The Birds and The Bees of St. Stephen's Green- Dublin Pics*

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My Goodness, My Guiness-Vive Dublin*

September 26-28th, 2008= Weekend in Dublin.

Dublin- is broken into thirty-two counties, six of which are in Northern Ireland and twenty-six of which are in the Republic. Dublin is the capital of the republic and the largest city in Ireland.  Its main river is the Liffey, its population 1.2 million. 

After a semi-insane evening of bar-hopping, nightclub dancing, and more, I arrive at the bus station in Aix at 5 am sharp without sleep on Friday morning, ready to head off to Dublin with Natalie, Kim, Medora, and Kerrie. We coolly navigate ourselves away from the creepy Frenchman offering to drive us the forty-minute distance to the Marseille airport and hop on the much more reliable bus, then sprint to our plane and before we know it we're seeing the sun rise in Dublin and shivering at the large temperature drop between the south of France and the north islands of the Atlantic. From there we hop on another bus to our hostel (The Shining Hostel, what a great name), drop our bags off, and start the tour. We walked down the main street, O'Connell Street, to arrive at Trinity College, oldest college in Dublin. I just found this great guidebook so I'll include random facts that I'm learning as I write. Actually, I'm not going to go chronologically but rather document all the sites we saw and describe them, then add random details that made our trip unique. So O'Connell Street, main street, has this giant thing called The Spire in the middle of it, its the highest thing in Dublin at 120 metres tall, it's just this big metal flagpole type thing that turns into a point at the top, quite ugly I'd say.  They have funny names for it, only one of which I remember now (Phalyis in the Palace). O'Connell also has the General Post Office, site of the siege during the 1916 Easter Rebellion where the rebels held out behind ramparts. You can still see bullet holes in the pillars outside the GPO, and when we went on the 1916 Rebellion Tour the guide pointed these out for us and described where the rebels shot from and all the logistics of the six day long battle, it was really interesting. 

So we walked down to Trinity, in the heart of the city, and walked through the gates onto a rather small but very beautiful campus, with well manicured lawns and an impressive bookstore. Trinity was founded in 1592, by Queen Elizabeth I, and in its library there is this ancient book of Gospel stories called the Book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript.  We didn't pay to see it but we saw lots of replicas in the bookstore, it was commissioned in the 500s and finished in 800 with this beautiful golden cover that was then stolen or lost over the ages.  From there we walked out and saw Oscar Wilde's residence right on the edge of the campus, which is now a center devoted to him. Our hostel was on Marlborough Street, same as The Abbey Theatre (the national theater) and they were playing something of Wilde's while we were there but it was unfortunately sold out. I thought that Ireland, or Dublin at least, took great pride in its literary and cultural history, because they had quotes of James Joyce and Yeats and Wilde all over the place, in the airport and coffeeshops and such. Then we went down to the area with national museums, all of which were free, and we saw the National Gallery and the National Museum of Archeology.  On the way we passed by Leinster House, former House of Parliament.  The National Gallery was a very good art museum, lots of Italian Renaissance paintings and some stuff from the medieval times, a room of Dutch art, not all forceably Irish works, but they did have a special exhibit on Jack Yeats, who I'd never heard of but he had some interesting work from the early 1900s. They also had some early French impressionist art, which made Natalie and Kerrie pleased because they had missed their class on the French Beaux Arts to come to Ireland, so in a way that was redemption because they were seeing firsthand what they would have been studying in class. the National Museum was not as cool as I'd expected, a lot of artifacts from prehistorical times that didn't really interest me much.  We kept waling and found the National Concert Hall, a rather austere grey building for a concert hall, and from there grabbed lunch and ate in St. Stephen's Green.  We couldn't really find any traditionally Irish foods other than Irish coffee and drinks and the "Irish breakfast" that none of us wanted to try, so we ate sandwiches and pizza and hamburgers for meals.  St. Stephen's Green was probably my favorite spot in Dublin.  It's a really big park that of course, has historical significance, but it's semi-touristy but also not in its own way, lots of schoolkids were there in their uniforms eating lunch, drinking on Saturday, and lots of businessmen and women were there with their lunches picnicking on the grass next to a little pond of ducks and swans, and the trees sort of fall over the pond but don't block the sun and the grass is really really really green.  At the entrance there's an archway, smaller than Arc de Triomphe, called the Fusilier's Arch, commemoration Irish success in the Second Boer War in 1904. The park was taken in the 1916 Easter Rebellion, but according to lore there was a ceasefire upheld at noon and 6 pm so the parkkeeper could peek his head out of his tower to feed bread to the ducks and swans in the pond and look after their safety, and the bullets would fly as soon as he stepped back in his house.  

After lunch we walked up Grafton Street, the main shopping area in Dublin, and they did have good shops.  Everything from music to clothes to flowers to chocolate.  Again we saw lots of teenagers on lunch break or hanging out after school, more kids than I would have thought in a bustling metropolis. There were streetperformers, these kids doing tricks with a soccer ball, and lots of people campaigning for organizations and asking for donations- it seemed like Irish people were committed in general to causes and street campaigning.  At the end of Grafton there's this little statue that's more famous than I think it should be, because it really was nothing special, but its the Molly Malone Statue. Molly Malone, says my book here, was a semi historical figure who was commemorated in the song 'Cockles and Mussels' a Dublin anthem. Finished with shopping, we went to the Office of Tourism, which is conveniently located in a converted Protestant Church, and then took a long walk across the city to the Guiness Storehouse.  There we learned how they make Guiness, and sprialed up the world's largest pint glass (the inner core of the building is in the shape of a pint glass) and at the top, Gravity Bar, we were treated to a free pint of Guiness (or Diet Coke, as the case may be). Guiness is definitely not my favorite beverage, but the tour was fun and kind of something you have to do in Dublin. Arthur Guiness, who bought the land where the storehouse is now, signed a lease for 9,000 years at some absurdly cheap price, because Guiness brewing was so essential to the city and still is, and next year they're celebrating the first 250 years of the 9,000 year lease.  I learned that 2/3 of Ireland's barley crop each year goes to the production of Guiness. By this time of the day we were super-tired, so we sat at Gravity Bar enjoying the view of the city and then walked back to the hostel, walking through the Temple Bar district which is a yuppie area with bars and nightclubs and the famous Temple Bar, on the way back. We also crossed the Liffey River via the famous Ha'Penny Bridge, Dublin's oldest pedestrian crossing over the river, built in 1816.  It's called halfpenny bridge because there used to be a toll levied on people who crossed (you can guess the exact amount) up until 1919. 

