We Should Have Remembered that Rhyme . . .

The Keukenhof on 25 March 2013
Not much was blooming.
Lisse, The Netherlands

The Netherlands outside of Amsterdam has a more country feel; here are the windmills, wooden shoes, and tulip fields. Tulips were brought to the Netherlands in the 1600s from Turkey, and caused a bit of a stir. People went mad over the flowers, and it is rumored that the tulip caused the first market boom and bubble popping in history. They called it tulipomania, and you can read about it here. Since then, the prices of tulips have returned to their normal levels, most average bulbs are cheap, while some rarer bulbs command a higher price. The Dutch have kept their love of the tulip alive and it’s evident in the fields of blooming flowers every spring.  

Shades of purple/blue hycainths in one of the Keukenhof pavilions.
Lisse, The Netherlands

For years I’ve wanted to see the fields of flowers, neatly laid out in bands of color, making the whole country look like fruit stripes gum. I’ll have to wait a bit longer though because flowers had barely sprouted when we visited! This winter was uncharacteristically cold and blustery, leading to a delayed blooming season. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, we all learn April showers bring May flowers. March is not even part of the rhyme; I should have known.

All the shades of hyacinths at the Keukenhof,
Lisse, The Netherlands

About 40 minutes outside of Amsterdam, in the town of Lisse, is a giant park called the Keukenhof. Here the Dutch celebrate their tulips with a festival from the end of March to the middle of May. The flowers are planted to make shapes (this year the theme was the UK) and beds are layered with multiple types of flowers to ensure something is always blooming; except when it’s cold and the blooming season hasn’t even started yet.

Around the park are various pavilions with dedicated exhibits and events throughout the season, much like a county or state fair. Inside these buildings we found blooming flowers. There were more colors and varieties of these plants than I have ever seen before in my life. For example, hyacinths, an early spring bloom that smells amazing; I’m accustomed to four colors: yellow, white, purple and pink. At Keukenhof, there were four shades of purple alone, and a whole new shade, orange.

Also around the park were smaller buildings, like garden sheds, and in these, you could purchase flowers. And I purchased flowers. I plan on making my own version of Keukenhof if everything grows and flourishes. In the fall, the bulbs will be shipped to me in the States, but I may not be there, so I put my mom’s address down. This fall she’ll receive a shipment of 200+ Dutch flower bulbs. This promises to be crazy; also I may owe my mom for the rest of forever for tending them while I’m away. So, next spring, pay a visit to my parents’ house and see a small version of the glory that is Holland.

Useful Links!

Pictures from Our Trip!

Business Week Article about Tulipomania

Tulipomania Wikipedia Page

Keukenhof Homepage

DAmsterdam

Amsterdam is an interesting city. Sitting below sea level, the people there have been using dams, locks, and canals to keep the water at bay for centuries. The canals lend a sense of calm to an otherwise frenzied city. Marijuana is legal in Amsterdam and the heady scent is pervasive. Many teens were walking around bleary eyed, and I was reminded of my trip to Canada at 19. The main purpose of the trip was to drink legally, and the kids visiting Amsterdam were probably there to smoke legally.

A Lovely Canal
Amsterdam, The Netherlands

And of course there were the whores. According to our guide, this was the preferable term for these women; there isn’t a Dutch word for prostitute. Around the area were young men scared and eager to pay for sex with the girl in the window—quite literally. In the Red Light District, scantily clad women wait behind glass, some beckoning you, others doing mundane tasks like eating lunch or checking email on their phone. It was like going to the zoo and realizing you have a lot in common with the animals. Some people find the experience humorous and awkward, I just felt pity, and a slew of questions came to mind. What led these girls to this occupation, and will they ever be able to leave it with dignity? Do they have health care, or are they susceptible to whatever diseases their current sex partner is carrying? At the very least, I hope they can choose to leave.

So what does one do in Amsterdam if smoking and whoring are off the table? And believe me, they are off the table. Two friends joined Joe and I, and the four of us spent our time wandering around the city and eating regional treats. J + A found some delicious cookies called stroopwafles, a sandwich cookie consisting of two layers of thin waffles on either side of a caramel filling. They also discovered speckuloos butter. This is butter made from spicy (laden with spices, not hot) cookies that are common at Christmas time. They are available year round in the United States in the form of windmill cookies, a treat I grew up with. This butter is phenomenal! I imagine on pretzels it would be delicious, but we also just spread it on the stroopwafels, creating a terribly delicious snack. A quick google search has told me that Trader Joe’s may carry the butter. Pick some up and pretend you are eating it while strolling along the canals in a wind tunnel, and you’ll have an approximation of our vacation, as it was VERY windy in Amsterdam during our visit.

We also enjoyed a regional specialty—pancakes! We visited the pancake bakery, a restaurant in one of the old warehouses of the East India Trading Company. With our order, we received a free cup of hard cider courtesy of our Holland passes. The options for pancakes were fanciful and numerous. You can check out the menu here. The boys opted for savory pancakes with meat and cheeses, while we girls got sweet pancakes with fruits and nuts. Our hubcap sized pancakes were thin, like crepes, but they were still very filling, and more than any of us could eat.

Our wandering took us through bustling markets and busy streets, along the canals, and to the temporary home of the Van Gogh museum, the Hermitage. The exhibition, Vincent, was a small collection of his works as well as some three dimensional objects that influenced him. I began to understand Van Gogh as a whole person through some of his lesser works, the focus of the exhibit.

Wandering through the museum I was astonished at the range displayed in his pieces. I was familiar with some of his more abstract pieces, but there were finely detailed sketches and a room full of paintings done in the Japanese style that I had never seen before.

I enjoyed seeing Sunflowers in person; the layering of paint to create texture was easy to see and appreciate at such a close distance. I considered buying a reproduction but none of them used enough paint to reproduce that effect. We also enjoyed seeing a painting, and then seeing the exact object in real life. Seeing a vase, and then seeing that exact vase in painting humanized Van Gogh for me. He became less a name in a book, and more a man who lived.

Useful Links!

Pictures from Our Trip

Stroopwafel Information

Windmill Cookies

Trader Joes Speckuloos Butter

All About the Pancake Bakery
Pancake Bakery Menu
Van Gogh at the Hermitage