The semester is finally over! I'm excited to finally get back to the states and eat chipotle, use public restrooms, drive a car, and not pay exorbitant prices for food. Although I'm ready to go back, our plane trip back is 2 weeks after the end of exams, leaving time for travel. Since this is probably going to be the last time for a while that I'm going to get to visit Europe, I wanted to go to a few different places. I didn't have a specific idea of where I wanted to go other than that I wanted to visit areas with a lot of great scenery.
I had heard other friends who were planning on traveling mention that they were using the Eurail pass, a travel ticket sold to people from outside the European Union, specially geared to people doing a lot of traveling in a short amount of time. Options for the pass range from travel within one country for only 3 days to unlimited transportation in the EU for 3 months.
After looking through the options for a while, I settled on the 5 day, 4 country pass. The days did not have to be consecutive, and on those days I was allowed to travel as much as I wanted within Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and Benelux (since the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg are pretty small, they are treated as one country). Having decided upon which countries I would visit, I then had to decide which cities I visited in those countries, and for the sake of consistency with my other trips,t waited too long to start planning. I would be leaving Monday morning, and so throughout Sunday night grappled with figuring out a good route and deciding which cities would be good. The decision process primarily consisted of perusing wikitravel(which, by the way, is an awesome sight if you are trying to learn about a city or region), searching on google for "hiking near _____", checking to see if the hostels in the areas weren't exorbitantly expensive, and then searching national railway sites for route times. I reordered my route several times (finding the most efficient route is an NP-complete problem, after all), and, as the sun rose Monday morning finally figured everything out.
The route I would be taking. Google maps pegs this route at over 3,000 kilometers.
Sunday was the day of the bboying event, so I didn't run around trying doing as many things as some of the other days. This was a really enjoyable break - I was pretty exhausted at this point in the trip from all of the walking and traveling. The event was held in Dourdan, a city about an hour outside of Paris. Most of Dourdan was closed down, because it was both a Sunday and a holiday - Victory in Europe Day, the day the Nazi military officially surrendered to the Allies. The town was pretty small, so it was easy to find the venue. In fact, once I got off the train and walked for a block or two, I was able to hear the music (they were blasting some songs outside), and just follow the sound until I arrived at the venue - how hip hop is that? Very hip-hop, I would say.
The jam was a 2 day event - the first consisted of several different competitions, the main one being a power battle, where different bboys battled for the open eighth slot in the main competition. This also would've been fun to attend, but I didn't go because I wanted to spend the day in Versailles.
The event was held in a theater, which makes a lot of sense - most of the people were probably there to watch the world-class competitors, so obviously it is important that everyone can see. A typical jam is held in a large open room so that between the rounds of the competition people have room to dance, but it wasn't as necessary here. Sitting in a theater for a jam was a novel experience for me. There was also a projector that played short trailers of the bboys on the screen behind the stage, which was also new and interesting. The only downside was that because of all of the power trailers, I heard that "Invaders Must Die" song by the prodigy at least 50 times, which gets old pretty quickly.
The stage where the competition took place.
Even though all of the bboys were doing powermoves, they all added their own unique flavor, which I think is a cool response to the idea in some bboying circles that there is this dichotomy between style and power - these bboys have a lot of style in their power. The final battle was between lil g and marcio, with lil g winning. The stamina of those competitors is amazing - I have no idea how they still have that much energy after throwing moves like that all day. A link to the final battle is below, if you are interested.
That evening I returned to Amsterdam, via the route of train, to metro, to metro, to eurolines bus, to one more train. I arrived home in Amsterdam, exhausted, early Monday morning.
The original idea was to spend 2 days in paris, one in Marseilles, and the last at the jam in Dourdan. Saturday morning, I rode over to the metro station where I would be departing and found the proper kiosk to buy my ticket to marseilles. I was shocked to learn that one way would be 86 euros! That's 129 dollars, my american friends. Considering that my ticket from Amsterdam to Paris was only ~35 euros, this was way too much, especially since I would only be there for a day.