Back at the hostel we rested up,  the other four went out to a pub for dinner while I got some much needed sleep, and then we just hung out in the hostel for a while before bed. The pub's close fairly early here, around 11, and I guess people go out earlier than in France.  But the pub's stop serving food around 8, so the girls had to walk to five pubs before finding one that was still serving food. Oh yeah, I forgot that when we were shopping on Grafton Street, there was a big music store blasting songs outside, and they played this one that was very very good, and then coincidentally I heard it again on Saturday, the second day we were there, when we went back to Grafton Street, and I asked who sang it and I was told it was MGMT. This is another coincidence because I just acquired MGMT's music (and in fact this particular song, called Kids), from a boy in our program named Will, who recommended their music to me. Small world.

Day 2: Well rested, we get up for breakfast at the hostel and then head out for more touring. Today we split up a little bit because we all wanted to see different things. Medora and I went together first to Whitefriar Street Church, site of St. Valentine's remains, where we interuppted mass to see his shrine. We didn't really interrupt mass, but it was going on as we walked and saw the shrine because it was inside the nave of the church, and there were other people doing that too so it wasn't disruptive, just a little odd in terms of set up. Maybe this is a good time to share my impressions of Dublin.  1. Catholicism rules. Churches are not only the main historical sites in the city, they are the main sites of meeting and praying and there's mass all day every day everywhere, and we saw people praying and crossing themselves on the bus which is something you maybe don't see everyday.  2. Dublin seems much more....Westernized than France. And I know that makes little sense since France too is in Western Europe, but in France even in Paris more of the culture, from cuisine to fashion to demeanor to traditions, seems to be intact. Dublin almost felt like America, I felt much more like I was at home in a big city, maybe that's just because Irish culture has many things in common with American, not sure.  Example, we learn that the stereotype of French people being rude or impolite mainly comes fromt he fact that they don't smile at each other in the street, keep head down, only interact with people they know, etc. In Ireland the streets were more like in America.  3. Ireland is not a melting pot. Lots of the kids I saw were stereotypically Irish, red lips, red hair, freckles, smaller squinty blue or dark jet black eyes, the build of the Irishman.  Kids or not, they were adorably cute, I definitely go for the Irish look. 4. Dublin is not a city of skyscrapers, the tallest building is liberty Tower and it's 16 stories, one for each of the 16 men who were executed for their part in the Easter Rebellion. It's actually a really ugly building anyways, I don't think Ireland really has a particular architectural style it's known for, and with none of the buildings out and out being impressive for their styles or height apart from the neoclassical government buildings or customs house, I guess it makes sense that an architectural style didn't really develop.  5. For a big city, people weren't moving to and fro at ninety miles per hour, it wasn't as "stressed" of a city or as neurotic of a city as say New York or Chicago or Paris, people seemed pretty relaxed in general and happy, which made it fun to walk around.  I got a good vibe in Dublin.

But where were we on this tour? Oh yes, after St Valentine we took a walking tour based on the 1916 Easter rebellion with this hilariously witty and smart guide Lorcan who had been recommended to me by my friend Melanie.  I thought he sort of assumed we knew a little too much about the rebellion because he didn't explain it linearly so I was a little confused at times, but it was a good tour nonetheless and he told us apart parts of Dublin today and what type of people live there and if areas are on the rise or decline.  Next we rejoined Natalie Kim and Kerrie for lunch and split up again, with Medora and I now going to see St. Patrick's Cathedral, Christchurch Cathedral, and Dublin Castle. St. Patrick's was very cool, it had a beautiful park behind it with that super green comfy grass, and it was built in the 1500s.  It has a fountain where the Irish people were first baptized in the fifth century, and inside the cathedral are the remains of Jonathan Swift, author of Gulliver's Travels.  Also, Handel's Messiah was first performed here in 1742.  Christchurch is more centrally located and I think older, there were ruins outside the church of a much older church built on the same spot.  Founded 1030 by Sitric, King of the Dublin Norsemen, it's Dublin's oldest building.  Then we saw Dublin Castle, which was a big square and similar to Versaille but not as grandiose, it was all red brick and the inside was furnished more simply. I can't figure out whose castle it was, and we didn't go on a tour so I still don't know. It was sort of hidden behind storefronts on the main street in Dublin, so it wasn't breathtaking when you approached it and I thought it was a rather odd place to have a castle, but for all that it seemed to fit for Dublin. Ireland is a republic after all, and they for sure don't commemorate monarchial history.  At the same time, our guide on the tour was telling us that a lot of places where the 1916 Easter Rebellion and the fights for independence took place are not as well labeled as they should be, so that walking around the city you lose the sense of historical significance of those major events.

