some highlights from Delft, The Hague and Prague
So I'm currently in Berlin (day two) but everyone knows I won't have time to write in LJ if I leave this for when I get back to Australia so here goes some highlights and photos from Delft, Den Haag and my last day in Amsterdam.
Delft is a quaint town in the south of Holland. The home and resting place of the artist Vermeer (who I love because he painted ordinary women doing ordinary things). Delft is also the home of "Dutch" pottery and blue and white glass work which was copied from the iconic Chinese style of decorating porcelain, tiles and pottery. We ended up buying a little framed tile of a cow in the country side - the tile was an original from 1625 and we found it at a antique store that claims to have been there for hundreds of years! (This was our first souvenir! Yay)
We walked te gorgeous cobbled stone streets, over little bridges (the water levels in the canals were quite high) and visited the Old and New Church. The Old Church is like the Dutch version of leaning tower of Piza but not as popular. The Church tower is at a 2m tilt (totally visible) and looks like it might fall down!
For lunch we ate the best damn burger I've had on my trip so far ! Definitely better than some I've had back home too. It was from a popular place I Delft called Zondag -
After Delft - The Hague was a let down. It was raining and miserable so we quickly wandered the streets and didn't have time to go into museums or to the Henrick Panoram painting whih I was dying to see. We did however walk through the central library of The Hague, China Town and HEMA grocery store (Luke and I love checking out grocery stores when travellung) and we saw some lovely / forward / culturally diverse art sculptures in the street of women in hijabs doing normal things like riding bikes and playing on phones. The Haugue seemed a lot more diverse than Amsterdam and there were Chinese, Japanese, Indonesian, Indian, Lebanese, Surinamese and Turkish restaurants and clothes stores everywhere.
On our last day in Amsterdam we packed early and went to Van Gogh museum - I loved it because the narrative was clear and it really showed how Van Gogh's talent progressed given he only started his career at 27! I thought the Rijksmuseum ha a wider collection but places like Rembranta House and Van Gogh Museum are a must see simply because I love stories and I love characters and it's the smaller museums that give me that storytelling feel.
We were not allowed to take pictures but these are a few sneakies!
After Van Gogh, Luke had "Vla" - he'd been dying to try that since the Boom Chicago show about Dutch people.
Afterwards, we finally got to catch up with Barak and Marije!!! We drank great local beer which I am currently craving (it was the best beer if had so far on the trip) and I at least had a delicious Indonesian inspired spicy chicken sandwhich!
I love these guys as a couple after meeting Marije only this one time! She is perfect for Barak!!
Delft is a quaint town in the south of Holland. The home and resting place of the artist Vermeer (who I love because he painted ordinary women doing ordinary things). Delft is also the home of "Dutch" pottery and blue and white glass work which was copied from the iconic Chinese style of decorating porcelain, tiles and pottery. We ended up buying a little framed tile of a cow in the country side - the tile was an original from 1625 and we found it at a antique store that claims to have been there for hundreds of years! (This was our first souvenir! Yay)
We walked te gorgeous cobbled stone streets, over little bridges (the water levels in the canals were quite high) and visited the Old and New Church. The Old Church is like the Dutch version of leaning tower of Piza but not as popular. The Church tower is at a 2m tilt (totally visible) and looks like it might fall down!
For lunch we ate the best damn burger I've had on my trip so far ! Definitely better than some I've had back home too. It was from a popular place I Delft called Zondag -
After Delft - The Hague was a let down. It was raining and miserable so we quickly wandered the streets and didn't have time to go into museums or to the Henrick Panoram painting whih I was dying to see. We did however walk through the central library of The Hague, China Town and HEMA grocery store (Luke and I love checking out grocery stores when travellung) and we saw some lovely / forward / culturally diverse art sculptures in the street of women in hijabs doing normal things like riding bikes and playing on phones. The Haugue seemed a lot more diverse than Amsterdam and there were Chinese, Japanese, Indonesian, Indian, Lebanese, Surinamese and Turkish restaurants and clothes stores everywhere.
On our last day in Amsterdam we packed early and went to Van Gogh museum - I loved it because the narrative was clear and it really showed how Van Gogh's talent progressed given he only started his career at 27! I thought the Rijksmuseum ha a wider collection but places like Rembranta House and Van Gogh Museum are a must see simply because I love stories and I love characters and it's the smaller museums that give me that storytelling feel.
We were not allowed to take pictures but these are a few sneakies!
After Van Gogh, Luke had "Vla" - he'd been dying to try that since the Boom Chicago show about Dutch people.
Afterwards, we finally got to catch up with Barak and Marije!!! We drank great local beer which I am currently craving (it was the best beer if had so far on the trip) and I at least had a delicious Indonesian inspired spicy chicken sandwhich!
I love these guys as a couple after meeting Marije only this one time! She is perfect for Barak!!