My seemingly flawless and watertight plan was disrupted, and I was scrambling to figure something else out. I finally decided to stay in Paris, and so boarded the tram back to the hostel to reserve a bed for that night (since it was saturday, I wanted to make sure I bought a bed before it was too late and possibly packed). At one of the metro stops, I ran into 2 calvin students from another study abroad trip! They were studying in Spain and decided to spend a weekend in Paris before their return to the states. Crazy stuff.
We decided to go to the Parisian catacombs, which holds the bones of roughly 6 million people - as Paris rapidly expanded in the 17th and 18th century, cemeteries that had previously been on the outskirts of the city turned into prime real estate area, so huge numbers of skeletons were moved to the catacombs.
After walking through the catacombs, the two people from the calvin program and I went our separate ways. Per their suggestion, I decided to check out Versailles.
This was a good idea for several reasons:
1. It was less than an hour outside the city, instead of 3 hours.
2. It was 4 euros round trip, instead of what would've been 160ish.
3. Admission to the Palace of Versailles was free! cool beans.
I don't know how they afford all of this stuff through free admission, but I'm not complaining.
Once the palace closed, I walked down to a nearby pond, and found a footpath. I walked on this footpath east, away from Versailles, for a while. It passed by this plot of gardens that were being farmed by french people, and met up with the road. I followed this road for a few hours until finally heading back.
Lots of small plots, presumably owned by different people.
After doing some more trip planning on one of the computers in the hostel, I attempted again to find the free walking tour. According to the map I had, they were supposed to meet right by the Moulin Rouge, a dance/concert hall in the north of Paris that apparently was the birthplace of the can-can and striptease dancing. It is also notable for having a large red windmill on its roof, which I find less interesting, since I see windmills all the time in Holland. Although I found the area, I failed again at meeting up with the free walking tour group, so I decided to head out on my own.
Heading south, I walked by the Eglise de la Sainte-Trinite, a 140 year old Catholic church, and made my way over to the louvre (still free!), because I didn't have enough time to check out the 3rd floor on the previous day. The floor contained mainly french, dutch, and flemish art.
And this. I saw this.
Since I was planning on having this be my last day in Paris, I continued hitting up the various tourist attractions/historical monuments: I walked to the Grand Palais, Petit Palais, and the Musee de l'armee. Next, I wanted to check out the Cathedral of Notre Dame. On the way, I passed through the Jardin du luxembourg, a nice park which contained the original model of the statue of liberty.
The musee de l'armee. I though it was pretty cool how the shadow was dividing the building right in half.
Depicted - the notre dame church that
WASN'T in the disney movie.
It took a while to make it through the labyrinth that is the street layout of paris, but I eventually made it over to Notre Dame. Upon arriving, I wasn't that impressed - it just seemed like a normal, old church - definitely not deserving of being the subject of an entire novel or Disney movie. I later realized that just as there are multiple statues of liberty in paris, there are multiple notre dames, and I ended up at the lame one (doesn't even have a wikipedia page!). Heading back that night, I also passed by the July Column monument to the French Revolution.
Another bboy picture, this time in the musee de l'armee.
Entirely unrelated song post:
To continue with the theme of cool Canadian musicians (I put up a song by rapper Kyprios in my last post), theres this cool dubstep/electro band I've been listening to lately called Zeds Dead, from toronto. The song here is a remix of a track by the foo fighters.
Just like in my trip to Spain over spring break (which you can read about here), a lot happened on my trip to France, so I'm splitting it up over several posts.
Beforehand/ Wednesday, May 4 I knew that before leaving Europe I wanted to visit France. Its one of those things in the list of "integral study abroad experiences", along with wearing scarves and judging other less-enlightened americans for not having enough of a multicultural perspective. In a manner similar to my trip to Antwerp, I read about a dance competition being held in a city just outside of Paris and used that as an excuse to travel. My plan was to just go and watch, rather than compete.
"But Matt", you might interject, "why would you go all of the way to France for a competition that you are not even participating in?" First off, perceptive reader, I would like to thank you for your well-placed question, giving me an excellent opportunity to segue into talking about the competition in more detail. It is readers like you that make blogs like this possible. Secondly, this competition is not a typical one. Instead, the event promoters managed to get 7 of the worlds best powermovers (powermoves being the momentum-based bboying moves, such as spinning on your head, that people normally think of when they think of bboying). It was going to be a great time just to watch.
