Amsterdam

All Poems, Amsterdam, Art/Arts, Family, Grandchildren, Trips and Places

Start of Summer

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I wandered into an art museum, said Bob.

Walking into the bedroom.

Greeted by Start of Summer.

Impressionist oil by Frédéric Thierry.

Typical canal scene in Amsterdam.

Noticed at Carré d’Artistes.

On a walk one day.

From Museumstraat back to the apartment.

On display in the window.

Beckoning passersby.

To see its play of light on water.

Yellows, pinks, blues.

Hovering over canal, boats.

Start of Summer.

Fitting title.

For Amsterdam was the start of summer.

For Bob, for Asher, for me.

We studied the canvas.

Let its calm soothe us.

Then left.

Wondering if the attraction would last.

Till our return in two days.

Noting a different oil in the spotlight.

Entering the gallery anyway.

Spotting the object of our affection.

Rotated to a back wall.

Deciding to purchase.

Have it sent.

From Amsterdam via Paris.

To Elkins Park.

Where it would float.

Above the bed.

Reminder of the week

with Asher at eighteen.

Retell the tale in brush strokes.

Images serene.

 

Lynn Benjamin

July 19, 2023

All Poems, Amsterdam, For Children, Humor, Trips and Places

Bicycles

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We Dutch are crazy for our bikes, said the canal boat driver.

A young civil engineering graduate student.

Who had just passed exams.

But, his proclamation was obvious.

From the first moment stepping off the train.

Wheeling our suitcases to Eric Vökel.

The apartment building where we lodged.

Dodging bikes, motor scooters, tiny car-like vehicles.

Every street has bike lanes.

Bike parking.

Even garage parking for bikes.

Bike rental stores.

The Netherlands is a haven

for folks who love to bike.

Pedestrians, look both ways

before crossing Bike Turnpike.

 

Lynn Benjamin

July 10, 2023

 

 

All Poems, Amsterdam, Museums, Trips and Places

III. The Tropenmuseum or Museum of the Tropics

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This museum was not on Asher’s list.

But, with extra time, we went.

To be challenged to see the other side of Dutch life.

To question colonialism.

How do people, institutions get rich?

How did the Dutch East/West India Companies become profitable?

Did explorers really discover new territories?

Or did they displace or enslave the indigenous to snatch the land?

How did the Dutch propagate coffee in Indonesia?

Through legitimate cultivation or theft?

What did plantations of tobacco, opium, sugar do to farm workers?

What about mining of tin?

Beauxite for production of aluminum?

What happened to the earth?

Who did all the labor?

Slaves and later indentured servants?

Under what conditions?

What is racism?

How does it shape society?

How were language, education, religion used to impose power?

These are only some of the themes the museum examined.

With the help of paintings, sculptures, artifacts.

The museum is vast.

History complex.

Much more to learn.

Than in any one text.

Power of a few

over the rest.

Means some get wealthy.

Others, oppressed.

Every action

has a consequence.

Who pays the price?

At whose expense?

 

Lynn Benjamin

July 10, 2023

 

 

 

 

All Poems, Amsterdam, Museums, Trips and Places

II. The Heineken Experience

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Heineken started as a small brewery in 1864.

Became an international purveyor of beer.

The original factory, now a museum.

Providing a Disneyesque experience.

For throngs who wait in line to enter.

To learn how beer is brewed.

Water, barley, hops, A-yeast.

Then into a room to become bottled themselves!

Finally, to the prize at the end.

Three glasses of beer to try.

All the while being blasted with ads to buy Heineken.

While many seemed to lap it up,

jump into taproom moods,

I’m sure had it been ice cream,

I would have been enthused!

 

Lynn Benjamin

July 10, 2023

 

All Poems, Amsterdam, Museums, Trips and Places

I. Maritime Museum

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The Netherlands is defined by water.

North Sea, rivers, canals.

With a maritime history museum to match.

Housed in the old navy warehouse.

Which used to hold supplies for expeditions.

Sails, masts, canons, gunpowder, food.

Now exhibition rooms.

Model ships.

Paintings.

Antique maps.

Ship decorations.

As well as a replica ship, The Amsterdam.

Stationed in the harbor.

For families to climb aboard.

