Springboards

Barcelona

December 16^th. Barcelona. We left a bitterly cold Paris at 2  ̊C and a bitter wind. We travelled down from Paris to Barcelona in an overnight sleeper designed for 4 people ….. allegedly! Ernie and I managed, just. Of course we had a collection of large bags (of the non-human variety) to share the compartment with us as we need enough clothes for business and leisure in a northern hemisphere winter. It was an adventure!

We are now firmly ensconced in our new home for the next three weeks. Our Christmas cards are on the little table in the tiny sun porch and food is in the cupboards. We have yet to go exploring, although shopping at the supermarket was an adventure. Ernie put a recyclable bag in the trolley to reduce the consumption of plastic bags but he got growled at and the checkout operator tut-tutted as she returned it to the stand.  He will know better than to try that again. Bought the fruit that sounds like Chinmoyan but in Spanish it’s a Xirimoia.

Things seem marginally cheaper than in NZ, a welcome change from the prices of Tokyo, London and Paris, or Brussels or Amsterdam for that matter.

Monuments

December 14^th. Sunday in Paris. We went up to the highest point around, and one of Ernie’s favourite places – Montmartre. It offers fabulous views over the city. It is also where Sacré-Cœur looks over the city. We went inside the basilica and it is magnificent. The ceiling especially is well worth the visit, but it is so much more than that.

Today I spent several hours at the Louvre. The Palace of Napoleon III is contained within the Louvre and is elaborate to the point of the extreme. I would feel suffocated by such heavy, elaborate furnishings (and short beds!), objects and chandeliers. It looks stunning. It’s amazing that people lived like that, especially those who were part of a system born out of the overthrow of the Monarchy as a result of their excesses.

When I was in Venice some years ago and went into the old palace and saw the gold on the ceilings, huge paintings on the walls, the sculptures, I thought – ‘Here is the wealth of a nation.’ I had at that time recently been in Bangkok and had been amazed at the golden temples and statures. When I was on the Paris hop-on hop-off bus just last Wednesday we had pointed out some golden statues built in the 1930s, a time when the world was in a severe depression. I think of all of the money that goes into building the palaces, monuments, churches and statues of Europe and other places in the world and I wonder how many people’s lives could have been lifted out of abject poverty with that kind of money. What would the result of that be?  How would our world be different now?

But then … we wouldn’t have all those magnificent buildings scattered throughout the world, and we wouldn’t be drawn to them, would we?

From the Thalys

December 13^th. On board the Thalys train somewhere between Rotterdam and Antwerp, on our way to Paris. 11.15 am and I have had a small bottle of Louis Montellier Bordeaux sitting beside my laptop waiting for a slightly more suitable time to drink it and I have waited long enough. There is something about thundering through the countryside at 300 kilometres an hour while sipping a Bordeaux. It’s the feeling of adventure.

Wandering through the tiny brick streets last night, looking for a place to eat (Argentinean? Uruguayan? Italian?) it became a matter of who had to best gift of the gab as to which restaurant we ate at.   On the street in the Leidseplein waiters were out on the street to persuade you to come into their restaurant. They would promise you free this and extra that, “‘specially for you,” should you like to dine in their restaurant. We dined Italian.

The Mayor has had a clean-up in Amsterdam  http://www.stuff.co.nz/oddstuff/182348 Gone is the red light district for which Amsterdam was famous.We also notice that the beggars and homeless people also seem to have disappeared. We hope they are warmly accommodated somewhere, I would not like to be homeless in an Amsterdam winter.

Delft

December 12^th.  A Saturday in Amsterdam, cold and blustery, so we decide to take a 45 minute train journey to Delft. Delft is small and utterly charming.  It has many old heritage buildings and they look lovely. There is hardly a car to be seen, almost all of the traffic is foot-traffic or bicycle. Delft makes blue and white pottery known as Delftware but this not what we saw.  We saw the small canals with ducks swimming. We walked over the little bridges linking one side of the canal with another. We went to the market. No stuff especially for the tourists here, it was a food market for the locals by the locals with fruit, vegetables and huge rounds of cheeses. I saw some fruit and had never seen before and purchase some very small red berries on a vine like tomatoes but the berry had a more transparent skin. A taste test (quite tart), and I have decided they are probably cranberries.

Delft is cold today. Freezing. Snow can’t be far away. It’s so cold that it felt positively warm when we came back into Amsterdam.  I was so glad of my gloves and hat, even if it does make me look like a Russian spy.