The week preceding the event had several holidays, so I had the time off and was able to leave wednesday night, spend two days in Paris, one in some other city, and then sunday in Dourdan at the competition. I would take the Eurolines night bus to get to France - it is about a 6-hour ride, so if I grabbed a late bus, I would be able to sleep on the way and get there early, without having to spend extra on a hostel.
I had this rough plan several weeks in advance, but didn't put too much thought in it, and so on wednesday I was still scrambling to figure out my travel plans. After reading travel website Wikitravel for a while, I decided to go to Marseilles on saturday. I then quickly bought my bus tickets and reserved my hostel rooms several hours before leaving. Around 8:50 wednesday night, I rode the train over to the bus stop, and began the long bus ride. Having used this company once before (on my trip in Spain), I should have realized that getting any amount of good sleep was an impossibility. The seats are perfectly angled to keep you alert as possible, and the temperature of the bus ranges from too cold to awkwardly warm and humid. It is a little bit worse than airline seating - at least airline seats recline. Sorry - I'll stop whining now. It was convenient enough.
Thursday, May 5 I arrived in Paris around 6 am, and headed off to my hostel in order to drop off my bag and grab a map of the city. Since I got there so early, they let me have breakfast, which was great. I also grabbed some extra baguette rolls for lunch and dinner. The fact that they were free meant that they became the primary staple of my diet for the next few days.
Outside the hostel.
Arc de Triomphe
From there, I walked over to the Arc de Triomphe. It seems like there are a lot of triumphal arches in different cities I've visited. I then headed downtown in search of the free walking tour - I was impressed by the free walking tour in Seville, and so wanted to go on one again. However, I could never find the group, so I ended up just walking around the center of town for a while (not a bad fate in itself), eventually heading over to the Louvre. You enter the louvre through the largest of the three glass pyramid structures. They look cool but seem to work like a magnifying glass and focus the light, heating up the inside - I feel bad for the security guards who have to stand in that all day. I was able to enter the museum for free because of my temporary residency in the Netherlands, and so I proceeded to check out the lower two floors, which contain the statue of ramesses II, the statue of aphrodite/venus de milo, the code of hammurabi, the french crown jewels, and a lot of other art.
I was surprised by the large amount of Egyptian artifacts present in the museum - they have over 50,000 objects from ancient Egypt, including scrolls, statues, and jewelry. For some reason, I only expected Western European art, so seeing the Egyptian collection was a nice surprise.
Though this is often the case with more famous museums, the building was as impressive as much of the art. I later learned that the building used to be a palace for French kings until 1682, when they moved to Versailles and kept the Louvre as a place to display their art collection. Its a huge and beatiful structure. Eventually, I made my way over to the mona lisa. There was a big room set aside primarily for that picture, with several other pictures in the room as well. Honestly, I was surprised by how large it is - I had always heard of how small the Mona Lisa is, but it actually is a normal sized painting.
Also that day: a sandwich and french fries - in france! To my dismay, the french fries were not leagues above other non-france french fries I've had before. In fact, they just tasted like normal french fries. Though, I guess thats to be expected, considering that french fries don't even originate in france. The scandal!
That evening, I went over to the Eiffel tower, and took some pictures with it. It was not hard to find the tower, because it rises so much over the rest of the skyline. I didn't end up going in the tower. I later walked along the Seine, found another one of the statues of liberty, and checked out the hippodrome d'auteil (a horse racing track) on the western corner of the city.
That night, after I returned to my hostel. I walked to a nearby convenience store and bought some cheese and meat to put on my baguettes. It wasn't that far from my hostel, but I still managed to get lost for a few minutes on the way back. PROTIP: never say to yourself "hey, i didn't get lost on this trip!" until you actually get home.
