Day 6

Off to Amsterdam....Day 6 is an early morning by normal standards, but Euro Tour standards we got to sleep in. The fact that I barely went to bed when the alarm went off, could be easily seen in my eyes. Thankfully we are off to Amsterdam where if my eyes are red and glossy most people probably won’t notice!!!

It is about an hour and half drive from Wagningen to Amsterdam, which in fact received its name because the city is located on the Amstel River and there are just a “few” dams in and around the city, thus the name Amsterdam. So what have we got in store today...well let’s see there will be some reflection on the loss of the Jewish community in various sectors of the city and a bit of an impromptu walking tour given by our excellent tour director David Harrod, supper in the city and some free time.

We were dropped off at the bottom of city center at around 9:30ish by our wonderful bus driver Will, who hails from the Netherlands, but was born in the country of Surinam. Very nice fellow and unbelievable bus driver!!! Today is a day to be out and about and on foot, all day!!!

Out first look at the old city of Amsterdam is one of ornate architecture on many of the 300-400 year old buildings. Unfortunately we didn’t get a chance to see the official home of Her Majesty Queen Beatrix, because the majority of the building is undergoing a “facelift”. David told us that she normally resides in the south of the country, in a city called The Hague, and the palace at Appledoorn that we will be seeing on Saturday is another one of the royal homes....tough life!!!

Seeing as it is early morning and we are on the way to the Portuguese Synagogue we made the decision to take the fastest route there. The reason I say that because we cut across the infamous Red Light district. I can assure your beating hearts right now that much of what you hear about that area is very untrue, especially at 10:00 AM in the morning. Because of the river system that runs all the way through the city, the Red Light area cuts across many side streets and apart from signage there is very little to see or do at this time of the day. It is a very interesting area because many people and families also live along the main street that runs with the river, but the "Red Light" area across in the small side streets that are only accessible by foot or by bike, of which in all of the Netherlands there are millions it seems.

David did an excellent job of explaining to the kids about the liberal culture of the city and the concepts behind the drugs and the prostitution (of which none were around I assure you and those that were had there window shades drawn!). What I didn’t realize was that drugs are not legalized in Amsterdam, the police simply choose to ignore the use of “soft” drugs and their private usage and deal more with the hard drugs and other types of crime that are more difficult and dangerous to cope with.

AS far as the discussion on prostitution, which they will get in grade 11 law classes; David Harrod made an extremely interesting point about the industry. He presented the fact to them that there are more slaves now in North America than there were during the time of the infamous “Triangular Trade” from Africa to North America and back to Europe. Shocking for sure!!! The majority of these slaves are in the sex trades are in it against their will, often kidnapped and taken illegally from Europe, or promised jobs as actresses, etc. In the system in Europe, these women pay taxes on their earnings, receive medical care and insurance as well as pensionable earnings....I realize it sounds crazy but it’s true. Anyways, after a couple of minutes we arrived in the Jewish sector of Amsterdam. You can all relax now that that is over!!!

The first area that we arrived at was the Portuguese Synagogue, although I have spent a small amount of time in the Jewish section of Montreal on tour before, this will be my first trip into a real live synagogue. Before entering the synagogue we were told of the beginnings of Judaism in this area of the world and of course we will learn about the dispersal of Jews during WWII a little later on.

The synagogue was very beautiful and very different from the churches we attend on PEI. First and foremost all of the benches or pews face one another.....I actually liked that a lot. Actually, before that, all of us males had to put on the traditional Jewish Yarmulke, no offence to the Jewish faith but to me it was a beanie. After a few minutes there and quite a few pictures of our Yamulkes, we departed for some more time in the city.......and some SHOPPING finally!!!

As I warned all of the girls prior to the tour, this would probably qualify as the worst shopping trip in history, but the best history lessons in the world would be had in Europe 2010. Well let the “mishegas” begin!!! Pretty good Yiddish for just having the Yamulke on for 15 minutes isn’t!!! By the was “mishegas” is Yiddish for you guessed it, craziness!!! David told everyone we needed to be back at the city square in one hour....one hour...one hour to shop in Amstedam!!!! I am pretty sure I heard an “oy vey” from my usual shopping partners!!! By the way “oy vey” is “Oh woe is me!” and I really think that I should be saying it as Emily, Shannon, Ashley, and Rachel looked right at me and said “gein fest”. Ok I will stop using my new found language of Yiddish...by the way that means “GO FAST!”

