take a photo by the now iconic "I amsterdam" sign. Here's mine and I'm standing just under the first hump of the "M" and being slightly less creative than the people surrounding me who were climbing letters and doing splits.

Museuming all day is exhausting and for no other reason on earth, we decided to go home and nap and rest up before checking out a nearby neighborhood. By the time all was said and done, we were hungry again and decided to wing it and walk around De Pijp, only it was getting late and a lot of places were closing up. We happened upon a tucked away Thai restaurant called Siriphon who were literally closing in 30 minutes. We made it just under the wire and holy shit, I am SO GLAD because the food was freaking amazing. I'm actually salivating in the memory. Tofu and noodles and spring rolls and spice and mmmmm. If I ever return to Amsterdam, I'm going to chase all the waffles I eat with all the food here.

We finished up dinner and headed to Barca for a cocktail. It was loungey and very sleek in there and, even though the bartender had some difficulty with Lauren's order of an extra dirty martini, very cool and low key which was the order of the evening. Across the way, there was an Irish bar (isn't there always one, in every city on earth?) called O'Donnells that seemed lively so we stopped in there for a quick drink before heading home. The last day of the trip was to be an all day excursion to see windmills, cheese making, clog factories and sundry and it had to be an early night.

Just one more of these and I can get back to writing about...um....stuff. And junk.

Amsterdam Part 2 but part 5 of the trip, or How I learned to drag things out and I should end this series soon

Some of what happened next during our trip is a bit hazy. I am going to be honest and say that is because it has been about six weeks now and I have been doing a LOT in the interim so if this part seems disjointed, that is why. And normally I am so very, very organized in my thoughts and the communication of them so this is a very strict departure from the detailed and very important recounting of my vacation in this blog, something that is the 2015 version of inviting you into my sunken living room to look at slides on the Carousel projector while we eat cheese fondue. But, you know, without all the cheese and swinger vibes of that scenario.

Aaaaanyway.

Here is a photo of the apartment where we spent the rest of our time in Amsterdam:

It was a one bedroom on the 2nd floor of that building up the most narrow stairs on the planet.

A glorified ladder

It really isn't a trip to Europe for me if at some point I am not forced to haul my luggage up a set of narrow ass stairs. It was worth it this time because the apartment was perfect in size, location and really great (and needed) water pressure in the shower and a washing machine. Someday we apartment dwelling Americans will pick up what Europe puts down and having a 2-in-1 washer/dryer the size of a small dishwasher will become de riegueur. But I digress. We dropped off our things and headed straight out to grab some lunch and explore the neighborhood a bit. It was the middle of a weekday afternoon so instead of what I'm assuming is the average 400 million bicycles on the streets of Amsterdam there were only 300 million. We found a cafe that hardcore reminded me, on a smaller scale, of the cafe in that unforgettable scene from "Oslo, August 31" which I'm including here because I just want to watch it again. My blog, my rules.

Watch it with subtitles, please.

There was a bit less going on in the real version but the people were just as pretty. We had a leisurely brunch and had quite a few hours to kill before taking a boat ride down the canals after sunset which would be at 10pm. The plan was to head to the Anne Frank house but when we got there, it was pissing rain and really cold and since we knew we'd have a chance to go the next day, we decided to forego the 2 hour line and instead check out the surrounding neighborhood. We walked down Rosengracht with all its shops and cafes and coffee shops (there is a difference here). Amsterdam, and that neighborhood in particular, reminded me so much of a large city version of where I went to college. The same laid back and simultaneously introverted vibe of the locals was very New England small town to me but the pace of the roadways and the frenetic energy of the transportation alone was very New York City. Lauren said she didn't appreciate it that much since it reminded her too much of NYC and she was looking for escape. I felt right at home there in that improbable convergence of two very familiar sensibilities. I spent that first afternoon thinking Amsterdam is an ideal city and I still do.

Ideal, yes and cold. It was late June but I was badly in need of socks because it was cold and wet. I had a serendipitous experience when I turned to Lauren and said "I need to buy socks right now because my feet are freezing" and she, quite literally pointed to a building behind me that had a plethora of socks in the window. It was a vintage clothing store with an entire back room full of socks. Ask and the city of Amsterdam provides. I went in and spent too much money on a pair of hounds tooth patterned socks which I fell in love with and will wear forever and ever.