Regrouping, we did some more shopping, revisited St. Stephen's Green, then headed back to Shining Hostel and chilled for a while until dinner, then came back and met some French and German and Spanish guys and hung out with them for a while.  Two girls ended up going out to the nightclubs but the other three of us stayed back and slept for a few precious hours before we had to be up at 6 am to do our bus-plane-bus trek back to Aix, which we did successfully and now we're back, with new passport stamps and all! I really enjoyed our time in Dublin, I did not feel like it was a purely commercial, touristy city, but I also felt like it was extremely welcoming and everyone we met was really nice to us. That said, we were all excited to say we were coming home to France, Aix specifically, and to shed our autumn coats the second we stepped off the plane in Marseille.  Next week, Ryanair takes me to Madrid. Stay tuned. Meanwhile, Vive Dublin! 

Vide Grenier and Mont St. Victoire pics

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Une Dimanche Divine: Le Vide-Grenier and Mont St. Victoire

For Journees du Patrimoine, Aix has an annual Vide-Grenier (attic cleaning) aka flea market on the long street of Cours Sextius (also home to our most favorite dancing spot IPN). As far as the eye can see, tables and tarps are set up with junk ranging from 17th century French literature to Pokemon cards and Moon Boots.  We got to haggle in French and find some really cool little tchotckes to have as keepsakes from our time in Aix.  I bought this little leather wallet with someone's initials on it (now forever will I wonder who is R.S.?) and one of the famous French keys, the heavy keys with long shafts and intricate, unique teeth at the end.  They really had a ton of random stuff: a stuffed beaver, medals of honor, lots of jewelry, clothes, children's toys, pocket watches, chips from Monaco's Monte Carlo casino, this thing that could have been either a paperweight or an old small missile/ really large bullet, books, old photos, furniture and antiques, metal signs advertising Orangina and Perrier, china dishes and tea sets, and more. Our dinner family had a table set up but we couldn't find them. Most of the people had brought picnic lunches with wine glasses and bread included, and sat chatting with the neighboring salesfamily.  Kids were playing with the toys in the streets and driving around remote control cars to the dismay of unlucky passersby, who had their toes stubbed with frequency. At the end of the street there were lots of old French cars, restored and painted bright gaudy colors of turqoise and light beige, which were giving tours of the city and continually driving past my apartment window with new passengers.

After exploring Le Vide-Grenier, I went with two other girls to Mont St. Victoire, a small mountain range just fifteen minutes outside of Aix. There we climbed up the hills of Cezanne's works for an hour, getting very tired and worn out along the way. The hills were steep, and we sort of veered off the path and decided to make our own. Not so fun for getting down, as we basically slid our way down pebbles and pine needles and got our hands completely shredded and nearly fell all the way down the mountain, but we luckily made it and after a hard core run to catch the bus we made it back to Aix. The view from St. Victoire was amazing, we'd be climbing and completely focused on our feet and not dislodging the rocks and then stop to look up for a moment and see this vast swath of land, a little hazy, full of hues of green and orangy red of the mountains, and we saw a few speckled houses in and out of the trees far off and the cloudy sky and the mountains descending straight down into the abyss of trees below, it was very pretty.  We all agreed we must return.  There's a six hour hike you can do to reach the tallest peak of the range, though I think I may skip that. Hiking's hard!! But overall it was very fun and worthwhile, good exercice, great view, very rewarding.  

Nimes pictures!!

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PS: My Aix-en-Provence pics from an earlier post have also been updated.

Nimes and La Feria

What better way to spend the day than to see 2,000 year old ruins in a beautifully quaint little French village and cap off the afternoon with a Spanish bullfight and sangrias? After a night of dancing to Mamma Mia and Aretha Franklin hits, I and three other girls dragger ourselves out of bed prematurely and sleepwalked over to the Office of Tourism, where we boarded a coach bus destined for the Roman city of Nimes an hour and a half to the northwest of Aix. There, we promenaded around the Jardins de la Fontaine, a pictoresque park with winding paths that snake up a hill and thermal baths below ground and, off to the side, the ancient Temple of Diane to make sacrifices to the gods for your good fortune at being able to come to such a beautiful place. We then climbed up said hill on a very steep path and saw the old lookout tower.  The tour continued down towards the Maiscon Carrée, this rectangular building constructed in 2 AD for unknown purposes and is studied today in many a french class as a great example of the Roman architectural impact in France. This weekend in Nimes was La Feria, this big festival dedicated to the celebration of the harvesting of the wine grape, so the town was swarming with people and there were tents setup along the main avenue selling food and little souvenirs and bands were playing what sounded like polkas and Spanish salsa every couple of feet.  We arrived at the Arena/Amphitheater, Roman site of gladiator games, now turned into site for les Corridas (bullfights). I saw my first and last Corrida, interesting from an educational and cultural standpoint, very disgusting and nauseating from a humanitarian standpoint. We saw three bulls put to their demise in the traditional fashion-bull comes out, is taunted by matadors with pink cloths, then come the men on horses who spear the bull a couple of times in the back, then more matadors with these things that look like juggling pins with spears on the end and they stick six of the large pins in the bull's back, then the actual matador star comes out with his red cloth and does some skills and footwork, and finally brings out his sword and puts the final blow in the bull's back. The arena was strangely silent throughout the whole thing and when the matador took his final bow, there was applause but it was not roaring by any means and we even heard some boos, and we couldn't figure out why.  After that, we roamed around La Feria, the party/celebration and ate at this little sit down place outside, sipping (free) sangria which was pretty good. We made out way back to the bus and drove a half hour outside the city to the Pont du Gard, Roman bridge and aqueduct in this remote area of the countryside that was very fun to walk over, with the Mistral blowing a fresh wind on our faces. The weather today was fantastic, great sun and cool breeze.  Tired and really sore from all our walking and hiking, we napped on the bus back to Aix, and made it back for dinner. All in all, a super successful séjour.

