The blog has missed some love lately. I stopped it and deleted my last post after I found that the site address had been shared with all the member of the baseball/softball club. I hope I can still make things funny and honest even though there is an almost equal audience on both sides of the pond. Here is one of the posts I decided to finish.
Friday
I’m sitting on the train back to Meppel. I’m tired but chocolate is keeping my eyes are wide open. My hands smell like Haring and Onions with a little bit of garlic still in my fingernails. My body has the hollow feeling of still processing the beer from last night. My stomach aches and my mouth feels like heavy whipping cream residue. I had a great time.
Yesterday I visited the family of one of my dad’s high school classmates. I took a train from Meppel in northern Holland to Tilburg, near the southern border. It took two and a half hours. With a little luck, I was unable to sabotage my efforts to travel.
They asked what I wanted for dinner and the answer was obvious. “I’ll cook.” I said. I chose my favorite dinner; an American classic: fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, and green beans. I was inspired by my grandmother’s classic cooking but since living here I am out of practice. The chicken got to the table cold and needed more garlic and pepper and the mashed potatoes and gravy where both lumpy. It was delicious. I had forgotten how happy my stomach could be.
After dinner I got a chance to practice with their local club. It is funny to see reactions of the people here when they see me play. By professional measures in the US my arm strength is about average. Here it is almost never seen. I got to throw a bullpen and at first they told me a 13 year old catch would catch me. After two warm up throws I switched for the brave kids safety. I continued to throw with a different catcher. I felt pretty good and actually knocked his glove off. He was frustrated but afterwards he told me how much fun it had been.
Practice concluded, as it often does, with a beer. The evening continued that way as I checked out the nightlife of Tilburg with Eddy, the son of the woman my dad knows. After sometime standing shoulder to shoulder with a bunch of 16 to 21 year old kids in a bar listening to a dj butcher American pop songs, I persuaded him to change scenes. We sat on the patio in cobblestone street of one of the Café/Pub places. Two comments about the last sentence: every street is cobble stone if it is not a major thoroughfare and there were eight of these establishments in a row, nearly identical to each other, but they were all full. I asked how they are different and how people chose. Apparently they just go to the same place every time.
Can you imagine this happening in America! That is like having a McDonalds, Burger King, Jack in the Box, Carl’s Junior, Sonic, and three others on the sharing walls on the same street. All have the same product and price. In America, one company would offer free fries with a burger and the rest would lose their business and have to follow suit until every last detail was fought over tooth and nail. Labor cost is cut. Quality is forgotten. Marketing takes a hold. Customers pay 20 cents for a tasty TV commercial and four cents for an “all beef” patty that cost 25 cents. The workers, low on income and short on time, buy the burgers and go home fat and…fat. By the time they get home, three of the places have a golden M and two are abandoned and the last three are a Walmart.
As an American I love my freedom. But I hate our ignorance.
That tangent was irresistible. Anyway, we sat down and had a beer at Walmart and watched people stumble in an out. The girls were nothing to take a second look at so we made fun convincing a kid that I was here as prize fighter.
The next morning I went with my hosts to Hertogenbosch. It is a beautiful city dating back to the 8th century it think. There are remnants of the cities outer walls. The cathedrals outside was astonishing. (see pictures) The inside was beyond words. I have never stepped into a place so immense and yet so silent. I felt minimal in space in time. Every aspect, EVERY last bit of the place was created with the care that can only be found in those seeking to please God. It is like if you opened a door and you were alone in the Grand Canyon, Yosemite Valley or Crater Lake. I was loving the complete loss of self-awareness until someone said to me. “This church was built in….” Damn it! It was gone.
We had to pack a lot into a short tour of the city so I could catch my train. Trying to see such a great city in such a short time makes me understand the phrase “(see) your cake and eat it too.” (see picture below) By this time, hold you back your astonishment, I was hungry. I asked as I usually do if we could get some typical Dutch food…
I was warned by my American connection about this Dutch specialty. As it turns out “new Haring” is the freshest and most delicious sushi I have ever had. It was caught probably the day before and served with chopped onions. It was so good. You can taste the fat that has not deteriorated yet and it doesn’t taste fishy at all. As long as you get past the fact that the fishes tail feels as slippery as if it were alive and you just watched a guy scale and gut it, it’s fantastic. Thanks for the warning Greg.
To round out the meal we sat down for a “Den Bol” which is named after the cities abbreviated name “Den Bosch.” (old Dutch for “the forest.”) It is the definition of indulgence. Covered in riiiiich Belgian milk chocolate, a thin layer of puff pastry encases a filling of riiiich sweet whipped real cream. I my mouth is watering thinking about it but my stomach is already beginning to hurt.
I didn’t have enough time to wash my hands in one of the pay bathrooms so. I pissed in one of the four-way outdoor pissers. (I need to get a picture of one of these.) Finally, I made it to my train with three minutes to spare.
The trip was a great success in the experience to time ratio measure. It feels like it took me as long to write this as it did to do it. Have a nice day.
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