The shopping went well as everyone split with an adult, but since the commercial district is really on one street they all would have been fine, but better safe than sorry. I will have to admit that between Amsterdam, Paris and Rome, I have felt much safer here....seriously. I have been keeping my eye out for pickpockets and petty thieves, mainly because we have some "green"(and I don't mean TOSH green) travelers, but I have seen nary a one!!!

Following the Dutch version of speed shopping(don't know the Yiddish translation for that) we reconvened and made our way across town to another Jewish quarter where we were scheduled to visit the Amsterdam Holocaust museum, the Auschwitz Memorial and the Auschwitz Museum before supper at the Hard Rock.

Powerful stuff was told and seen as we looked at the list of names of all the Jewish families who were deported through Amsterdam in the 1940’s once the Germans invaded and the Dutch capitulated. Out of the roughly 120,000 Jews that lived in the city at that time, 104,000 of them never returned. No need to say more. This museum is actually located in an old Jewish theatre that served as the deportation house for the Nazis during WWII. Very eerie and extremely sad when you heard the Jewish guides talk about members of their own family and their round up and deportation.

From there we went to the Auschwitz Memorial located in a nearby park and spoke to a wonderful lady who told about her grandparents and other Jews and their struggles during those times. Another very powerful moment in our tour for sure!

The Jewish section of the tour continued as we continued to learn more about the Jewish people, their faith, their lives and their traditions. The kids had a great day learning about the menorah and the hannukiah as well as the Torah. They had a great time in the children’s section of the museum as they learned about all of the famous Jews in the world such as Steven Speilberg, Lenny Kravitz, Mr. Spock, Marilyn Monroe, Bob Dylan and of course Sammy Davis Jr. Personally I learned about famous Jewish people through the Adam Sandler Hannukah Song, if you haven’t heard it you should youtube it! Its clean and quite comical, in fact there are 3 versions now.

We learned about kosher meal preparations and Jewish music and literature. Coming from mono-cultural Summerside, this was another great learning experience for your children. Off to the Hard Rock Cafe and then to another highlight.....but first a little more free time for.

I may as well tell you now, I was late!! They all had a great time laughing their butts off as I showed up 15 minutes later for the walk to Hard Rock. I think the lack of sleep caught up with me this afternoon. After we left the museums, David said that we have about 2 hours before our dinner reservation...”Oy Vey,” More shopping!!!! Well this time I told the girls I would take them to a couple of stores then there were getting dumped onto Kelly or Marliyn, so I could shop as well(can't come home without things for the fam)!! Well, let’s just say I lost track of time, not shopping all the 2 hours by any means, but wandering aimlessly on the same street everyone else was on and I showed up 12 minutes late. Brendan took great pride in running towards me and telling me that “my tardiness would no longer be tolerated any further on the trip!” The things I have done for these kids and they are chirping their heads off about being late!!! All in fun!

We proceeded to the Hard Rock with about 20 minutes to spare(I could have shopped for another 10 and we still wouldn't have been late!) and sat down for some good music and a good ole Cheeseburger and chips (fries). Following the quick 45 minute supper we were off to Anne Frank House. More learning!

As we waited outside the museum/house we all brushed up on our Anne Frank story. Although I know the story very well, I have not read the book and a number of them were very excited because of their love of the book. As we wound around the beginning of the museum before we actually enter the house, Anne Frank’s writing on the walls is chilling to say the least. I am not sure if I can describe what we saw over the next hour, I just know that I was speechless when I left. I will post a couple of videos pertaining to the house and leave you to form your own opinion...it is a must see I will finish with.

Tomorrow we are back in Amsterdam with a guided tour of the old district I believe and then onto Voorthuizen for the afternoon and the military tattoo. Looking forward to our second last day in Europe....I mean that in a good way!!


A gute nahkt,
dc

Day 5 Video

Day 5 Pics

Liberation Day Parade

Day 5

Well another late night for yours truly, didn’t realize what time it was when I finished, but man I slept well. But I was able to talk to Julie and the kids so this perked me up a little bit to keep me energized.

Today, Day 5, is our celebration day. I would compare to Canada Day in Canada, a lot of festivities and quite a lot of partying. Don’t get nervous folks I can assure you that the kids were not allowed out after supper and will all be in bed in about 20 minutes.

The morning began with a radio interview with a local Dutch radio station that featured Sarah and Brendan and really did a wonderful job talking about the meaning of all of this from a Canadian perspective as well. From there it was onto CBC Island Morning with Karen Mair and Emily and Patrick once again did a great job of speaking about the meaning of what they are experiencing...yeah they are getting “it” but I don’t really think there ever was a doubt!!