Entirely unrelated song post: This is a song by Kyprios, a Canadian rapper that used to be in rap group Sweatshop Union. I think I originally heard this song on the indie rap blog pigeons and planes. The production is really unique for a rap song - kinda dark and drum'n'bass-ish, and it works out really well. Plus, you can download it for free! (Without getting fined over 200,000 dollars for pirating a few tracks). Check out the link below. Kyprios - Go Away (Superhero Remix) by listentosuperhero
After mentioning going to church in my previous post, I thought I talk about it in some more depth. As far as I know, there are only a couple contemporary church services taught in English that are in Amsterdam. I attended Crossroads, one of those churches, once, but wasn't too motivated to return. A couple of weeks later, a friend mentioned the Vineyard Church to me. The vineyard is a movement that started in the US, and this church was recently planted by people in ohio. The website says this about their founding:
"Sent out by Vineyard Columbus (Ohio, USA), seven adults and four children moved to Amsterdam in 2008 and early 2009, in order to assist in the forming of a new community of Jesus-followers in the city. They united with an already existing group of about 15 people, made up mostly of Dutch folks, in the hopes of establishing this community together."
My friend knew the founders of the church from his home in cincinnatti, so when coming here he had been planning on attending. I had heard about the vineyard, but didn't know much about it. In case, you the reader, didn't either, here is the wikipedia article on them: Association of Vineyard Churches. I can also highlight the significant (and by significant, I mean rather strange) points from the article:
They are "neo-evangelical" - important because the term neo-evangelical sounds cool.
It was founded through a combination of Bible studies held by Larry Norman and Chuck Girard, both of whom were pioneers in the CCM (christian contemporary) genre. Ugh, CCM.
Bob Dylan attended some of these bible studies.
The headquarters of the movement are in a city called Sugar Land, which I think, its safe to assume, is one of Candy Land's sister cities.
It is described as the middle ground between evangelicalism and pentecostalism.
The service is held in what used to be a coffee shop, and instead of having rows of pews or chairs all facing the front, the chairs are more grouped around tables or scattered throughout. The sermon and announcements are given in either Dutch or English, and then translated into the other language. Most of the worship music is done in english, which works fine since almost all of the Dutch in Amsterdam have great English. One of the people who is completing an internship at the church mentioned that it is 70% Dutch, and 30% other nationalities, so I've gotten to meet a lot of people from other cultures that way. It has a really informal and tight community feel - I felt really welcomed the first time I came, and actually have gotten to know people. In the past at some churches I've attended, I've gone to the service for a while without actually getting to know anyone, but it makes a huge difference when you build relationships with the people at church. I'm going to miss it when I leave.
A couple of shots from right after church has ended:
April 30
Throughout my time here, when I've talked to Dutch people, they've excitedly told me about Koninginnedag, or queen's day, and asked what my plans for the day were. The day is a celebration of the queen's birthday, although it is not actually on the birthday of the current Queen, Queen Beatrix (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beatrix_of_the_Netherlands). Instead, its on April 30th, the birthday of the previous queen (Queen Juliana).
There are a few things that make Queen's day a unique and crazy holiday:
All of the city streets are packed with people - everyone is partying and milling about, and the canals are packed with boats, all blasting music and full of dancing people.
People partying on a boat. Note the full dj setup.
The city turns into a giant yard sale - people set up a spot on the street and sell their stuff, whether it be books, food/drinks, clothes, or other random trinkets. Even the kids join in the festivities - I saw kids performing musical instruments, doing gymnastics, or selling things of their own.
Everyone is dressed in orange. The royal family is the "house of orange" - William of Orange was the guy that led the dutch in revolt against spanish rule, which was the basis for the founding of the nation.
Bands play all day over at museumplein (a big open field right next to the Concertgebouw and the Van Gogh museum). I think they were mostly Dutch bands - the area was really packed.
Museumplein, early in the morning before it was super crowded
I spent most of the day downtown, just wandering around, and then went back later that night to see if any of the vendors had left free stuff behind. All of downtown Amsterdam was filled with trash.
I've never seen so much trash lying out on the street before - there were food wrappers and broken beer bottles everywhere. At several points I got off my bike and carried it to prevent the tires from being punctured. My foraging efforts proved successful, as I found a cool backpack and a glass goblet/wine glass thing.
Dam square turned into a carnival.
That next day, I went with another Calvin student downtown to the church we've been going to all semester. Normally our trip down to church is somewhat hampered by the normal hustle of urban life, but the city was a lot more empty and quieter than normal. Everyone was obviously recovering from the weekend of action packed festivities. Add "queen's day" to the ever-growing list of things michigan needs.
