Capture the moment…

Capture the moment… be present. be still.  be here.  You’ll be okay…

I look over and see the green bunches of leaves that were drooping now swinging and that same breath of wind now dances its way slowly over to me, gently pulling the hanging strands of hair that have dried long and loose today.  One, two, three. One two three.  I imagine a waltz but I don’t know if that’s because it really is one or because it’s the only type of dance I can think of (well, that and the cha cha, but it certainly isn’t that one…).  We pick up the dance again now and then, swaying to the melody of birdsong joined now and then by buoyant bursts of merriment from laughing kids playing (probably kicking a football—soccer ball—), somewhere a couple blocks away.  Faint and intermittent barking and softly rumbling engines carry the beat.  one two three…

(now, I suppose if I’m to be completely honest in my writing and if I want to accurately paint the entirety of the scene surrounding me, I should admit that my phone sits on the chair next to me on my left, playing its own melodies—and throwing off my whole 1-2-3 waltzing rambling a little…—to the “Rhythm of One Heart Beating”…).  Λοιπόν… (Anyway…)

Now, every once in a while, the gentle breath that invites me to dance sends, too, a subtle smattering of goose bumps down my arms (arms bared to the sun to soak in thewonder of such a beautiful day and the downright awe that it’s all happening in February… πολύ ωραία… (very beautiful/lovely/wonderful).  I close my eyes against the brightness of a sun starting to make its scheduled evening descent. Will you leave so soon? Stay a while longer…

I close my eyes and let the warmth settle over me and chase away the wind’s tempting chill.  And in this way I can postpone the inevitability of donning my waiting jacket just a little bit longer…

Capture the moment.. see feel taste the beauty of the day.  The gift of the present.  Breathe it in and let it out…

Did you ever imagine you would be here? Not simply warm and outside in a tanktop on a Saturday in February… Not just living for a stint in a new country immersed in a culture, language, loveliness entirely different…

Not even just curled up like a cat on a chair on the little rooftop space kitty-corner from your bedroom window with a view of the surrounding mountains beyond the trees embracing you under the bluest sky streaked here and there by the faintest and lightest brushstrokes of clouds masterfully and artfully placed in the purest white, the wind dancing with your hair, the orchestra picks up the tune…And the sun—close your eyes and raise you sunkissed a little higher for just a moment… breathe in and breathe out…. let the warmth and the moving stillness fill you, settle you, sustain you…

No.  Not even just here in this place in this moment (though truly I never ever imagined I’d find myself writing on a rooftop in February and a tank top under the beautiful bright Greek sun…).  No.  Even more.  The gentle sailing of your pen across the page in rolling waves of inky blue that leaves a lingering wake of these foamy white beautiful memories, brings now to you a feeling of purpose and completeness in your writing that you hadn’t realized until now that you had been missing.  And now it moves to find the words to describe a moment you could never in your wildest or calmest dreams ever ever imagine….

Capture the moment.  feel the chill of the waltzing whispering wind.  let your ears stretch to the happily mumbling birds and that pesky bumbling bee buzzing by your head.  lift your face one more time to the sun, now setting a bit lower on this beautiful day, promising more soon to come with a bright shining wink. 

Capture the moment. Breathe in.  Breathe out.  Be present.  Be still.  Be here.  Be grateful.  Be content.  Smile.  You are okay…

~*~

και η ζωή είναι ωραία...

~*~

Day 15: Favorite city…

Day: 15

Countries: 4               Cities: 7

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Favorite city…

Day 15 

Sunday 3 January 2016

Just realized I've typed every entry so far under the year 2015. Whoops. Guess the tradition lives on, transitioning from incorrectly dating worksheets in grade school to incorrectly dating journal. Alas. This whole New Year thing shall take some getting used to…At any rate, I have a whole year left still to get it right…

Anyway.