After a few hours of wandering in and out of rain that was falling and stopping again we decided to have a small snack and ended up at a cocktail bar that served really good, if incongruous with the sleek lounge atmosphere, Chinese food. Unbelievably, we still had a couple of hours to kill before the boat tour so we decided to get a drink and ended up at Brasserie Blazer. We had a few pints and enjoyed the bartender's killer Spotify playlist. About an hour later it was time to head to the ferry for the canal boat tour.

We had spent the trip thus far forgetting to eat and functioning on empty stomachs so we decided to stop quickly for some frites because, and if there is any lesson to be learned from my relating my vacation stories to you this would be it, if you are going to shove your face on vacation, it may as well be with fries.

Seeing the city at night from the canal was a unique and beautiful experience and one I will never forget. The pictures I took were not the best but here they are anyway:

The accompanying audio tour was a bit cheesy but amusing and did have some informational tidbits I appreciated.

It was after eleven by the time the tour ended so we decided to stroll through the red light district to check out what was happening. And when I say "stroll" I mean that very loosely since one can't really stroll down streets packed like sardines. It was pretty quickly apparent that every night is the same in that area so we had a drink and headed back to the apartment to prepare for the next day of day drinking and brownie eating. I mean, of museum hopping and culture.

I swear there are only two more days to get through. Hold my hand and we'll make it through the next installment which features two museums, a hallucination I had and the best Thai food I've ever, ever eaten. I know, whatta cliffhanger.

Belgium Part 4/Amsterdam Part 1: Too Old and Drunk

We left Bruges by train and planned to make an afternoon stopover in Ghent to see Gravensteen and have some lunch before the three hour train ride to Amsterdam. I noticed a lot of the locals we spoke with in Bruges actually lived in Ghent and more than one person mentioned that it was a cool city so I was looking forward to taking a look around. It was close and on the way to Amsterdam so why not?

We got to the train station in Ghent and were immediately lost outside. This was the first contact we had with public buses/trams so I'm reasonably certain we got away with not paying for any tram fares at all in Ghent due to our extreme ignorance and their system's extreme reliance on the honor system. We got some information from a kind stranger on the tram who should really have run for chamber of commerce king or whatever that office is that totally exists in every city. He told us which stop to get out for the castle, pointed out the bar nearby that used to function as an actual gallows (please don't ask me how to pronounce it), and that Ghent was a party city and really, what else do travelers need to know?

We made our way into the castle and thankfully were able to drop off our heavy bags. Here are some photos I took of the city from the castle. It is a really beautiful skyline that, like most other cities in Belgium, seemed very medieval. One side of the castle was blue skied and cloudy, the other was all gray and cold:

I think only a handful of people were touring the castle along with some school kids. Not that we saw any actual kids, just a creepy pile of unattended backpacks in a pile in one empty room which gave me the willies, particularly inside a castle where a LOT of people were tortured. There is a torture museum in this castle.

Can you hear their cries?

Here's a photo of me being scared.

But like, scared lite. And in my brand new jacket which I haven't lost yet.

The whole castle and museum took about an hour to see and after we finished up we walked around a bit. We stopped in a chocolate shop but all I could seem to find were chocolates from South America and I'm saving that for my actual South American trip. So we continued on around the beautiful city, dodging trams and window shopping until we got hungry and stumbled upon this restaurant called Krokantino where I had an Orval, of course, and we had a delicious lunch al fresco and people watched the, and I really don't think I can overstate this, gorgeous, well-dressed people of Belgium. I contemplated staying a night to check out the nightlife but we had booked a hostel for our first night in Amsterdam so it was time to go. The train from Ghent to Amsterdam would take around three hours and change. I was looking forward to zoning out and staring at the Belgian countryside while saying goodbye to one of the best places I've ever visited. I'm definitely going back.