The sights sounds and smells of Amsterdam

December 11^th – Amsterdam. We arrive at Central Station which is the best point to use for navigation around the city. Last time I was here it was a January and the temperature was minus 12  ̊C, and the cold sucked at your knees (or any lightly covered place) the minute one stepped outside. Today could be described as refreshingly cold. The hotel room is a welcome relief of cool space where you can even open a window, sheer luxury after the hothouse tiny boxes of Tokyo, London and Paris. Why do hotels feel the need to wind up the heat, sometimes unbearably, day and night?  It must cost as fortune to keep the heat up in winter and it makes sleeping (and breathing!) difficult.

 Out and about the streets of Amsterdam. I would call Amsterdam the city of sounds, or the city of music. There is music coming from the Dam and the sound of trams, ding ding, and an old man along Damrak Street plays the Xylophone, while music filters out from the different shops. This afternoon I explored the area between the Central Station and Dam Square.  Running parallel to and in between Damrak and Nieuwezijds-Voorburgwal Streets is a foot-traffic only street. Criss-crossing between Damrak and Nieuwezijds-Voorburgwal are many little lanes.  These and the foot-traffic only road are filled with restaurants (Italian, French, Chinese, McDonalds, KFC, Burger King), cheese shops, souvenir shops, places you can get a piercing, a Chinese massage, cannabis tea, smoking paraphernalia, sex toys, sex T-shirts, sex ashtrays, even a salt and pepper shaker set each in the shape of a penis, and clogs, clogs, clogs, clogs, clogs. Interesting smells waft around. Young men move in groups of up to eight or ten. Police also cruise through on foot and in groups of four to six. 

Amsterdam is an intriguing, stimulating and somewhat sleazy city. If you are looking for a city in Europe that is a little different, this is it – although of course I have many, many cities still to see.

People observations

11th December. At last I am back online and can post the previous blog. Again we are on the Thayls, this time travelling from Paris to Amsterdam via Brussels, Antwerp and Rotterdam. It’s 8.45 am and just coming light as we pull out of Antwerp, Belgium, having caught the train in Paris at 6.25 am. After dinner last night with friends at a lovely little French bistro, we were wide awake at 4.30 am so it was no effort to be up and off on another adventure. We will be back in Paris Sunday afternoon – a chance to explore further.

Some observations of the people of Paris:

The people of Paris are friendly and helpful. This is in stark contrast to my last visit (the northern winter of 2002-2003) where I found the men especially, rude, surly and unhelpful. What has changed? Have they realised the importance of being friendly to tourists? Is it an effect of the recessionary times? Or is it just that I have encountered different people?

The drivers in Paris (and Brussels) are very, very aggressive. It’s like a game of chicken. One can almost hear them shouting inside “GET OUT OF MY WAY!” Our taxi driver in Brussels took on buses, other cars and a child on a skateboard. Our taxi driver in Paris also challenged buses, pedestrians on crossings with the Walk signal, and of course other cars. There is this jostling for position and the need to dash into any space before someone else does. Is it a sign of a highly competitive society, I wonder.

The teenage pout seems to be non-existent in Europe and Japan. You know the one. Thirteen or fourteen year old girls in particular who look as if they don’t want to be here (wherever ‘here’ is, especially if accompanied by a parent), that the world owes them something and that life, generally, sucks! Some manage to retain the look for quite a few years but most outgrow it quite quickly. Yet in Tokyo, Brussels and Paris I have observed large groups of children and teens, some on school outings, and not a pout to be seen anywhere. The teens are actually smiling and appear excited by life.

We are now appoaching Rotterdam, Holland.

The Attractions of Paris

9th December – Paris. Paris is a beautiful city. Today I went on the hop-on hop-off bus around the sights of the city with the plan to specifically visit places of interest at a later time. I travelled up the Champs Elysées – that famous street in Paris of haute couture where the Arc d’Triomphe, commissioned by Napoleon, stands proudly at the end of the long straight street. He never saw the monument but his ashes were brought back to Paris from his exile and buried at the monument. Arc d’Triomphe is also the site where the unknown soldier is buried. We saw the Eiffel Tower – that iron structure built for the world exposition of 1889, it was very controversial at first with many Parisians disliking it intensely. Sacre Coeur, the basilica built on the highest point in Paris, and The Notre Dame Cathedral with its magnificent Gothic architecture. We passed the Louvre, the home of all those famous paintings and sculptures, and the Musée d’Orsay with its collections of modern and classical paintings. The bus went through the Latin Quarter where the Sorbonne is found – one of the oldest universities in Europe founded in 1257 for just 16 poor theology students.

