Biking in the Snow

The temperatures "plunged" to under 30 degrees every day this past week, and, as one might expect, snow replaced the usual rains. The cooler weather and the snow cleared the bike paths of most of their usual riders. Only half of the slots in the bike racks were used at work; usually they are completely full by 10:00am.

I was surprised last year at how the locals handle (slightly) cold weather. Instead of sharing these thoughts again, I will share what a (Dutch) Facebook friend posted on Facebook on Wednesday:

Once, once my dear friends, we were a great Nation. Dutch people feared nothing, we kicked the asses of the English, the Spanish ( sorry Sinterklaas) and the portuguese. We discovered and conquered new worlds, we invented multinationals and the stock market (ok ok, not our brightest moves)....and now today, the news I read is this my dear friends: In bold and bright typeface, our national weather

 service is forecasting: EXTREME WEATHER. 

What extreme weather is this you ask? Is Hurricane Sandy on her way? Is a Tsunami coming? No. It means an average of 5-10 cm of snow tonight.

It saddens me every time I read these things (sniff) and when I see people struggling forth tomorrow in those 5 cm's of snow, or whenever 5 drops of rain fall from the sky... It is at those moments in time (I wish I could say rare moments) when I realise more than ever, that we, the great Dutch people...the front runners....the conquerors....have turned into a nation of FUCKING PUSSIES...(sniff sniff)

Dear, former great and awesome, Dutch people, this extreme weather is what the rest of the world would call: A NORMAL WINTER! So get a life, stop whining about snow and stop being pussies, you are a disgrace to men like Tromp, De Ruyter and William of Orange. Now make us all proud and run those damn trains like snow does not exist! (I think by now NS means National Softies). Make me prouder and drive your cars on the left lane like those Germans. Let's try to "unpussy" ourselves before it is too late! Before you now it we will not have an Elfstedentocht anymore because the ice is found to be too slippery and dangerous...

I took my friend's advice and biked to work on Friday morning. I saw about ten other cyclists in the five kilometer ride. I do have one complaint, though: my hand became numb when I took the following biking video:

Biking to Dutch Class

I just completed an "intense" Dutch course over the past two weeks. It met Monday through Friday, four hours per day for two weeks. The bike route to the class was different than what I take to work, and it gave me a chance to record biking closer to the center of town in the morning:

More comments and information on the Dutch language later.

After Dark - November 2012

I walked around Amsterdam after dark for the first time in months two weeks ago. And here were the results:

Looking over the Amstel river, just down the street from my apartment.

From the same location as above, but looking away from the river.

Looking over Frederiksplein

A look inside a cafe just outside of the center of the city

Closed shops on Utrechtsestraat

Mannequins in a shop window on Utrechtsestraat

A set of building on Utrechtsestraat

Walking down Vijzelstraat into the center

Girls walking at Muntplein

A bridge in the Jordaan

Two Bruggse Zot (Brugge is the city Bruges in Belgium, and Zot is fool/Joker)

A look over the cafe bar

Looking down a canal in the Jordaan

Leidseplein after last call

An empty Stadhouderkade

Meer Fietsen

Er, more cycling.

Three videos here.

First, we have a trip through Beatrixpark 10 days ago:

Second, we have part of the ride home, boring the Amstel, one week ago:

And, finally, we have my bike ride yesterday morning, in 34 degrees, with a nice layer of fog:

The Gray

"Summer time" - the European equivalent of Daylight Savings Time - ended last week. Wikipedia tells me that November is the second wettest month of the year (after October) and the second darkest month of the year (after December). The first days of the month have fallen in line with the averages, with shocking darkness in the early afternoons because of the cloud cover, and soaking, cold rain for most of the day.

It feels like winter has started, but reminders of fall remain. It's not quite cold enough to numb my hands if I bike outside without gloves, and most of the leaves stubbornly remained on trees up until last week. They were often brilliant shades of yellow and orange that shimmered in the wind when the sun would peak through the clouds.

My street last weekend

The VU three weeks ago

The VU three weeks ago

Oosterpark one week ago

Oosterpark one week ago

Statues in Oosterpark

This cat is not dead - it's displaying the "post-amazing-petting-session" facial expression.

On Saturday, I used my museum card to go to the Tropenmuseum (tropics museum), and then read and graded papers in a coffee house. I took a few videos of the biking during the few hours that it was not raining yesterday.

Bikes and Fog

I took a few short videos of my bike ride to work on a relatively warm, foggy morning.

The first video was taken on the street where the bed and breakfast I stayed in when I moved to Amsterdam is located.

The second video was taken in Beatrixpark, where I had my bike accident in June 2011.

Van Loon

The transition to autumn in Amsterdam continues, and it is starting to feel more like winter than summer. The rains started falling on Thursday evening, and they took only a few short breaks through Sunday evening. The outside temperature is below 50 degrees, the heat has come on in my apartment, and my beer (Rogue, Sam Adams, Marble, etc.) shirts are now undershirts for warmer clothing.

With the daylight shrinking - both due to cloud cover and the sun rising later and setting earlier - I've decided to purchase another museum card, which allows free entry to most "real" museums in the Netherlands for a year (so, not including things like the Torture Museum, the Canabis Museum, and the various sex museums). I have a vague goal of visiting all of the museums in Amsterdam that are covered by the card in the next year, with many of those visits occurring during the dark holiday hours.

Today's trip was to the Van Loon Museum, which is described as follows on their website:

In the heart of the Amsterdam canal district lies Museum Van Loon, a magnificent private residence built in 1672 by the architect Adriaen Dortsman. The first resident was painter Ferdinand Bol, a pupil of Rembrandt. The interior of the house has remained largely intact during the last centuries and still evokes the splendor of the Golden Age. 

In the rooms, a large collection of paintings, fine furniture, precious silvery and porcelain from different centuries is on display. Behind the house is a beautiful garden, an oasis of quiet in the modern inner city. The garden is laid out in formal style, and is bordered on the far side by the classical façade of the coach house. This original unity of canal house, garden and coach house is nowhere else to be seen. If you want a glimpse of the world behind the façades of the world famous canals, a visit to Museum Van Loon is definitely worth your while.

I think these pictures were on loan from the photography museum. And that might be Juliette Lewis. Regardless, they're creepy.

I took several of these when I was confident no one was looking.

It was especially notable for having more Dutch visitors than foreign visitors, with several Dutch families and elderly couples. I am guessing that a lot of these smaller museums (so, ones apart from the Rijks and Van Gogh) will tend to have fewer foreigners. This is not a bad thing.

Something a little more modern