Home Sweet Home -Auberge Vendome in Aix! and the Great Landmarks of the City

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Pictures from Cassis and Nice

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Opera Plage, we meet again! NICE!

Next weekend after Cassis, we've had half a week of school, our first couple family dinners, lots of orientation, and a week of nighttime excitement and group bonding. What better way to continue our voyages then to go to the Mediterranean resort town of Nice? Waking up insanely early, we get on the bus and look forward to a rather chilly day in the sun. Nice was cool because I've already been there and spent some time exploring its backroads and main sites, so I got to make new memories where I already had old ones and it somehow felt different than just seeing the city for the first time. First stop, Musee Chagall. We saw Chagall's work, having had our art lesson on his history and the signficance of the bible and torah in his works the day before, and we bought a few souvenirs. Then we drove down to the bayside (Baie des Anges) and were free to roam. My group went up the hill for a panoramic view of the city and its environs, well worth it because we saw all the tops of the buildings and the cool church belltowers and the bay spread out in its full glory. We made it all the way to the top, passing a waterfall randomly along the path, and ate lunch at the top. We redescended and made it to the beach finally, walking through the open air market first and seeing traditional goods, food, seafood, flowers, and all sorts of things being sold.  We found the one sand beach in Nice, avoiding rocks, and tanned for a little. From the beach we could look up to the hill we had climbed and see the waterfall neatly tucked into the top of the hill. Before leaving, we went to the world famous Fenocchio ice cream shop (which has 96 flavors!!!) and got ice cream. I got Rose, delicious, and no, I can't describe how a flower tastes, it just tastes good and you'll have to trust me on that, and I tried everyone else's flavors. I mean literally everyones. My goal is to try all 96 flavors eventually, I'm well on my way because last time I was in Nice every day for three weeks I got a different flavor, so my repertoire is slowly filling out. Other people got Nougat, Avocado, Gingerbread, Fig, Lemon, Pineapple, Bounty (comparable to Mounds bars in the States), Caramel, Calisson, and Lavender. The Calisson was very good, but not as good as rose. Then we all met up at the bus and arrived back in Aix tired but contented.  Nice looked pretty much the same as it did years ago, and I got to sit on Opera Plage again, my oh so favorite beach, so that was fun too

Cassis and Calanques

So we arrive in Aix, get a little orientation, and then the next day we go off on our first adventure to the Mediterranean town of Cassis. Blue sky, sun, rolling hills, beautiful water, a great beach, idyllic in every sense of the word. We descend a zigzagging route and arrive at the sea only to find a traditional provincial celebration for the Fete du Vin (wine), with Provence's wine growing families dressed in traditional provence attire and walking the parade route around a small circle in wagons carried by donkeys and horses, with the mayor of Cassis narrating and describing each family as they paraded by. Some were throwing little sachets of lavender or other spices.  After that nice little introduction to Provence, we hopped on a boat to tour the bay and the Calanques of Cassis (seacliffs). An hour out on the water and then we were free to explore Cassis, so we walked around the small little shops, bought some sandwiches and ice cream, and walked down to the beach to tan and test the water. We all got to know each other a little better which was good, and we stayed together for the most part as the beach was rather small. A successful fun in the sun voyage. We stopped the bus on the way back for a second to get a breathtaking view of the region from atop a mountain and take a picture of the seacliffs, we were literally on a cliff at the time and without barriers it was a little scary standing a foot from the edge of the drop, but the view was unbelievable. I sadly didn't take many pics in Cassis.  Then we returned to Aix, worn out but ready for more fun and nightlife in Aix!

Beggin, Beggin You, Put Your Lovin' Hands Out Baby! -Aix-en-Provence

Aix-en-Provence, j'y suis arrivee enfin! Okay, since I'm obviously residing here, it's not really a travel stop, but first city in France on Le Grand Tour apart from Charles de Gaulle airport so that deserves a post. I got situated, I love my apartment it's very cute and sunny, and right off Cours Mirabeaux, the main drag here in Aix. Aix is beautiful (bien sur) and lo and behold I actually managed to carry on conversations in French yesterday, very good. Tried to meet everyone in the program ( there's thirty-two of us) and most people were super jetlagged and tired but it looks like a "good group" as they say. I met my french roomie and the french tutors and after eating crepes with Nutella for dinner we went out for a drink- can you say college-y town? The entire nightlife is European bars and clubs and music. Already went to Monoprix to buy baguette, cheese, fruits, and chocolate, the french staples (and Haribo Fraises Tagada, which no one knew of yesterday at dinner so I'll have to buy them some today, they're like these delicious marshmallows covered in sugar and they taste like strawberries.) So no that I've unpacked and walked around and have a stable internet source, all's well. Though I will say it was rough going yesterday on the TGV, I think I got train-sick for a while there.  

So now it's l'heure pour the tour of the town, then dinner with the group, tomorrow academic orientation and such. I'll be back for the next adventure (which is actually tomorrow, we're going to Cassis-deja vu from my senior year trip when we went there too!)

PS- as to the title of this post, the number one song on French charts is Beggin' by Madcon (it's in English but not on American Itunes). I find this extremely amusing because...all you Jersey Boy fans....it's a remake of the Four Seasons Beggin' from 1967!!! hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

Photos from the Heart of Europe -Bruxelles

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XXX - Amsterdam Photos (City of the Triple Cross)

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Please go to the address above, I can't upload lots of photos onto this website. Thanks!

