I’ve been taking a survey for the last several years and I’ve discovered that less than 5% of the people I’ve encountered ever ask about me or my life and are very content to chat at great length about themselves. I let em, after all, I know all about myself. Just for the sake of my survey, I never volunteer any information unless asked. Dale Carnegie is right, ask people enough questions about themselves and they think you are a brilliant conversationalist. So it goes, but once again, I digress.

Out of the gate in Amsterdam we got a map, checked our bags and boarded a trolley to the Van Gogh Museum.

This city is do different, so Dutch, so charming. The trolleys, skinny, tall and cute. The people friendly and helpful, they don’t hate you because you speak English, quite unlike Parisians, so pleasant.

We disembark and enter the museum, amazingly I notice that when I’m reading the writing on the wall people respect your space and don’t step in front of you. Yes, we are definitely out of France now. YES!

Van Gogh, well, you, of course know, Van Gogh, painted for only 10 years, never sold a thing except to his brother and patron Theo, went mad, cut off his ear, had himself committed, got out, got depressed, shot himself to death and created one hell of a lot of great art. 200 paintings a year. Theo paid for the paint and canvas.

We joined the throng and in a calm and orderly fashion, filed around the walls, as I said, respecting each others space and viewed the master work of the master..... lovely, lovely, lovely... We also saw the amazons and fawns and centaurs of Stuck. We left, trammed back to the central station, trained to Schagen, called our friends Hans and Antje, whom we had spent two weeks traveling in France with, were met and returned to their castle for friendship, company and a marvelous Dutch repast of sauerkraut, pork and boiled potatoes. [sauté onions, garlic, green and red peppers, add sauerkraut, brown meat, add cream and bake till tender... 1 1/2 to 2 hours] Great stuff and none went into the fridge or to waste... Chat it up some more with Antje, Hans, Tijs (their son) and his girlfriend Francine and then it was off to bed for the weary travelers.

The following day was virtually a day of rest... no it’s reality, not virtual reality!... Up and a marvelous  Dutch breakfast made by Hans with Antje and Hans until Antje’s folks arrive and we all look at photos of La Roque and chit, chat, chit. Hans then shows us his studio, garden, workshop and we flip through some old portfolios of his looking at water colors, drawings and toy designs and a book of Hans’s recent collages...Such talent is rare to see.   Then it’s lunch in the studio. I sure love to eat and even though I’ve never missed a meal since 1963 or earlier, on this journey I’ve tightened my belt 2 notches... Maybe it’s stretched... but, I think it’s all the walking, art walking.

Speaking of walking, that’s what we do next. I forgot to mention that last night we got the Antje walking tour of Schagen after dinner. Today after lunch we got the Hans walking tour. All the hot spots, all the architecture, the churches, the streets, alleys and by ways, the bocci ball players, practicing up for the big game coming up soon.

Back home and it’s napie poo time, then a visit and dinner with H & A’s friends, Hans and Janine. He is a shrink working with asthmatics and she a dramaturge with the largest theater in Holland... We were told the name, but hey, we don’t speak Dutch and can’t remember... The asthmatics, now there’s a good name for a band... working in smoky bars all the life and developing asthma... whoa... another case of imagination run wild.. How about the spazmatics?

For din din it was chicken curry, beef and gravy, steamed veggies and rice, also wine, red and white and coffee for those that had to rush off to face the wrath of a controlling 16 year old, capable of instilling great guilt and fear in the parents in their new/old Jaguar. I’m getting hungry just thinking about it. But well, I have no guilt.

The remainder of the party retired to the next room and chatted the chit and chitted the chat some more, looked at Art Books, you know, Art Walks brother, till the break of 10:30 and retired once more.

Pan Macs Out at the Sex Museum

It was breakfast and off to Amsterdam to the red light district but first a stop at the sex museum at Damrak #18. It’s amusing at first, shows everything we never wanted to know about sex and then becomes a bit tedious. Only one piece I found worthy of a photo... a small bronze of a fawn sodamizing a woman of the human persuasion... macking out, so to speak...

Now it’s across the canal to the "Legal" red light district... Rosemary clutching my hand we stroll along... feeling peculiar... looking for amusement... sport... what we find, during these daylight hours, are third world women, scantily clad, yet wearing much more than at the beach back home, standing in windows and tap, tap, tapping their glass enclosures to attract the potential client... It was not amused that we felt as we voyeuristically strolled by, but saddened, depressed and bemused by this 20th century meat market version of the world’s oldest profession. I much prefer the method of street walking, bar scene or brothel to conduct biz and connect with johns... not so degrading, so blatant, so absurdly, crassly commercial.

"We interrupt our broadcast for access by German TV and Santa Claus of the airwaves... my drink and belongings have been moved to enable a TV Star to sit next to me whilst I write and she is tended by her minions... overpowering perfume... just the right amount of cleavage exposure... chats with Santa in German and here all this time I thought he spoke only English... After the shoot, high above the Atlantic, Santa gives me a shot of his schnapps... I thought he was pure... I take his photo but not the fading stars, I ask if this star thinks life is a tad bit absurd? She laughs and shakes her bosom but she doesn’t understand... I ask Santa if he’s happy with where life has taken him thus far... He replies that he only speaks German, but the director understands and smiles behind Santa’s back...