Current status:

Sitting at a short counter in the small second floor loft of a tiny, Dutch, corner cafe called Small Talk Coffee Corner; sipping on a frothy cappuccino sprinkled with these delicious little sugar rocks (discovered they were sugar and not salt after careful and thorough investigation, namely, the oh so reliable taste test); listening to the clunking of dishes coming out of the dishwasher from down below and the clinking of silverware being put away in their rightful places, all to the background tunes of your favorite American boogie dance hits (We're “staying alive” here in Amsterdam on this beautiful Sunday afternoon…).

~

Updated status: sitting across from Gracie at a table with a single red candle and a hanging lamp over head, one of those colored glass dome ones like grandma and grandpa used to have in their den by the davenport (not their living room by their couch, like most people might call it… J); in a little Italian restaurant off the beaten path in Jordaan in Amsterdam, called Cafe Koevet; with soft Frank Sinatra-esque music basking us in its soft tunes; with four other people in total in the restaurant—a Dutch speaking couple at the table kitty-korner (or, as Gracie would say, katty-korner) from us and two workers who welcomed us in; a dark interior highlighted by white napkins and silver silverware and glowing red candles under the muted light; and a menu that promises this will be a wonderful meal, hopefully the icing on the cake of a wonderfully filling and delightful day J

~

Update number 3:

It was. It was the most delicious icing for the most delectable of days. And that's enough of that metaphor…

~

Recap:

We had quite the full and wonderful day. Starting right away again, at 7 am. Or more accurately, like 715 or 718 or so. Anyway. We got ready and headed out into the rainy dreary dark. I swear it felt like 6 am and was almost as dark as when we'd come back the night before…

And it's quiet. I mean for 8-9 am on a Saturday or Sunday morning I would have thought there'd be more people out and about. But only a few bikes were dinging their way down the sidewalk. The rest were all parked.

We made the 2.5 mi trek to our breakfast recommendation for the day (brought to us by those girls we met at dinner Christmas Eve—really glad we ran into them). Omelegg. So good. New best breakfast of the trip and we've had a couple pretty fantastic breakfasts. Fresh made omelettes. Home baked bread. Fresh squeezed Appel juice. The best juice I've ever drank (? drunk? drinken? [[okay, I know for sure it’s not the last one but the drank vs. drunk war continues to wage…will have to ask my Greek students who are grammar pros compared to me…).  Anyway. The juice was like liquid apple pie. So good. Glad we went.

And then we walked back towards the Van Gogh Museum in Museum Square about a half mile back. Got there just in time for our pre-purchased tickets’ time stamp. Skipped the line and walked in, checked our coats, and then started checking out the museum. Very nice museum. Well put together. Told a story of his life, with highlights from the letters he would write to his brother with whom he was very close.

Though we’d learned about Van Gogh in art class every grade since grade one (and had an age-appropriate art project to match), there were some things I didn't realize—like how mentally sick he was, that he shot himself in the chest, that he did almost all his work in the span of 10 years, that in the last year of his life he painted almost a painting a day, that his sister-in-law and later his nephew was largely responsible for spreading his work. And other things like that. Or that he drew almost as much as he painted. And he was so disciplined, basically teaching himself how to paint and paint well. And then practice practice practicing…

It was a neat museum. But we were so tired. And standing and looking at art just makes you even more tired. And we needed a little break. To just sit down. Oh and it was kinda crazy. They had these little sitting boxes made out of two by fours where people could sit if they got overstimulated by the art. Apparently, there’s some legitimate syndrome where people actually get dizzy and overwhelmed from looking at too much art for too long in too concentrated of a setting/dose.

Next, we went over to the Modern Art Museum to check out their gift shop next because a painter Gracie's mom really likes has some work there. Then we crossed the street and found the little corner cafe where I started this entry. And then we walked down the street to the other corner of Museum Square where the Rhijks Museum is. In front of it is the Iamsterdam sign so we stopped there for a quick selfie before heading into the museum.

It's a very nice museum. Quite the collection of Dutch artwork from the medieval ages and then from the 17th century on. And some insanely huge paintings and other paintings with great detail. But again, we were tired. Took a break on one of the couches. Skimmed over a painting here or there. But it was a good trip.

Then we walked along the canal a couple blocks and stopped for desert in this cute little cake shop Taart de m'n Tante. Delicious!  Then we walked to the Heineken experience which was right there. Which was a pretty fun at your own pace walk through interactive tour.