Bruxelles/Brussels

Stop 2:  Brussels, Belgium

Population: 1,350,000

Brussels!!! I haven't yet learned how this city got its name, but I should find out. First impressions: it's really nothing "special." It has high rises, shopping districts, etc. Then I look at my map only to find that apparently the city has accepted its qualification as "moche" (ugly) and is proud of it. Okay. Well, anyways, after exploring I've come to find that it has cool buildings, a great shopping district, and people who speak French!! It's really just an urban area, like a working city, but has some historical squares and parks that are pretty. It reminds me a lot of France- same chain shopping stores, Quick (the Europeans' lame attempt to imitate McDonald's), cafes with lots of tables sitting nearly on top of each other on the sidewalk. Both here and in Amsterdam it's been really windy and chilly and overcast, and in Belgium it's rained light showers for the past two days, but it's nothing too bad. One of the first things I noticed was that Brussels did not follow Amsterdam's trend of bikes: Holland was literally overrun with bikers, they had their own streetlights and paths and everything. Apparently theirs a black market stolen bike trade in Holland that does good business, and everyone owns at least two. They're all from the 50s maybe, really old with paint peeling. Not so in Brussels, although there are still more bikers than in America. Middle aged men in suits riding home from work on a bike are funny to see. 

Right, so Brussels attractions: I went to the Grand Place (a UNESCO site!!) which is this square with four huge imposing buildings on every side of the square so its very impressive, and in the middle there are always tents set up with sellers (today there was a Beerfest type fair there). Two sides have been converted into cafes and shops and the other two sides are museums: one's the Hotel de Ville (former Town Hall) and the other's Le Maison du Roi. Le Maison du Roi was a really beautiful interior to a building built in the 1400s, but it's contents were also interesting, it was sort of a history of Brussels but more like a history of their culture: a room of porcelain from Faber, a room of tapestries, a room of artwork and mock models of the city's growth. There was also a costume room displaying 100 of the 708 costumes that have adorned Mannekin-Pis (this famous statue of a little boy peeing into a fountain) which I liked very much. The statue is a big part of the culture here, there's lots of legends as to why it was commissioned in the medieval era which give it an air of mystery. So after exploring the Maison du Roi I did some window-shopping at the many Belgian chocolate stores, lace stores, and souvenir shops. It seems like every other store is purely selling chocolate confections, Guylain seashells and pralines (invented in Belgium!) and biscuits of all colors and shapes, they all smell and look delicious. 

In my sightseeing I went to Mannekin-Pis, who's really small compared to what one might think for a famous statue, and his little known sister statue Jannekin-Pis, who's not even labelled and in the middle of some apartment courtyard, and I went in "the" cathedral (of St. Michael and St. Gudula). It really reminded me of Notre Dame with its frontal view, and it sat atop a big hill in the middle of the city so it stood out. This little old man gave me a half hour history lesson of the church and this huge oak pulpit that was brought in from a church in Liege, and I got to descend the steps to the basement and see the original stones from the wall and foundation built in the 1200s.  The whole city prides itself on its medieval history.  And since Brussels is already grappling with French and Dutch, nothing's translated into English, even though most everyone speaks some. 

I walked up to see the Congres Column, a really large column with a copper soldier on top as a tomb of the unknown soldier, and saw the Palais de Justice, still in use as the main courts of the city today but undergoing renovations to the exterior so most of the front was covered up by scaffolding. From the Palais there was a great view of the city (even though the view itself wasn't that breathtaking, but you could see far), and while I was standing there I saw lots of barristers walking into the Palais, I guess to go to work. They all had on black robes with white fur cuffs and a white pouffy scarf tucked into the front of the robe at the neck.  Near the Palais de Justice was the Royal Library, which had good maps for tourists and some old printing presses, and this amazing little park called Le Parc des Sablons (it was on Rue Sablon). That was probably my favorite part of the entire city. It's right behind the Royal Palace and its well manicured with pink and orange flowers and some little fountains, nothing too extravagant, but the centerpiece is this huge statue of two men whose names were unfamiliar to me, and then all around the statue were white stone busts of famous scientists and thinkers (eg Mercator) sectioned off by tall hedges. Then, on the  wrought iron fence surrounding the park, there were really small copper statues of little men in different poses, but the whole environment was very welcoming and lovely.  

After snapping a photo in the Parc des Sablons I went to the Musee des Beaux Arts, affectionely called Bozar. Not my favorite national museum, even though it was pretty cheap to see.  It had a lot of Belgium painters' works of impressionism, some more modern things, and romantic works, but the layout of the museum was odd - lots of stairs, and the paintings were really spaced far apart and hung on faux walls within each room...it's hard to explain. However, my opinion of the museum heightened slightly upon reaching the upper levels where the "Ancient Art" (circa medieval times) was displayed. It was all medieval and Renaissance art, like I remember studying in European History in high school, one of the paintings innocuously hung on a side wall was the very one I did a report on so many years ago (Le banquier et sa femme, de Mestys). There were a lot of Breughel, who I reckon must be Belge. After seeing so many depictions of Christ, I was ready for something else. The museum is opening another wing in 2009, all works of Magritte (he did the picture with a man in a bowler hat and the green apple obstructing the face). But for now, I moved on to the Royal Palace.

