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We awoke early to leave the campsite and drove into Amsterdam to pick up the luggage we had stored at the B & B. We parked there and packed up all of our delicious souvenirs (too many of course--next time: no souvenirs), cleaned out the van, decided what to give away, left the newly packed luggage at the B & B and returned the van before our 2:00 PM deadline.
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We hurried (taking two trams and walking… we'd learned our way around a bit) to the Hollandsche Schouwburg [This Web site is quite good.], the Dutch memorial to the Jews at the deportation site.…. again with the list of names. The name of every Amsterdam Jewish family deported is etched in glass on large panels in what at one time was the lobby of a theater. We found our families' names:
Others had brought the customary pebbles and the candles we had seen in Poland on Easter.
The Dutch Resistance Museum around the corner, caused us to wonder whether Dutch resistance was greater and whether there are other museums about resistance. We don't remember seeing any other museums in our travels. The resistance of the Dutch really was quite widespread in the population, as exemplified by the general strikes (there's even a monument to the dock strikers, nearby). This museum really is also worth seeing. It was there that Mark recognized the name Gerrit Van Der Veen. He decided to "open the circle" by taking a "portrait of the day" in front of the sign of the school near where we'd been staying.
A little research turns up a few more museums to resistance:
Finally, we rushed by foot and tram to the Van Gogh Museum to see the Rembrandt-Caravaggio exhibition, the first time the works have been shown together, despite the fact that Rembrandt was very influenced by Caravaggio through his teacher.... Debbie comments that Caravaggio really has stronger colors and outshines the Rembrandt, though all are quite beautiful and use similar themes. Mark was more intrigued by the location of the light sources in Rembrandt's work as well as what he felt was the greater emotional drama of the way in which Rembrandt depicted some of the same scenes as Caravaggio.
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We saw what used to be called The Jewish Bride, the poster of which we had bought when we went through Amsertdam on our way to Isarel a week after our wedding
Mark was thrilled by the opportunity to look into Rembrandt's eyes (an early portrait he can't find on the Web where the eyes are simply black spots, not the carefully delineated optical openings usually painted).
Mark thinks he found a spelling error (or "typo") in the Balthazar's Banquet painting
It appears that what should be a final nun (in God's hand): ן is a ז.
Then on to find our "final restaurant for dinner". We wanted to eat at a highly recommended veggie restaurant. We even had an address, but after roaming the street and asking several people who sent us in all directions, we finally learned that it had closed. We ended up at another veggie place for yummy food and headed back to the B & B… but…
On Thursday we awoke early, had breakfast, took a cab and spent the next approximately twenty-four hours in transit.
At home we put all our luggage in one place. Yes, that's all it was for ten weeks... and went to bed.
In the morning (through blurry eyes) we looked at the piles of mail that had accumulated over the previous ten weeks (it could fill our luggage!).