Experience hardships encountered to and from the East Indies.

Back in 1748.

Crowding, rodents, basic foods.

Not to mention attacks, storms, epidemics.

Another vessel, the royal barge.

Sits retired in a building.

Built by King William I in 1816.

Used for ceremonial voyages.

Pride in sailing prowess

in the museum on display.

With a tad of condemnation

for colonial dossier.

 

Lynn Benjamin

July 10, 2023

 

 

All Poems, Amsterdam, Family, Grandchildren, Museums, Trips and Places

Last Full Day in Amsterdam

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Asher Chooses What To Do

We left our last day free.
For Asher to choose sites.
His two choices were the Maritime Museum.
The Heineken Brewery Experience.
Finishing the second early, we had bonus time.
To tour the Tropenmuseum.
Museum of the Tropics.
Asher got to select.
Decide what to see.
First one, ships and sailing.
The second, a brewery.

Lynn Benjamin
July 10, 2023

All Poems, Amsterdam, Gardens, Trips and Places

Amsterdam Botanical Gardens

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Amsterdam has botanical gardens.

Established in 1638!

Where we sought solice.

After two holocaust museum encounters.

Potted cycads calmed us.

Specimens in pots.

Over three hundred years old.

First appearing in early dinosaur days.

Predecessors of flowering plants.

Greenhouses for three tropical climates.

Palms.

Cacti.

Rainforest.

A native wildflower garden.

Carnivorous plants.

Bee houses.

Coffee that seeded the coffee industry in the Americas.

All reminders that life can bloom

in balance and harmony.

When people work, collaborate.

Protect biodiversity.

 

Lynn Benjamin

July 9, 2023

All Poems, Amsterdam, Museums, Trips and Places

Remembrances

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World War II and the Holocaust confronted twice today,

Once at the Jewish Museum.

Explaining Jewish history in the Netherlands.

Then, the Resistance Museum.

Detailing experiences of Dutch Jews.

As Nazis rose to political power.

Both museums, curated well.

Relying on real stories of individuals.

Jews, non-Jews, collaborators.

Resistance fighters, soldiers, civilians.

Stirring up terror, awe, sadness.

But what caught us unaware were stolperstein.

Stumbling stones.

Brass plaques embedded in sidewalks.

In front of houses where people were deported.

Sent to death camps.

Sobibor, Auschevitz, Dachau.

Imploring us to bow, to read,

to know, to honor, to weep.

Each plate, a life extinguished.

Whose memory we must keep.

 

Lynn Benjamin

July 9, 2023

All Poems, Amsterdam, Trips and Places

Delft

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I know what Delft china looks like.

From a Delft milk pitcher given to me as a gift.

A Delft vase I’ve owned for years.

Some Delft earrings I bought in Curaçao, a Dutch colony.

But, who would have guessed I’d go to Delft?

Only a little further by train from Gouda.

To visit the outdoor market.

Try Dutch fries.

Wander through the New Church.

Built in 1381!

Observe the leaning tower of the Old Church, 1246!

Take a canal boat to the Delft factory.

To learn how Delft porcelain is crafted.

How it became popular in the Netherlands.

After being pirated from a Portuguese ship.

Carrying earthenware from Asia with blue designs.

Importing it for many years.

Till China could no longer supply it.

Inspiring factories to pop up in the Netherlands.

Then Delftware went out of fashion

two centuries past.

Leaving only Royal Delft Blue

to make molds and cast.

  

Lynn Benjamin

July 9, 2023

 

All Poems, Amsterdam, Food, Love, Trips and Places

Gouda

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For me, gouda cheese has always been a symbol of love.

Peeling off the red wax.

Slicing or shaving the yellow cheese.

Putting out a bunch of grapes.

Drinking a glass of Mateus.

Next to Bob.

Appetizer or dessert.

Either one.

Who would have thought I’d make it to Gouda?

Pronounced howda.

With the very same Bob?

And a grandson of eighteen years?

To witness the cheese market?

Watch how genuine gouda is made?

Buy it aged?

Pick up a loaf of dark bread?

To take back to our patio.

Serve for a meal

with apples and cheese jams.

Romantic appeal.

 

Lynn Benjamin

July 9, 2023