The Royal Palace also had to be a highlight of my short visit to Brussels, mainly because I had no idea you could go in but for 0 euros I got to see picturesque sitting rooms and music rooms and ballrooms with these huge crystal chandeliers, and all the while Albert himself was in the building somewhere! (The tricolor flag was flying, that's how you know). It was a palace like any other, but a very  nice palace of course, and this one ballroom had a ceiling and chandelier that were of the most flourescent electric green color I've ever seen, it was made from the shells of jewel beetles of Malaysia. It gave a holographic effect to the room and lit it up without electricity and was just very unique for a Royal Palace.  Next I went to the Belvue Museum, which was a history of Belgium the country, stressed because it's only been a country since 1830, so the medieval era was left out. This was definitely my kind of museum - straight up history. So after fighting off Holland in 1830 Belgium became an independent nation searching for a king, it chose Leopold I, member of the Hapsburgs, who led the nation towards economic prosperity while adhering to the country's strict interpretations of constitutional monarchy: he couldn't have a scepter or wear a cloak or make decisions without the pertinent minister's approval, and though he privately criticized this he followed suit. Belgium's main internal battles came from the Catholic and Liberal factions different interpretations of primary education, with Catholics obviously wanting religious education to "save souls" and liberals opposing this. There was and still is also a split between the French speakers and Dutch speakers (and now German speakers since after World War I Belgium got 60,000 Germans and some of Germany as part of Versailles). French = Wallon, Dutch = Flemish, Flemish people in Flanders have traditionally been very poor and this region has in the past fought for independence, unsuccessfully. The second King, Leopold II, took the country to new levels of wealth by conquering the Congo and making millions off the ivory and rubber trades (he actually owned the entirety of the Congo by himself from 1885 until 1908, when his country forced him to cede the title to the ownership of Belgium as a whole, which confused me a little, but either way the Congo was a colony and people were getting their hands chopped off so the technicalities can rest.) With this revenue Leopold redid a lot of the main boulevards and built lots of monuments that people still come to see today, including Le Parc du Cinquentenaire, built for the fiftieth anniversary of Belgium. The early 1900s were prosperous for Belgium and they had 7 World Fairs (Expositions) prior to World War I, then, being the first country run over by the Germans in 1914, they suffered, but were rebuilt in time for World War II, where they were again overrun and had factions that supported the Nazis and a complicated controversy surrounding the King who went to Germany as prisoner or maybe not, I'm not sure, but either way his son ruled as Regent for a while until the country allowed him to retake his post. The Congo was given up in 1960, and from then on the history is just that of the EU pretty much, although I was really surprised to learn just how important Brussels is :not only is the European Commission here and the Parliament, but also the headquarters of NATO and of the Benelux Federation.  It doesn't seem like this city is all that worthy of such worldchanging corporation headquarters. Oh yeah, and the other thing that happened post-1960 was that laws were passed making Belgium a federation, so the three ethnicities have more say over cultural affairs and domestic laws, while the capital takes care of foreign policy. Random facts included in my learning expedition: Bakelite was invented by a Belgian, 80% of the world's billiard balls are made by a Belgian company, 85% of the world's diamond trade takes place here, the border between Belgium and the Netherlands was not finalized until 1995, and Belgians are the second highest consumers of champagne, behind the French. 

Also in that area was Coudenberg, this old palace of Charles V that burned down in 1731, but the foundations still rest underground. Moving on to the Parc du Cinquentenaire, another pretty green area with this giant triple arch behemoth designed to replicate (and exceed) the likes of the Arc de Triomphe. The only thing is, its in the  middle of this park that was really nearly empty so its tourist attraction is not as piqued. Attached to the arches are wings for major expositions, and one entire wing is now the National Army Museum, which was this amazingly vast museum (also amazingly free of charge) with literally every piece of knowledge about every war and every country involved in every war that you'd ever want to know. There was a section on Communism, the Russian Revolution, concentration camps, Finland's part in World War II, I mean down to the last detail they had it. It was a little eerie because a lot of the museum was wax figures dressed up in real military uniforms, and there was heavy music playing and dark lights in some of the exhibits, and I guess the fake people is just not done much in museums today so that was a little odd. But I stumbled out of that place overwhelmed by the amount of info there.  Most things weren't translated into English, and I didn't take the time to read the French, so if I ever came back to Brussels I would most definitely return to that museum (you could spend days there and not read everything, if you could stand the lifelike models around every turn). 

Finally, I passed up all the European Union buildings, I mean I walked past them but they are all literally just big skyscrapers with glass windows reflecting the sky, and lots of suits walking by. The criticism of the EU - that it has no face and no good public symbolism to evoke pride in its members, is most definitely apparent here in the "heart of Europe." It's almost sad that the heart of Europe is so depressingly average, even the one statue of a man stepping off into the unknown was unappealing.  Too bad really. So after all of this touring I enjoyed my delicious French cuisine - bread, fruit, cheese, and chocolate, and Coca Light, which is infinitely better than Diet Coke and I forget how much better it is until I get here, and go back to the hostel to relax. I'm not sure how many tourists this city gets as compared to say Amsterdam, but here I saw a lot more inhabitants of the city actually carrying out daily life - kids visiting museums or riding bikes, people jogging in the parks, etc.  Tomorrow I'll make a quick stop at the grocery for more bread and chocolate and reine claudes (these little green plums that are really sweet and good), and head to Brussels Midi/Zuid for the train to Aix. 