This morning we are representing the youth of Canada at the annual Liberation Day Peace Symposium. We have been selected because of my background in global issues and I suspected it would be very “dry” but at least something they could say they did. Unfortunately, their “participation” at this point will be limited to listening...difference in wording but they are fine with it!

The topic was about international freedom and the fight that continues around the world to maintain the freedoms that we so readily enjoy in our country. The kids will get a chance to listen to 3 different speakers but because of time issues they will not be able to stay and ask questions, although at this point I can guarantee that Brendan is the only that would dare ask anything in this type of situation. Lisa and Mark I apologize if he returns home a little different, different in the fact that after 5 days I think he is finally figuring out my sarcasm...he has heard enough of it for sure...haha!!!

The first speaker was a female Iranian news reporter who was speaking about the connections of what is going on today in Iran in comparison to what took place in Europe under Hitler and the Nazi movement. Only 2 minutes into the speech and I know they are hearing something very powerful as she compared the current Iranian leader of the Taliban, Ahmaddinejad to Hitler. I always thought the name Hitler seemed very eerie in Canada, well I can tell you that when you are amongst a group of people who were directly affected by a monster like that, the word sounds even worse in Europe.

The second speaker was a tad bit more “dry” (literal translation boring...) but he is a high ranking official in the European Union that deals directly with crisis intervention (Kosovo, Balkans, etc). Also present are the Queen’s High Commissioner and the third and final speaker, the head Dutch General in charge of the Afghan mission. The major general began his talked and continued to talk in high reverence of Canadians. My chest is sticking out now, as it should when you are this proud to be a Canadian in a foreign country. Loving it for sure!!

He furthered his discussion by talking about how we too often take our freedoms for granted until they are challenged, it took a major general in the Dutch army to back the majority of my messages in my Global Issues class..wonder if he would be interested in being a guest speaker??? Following the 3^rd speaker we are now off to lunch at the central location for the Liberation day parades.

Lunch became another interesting adventure as we were eating emergency rations provided to the troops currently serving in Afghanistan. The choice was either ravioli or curry chicken in a tin. There was a catch, the tin and food cook by themselves when you press a button on the bottom of the packaging. When the button is pressed a chemical reaction is begun in a separate compartment at the bottom of the tin and within 5 -7 minutes the meal is boiling hot!!! Loved it!!! SO much I ate 3, both Barb and Sarah Gillis’. I have spent a lot of time with Barb and especially Sarah because she rarely eats her meals...the meals in general have been really good but we are with teenagers you know. We have yet to get chicken fingers and fries so there is usually plenty for me to eat at any time. They don’t believe how much this body can put away...haha just ask my staff!!!

During the whole time we have been here, Brendan and the boys have been complete infatuated with the large number of battle re-enactments that are going on. The girls could care less because the horses are “poopin’ everywhere” and the artillery shells are “scaring the living .........out of them”. The whole afternoon seemed to revolve around poop in their minds for some reason, which strangely enough is a word Brendan is incapable of saying(too too funny!). Sounds kinda weird but he is going to say it before he leaves Europe...Ironically enough the day finishes with another instance involving a horse and its droppings so one might say we had a sh**** day!!!

Enough about that. These kids really enjoy the celebrity lifestyle. They all have spent the day mingling with the Dutch people and giving them everything Canadian(mini flags, pins, cards, etc) that they have. I can’t believe how much stuff people brought with them and how much the Dutch want anything with a flag on it. After a couple of hours we needed to get into position for the parade, because of another miscommunication or at the least misinterpretation of emails, not all of the kids get to walk in the parade. In all honesty both groups of kids had great experiences. The ones positioned on the parade route got to see everyone and especially the vets, who wanted to shake hands with all of the kids, while the ones in the parade with or flag got to be cheered on for an hour by at least 100,000 people...pretty darn cool. I will try to upload some pics after I finish writing.

The parade began with the releasing of flock of doves and then a fly over by some WWII planes which included a very fast moving spitfire!! As Rachel, Patrick, Brooke, Chloe, Shannon and I moved along the parade route. By the way I hope you have noticed I have been trying to use different kids for different parts of the tour, Emily and Pat have been the only repeats(interview + march) because they were willing to wait in line for two hours and walk for another hour, somehow that just didn’t appeal to some!!!