After we were ready for an actual dinner and we were thinking maybe Italian. So we started walking back toward the area we were in the first night, Ledseiplen (which sounds to me like led Zeppelin in a Dutch accent). But the restaurants there looked too bright and touristy and mediocre. So we kept walking and then stopped by a corner tour ticket office to mooch off their wifi and look up Italian restaurants near us. Gracie found one randomly off some little blog that was  about a mile away so we walked there. That's where this entry continued. And it ended with gnocchi alla sorentina which was hot and fresh and delicious and amazing. Rivals real Italian food. And we had this amazing bread with fancy olive oil decorated with balsamic. So good.

And then we walked in the rain diagonally toward our air bnb. We stopped at this little corner organic local market and picked up some snacks. And then we came back to our place. Just past 8. Burning the midnight oil here.  Caught up with people from home.  Then we attempted repacking and reorganizing all our stuff and amazingly and surprisingly enough managed to fit it all into our two bags each. Which is really good.

We just finished the movie we fell asleep during the other night and now just relaxing and catching up here before calling it a night. Early start tomorrow for our travel day to Dublin. Will have to navigate the tram to the train to the plane to the however we will get to the center of Dublin. Anyway. Goodnight for now.

Amsterdam, you are wonderful. Today was so fun and I'd recommend everything we did to anyone. Amsterdam, I think you are my favorite place so far. Goodnight. 

~

Day 14b:

Day: 14b

Countries: 4               Cities: 7

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Steps through Amsterdam…

Day 14b

Saturday 2 January 2016

But there's still so much left that we did to write about…

(And it doesn’t seem quite right to so abruptly shift from…. So we’ll continue our steps through Amsterdam on a different page, in a different post.  Day 14, part two…)

After walking through the Anne Frank House, which took two hours that didn't feel like two hours, we went to the Pancake Bakery and had these delicious and huge pancakes. It was delicious. So filling. Don't even want to think about the calories that filled me up today. Those pancakes did keep us pretty well filled for pretty much the entire day.

After second breakfast, we walked around, saw the Tulip Museum, walked in and out of a few cheese shops that offered free samples. Across the canals. Past many a bicycle. Up and down these cute little streets lined with cute little narrow houses that I just want to move into today—and decorate with all of the cute little decoratives from all of the funky, cute, neat little homeware stores that lined the other side of the streets we walked...

We meandered around most of the day, walking here and there and everywhere, from one spot on our Tripomatic app map to the next. Walked briefly through the red light district which was uncomfortable and sad. Hard to see women actually in windows like that, striking up business deals, and people walking through there for whom this was not just a tourist stop to check off on the map. How? A different kind of awful.

But otherwise most everything we saw was really—just cool, neat, charming, nice. All these cool little shops and cute little houses, and neat little rivers, and nice little restaurants, and cozy little coffee places, and delicious little bakeries. (okay, so they weren’t all necessary “little” as in small, but taking advantage of writer’s license and for the sake of parallelism and figurative language and imagery and all that jazz, let’s just throw that adjective into the mix half a dozen times or so… anyway.). 

Nary a place we wouldn't have wanted to go.

Other stops on our tour included Dam Square, the National Monument, Droog Design, various cheese stores and other (“little”) hipster/unique/small local shops, Waterloo Flea Market Square, this tiny 1647 floating house boat restaurant, the Rembrandt Museum (well, at least its gift shop), across the bridge to Rembrandt Square and the Flower Market (tulips galore) and the canal tours ticket office and more cheese stores and Beginhof, the cutest little medieval square ever to walk through…

By then we were ready to sit for a bit so we went to Brix Food and Cafe. Cool atmosphere.  A nice little find. After, we were ready to head over to the canal cruise. We got there and waited in line for about an hour before boarding a little boat for 20 euro that took us calmly and peacefully through the maze of canals, past all these light installations about friendship that were created as part of the light festival. It was pretty cool. My favorites were this one where it looked like a man running then jumping over the bridge, one with colored rope strung all along the river connecting the people in a story, and the last one which was two people rowing with less than 40 lights moving in just the right way so that your mind filled in the rest. It took the guy 8 years to figure out the technology for it. It was pretty neat.