Amste(elle)rdam

Stop 1: Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Population: 751,000

After what may only be called an endurance marathon of travel by plane, metro, train, and foot, I finally made it to my first stop: Amsterdam. Bustling city, full of tourists, and I was soon to find out why. I have a tendency to overwrite when I leave journal entries, so for all our sakes I'll try to stick to main events and leave commentaries aside. First main stop: Anne Frank House, on Prinsengracht. The secret annex is unfurnished, as Otto Frank wanted it to always remain, so there's not a whole lot to see, but to set foot in the same rooms as Anne was enough. A very simply museum, it did not try to overwhelm you with information, and quotes of Anne's etched in the walls helped evoke feelings of sympathy and sadness at their cramped lifestyle. Sizewise, the annex compared to a normal flat of today's standards, really not a hole in the ground, but small for eight people. An additional section of the museum, for kids groups I think, had this room with comfy cushions to sit on and a big screen that showed controversial events and each chair had a buzzer next to it to vote or share your opinion. For example, the miniclip showing when I was there was about anti-Israeli demonstrations in Amsterdam following the takeover of Gaza, and the film asked if you thought the demonstrations should be allowed to continue in light of the fact that some protestors shouted anti-Semitic slurs against the Israeli people.

Onwards, to the Tulip Museum. The tulip has a lot of history. It comes from East Asia and the Manchuria region originally, was first exulted by the Sultan of the Ottoman empire for its beauty and became a symbol of the eternal, then came to Amsterdam via the botanist Clusius of the Ottoman Empire. Used for trade, the tulip market brought enormous revenue and the most famous tulip, the Semper Augustus, sold for the value of a house (It was very beautiful, red and white striped). In 1637, during Holland's Golden Age, the tulip market collapsed and bankruptcy subsumed most of the wealthy population of traders. Other interesting fact to note: the tulip's name comes from a mistake- the Dutch thought it was named after the Eastern turban, also called tuyban, for its shape, but in its original language the Turks called it just "lalé." (As an aside, the title Dutch also came as a mistranslation, as the Spaniards when invading in the 16th century were looking for the Germans (Deutsch) but pronounced it incorrectly. Dutch is a derivative of German, so it sounds very similar).

I also visited the Rembrandt House, in the old Jewish District (it was all torn down and ransacked during the Hunger Winter of 1944), the Jewish Museum built inside the former Old and New synagogues, a vintage-esque flea market called Waterlooplein, the largest floating flower market in the world on Singel canal, the bloenmarkt, and the Torture Museum, which just had medieval torture instruments and short explanations and woodcut pictures depicting their use, all in a dungeon style darkened stone corridor. My hostel was right in the Redlight District, so it wasn't hard to experience that firsthand. Summary of Redlight: crooked alleyways opening onto main avenues filled with people at cafe tables looking out onto the canals, and in said alleyways you pas storefront windows lined with rich colored curtains that unveil one woman per window, wearing lingerie and high heels, face covered with makeup, waiting for the next customer. Some women were eating potato chips, one was on her phone, and it was just strange to stare at a window where the goods were people, offputting to American values that eschew slavery, the sex trade, grossly open promiscuity as in the case here. On a tour our guide said the women have to pay to rent the windows for an eight hour time shift, and they charge around 70 euro for fifteen minutes. Most women stay about three years on average, but one woman had been working there for forty four years and was now 72!! And the thing is, most of the women I saw were probably in their thirties or up, but most were not striking physically, I mean you wouldn't see them posing on the cover of a magazine anytime soon. Redlight was also a lot of sex shops, porno shows, nightclubs, gay and straight, and erotic massage parlors.

Then there were the coffeeshops, which were not unique to Redlight but spread out throughout the city. I say coffeeshops, not cafes, because in the coffeeshop of course you can't buy coffee, just pot. Pot's actually illegal on the books but tolerated because the police don't want to fill their jails with potheads and instead want to focus on crime and hard drug usage, which they have gotten down to a minimum. No one's been arrested for marijuana use in 31 years. So coffeeshops, little hole in the wall joints brimming with marijuana smoke and a smell that wafts outside to the passersby, most decorated in psychadelic colors with funny names. You see people rolling their own joints at the counter in the window and blowing smoke rings. Every year they have the Cannabis Cup where people go around to all the coffeeshops and test the marijuana, then at the end of the week they rate each shop on the product, service, atmosphere, etc. One of the most famous coffeeshops I saw was called Dampkring (smokering), and it was featured as the meeting point for George Clooney and Brad Pitt and the Russians in Ocean's Twelve. On the tv screens they roll the clip endlessly.

So for the history buff in me, my favorite part of the trip was the free walking tour that I took one afternoon, where I learned all I could possibly ever want to know and more about Amsterdam. We walked through the Amsterdam Historical Museum and saw paintings from the Golden Age (circa 1650-1750), most of militia groups that had posed for their giant company portrait, we walked through the Begijnhof, a quiet strip of canalhouses ringed around a courtyard where French single religious women (though not nuns) came to escape hardships in the later 19th century and the area is now still for single religious women with certain financial limitations, though you wouldn't know it just walking through. We learned about the city's layout and the Dutch feats of engineering (houses are on a slant, with these wooden bars at the top used for a pulley system to lift furniture and such into the top regions of the houses since the stairwells are often extremely thin and narrow), and saw the headquarters of the Dutch East India Company, starting point for capitalism, now part of the University of Amsterdam's library. Amsterdam underwent major basic changes under Napoleon's brother Louis' rule in 1796, where every house got a number instead of a gablestone, these beautiful little painting-like designs inlaid above each entrydoor, most of which are still there since the buildings are original from the 1500s, and each person got a surname. Our tour started in Dam Square, the main square where the Royal Palace is located and across from it the National Monument, built of white stone. It's not very pleasing to the eye, it's just one big slab of stone standing vertically and then some figures at the base, honoring those who died in World War II. Likewise, the Royal Palace is huge but in need of some cleaning as it is very dark and soot and grime have sort of overtaken it. The Queen stays there only one night a year: May 4, on the country's day of remembrance, the day it was liberated from Germany in World War II, and every other night she is in the Hague. Amsterdam is the only European capital where the seat of government is not there, because in medieval Amsterdam and the Golden Ages Amsterdam was not run by royalty but rather by burghers, wealthy aristocrats, and the tradition of citizens coming first is part of their culture; hierarchy dismays the average Amsterdamer.