We got to Amsterdam around 8pm and as we spilled out onto the main drag near the central train station I had a few fleeting thoughts. The first one that flitted by was that it was past 8 and still bright outside. The second was that I might die in Amsterdam. The only reason I thought this was because at the very mouth of the station is an immediate roadway that is shared by the following: cars, motorcycles, bicycles, pedestrians and trams, all moving in one simultaneous rush forward. And I wasn't oriented enough to understand where to cross, when to cross and at what point I should scream in fear for my life. Combined with my travel fatigue and 900 pound backpack and we had an interesting ten minute walk to the hostel. The path to the hostel led us right to the heart of the red light district. For those unaware of what this is I'll simplify: it is a touristy neighborhood of Amsterdam where there are prostitutes hanging out in the street facing windows like mobile mannequins with sad eyes. Aside from all the prostitutes, it is really a lively area of the city which I'm positive I would have appreciated more had I not been lost and worried about being run over by something.

At long last we arrived at the hostel which was way more a stereotypical "youth" hostel than the one in Bruges. As the pub crawl organized by this hostel was just outside and things were getting raucous for that group of young drunkards, I thought fondly of my own very recent sojourn to a few bars in the company of strangers. As I heard a loud belch that greeted us as we entered the very loud bar adjoining the hostel, I realized that everyone is the same. And that one pub crawl a year would do for me.

We were checked in to the hostel by a dreadlocked Australian and we were to spend the night in the room with eight other strangers who had all already checked in; each bed was taken by the time we got to our rooms. It was our intention to find some street food and go have a drink in a nearby bar since we had to get up and out early to check in to our apartment the next morning. The best laid plans...

It was pissing rain as we walked outside and cold so we wandered a bit around the close streets of   De Wallen which looked like this, although this is not my picture:

...but it may as well be. Just picture this plus a downpour.

And we walked (quickly) to what we assumed was the end of the neighborhood and decided to turn back to get dry and warm. We did find a cone of fries which the Dutch apparently fry twice in order to get that flavor of fries that is, how shall I put this eloquently? Effing delicious.

We ended up back the hostel's bar where it was loud and crowded and full of fellow foreigners. We had a few drinks and the most notable thing about that bar was the, what I'm assuming, very, very high bartender who was so manic, quick and gruff that watching him bounce around the bar was like watching a video on fast forward. Also, he picked his nose quite a few times. Like digging for gold style picking. We decided to leave after seeing that and went to a place right down the street. It was a lot less rowdy in there and much more my speed. We ended up talking to a German guy with dreads (a very popular style in that neighborhood, apparently). I also encountered the biggest man I've ever met in my life who was an 18 year old from Mississippi who plays for Ole Miss (I still have some Louisiana in me and I know how big of a deal that is). He was sort of wandering around Amsterdam with some friends and a family member he told us was a male model but we never did see the guy. He was adorable in that "I'm 18 and far away from home and I need to talk to and see everyone and everything." He was literally approaching everyone in the bar at that point and when a 7 foot something extremely large man approaches you, you remember it.

I also had a very, very long conversation with an Irish guy named Aaron while Lauren and his friend played pool. He was one of the smartest people I've ever met and we talked about Ireland and New York and politics and Samuel Beckett and F.Scott Fitzgerald and we bonded over bringing too many books with us on our respective trips. If my life was in fact a romantic comedy, this would have been the meet/cute. And my life IS a movie, it's just not that kind. The title of my movie is "Too Old and Drunk: A Non-Romance." Still, I wish I had gotten his last name because he was really nice to talk to. So we said our goodbyes at around 5 am and naturally it was bright as noonday outside. Our room was a two minute walk away and naturally all of our bunkmates were sane and fast asleep. The only issue was that there was a warm body in my bed.

Convinced I had the wrong room/bed I just stood there for a moment, staring at the mowhawked head that lay snoring atop my pillow. Lauren poked him with her finger and he apologized for sleeping in the wrong bed but that it was "too dark" in the room so he got lost which I thought was funny. Luckily his bed was empty and I just crashed in that, fully dressed, for about three hours before we had to check out and head to our apartment. It was a very fly-by-night stay in the hostel and as we packed our stuff up I met the guy who took my bed and he was a very cool guy from South Africa so I forgave him. Plus, I had neither time nor energy to hold a minor grudge; there was another waffle to consume and Amsterdam to explore.

The riverting, gripping journey continues in the next post which promises adventures in museums, canals and mispronouncing Dutch. Whatta cliffhanger.

