California Dreamin'

Originally posted 6/26/07.

Honestly, I just don't understand the Netherlands. You are walking outside in the sunshine and suddenly there is a crack of thunder and it is pouring on you. Two days in a row now this has happened. So I come back to my room looking like a drowned rat, and quietly change clothes before my neighbors notice that I got caught in the rain again. Most of my pants are hanging to dry right now. Pretty soon I will have to go naked.

Really all the rain wouldn't be so bad, but it has been below 60 here every day for at least a week. I really miss hot weather and sun tans. The other day, 70 felt really warm!

I have more pictures from our last zoo day, as promised. They are pretty funny really.

Yes, we rode the train and a pelican tried to eat my camera. Also, just a crazy bike we saw.

This past weekend was wonderful, despite the rain. We went to a nice park called De Hoge Veluwe. It is a large national park with wildlife preserves, grasslands, sand dunes, and pine forests. I wish I had gone around the park more, but I spent most of my time touring their superb art museum. It was really something. The set up was very well composed, and even though there were plenty of tourists, I never felt crowded. It was really a chance to enjoy the art. Beautiful Van Goghs, Rodins, and Monets filled rooms and rooms of this building. Plus, surrounding the building was a giant sculpture garden. They have over 100 sculptures out there and the paths take you through the woods and by nice ponds and fields. One of the sculptures actually floated and another had a way into it, so when you climbed the stairs you were in a giant plastic desert of sorts. I would be walking down the path and until noticing a little indicator sign, would not even see that the tree next to me wasn't a tree at all, but rather a brass statue.

They had everything from Renaissance to Modern. Sometimes though, I just couldn't see the artistry in the art. At one point in the museum, I saw a sign on the wall for a piece entitled, "meter." I looked and looked around me and nearly attributed it to the piece being out on loan until I saw two men pointing at this thing on the wall. That was it. It was just a stick of aluminum stuck to the wall. Is that really visionary? Is that art? I just don't see it.

Some of the newer pieces were really intriguing. Today, people try to make statements with their art, which accounts for some really interesting work. One woman had taken photographs of women naked and bound down by household items. The titles were all things like "Is a women just a stereotype" and such. Some others I found interesting were photos of random objects placed on record turntables and photographed while spinning, and then there were some where the artist had photographed bouquets of flowers, which seemed simple at first, until you realized that the flowers in the picture were photographs of flowers that had been cut out and arranged perfectly to look like real flowers. No cameras allowed though, so sorry, no pictures.

So, as is obvious, I spent a lot of time there, and I really enjoyed myself. Sam wasn't interested in the museum, so she rode around the park by herself for awhile and then went home. After the art, I also rode around part of the park. This park just has free bikes for anyone to take and use that you just leave wherever if you are finished. The first bike I had was way too small, so it was pretty comical to ride, but the second one was just right for cruising around the grasslands. I took a few pictures, but a big black monster of a raincloud was threatening to eat me, so I had to head to the park gates to catch the bus.

When I got to the bus stop (actually it was a little van that carted people to the real bus stop), I asked the information booth when it would arrive. He smiled and told me 20 minutes. I was a bit disappointed that I hadn't spent that time in the park, but it began to rain and I squatted on the sidewalk. Twenty minutes past, 30, 40, and then after almost an hour, the little van came. Then I was in a rush to get home because I thought our neigbor was cooking dinner for us, but when I arrived, there was no sign of dinner.

We helped this Polish neighbor the night before with editing her 106 page thesis. Took 7 hours of working and chatting, but in the end she told us that she would make us dinner the next night for our troubles. Never happened. I am not bitter at all, but Sam and I did wait all night without eating. Miraculously, another neighbor knocked on my door at around 10 and commanded that Sam and I come eat because they made too much food. So instead, at around 11 we ate with 6 crazy Brazilians and a Romanian. Great food, but it was almost all meat and cheese. I am pretty sure he invited us because the weekend before he forgot to pick us up for a party when he said we should wait for him. But hey, free dinner at the price of helping with the dishes. I'll take that any day.

This week we have been analyzing our data from the zoo. We have become more and more apathetic about this course every day. It was nice to partake in, but putting forth a lot of effort for a class you aren't getting credit from just seems pointless. And it has been gloomy and depressingly drizzly, which does not encourage us to bike across town at 8 a.m. It is all over tomorrow, when we present our project. There is an exam for the class on Friday, but we are skipping it (yes, we okayed it with our advisor, and no we aren't going to get in trouble from the University or get kicked out of the dorm (Dad)). Instead we are taking a very long bus to spend a few days in Berlin. Yes, we are slackers; we know.