What was also interesting was what was ignored, that is, anything modern. I also was fascinated by the commentary, the ignoring of any mention of anything related to the rulers of France, royalty or the Emperors before Napoleon, as if none of this had ever existed, the obvious pride in Napoleon and his achievements and especially I noted that 14th July was not described as Bastille day, it was described and “an annual bank holiday.”  Pics will follow.

Give us this day …

Well I can’t quite believe this. I have trouble getting online while in a hotel room yet here I am on a Thalys train hurtling along at 300 kms/hr (or we will once we really get going) between Brussels and Paris and I am online.  Isn’t that just awesome? Oops, we’re on a bit of a lean at the moment, that feels a little disconcerting while typing.

Time to reflect back on my time in Brussels. The things I liked most – the buildings in Grande Place with the magnificient architecture, looking around the touristy novelty shops, the nice food, the crisp cold, listening to all the different languages being spoken, observing people and their different behaviours, and oh! The bread! The bread is absolutely delicious.  It’s how bread should be, scrummy with butter, absolutely fresh, real bread that will be stale the next day, not last on a supermarket shelf for a week.

A break for a meal there, it’s like being on a plane. Another piece of delicious bread as part of a meat and salad dinner. Roast beef wrapped around some unfamiliar vegetable that looks a bit like onion but certainly doesn’t taste like it, has a slight taste of aniseed. Any ideas on what it is anyone? Send me a reply

Beautiful desolation

7^th December – Brussels is beautiful. We have been to the Grande Place, also known as Grot Market which doesn’t suit it at all, with its beautiful C15 buildings, just stunning. They had a laser light display on (and seemingly in) one of the most beautiful buildings, what looks like a cathedral. No trouble finding traditional Belgian food in Brussels, it is awash with frites (chips), mussels, waffles and other traditional Belgian food. The Grand Place and nearby areas has throngs of tourists. It is interesting to watch the difference in the groups, their behaviours, their clothes. It is fairly easy to differentiate between the groups before they open their mouths to speak. I wonder how people categorise me. I had a conversation with a Moroccan man who introduced me to a fruit called a Chinmoyan (spelling unknown). Very nice, somewhat reminiscent of a fresh fig.

There are many homeless people and beggars here, I am surprised. I am asked for money constantly and I struggle to keep walking. I find I can’t pass by women begging who have children with them without giving them something. Sometimes beggars don’t ask, they sit, hopefully, with a cup or bowl out in front of them. Their eyes reflect a loss of hope, a loss of self-respect, desolation. It is so sad and I so wish I could help them all in a meaningful way, which is not really to do with perpetuating their predicament with a coin or two.  The nights are getting colder, their situation is likely to get worse.

Tokyo – London – Brussels

5^th December – Yesterday we flew from Tokyo to London on Virgin. Ernie said he thought the girls looked very virginal in their red and white uniforms and big smiles. The flight went over the upper part of Russia and although it was daytime it was dark for most of the trip, being December up near the Arctic Circle.  The flight was also over Norway, Finland and Sweden. We caught the train from the airport then a traditional London cab from the train station to the hotel (Thistle Hotel Kensington, opposite Hyde Park) while watching the red double-decker buses that are so much a part of the London street scene.  Last night we went out for a traditional pub dinner of roast beef with Yorkshire pudding at a traditional London pub – The Swan, which has been a licensed pub since 1721 of thereabouts, and was a pub for hundreds of years before that, they say. I enjoyed a cider for the first time since I was in England in the winter of 2002/2003, and Ernie a traditional Aussie beer.

Today we travelled from London to Brussels via Calais and Lille, France, on the Eurostar.  It was interesting watching the French countryside flash past – all the houses in the villages, remembering that some of our relatives and country-men fought and died there during World War I and II. 

We are now ensconced in a hotel room laughingly described as “spacious” that is at least bigger than the pocket-handkerchief room we had last night in London and the even tinier room we had in Japan.  No tea or coffee-making facilities which is a bit of a nuisance, but we will survive.  Off out for a drink and then dinner shortly.