To return to our sordid tale, after being so rudely interrupted by the media... I know that hookers need to be hookers or at least that is the path they have chosen during this lifetime, but hey, let’s have a little dignity whilst goingist aboutist... we feel dirty and whip out our flask and imbibe and feel marginally better with that and a couple of WWWAAAAAaaaaaaasssssssssssssssss..... and take the trolley, I love the trolleys here.

Every year they have an art competition to design the paint jobs for the   trolleys and some are wonderful, while others are just billboards with Santa and buxom blondes with lots of cleavage in German, swilling schnapps... just kidding... To the Stedelejk Museum and go in to view the modern art... wrong here too! The top floor is closed and most of the collection is unobservable... We view the poster collection, collect our coats and wander out back to view and feel the sculpture. We wander through a park and I espy a Russian, French horn player and 2 other musicians with indecipherable cases strolling by followed by more Russians with red stars in their hats... How do I know they are Russian? They spoke Russian, or hell, it could have been Greek but it sounded Russian to me. Wander a bit more and feel the Amsterdam in Amsterdam... Hans says it’s an open air museum... the whole city.. he’s right.

We meet Tijs, the son of Hans and Antje, who is in his first year of college  specializing in writing for film, in front of the Stedeljk and trolley off to his house to chat and meet his roommate. Tijs tells me that his English friends asked him if he was to meet the septic tanks that eve and allows that’s us, we Americans, septic tanks... full of shit... uuummmmmm...... I reply that it’s just that they lost the revolution and are still bitter having blown the rule Britannia bit and squandering the colonies and all and that they eat bland food... boil everything. I also decide to name our band "Cesspool and the Tanquetts" and that our big hit will be "My Sludge Just Churns for You." Perhaps dedicate it to the English and tell em to swill this, you..... Septic tanks indeed... At least a septic tank has a drain field and the Brits have island fever, their economy has failed and they name their dogs Bruce and such..... HaRumph.....

Tijs allows that we must go to the store if he is to cook dinner... We take him out instead at a grill/salad bar and enjoy ourselves with pork and fritts and pork and pasta, rasta... Speaking of rasta, I allow as how no trip to Amsterdam is complete without a visit to a "Coffee shop" and ask Tijs to take us to one... He is nervous... says he’s never been to a "Coffee shop"... that he’s the only teen in Holland that’s never been to one and doesn’t imbibe... that he’s a regular social misfit...

You see, in the Netherlands, "Coffee shops" are hashish and marijuana houses, sort of like a beer bar and cause about as much concern, how civilized, legal soft drugs.

We go to the "Bull Dog" and step into Reefer Maddness... I make my cop, special skunk and order up 3 hot chocolates with whipped cream, which arrive whist I twist one up and burn it down with my souvenir "Bull Dog" lighter... no matches available... we drink our cocoa and off into the night, myself totally altered and Rosemary and Tijs, I suspect, with a contact high, after all no son of a friend of ours would ever, ever, indulged in the devil’s weed, that perverter of youth. We go to check out the Milky Way Bar... a big club... it’s early yet but they let us come on in and see the room... I’m so glad we septic tank yanks are brazen enough to ask for what we want. It’s an okey dokey space, like the Belly Up in Solana Beach, CA. or Key Largo in Portland, Oregon, only Dutch... a room that would hold one to one point five K I suppose and famous... The Stones have played there and I suppose the Grateful Dead... who knows???

Having seen the Milky Way we wander off and just hang out on canal bridges and enjoy the lights on the water, ah, romance and the ambiance of A’dam while gonzo at night. WOW, Look at the Colors!!!

Tijs finds his way home, we trolley to the train and ride, contentedly, back to our haven in Schagen and to bed we go.

In the A M it’s a quick breakfast and at 9:00 Antje’s father takes us for a ride about the country side. We tour the dikes and listen to their history and when they started to ride those bikes, ah, no, that’s another story. As I was saying their history and when they were built, which I forget as I never was much of a student, my mind wanders, A.D.S. I suppose. We went to the sea shore, the North Sea, wind blowing, waves in the sea, reeds waving by the shore we waving bye bye by the sea to the sea. We played leap frog on a kid, post, pier sort of a thing, also saw, heard, felt and experienced a sculpture of 3 stands of large bronze bamboo on the dunes, with holes cut in the sides to sound and whistle when the wind blows, which it was, amazing, marvelous, never saw anything quite like that before, we’se was groovin it man... it be COOL!

