I win at life, lose at wallets

So last night I went out and got massively robbed. Someone at the pub made out with my wallet with 3 credit cards, €80 cash, and my room keys.

A friend in Kaarsenmakerstraat let me crash on her floor, so this morning I woke up having to run around to the police station and to my Rural Development class this afternoon. Talking to a lesbian popo agent with a harsh Dutch accent with a horrible night of sleep under my belt was a fun little experience. Needless to say I've been a wee bit frazzled, retracing my steps to see if I dropped in the bushes or something on my way home, but that was just fruitless. Know I went in to Einstein's with everything- know I got back to my building sans wallet. Great.

But, shit happens, and I've canceled my cards, am getting spare keys tomorrow. Till then, I'm crawling in to my room via the window. I actually kind of like that part. Makes me feel like a badass. It will all be fine, thanks to my AMAZING MAMA. Did you know that currency can travel on wires?

Amsterdam

This weekend I went on my first adventure in Amsterdam. No matter who you talk to, this city always elicits some interesting reactions, expectations, associations. And more or less, they are probably all true, because I feel like anything a person could want for is somewhere to be found within the city's web of canals. I had a great first visit and really enjoyed the city. It's much larger than Leiden, but is manageable, walkable and beautiful. There is an in-your-face quality to parts of touristy Amsterdam that could easily become overwhelming, but that's a part of what the city is, too. It's a pretty unabashed place, and I like that.

We caught our 25m train at 11 in the morning. Here's a shot of the double-decker bike parking at Leiden Centraal station -
I've been trying to describe the bike situation over here,
hope this helps illustrate the quantity, confusion and awesomeness

In the Museum Quarter's open square
We spent several hours at the wonderful Van Goh Museum, housing the largest collection of Van Gogh's work and included some of his correspondence with his brother, art merchant Theo Van Gogh, and his other painter friends. We spent the rest of the day wandering around the streets, just taking it all in

Vondelpark, Amsterdam's sprawling 100+ acre park, is named after writer and playwright

Joost van den Vondel, the "Dutch Shakespeare" -
We walked around a bit, but it was wet and cold out,
so I'm looking forward to coming back on a sunny, warm day

Christiaan Huygens, Dutch mathematician and astronomer
famous for his work with telescopes and pendulum clocks

Tall, skinny Dutch urban homes and offices-
Property used to be taxed on "frontage," so the narrower the face of the house, the less you paid

The Dutch Royal Palace -
Amsterdam is the capital of the Netherlands, but it's more or less just a title- all of the official parlimentary and royal business is handled in Den Haag

Laura, Margaret, Kata in Dam Square in front of the palace -

Dam Square got its name from its original function as a dam on the Amstel River which runs through Amsterdam

Outdoor flower market!
Tulip craze

Colorful baby cacti at the flower market!

DIY kit comes with a little flower pot, soil, & cannabis seeds

Flowerz!

After sampling a coffeeshop, the Hungarians and I decided an

Erotic Museum was a good use of €5 - it so was.
This woodcut is one of my favorites.
Anna Wagner, please reproduce this for our house next year

Watching hilarious old school cartoon porn at the Erotic Museum

We were really lucky to have such a nice day to walk around the city, it was sunny all afternoon

At a modern art gallery in De Pijp

This definately made me think of the Lips publication!

Gorgeous old houses in the Southern Canal Belt

We went out to eat, stopped in to another coffeeshop, and then went out for drinks. This is a view of the late night ice skating from the bar in the Leidsplein square

Coming back home to sweet Leiden -
A shot of the city biking home at six in the morning

Bicycling and wall poetry

I finally got a bike! I found it at a little used goods store a few blocks from my building for under €100. I then spent the day whizzing around Leiden- exploring goes by a lot faster on two wheels!

Bicycle = "fiets"

Zoom!

Upon arriving in Leiden, I noticed that there is a public art project all over the city. Giant poems are printed on the sides of buildings and walls all over town. It's really lovely, the longer you've been here, the more you find just around corners. I found a few new ones on my bike adventure this afternoon.