After that we stepped back into the rainy cold, coldest it's been all day. And we headed back to this Foodhallen place we’d stumbled upon the night before (go if you're ever in Amsterdam). And we thought about food but really weren't hungry for it. So then just walked back… And had chocolate for dinner. And got caught up here. And now need to catch back up with sleep. So tired. Good night from the lovely, lovely city of Amsterdam. :) 

~

Day 14a: Walking in her steps…

Day: 14a

Countries: 4               Cities: 7

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Walking in her steps…

Day 14a 

Saturday 2 January 2016

I like Amsterdam. A lot.

You know you like a city when, even in the rain and dreary weather it still manages to charm you. J  I think this might be my favorite city yet. Maybe even better than Rome… Yep, I think (now, reflecting on it a couple months later, definitely better…).  It’s like Budapest with that instant captivating charm but with wayyy better food.

Started off today fairly early, wishing for just a little more sleep but with a pretty good night’s rest behind me. I could hardly keep my eyes open for the movie last night and we both decided to turn it off early and turn in. Before midnight.  Us old ladies can't quite handle these late nights in new cities like we used to ;) … But that's ok.

We woke up and got going, heading toward the Anne Frank House first thing for our 930 tour time. Both of our morning cafe recommendations were still closed that early, but fortunately we found a decent place right across the street from the Anne Frank House that sold coffee and fresh-made stroop waffles. One of the best things known to man.  A sweet, delectable specialty of Amsterdam.  Like a thin cross between a waffle and a pinelle (like our former neighbor/adopted grandmother, Lucille, used to make) and then you carefully slice it in half and smother stroop syrup (almost like a caramely, maple-syrupy type concoction) in the middle, and then put it back together and it's crunchy and sweet and melts in your mouth and is just downright delicious. So that was our (not-so-nutritious-but-delicious) breakfast.

Next up was the Anne Frank House which was pretty incredible. Impressively and well done. Informative. Poignant. Impacting. Powerful. Moving. That's the word in looking for. Moving. Struck a cord. Triggered the tears. At multiple points. And I don't often cry. But at seemingly random moments, it just hits sometimes…

I'm glad we bought our tickets ahead of time online. Well worth it. We skipped the huge line that had formed outside, down the street and around the block. People waiting in line for hours standing in the chill and misty rainy dreariness waiting. We also got a good history/overview of the Frank family and the annex and the circumstances and the history surrounding. Which was really nice to have a refresher course, set the context, and learn more details about Anne's life.

And then after the overview we were able to walk through the house at or own pace, following a bit of a line with the build-up of people.

You start on the bottom floors of her father’s factory/office and work your way up narrow, steep stairs, learning more, seeing pictures from the family or of the refurbished replica rooms or hearing from people who knew the family giving their testimonies. Carefully and poignantly picked portions of her diary printed on the walls.

And then there is the original bookcase built to hide the staircase to the annex.

And then you go up.

And you see the tiny rooms. Not furnished but you can imagine. It's more impactful and powerful not furnished.

Your mind and your heart fills in the blanks.

And you're left walking through the rooms fighting back tears,

mouth pressed in a thin line,

eyes open wide,

 moving slowly of their own accord, one in front of the other in front of the other…

mind reeling

                                   

This happened.

This really happened.

And what about all the other Anne Frank's for whom there was no hiding place and now have no museum? There's a book there, In Memoriam, which has the names of over 100,000 Jews who were deported and killed. It's bigger than a dictionary.  With print almost as tiny as the print I would use to cram all of my science notes onto an index card before a big test… Filled with names.

Just names. 

Of people.

Who were killed.

For no reason.

It's awful. Sickening.  The hate.  How………

And then at the end of the tour you see her actual diary and you hear more from people who knew her and also from people today who have been impacted by her.

"Her would-haves are our opportunities."

