What, that's not enough information? Okay, I AM sort of procrastinating until it's time to go do homework (on a Friday? what?), so I will go into more detail...
Sunday:
Happy Easter, everyone! I hope the day was wonderful for all of you. I had a great, relaxing day. A few of us went downtown to the English Reformed Church in the Begijnhof. We went there on Good Friday and it felt appropriate to complete the circle in the same place on Sunday. We got there early, as the pastor advised on Friday, and it was a good thing because he was right -- the place filled up. The service was great, but the weirdest part was walking out of the church to a courtyard filled with tourists talking pictures of the outside (I guess since they couldn't go in since the church was "in use"?). Anna and I also had quite a vocal tourist couple behind us on the way into the church ("Is this the church? Oh, it's so cute!"). Now, I have been to this church a grand total of four or five times, and I can't say that I even know anyone who goes there regularly, but...urg, the tourists got to me. Maybe because I never expected church to be a touristy place. I guess that's what you get when you go to a church built in 1607.
Am I turning into an Amsterdam snob? Maybe. But like to think I have a little bit of a reason to be.
Tourists aside, the service was great. Then that afternoon, the Aays graciously had all of us who could come over to their apartment for a delicious brunch. Easter was great!
Monday:
I honestly don't remember anything special from Monday. So sorry.
Tuesday:
Ahh, Tuesday. This was the day I got to spend quality time with some of my fossil friends:
Oh, and one (very sticky, nasty) foot:
Yes, my Human Evolution biology class had a lab that met for EIGHT HOURS on Tuesday. To be fair, we did get a breaks for lunch and such, but we were in the same room from roughly 9am to 5pm. I came to the conclusion that, no matter how interesting something is, it begins to become uninteresting after eight hours. I remember sitting at the last of the twelve lab stations that we had to do, almost visually observing Chris and Adam's words bouncing off my head. Knowledge absorption at that stage is minimal.
But, hey, I got some pictures! (Nevermind the fact that they are for our lab report that we still need to type up...) I now could tell you the difference between a male and a female skull, or give a jaw an age based on what teeth it had come in. And I've seen enough "brow ridges" to last a lifetime.
What I'm saying is, this class is extremely interesting, but I'm coming off of two months of a history class that met for four hours a week. Now I go to lectures for sometimes five hours a day, and the lab...sigh. Not complaining! Just pointing out a difference for, you know, posterity.
Wednesday:
Something you should know -- the concert hall in Amsterdam, the Concertgebouw, holds free concerts at 12:30 every Wednesday. Something else you should know -- if you are ever in Amsterdam on a Wednesday, get to the concert hall at noon at least, because every retired person in Amsterdam will already be in line to beat you to a seat.
But Deborah, Anna, Bonnie, and I made it there early enough, and we got seats!
The concert was short (30 minutes), FREE, and much, much different than I expected. Well, I expected Mozart, or something. The Nieuw Ensemble played three new pieces written by...university students? (It was hard to tell, the program was in Dutch). The pieces can best be described as experimental, and described worst as strictly melodic. Some of the new things were kind of cool! For example, in the piece called "Mice," the instrumentalists scratched on boxes with pencils at one point to make the sound of scurrying mice. Then they all sang "Three Blind Mice." But other times, I would kind of zone out. Experimental music doesn't always hold one's attention well.
I experienced a bit of "culture," though, instead of just spending my time reading TV recaps on Entertainment Weekly.com like I sometimes do. And - bonus! - we emerged from the concert to find that it was a beautiful sunny day in Amsterdam.
We had to photographically take advantage of the sun, the blue sky, and the fact that they finally took down the tent in front of the Rijksmuseum, meaning you don't have to stand three feet away from the I amsterdam letters to get a picture with them.
Now if only they would finish up with that scaffolding...
We also took a walk through the Albert Cuyp market, rumored (whisper, whisper) to be the largest daytime market in Europe. But don't tell the other countries, they'd be jealous.
We found things there both good and bad.
Good: the fresh stroopwafel that I had.
Bad: these harem pant-jeans.
Thursday:
We experienced a classroom landmark, namely an AMAZING guest lecturer. Meet Jan van Hooff.
I admit, the picture is not mine. I took it from a website I found a link to on his WIKIPEDIA PAGE! And one of his former students, Frans de Waal, is now slightly famous among some biology circles. You could say I was starstruck in a biological-academia sense.
Like all good professors I've known, he was a great lecturer mainly because he was slightly crazy. He talked about the social groups that primates live in, which naturally includes acting like a chimpanzee from time to time. He would also start speaking in Dutch whenever he got very excited/distracted. Most of the time he would notice. But once:
Prof. van Hooff: Dutch, dutch, dutch
Student: Professor? You're speaking in Dutch again.
Prof. van Hooff: I can switch to German, too, if you'd like.
(hehe)
Overall, one of the best lectures I've had at the VU!
Friday:
That is today, which means I can't write about it yet since it isn't over! I can tell you, though, that writing a lab report is in my near future.
And Saturday/Sunday bring another round of our group excursions with Prof. Aay. Let's hope for no stomach flu/traffic jams on this one! Honestly, though, I think this weekend will be pretty fun. We are going on a biking trip on Sunday around Amsterdam's largest park, the Amsterdamse Bos, and the trip may or may not include goat's milk ice cream and Scottish Highlander cows. Saturday -- I still don't know exactly where we're going. You and I will just have to find out, won't we?
Until next time, thanks for reading!
I had a patient yesterday who said that you need to try another Dutch treat (we were comparing our Dutch food experiments and you came up in the conversation!). It's a 'vla flip' - vla mixed with yogurt. Give it a try!
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