Belgium Part 3: Mannequin Peas and Broozhe

It doesn't happen often but the last night I was in Brussels, as I got to bed, my watch read 7 a.m.When my eyes slogged open three hours later, in time to get checked out of the apartment, I realized why I don't let that happen often; it is a terrible idea. Also, I'm too old for that. I packed my stuff up as quietly and gently as possible, all the while envisioning large gallons of water and coffee and a fresh, hot street waffle as a reward. If anything could make lugging my bag through the cobblestone streets of Brussels to the train station bearable, it was going to be that waffle.

We didn't have a chance to see the darling of Brussels, the Mannekin Pis the day before so we wanted to take a look before leaving the city. We stopped to get both a waffle and a coffee on the way and I can't say I've ever enjoyed something so deeply, with such aplomb than that moment on the street with a 30 pound backpack on my back. And thus was born another favorite moment of mine, apart from the splitting headache, nauseated feeling and the shame and regret that is the quintessential hangover.

Aaaaanyway, here is the photo I took of the Mannekin Pis, a landmark that, much like the Mona Lisa, is way smaller than I envisioned but just as crowded around:

You can't see it there, but he's peeing and he has been peeing since the 17th century. I enjoyed the legends about him, my favorite being that he was a two year old lord who peed on the enemy in a battlefield. My kind of kid.

A bit further down the block we saw this graffiti on the side of a building:

And while I appreciate the play on words, puns make it nearly impossible to Google the thing you want to really advertise. When you search for Manneken Peace the statue just comes up. Oh well. It was time to leave Brussels, a city that wowed me, filled as it is of people that are interesting and fun and the beer and the waffles and ohhhhh I need to go back.

We eventually, if aimlessly, made it to the train station and were on our way to Bruges (which is pronounced Broozhe, something I didn't know until visiting there...instead I was saying Bruise-jes like a dummy) for an overnight stay. It was going to be my first time staying in a hostel so I was little nervous but I'm glad Lauren was with me. She knew the ropes. We got to Bruges in about an hour and walked to the hostel which took about ten glorious minutes of meandering, a bit lost through little enclosures and cobblestone streets. It was a beautiful day and my first impression of Bruges was that it was like walking through a medieval storybook.

We got to the hostel and had booked a private room and I was pleasantly surprised at our accommodations. We stayed at this hostel, which I wholeheartedly recommend for location, comfort and affordability. Staying in hostels, as I would later find out, is the absolute best way to meet other people. There are usually tons of organized activities and free tours and, if  you are lucky enough to be in Belgium, beer tastings. Our plan was to stroll around Bruges, have a leisurely lunch and do the beer tasting.

The layout of the main room of the hostel is set up to look like a large living room, albeit one with a full bar in the center of it. As we sat waiting for our room to be ready so we could drop our bags off, I noticed there was a little library housed inside an old display cabinet. I left a copy of the book I had finished on the plane and was very tempted to take one to replace it. Then I remembered how heavy my bag already was so I decided against it. People were coming and going in the room, many of them fellow Americans but a lot of people were from everywhere in the world, which isn't something that happens to me everyday.

We had a lovely lunch at Aquarel  and people watched, again in awe of how put together and good looking everyone seemed. I mean is it vacation eyes? It can't be, right? After lunch we meandered the city for a few hours, eventually ending up back at the hostel to rest for a spell before...ingesting more beer. 

The beer tasting was being held at the Lybeer's sister hostel, Bauhaus which is located on what seemed like the other end of the earth in the city. If the hostel we chose was on the quiet, reserved side, this one seemed like the Bohemian younger brother. There was a lively bar attached to it that was already very busy by the time got there. We arrived late but not too late for the first taste of Duvel, which turned out to be another one of my favorites. Orval and Duvel...if I had a pair of dachshunds, that's what I'd name 'em. The tasting was being run by a woman, her name escapes me, who was from Chile and had immigrated to Belgium which has now become my dream...to immigrate to Belgium. She was knowledgeable and funny and friendly. The other tasting attendees, most of whom were American were by and large obnoxious except for the three young women next to us. They were friendly and smart and two of them were college friends traveling together and one was a Canadian expat living in Ireland and traveling alone. I enjoyed talking to them and hearing about their itineraries and adventures. When we arrived we were told about a pub crawl that was going to take place later on that evening. Lauren and I had decided against it, thinking we could save our 15 euro or however much it cost and tour the city alone. Then we drank a bunch of beer (are beer tastings universally just full glasses/bottles of beer or is that just Belgium?) and were cashing in our one free beer (yes, the beer tasting gave you a bunch of beer and then a token for a pint of beer at the bar, you damn LUSHES) when I spotted a very good looking beardy type of guy headed over to us. He told us he would be running the pub crawl and that we should definitely join. And then, like all good looking and charming salesmen, he convinced us to do it. 