Let me tell you, I have been a part of a parade before(insert Lobster Carnival here) and have even been front and center(haha) on a float with my kids who won the National Award for History research a couple of years ago on the Legion float. But I have never been made feel the entire parade was about us and us alone. Although each school had 5/6 kids and with 58 schools represented(you do the math I am tired and bad with numbers to boot!), each footstep we took people wanted to shake our hands and continued to clap and say thank you, sing O Canada, etc. WOW!!! I had the easy job of passing out pins and such to little kids, teenagers, young adults, middle aged adults and seniors alike, they all wanted something Canadian and they couldn’t get enough. In fact at one point I went over to a group of little kids, 5 little blonde(they are all blonde it seems) kids. I reached into my pocket and shook their hands and proceeded to give them a pin. 1,2,3,4......uh oh I am all out of pins and I am only 15 minutes into the damn parade and the kids are now ahead of me so I can’t go back. So this poor cute little 4 year old boy looked pretty sad and I looked like a big Canadian jerk!!! Well, the next look was priceless, as I reached into my bag the other group of 5 years were looking intently at their pins I grabbed a large Canadian flag and wrapped it around him. The look was truly priceless, both from him and the others kids who got stuck with only a chintzy pin!!!

We continued on for another hour and moved passed seated vets and some guy from the Dutch Royal Family, sorry I didn’t get his name and I was scared to go near him with a pin because I might get tazered(sp?) or something, but nonetheless he looked pretty royal. Everyone continued to cheer and shake our hands, the kids were having a blast and I wished they all could have participated. (IN the end the kids who were along the watching route said they had a blast so I am not sure who had a better time...good problem to have!)

The crowds seemed to get larger and larger the closer we got to the end and by the time we finished the number going around had grown to be about 120,000 people. Yeah that’s right!!! We have about 135,000 people on the island and we were just cheered on by almost the entire province of PEI. Funny side to that story, we wanted to order pizza for supper and the front desk said that there were really no pizza shops in town like Domino’s and such, only available in restaurants. I said to him that I found that very strange, he replied not really because it was a tiny town of almost 40,000 with 120,000 in it today!

In the end I think each of your kids had another “once in a lifetime” experience today. Supper was another one of these as we had to wander through a lot of “celebratory” people who have been enjoying their day to say the least. The kids thought it was pretty interesting to see, there is one rock concert rumbling our rooms on one side of the hotel. The other side, Marilyn’s side is being serenaded to sleep with death metal on the other side and I can hear some rap off in the distance as well....gotta head to bed because the Bruins will be on soon so another late night!!!!

I will leave you with one last story. As we approached the end of the parade I asked Shannon to pick out a family for me....so she choose a family of four with two blonde boys about 8 and 10 years of age, roughly a little older than my Mya and Max. So as they held out their hands to shake mine, instead of giving them a maple leaf pin I surprised them as I pulled another flag out of my bag and wrapped it around them both. Both of their parents were extremely happy and grateful for the gift. Truth be known, I am more grateful than they are right now because I was able to experience what being a Canadian is really about! It doesn’t get much better than this and each of the kids were able to learn more about that today. Imagine learning more today about being Canadian thousands of miles from home, more than they have learned probably every day they have lived within our borders...fun stuff!!!! Cheer for the Bruins all and thanks for your time and patience in reading what my wife says is my usual wordy self!!! Must be why she loves me so much, either that or my handyman abilities around the house!!! Good night!!!

Off to Amsterdam and the Jewish remembrance tomorrow...and shopping for the girls!!!

Here we go Bruins Here we go....I can hear you cheering Jeff Brant!!!!

Pics from yesterday(Day 4)

Liberation Museum 1944-1945 and March of Silence to Groesbeek Cemetery

Day 4

Good evening everyone...wow what a day.....are you ready for this?? Well today was expected to be of our big days and it certainly was. AS I mentioned earlier today the Bruins won last night so that offset the 2-2.5 hours sleep I got last night, plus on a more personal note we are heading to a country that I have never been to before and I am very excited about that. However, before we head to the Netherlands we are heading to the medieval city of Brugges, Belgium.



Although the link I have provided you with is not ours, it still gives a great sense of what this city is all about and for the most part we hit almost everyone of those sites in a short period of time and the girls even had a hour to shop. More on the shopping later! By the way if you watch the entirety of the video you obviously need to check out the architecture of the city, truly breathtaking and also pay special attention to about the 8:36-8:40 mark and you will see a sculpture in a church and that sculpture is of the Virgin Mary and the babe and is one of the few sculptures of Buonarroti outside of Italy. Amazing eh!!!

I truly hope none of you said “Who the %^LL is Buonarroti?”....just being a smart ass again. The sculpter is probably better known to you as Michelangelo, and no not the Ninja Turtle!!! The piece was really neat to see!!!