Wahrlich, Igeborg Bachmann

Basho

Danse Africaine, Langston Hughes

Sonnet XXX, William Shakespeare

Das ist die Sehnsucht, Rainer Maria Rilke

Zawarte Zwanen, Paul Marijnis

Quevedo y Villegas, Francisco Gomez

Some other wall doo-dads...

Outside a Coffeeshop a few blocks away

Streets of Leiden are pretty badass -

Notice the city symbols of the lion and St. Peter's keys to heaven's gates

Inside these walls...

Kata (Budapest, Hungary), Margaret,

Laura (Budapest, Hungary), Gen (Singapore/London, UK)


Erm, €1 Jager, €2 Heineken?
Olivia (Sydney, Australia), Kata (Budapest, Hungary), Margaret

First day of class in the rain and snow

More snow, rain and fog today. The best treatment for this, I've found, is my new Dutch delight...

Half of an appeltaart: my new favorite lowland dessert

Today was my first day of class at Universiteit Leiden. I started my "Rural Development" course at the department for Cultural Anthropology & Development Sociology.

The Pieter de la Court building for Social Sciences where most of my classes will be -
Looking like many a social sciences academic building:
narrow windows, 1970s exterior, and mustard yellow

I'm actually really excited about this course- the professor is French and speaks Dutch as well as pretty good English. She does a lot of work for sustainable land management in decolonialized Africa, and we'll be learning about the organization of food production, trade agreements involving peasant communities, and industrial agribusiness versus more traditional models of community farmers and nomads. I think it will be very interesting, and will certainly allow me to draw on past experiences and coursework.

Other than that, I've been going out with lots of international students here in Leiden and having a great time. A few highlights: watching a piss-drunk "Niiick ze Greeek" roll up three joints on the bar in the middle of a packed pub and receiving 1000s of "are you serious" looks from fellow patrons, smiling, walking out of the pub and bonding over a firestick with a homeless lady named Oogah or something equally as melodic; explaining to a tall, skinny, blond Latvian why it's so funny that his nickname is O.J.; watching a drunken couple toss a bicycle into a canal at 4 in the morning; having a lovely dinner with a Polish gal, Scot and Irishman where we attempted to recreate out Dutch pancake experience and were left with more of a scrambled batter and cheese dish; and, purchasing two new houseguests, Lola and Frank.

Frank & Lola hard at work oxygenizing #13

Den Haag

Snow early in the morning on the Kaarsenmakerstraat courtyard

Out for Italian at O' Sole Mio in Leiden

Margaret, Curtis (Sioux Falls, USA), Anna (Baton Rouge, USA), Elfa (Reykjavík, Iceland)

Windmill

Went on a day trip to the Hague, the Dutch seat of government and home of Queen Beatrix. The Hague used to be the capital city of the Netherlands, until Mr. Bonaparte rolled around and installed his government in Amsterdam. After the French were kicked out, the government returned to Den Haag, but Amsterdam remained the official capital.

Train station -
It's a short 15 m ride from Leiden Centraal

Den Haag Centre
Kata (Budapest, Hungary) & Margaret

Ridderzaal (Knight's Hall) from the 1200s in the Binnenhof, where most of the Dutch parliamentary buildings are found in Den Haag -
The courtyard outside was used for executions "back in the day"

Baller office, Beatrix -
The inscription on the golden gate seal reads: "Je maintiendrai,"
or, I will maintain

Queen's garden park behind her office in Den Haag

Environmentalist canal flags read: "Year of Green, 2009"

Dutch King William of Orange
He married Queen Mary II of England, giving him power over England and Scotland -
William & Mary was charted in their name

Canal view from the Binnenhof buildings

Mauritshuis museum in the classical 1600s Dutch mansion style

The Mauritshus houses several Rembrandts and Vermeers,
including Girl with a Pearl Earring

Andy Warhol's Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands at Mauritshus
She's in her 70s now, but she was pretty fierce back in her day, it looks