Confession: I have never been on a pub crawl before. At least not one that is organized by a company with a set itinerary. I've crawled to pubs. Is that the same thing? I jest. But this was a brand new experience for me. I think I've stated before that I have a deep admiration for Belgian beer. However, what I learned on this pub crawl is that my admiration is just not as manic as it is for some people. I'm happy to sit and enjoy a few drinks over conversation; by and large the people on the pub crawl were on a mission. Being an introvert who enjoys being around extroverts, I got to do one of my favorite things: sit back and observe. It did make me stick out a bit though since most of the group was socializing and having fun in a visible way. I suppose my proclivity to hang back makes people think I'm not enjoying myself when in actuality that is my favorite thing to do. It also left me wide open to meet and talk with our tour guides who were stone cold sober the entire pub crawl. I got a chance to ogle  talk to the guy who sold us on the pub crawl and who smelled like freshly washed linen sheets and was wearing the most stylish outfit I've seen in a long time. We had a good conversation about Sam Cooke and Aretha Franklin and obscure graduate school programs. I talked to a man from Brazil who taught me how to say "pleasure to meet you" in Portuguese which, by the way, is spelled totally different than I spelled it in my head.  In the shadow of a lot of chaotic chatter in an underground cave-like bar called 't Poatersgat, I talked to another guide who, again, was well dressed and put together and told me about immigration issues in Belgium since his day job was as a lawyer and interpreter for the government against people seeking asylum. He was the opposite of me, politically, but we talked about Murakami and all was forgiven. I told him he'd do really well if he came to New York and it turns out he already does. 

The night carried on as it will do and here's a deceptively calm photo I took during this pub crawl. If you are imagining, as you look at this photo that the background is calm and quiet, you are totally wrong. A few minutes after this was taken, a young Scottish man was dangling from the lip of that stone bridge for photos. 

One thing I'll say is that I enjoyed how noncommittal the whole evening felt. I wasn't aware of time or place or anything but the people surrounding me and the crisp June night. As we walked to what would be the last bar one of the guides said to me, "It's almost the end. This is where people get really drunk." And, like a hot, bearded, well dressed canary in a beer soaked coal mine, he was correct. Much of the rest of the evening passed by very loudly and very quickly. I remember dancing with a French man who looked, and I'm talking soberly after the rose colored glasses of a month ago, looked like this: 

...but the only reason he looked like that is because EVERYONE OVER THERE LOOKS LIKE THAT. He wore a cowl necked sweater and was pretty much the definition of refined or "reFOINEd" and so imagine my surprise when the club began to play the theme song to the "Fresh Prince of Bel Air" and this man mouthed every single word. I was unaware that the Fresh Prince had made it to overseas airwaves. I'm gonna kinda always remember that. 

One of the guides walked me back to the hostel and before I knew it it was morning in Bruges and nearly time for checkout. Ah, vacation. Where time clumps together like sweaty, old spaghetti. No, wait that is just how I felt when I woke up. Lauren and I checked out of the hostel and walked to have breakfast in this amazing little place called Marie's House which had great coffee and a damn fine croque madame. We sat in the front window and while we ate we saw a few fellow pub crawlers, still crawling but out in the daylight with squinted eyes. The day was cold and gray and I needed a jacket since I lost mine in Brussels. I found one and will probably wear it until it disintegrates. Or until I lose it. We walked to the train station to board a train to Ghent where we would spend an afternoon before arriving in Amsterdam. 

Our trip to Bruges was fly by night but memorable and fun. Thinking back on it now, I would have extended my stay in Bruges because I'd like one more day to wander and maybe take a boat ride. I suppose I'll just have to return. Wait for me, French Prince of Bel Air. (Do you see what I did there?)

Stay tuned for the next installment of my trip blogs (I'm not done yet???) wherein I visit a medieval castle in Ghent and arrive, frazzled, in the Red Light district of Amsterdam. Ooooo.