I read the The Diary of Anne Frank when I was younger. First when I was pretty young and then again later when I could appreciate it more. I bought it again so I could read it once more and appreciate it even more with memories of this place lingering to fit with it, give more substance to her words.

I'd forgotten she'd written with such passion and purpose. And I didn't realize she was seeking publication. And I never imagined how her dad had to be strong enough to read it and then try to get it published. I didn't realize he had been so involved and instrumental in the museum. It was his wish that it be left unfurnished. It's just so....

And now how do I go on with the rest of the day? When my mind is still trying to process that…

~

Day 13: Ringing in the New Year and Starting Somewhere New…

Day: 13

Countries: 4               Cities: 7

Berlin, Germany à Amsterdam, Netherlands

Ringing in the New Year and Starting Somewhere New…

Day 13

Friday 1 December 2015

I woke up this morning, just in time to ring in the New Year anew with my family staying up late half way around the world back home. After spending a short night wrapped in a sheet with my head propped up on my scarf and sweatshirt, hugging the edge of the bed and trying not to kick Gracie at the foot of the bed in the face (hazards of trying to split a bed for two among four girls, but it suited just fine...).

We didn't end up making it all the way to Brandenburg Gate for the main New Year’s celebration last night but we managed to metro last minute to Alexanderplatz and rang in the New Year among a crowd of people, in the midst of firework-smoky air, jumping at each pop and crack and bright light from crazy amount of fireworks being set off every which way on the street—even just from the bare hands of the people that surrounded us.

It was something to behold for sure.

After we'd had officially crossed into 2016 (hmmmm, I guess this was technically the shortest year of my life since I rang it in in the US at the beginning of 2015 and then said “so long” a few time zones earlier in Germany…. So 2015 was technically 7 hours shorter than every other year I’ve lived… hmmmmm… maybe the hours make up somewhere…anyway…)…. After we'd had officially crossed into 2016, a little prematurely or not aside, we made our way back to the hotel, the excitement and fireworks continuing all along the road, from one year into the next.

When we got back upstairs to our room, I was trying to organize my stuff and thought I'd lost my phone charger cord. Turns out I didn't but I spent a good hour looking everywhere except where it was and trying not to fret about it. Found it this morning in a last minute sweep/let's-just-make-sure-I-don’t-have-anything-in-this-side-of-the-closet, and lo-and-behold-lookie-here there's my cord! Sigh of relief. Ufda.  Is it weird that those moments of frantically searching and fretting into the next morning was a practice in handling how to lose things better? If that makes any sense at all… anyway.  That could probably be another blog post for another day, but back to our journey…

Anyway. That was the rest of our New Years night. Four girls dodging fireworks in the streets of Berlin then curling up four to a double twin bed trying to sleep through the sound of fireworks. But not a bad night.

This morning Gracie and I woke up, got our stuff together, then got on a train. There wasn't much open in the station so we ended up (again!) only eating train station bread and chocolate for a majority of the day. Whoops…

Our train ride was kinda long but not bad. A little chilly. Some fog covering the passing scenery. Green fields. Square buildings. Miniature horses. Slept for a bit. Organized/planned/wrote some postcards. Made some resolutions (hmmmm, how well am I sticking with those 2 and a half months in?? I should go back and check/reflect/evaluate/maybe renew….). Listened to music…

And then we got here to Amsterdam and it is such a neat city! I had a good vibe like an “I-kinda-really-like-this-place” kind of feeling. We trammed to our air bnb, a small but nice attic in a little apartment in a good part of town. We walked the mile and a half from there to the main restaurant/going out neighborhood. A nice walk: down and over and down and over again and again. Cross the canal then turn right for a block then turn left and walk past three canals, turning along the fourth. See the canals lined with houseboats. So cute! Let's live in a tiny house!

We tried to go to the Indonesian restaurant recommended by friends, and thought we'd found it and made our way there, but then realized it wasn’t the same one after the fact.  Ah well. We had a delicious meal. A variety of dishes to try a little bit of everything. Rice. And peanut sauce salad and chicken skewer. And soy sauce pork. And chicken curry. And spicy beef stew. And these little crunchy straws band fried bananas for dessert. And then after dinner they brought us out a whole pitcher of water for free and it was cold. And the wait staff was nice and attentive. A refreshing and surprising change from the abrupt German waiters we'd had the last week or so. So that was dinner.