Tour complete of Brugges and now their first bit of free time, only 1 hour but hey it is better than nothing (although I did mention this was not a shopping trip, a few of the ladies don’t recall that being mentioned!!!) So when everything starts to shake down and kids are pairing up with teachers...how the H E Double Hockey Sticks do I get stuck with 4 women whose sole desire is to do as much shoe shopping in an hour that would make some chick from “The Hills” blush!!! Anyways, Rachel, Emily, Ashley, Shannon and I are off to find some shoes...how exciting!!! Ah heck let’s just make the best of it and of course set some ground rules early!!! Rule #1 No underwear stores for this cat.....Rule #2 only 1 pair of shoes per girl per store...Rule #3 10 minute time limit in each store...Rule #4 Chiz is the boss and this is not a democracy....

For the most part everything worked out well and all of the rules were followed and only Emily and Rachel walked away with any items..well unless you count Emily and Shannon’s 15th chocolate covered Belgian waffle in the last 24 hours!!! And I thought I could eat...wow!!!!

From Brugges it is about a 3 hour drive to Groesbeek which was the location of the silent march to the CWG Cemetery at Groesbeek. However, before all of that happened the kids were treated to a lot of fun and information at the Groesbeek Liberation Museum 1944-45. It was here the kids were able to interact with some Dutch people who were alive during the occupation. One of which in particular Martiin Dekkurs spoke with the kids about what it was like to be held captive in your own country. He furthered hammered home the message about not forgetting these individuals(Canadians) because of what they did...they could have stayed in the country(Canada) and lived their own lives, instead they gave their lives to liberate the Netherlands from the Nazi occupation and this is why the people will be forever grateful. A few tears were shed from time to time. The kids also got to sing karaoke..ya go figure! Well there was a 77 year old Dutch man singing period tunes and after some of our kids began to chat with him, the next thing Marilyn and I noticed, he was off the stage singing to them. It moved from that to Sam Mundy singing with him on stage and then all of a sudden about 15 of them were on stage singing a song they used to sing about “Beautiful Canada.” They were having a ball and go figure they were the life of the party amongst about 300 other kids at that point.



From there we walked to a dinner hall to have a great dinner of pasta (not bland French pasta...but something delicious) that was prepared by the local people of Wageningen. Yep they fed and served over 2500 people, don’t get me wrong, I am sure it was catered but the people were there to help serve, so it was fun to meet some more of the Dutch.

Following supper we assembled in the town square to get ready for the 45 minute Silent March of Remembrance back to the cemetery at Groesbeek. Picture it, about 2500 people plus townspeople marching silently through the beautiful valleys for approximately 45 minutes...wow!!! The kids were awesome!!! As we reached the cemetery every student and/or adult Canadian stood in front of a Canadian soldier throughout the entire ceremony. I did mention it was a beautiful sunny day but with a cool north wind...and it got even cooler! But the kids stood straight and listened to the Dutch and English speeches of what took place so many years ago, and it was very cool in both senses of the word. But the cooler it got the more impressed I was with the students, no complaints at all. They were getting it...this was nothing compared to what the 23 year old lying buried in front of me went through 65 years ago...not even close!!! When the ceremony finally ended each one of us lit a candle and left it at the base of each headstone along with our island clay inuksuk.....a fitting gift for worthy recipients!

Well another emotional day is in the books and we finally made it back to the hotel we are staying at for the duration of the stay in Wageningen, which is a blessing because tomorrow’s May celebrations are right down from the hotel and there are only 4 of the 58 busses within walking distance!!! No bussing tomorrow...also in the AM the kids will get to sleep in a little longer as we don’t need to be at our Symposium until 9:45 and it is actually in our hotel. Then it is onto the celebrations and I think the kids are going to really appreciate an upbeat day as opposed to the more downtrodden days of remembrance.

I am going to sign off and I feel I was a little boring today but it could be due to the fact that I am going on 3 hours sleep..but the Bruins did win so who cares...oh yeah just remembered we finally got through our first completed count off today without delay....our number 32 Bradley even shouted his number out for the first time!!! We are going to try it backwards next...we will be in Charlottetown before we figure that out!!! Hope all is well at home and I am heading to bed...I have two interviews in the AM and I need my beauty sleep..ah heck they are radio interviews so who cares...in the AM Brendan, Sarah and I are doing a Dutch radio show and then I think I need to do another one at 11:00 my time with CBC Radio’s Island Morning...supposedly they have been reading the blog..if I find out who gave it to them..they are in big trouble!! Take Care!!!
DC(Dutch Chizzy)

PS No pics until AM I am beat!!!