Back to Schagen and train to A’dam with Antje and trolley to her school whilst she picks up her bike at the station garage and rides there to meet us. Amazingly enough, as we complete our ride and dismount, she rides up and it’s off to school. It’s an architectural monument, it’s an art school, it’s navy grey, it’s drab, it’s not unlike a modern prison, but the color is sacred... yuk... I can’t imagine working there... I’d go mad, Mad, MAD... we lunch... I’ve never had thinner ham on a sandwich. Ham, butter, brown bread, thin sliced, sandwich bread, rather like Wonder Bread... yuk... I express my views on the worst cafeteria food I’ve ever eaten, of course loud enough for the matronex of the food bar to hear... yuk, yuk!

We tour the school, there is barely any student work hung on the walls to lighten up this drab institution and the "art" students dress in drab also, monochromatic, dull, dark, drab.

We meet the director, chat, discover he is an architect, don’t discuss sacred grey, but as we pass the president’s office, it has carpet, I wonder aloud, "Why is it that the president’s office is ruggedly rugged and the staff doesn’t even have offices." Were it I on staff, I’m sure they’re glad that I’m not, I’d go out on strike for staff offices, better food and I’d anarchical paint my room white. Antje seems to be happy working there, however, she does go on LOTS of field trips to museums in Amsterdam and all over Europe. I suppose that that is on the plus side of the ledger.

Brother Brother cops a feel

We leave Antje at the academe and wander off to the Rijks Museum, one of the world’s largest. We enjoy a few of the works on view, after all , the art of the academe with it’s academic nudes, etc. is well, academic. The 2 Vermeers of their total of 4 are marvelous, (the others are in Washington on tour where the exhibition is closed because of budget squabbles between the pres. and the rest of the, or should be able to be, ruling class. Sad! state of affairs, an annual event in our adversarial method of non government. But I suppose the function of government is to subjugate the masses and maintain the status quo not to give a hoot about the arts, but yet again I digress.) but hey I’m sorry, I just can’t get that worked up over Rembrant van Rijn... I know, I know, he illustrated the Dutch Masters Cigar box but hey, he was a master, I know, but, he’s so dated and so is most of the stuff in the Rijks Museum and I’m a modern day Philistine I suppose. They do have nice bathrooms though and we use them before exiting the museum.

Cigars, Cigarettes, Tiparillos ?

No canal boat ride as they close at dusk in this season so it’s off to an argentine restaurant where we had a serviceable meal of steak and fritts and listened to Cuban and Mexican music. They’d never heard of, ah, ah, what’s his name... ah, Astor Piazzolla, the father of nuevo tango and the pride of Argentina... Oh, well, the steak was good...

Around the block to the neighborhood "Coffee shop" to twist up a veritable bomber, a pocket rocket and to enjoy the same over a cup of Joe in an empty shop, save we 2 and the barman. To the theater to meet Antje and Hans, Tijs and Francine. Dazed and confused we trod the cobble stones, along the night lit canals of romantic Amsterdam to join our friends in the viewing of a Swedish ballet company, the Cullberg Ballet of Stockholm. The theater is a modern, understated, minimalist affair, Tijs says it’s called the false teeth of Amsterdam because of the glass enclosed columns that I must admit have a certain dental flair. The lighting is great and the whole bit retreats into the ceiling during intermission and when not in use.

The dance troupe is just great, performing modern pieces with great humor, dog barks, cock crows, goat bleats, very erotic, hump, hump, humping, bumping and grinding. The women remind me muchly of the Martha Graham method of dance along with a bit of the Twyla Tharp style and the men are more original and risk taking. One piece by three dancers, all men, where one would expect one to be a woman and others with affectionate male bonding... minimalist props and very inventive in the changing of sets without dropping the curtain. An example is moving from one piece with a fabric floor representing water to it’s being drug and raised as a back drop for a bit of sky. Tasty.

At intermission Hans said he hated them and Antje had to hush his groaning during the performance. At the end of the evening he said he liked the show, but deep in my heart, I knew Antje had kicked some verbal butt as we had purchased the tickets.

We also discovered a new fave rave of the month..... Charlie Toorop..... A woman artist, of Dutch heritage, whose portraits really knock me out... Wow, it’s a great thing to discover someone you flip for, that you’ve never known of before. The piercing gaze of her subjects speaks to my heart. There is a fine collection of this artist at the Kroller-Muller. Apparently the largest collection of her work extant.

We catch the bus back to the train and it’s on to Brussels. At the station in Brussels we contact the Pacific Hotel and they say, "come on over." A charming room with abstract expressionist works everywhere, walls, ceilings, on the floor of the elevator, on the toilet seat. Also the yin/yang helix here and there about the place. Cool! Possibly the worst bed we’ve slept in, in Europe. Sag city, but a great location... We dine on Uncle Austin, who had slipped us a few bones before we left and directed us to spend it on a great meal, at the Gala Cantina. A French/Italian affair where they don’t sneer because we don’t speak French, the language of half of Belgium. Fantastic food. Goose liver that literally melts in the mouth.

After this marvelous repast, we stroll up the street to find ourselves in the Grande Place... the great square in old Brussels... illuminated at night are a circle of Grande, olde, edifices, a joy to behold.

To the chocolate shop and we load up on chocolate for all the needy at home, us too... Back to our room at the witching hour minus 5 and we are allowed in.