And though it was only like 630 we were kinda tired. We walked around the area and sat down for dessert (mini pancakes with ice cream and toffee sauce. Pforfetjes or something like that). We made a gameplan for tomorrow. Said goodbye to our little mouse friend (who’d come out from underneath the booth kitty corner from us to say hello and grab some crumbs for dinner...). And then we walked back. Stopped at that little homey homemade shop on the way back. Got a ginger soda that wasn’t my favorite. Showered. Caught up here. And now we are watching Netflix. Another good day. Two weeks down. One full week to go. Woo! We are in Amsterdam!!! :) 

~

Day 12: Happy Birthday!

Day: 12

Countries: 3               Cities: 6

Berlin, Germany

Happy Birthday!

Thursday 31 December 2015

I suppose I can use this time before we go out for the night to write and catch up on the day instead of just mindlessly scrolling through Facebook. Today was a pretty darn good day. We just had a really delicious meal, one of the best we’ve had in a while: Chicago Williams Barbecue. If ever you find yourself in Berlin, go there. Do not pass go. Do not collect 200 dollars. Just go and get yourself some delicious barbecue.

We did that thing again today where we kept postponing actually eating a meal, just snacking instead. So it got to be almost 4 in the afternoon and all we'd had was a donut and some coffee and the half of a slice of pizza we’d shared. And we'd been walking around all day, lugging all of our belongings. But when we were looking up our hotel for the night on the map I was just scanning the area for places to eat and this came up. And since our previous attempts at bbq the past few days had fallen through (and we'd been craving it) we decided to give it a try. We walked to where it was supposed to be just a block or two away and found it, but found also that it wouldn't open ‘till 5. We were willing to wait.

But I was also in need of some food. So we searched out a cafe and found one across the street from our hotel. But it was closing. And the one next to that was full. But on our second passby the lady sitting at the bar in the window gave us a thumbs up, so we went in just as two people were leaving and their seats opened. The guy who worked there was super nice. I had some delicious carrot cake and a café latte that were both really good.

As we were sitting there, we got in contact with Amanda and Gracie and then went across the street to their hotel. We hung out there for a while. Then Gracie and I headed out to check out this bbq place. We got there and the guy behind the bar gave us a spot at the bar even though we didn't have a reservation. Thank goodness! The food was delicious.  Gracie even gave it her the Texas stamp of approval. So good. Mmmmmm…

Anyway.  Afterwards we headed back to the hotel, and now we are back in the room just hanging out and waiting. Fireworks must be a big deal because they are going off everywhere, on the sidewalk even. Boom boom boom. 24/7. Happy New Year…

Okay. So that's the second half of the day. Back to the beginning. Woke up this morning and did a bit of stretching and got packed up for the day. We checked out and then headed out. We metroed to the Kreuzberg area for the third time in as many days. But this time we went their on purpose. The cafe we were looking for was closed for Christmas break. But there was a place right across the street with delicious donuts. And a cappuccino.

Then we kept walking. Stopped and got some cute postcards and a birthday card for mom. Kinda dropped the ball getting one in the mail for her on time (sorry, mom!). Then crossed the street and found a place that sold cute winter headbands. Got one for 10 euro. Good buy. Then kept walking and made our way to the Markethall. There, we found a bunch of free samples and good homemade chocolate and split a piece of pizza. Then kept walking looking for another cafe. But didn't end up staying there. Instead, found a cute paper place.

Then we got back on the train and made our way toward the station from yesterday. We found wifi at a Starbucks near there. And I face timed mom and got to talk to her and wish her happy birthday :) and that was really nice. I'm glad I got to talk to her today. Then we walked and found another store to look around in. And then we metroed/walked to our hotel area and that's where I started writing about today.

So there we are. A pretty good day. Good to be in Berlin. Here's to 2015. Here's to 2016. Hope it's another good year. Happy new year!!!!! :)

PS: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM!! J

~