So we saw a lot more too, but my favorite sites were the churches. They are all from medieval times, and have been added on to in several installments so they appear to be mish mashes of bricks and stones rising in overlapping towers. My favorite was the one right in the center of Redlight: the oudekerk (Old Church). The oldest church there, dating from 1200. It's very beautiful and not imposing, really, you  just arrive at it while walking down the alleys and boom, you're standing and looking up at this bell tower inlaid with gold on an elaborate clock and sundial (all of the belltower clocks were inlaid with gold or silver, and most had been dyed a rich color of blue or green that contrasted with the dark colors of the buildings themselves). I also liked Westerkerk (West Church), which was literally the building right next to the Anne Frank House. The other cool thing about churches was that a lot of them are not still churches but rather public functionary buildings, like Oudekerk is a concert hall now. Next to my hostel was Nieuemarkt (New Market), another cool building that was of red brick and had lots of towers so it was very circular. It used to demarcate the city's border when it had city walls, but then became a building for guild meetings and each tower corresponded with a different guild. The square around it was site of public executions for a while, and today it's shops and restaurants. That sounds like it's pretty big, but actually it's not a huge building, neither were the churches. I mean they were big, but they all fit in, not like say the Royal Palace which was just that: palatial. Oh yeah, and on our tour we walked over the tallest point of Amsterdam, surprisingly just 1/2 meter above sea level (on top of one of the bridges over a canal.) The entire city is literally submerged, but it's not sinking like Venice. Our guide said Amsterdam is very tolerant because the common enemy is the sea, so no matter what your creed or race once you're there you have to work together to keep out the sea. There were a fair amount of cats sulking around restaurant areas (not wild cats, there weren't any of those) and the cats kept the  mice and rats away since they were more likely to gravitate towards below sea level stockrooms.

Anyways, the next day I went out of the city centre to Vondelpark, just a nice green area, and to the Van Gogh Museum and the Rijksmuseum (National Museum). The Rijksmuseum was being renovated so I couldn't see all of it, but I did see the famous "The Night Watch" by Rembrandt. It  must be two stories tall and two stories in width, it's really huge, and it's sort of become a national treasure, by virtue of its history with the city (which we learned on our tour but I'll spare you the details). Later on that day I went to Rembrantplein (Rembrandt Square), and there was a statue of him and then at eye level there were castiron metal reproductions of all 21 figures in the Nightwatch, they call in Nightwatch 3D. Some Russian sculptors made it their pet project. It was almost too many statues in one square, you couldn't really appreciate them all it seemed like they were just thrown down next to each other, but it was still cool. During the day I went by train to Utrecht for half a day. I didn't really have a plan or know what to see so I just walked around. It's a university town and there were lots of students and a busy shopping district, and it has a few main canals that are larger in width than those in Amsterdam. There were paths alongside both edges of the canal with little underground houses whose doors you could just see, but you could walk next to the water whereas in Amsterdam you were always three or four feet above water level. Other than that, the town itself wasn't very impressive, just a sleepy little urban area. Utrecht was given a bishopric in 777 and so it has been a Catholic town, known for its Cathedral Tower built starting in 1300, and that was the main site of the city I guess. It was this huge, absolutely huge tower that you could walk through via an archway at the base, but the tower itself clearly dominated the skyline. Next to it was the Domkerk (Dom Church), a really big church with flying buttresses that reminded me of Notre Dame. The most interesting part of Utrecht was that parts of the church and what used to be the bishop's gardens are being restored, and I watched bulldozers partake in said excavation, but for the most part it's been left as it was hundreds of years ago and the half-decayed state is very natural. Instead of having a red rope prevent me from walking somewhwere or having glass encasing the artifacts, I could actually touch the statues in the church. A lot of the statues of the saints carved into the walls had their heads gone as a result of the Reformation fo 1580 and iconoclasts, and it almost seemed better to see them like that than to have them restored to their original setting (although this coming from a non-Catholic).

I guess the Dutch aren't particularly known for their cuisine (the national dish is some sort of mashed potato), but in Amsterdam they have found ways of infusing other country's dishes as their own specialties. Pancakes, vlaamese friet (French fries served in a paper cone with a dollop of mayonnaise or sauce on top), stroopwafels (sugary waffles with chocolate on top), were all delicious. There were also a ton of pizza by the slice places, but I figure that's just part of the international flavor of the city and the need for "munchies" (oh yeah, the other big thing here is mushroom shops, called smartshops, where you can buy magic mushrooms). For all of the hype about legal drugs, Holland actually ranks 7th in Western Europe for marijuana use, with Spain and then England capturing first and second respectively. It's mainly tourists that indulge.

I liked Amsterdam, not as much Utrecht, but I wouldn't really say it was a picturesque city. It's more of a functional, urban center, the charm of those little alleyways and canalhouses isn't as prominent as it could be, because everything's still in use for modern day whorehouses or regular houses or marijuana shops or pizza parlors. But it was certainly a unique city in that respect. I didn't have to go hunting for history, because every two steps there was something of significance. I just needed a guide to explain it to me, because there weren't any plaques commemorating the historical significance so prevalent in the city centre. So with Amsterdam toured out, I'm off to Brussels. I was told it's a little bit of a disappointment, but we'll see. The major hikes with all of my luggage are really draining, but fortunately not all of my travels will be done with over a hundred pounds of luggage!