utilitarian and ugly
17 January 2014
The reason we're in Amsterdam is that Jack was invited to give the keynote address at the Annual Conference of the Dutch-Belgian Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies. This year's topic is "The Art of Lying." One of Jack's pet subjects is forgeries. So there we were, in one of Amsterdam's "hidden churches" along the Singel Canal, with about 30 other people, all of them strangers.
Jack's talk was first. I stayed for that, and for the next one, but I can only sit still for so long. Knowing that tomorrow we'd be stuck on an airplane for 9 hours straight, I pulled up a Google map on my phone, got an idea, and told Jack I'd be back in an hour.
I headed northwest at a pace somewhat shy of my commuter clip, definitely walking, not strolling, stopping only for red lights, bikers, and the occasional picture.
My goal was to follow the canal for as long as I could, which, if I could get far enough, would get me to the North Sea. Should restlessness strike again in the afternoon, and I knew it would, my next walk would be to Centraal Station, the train station famed for the number of bikes parked there.
As it happened, the canal took me to the station. All of this is bike parking:
I stopped only once on my way back:
When I entered the church again, I was sweating a little. I'd made it back in time for lunch -- sandwiches and apples while standing in a small hallway -- and was bored again in minutes.
The next two talks were fun, though, because there were visual aids to keep me entertained. Then I was off again, this time to the hotel, so that I could upload today's pictures, blog about them, and scurry back to the church. There will be a tour of an 18th century house (probably boring), then dinner at an Indonesian restaurant, courtesy of the Dutch-Belgian Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies.
Time to scurry. I'll be stateside in 24 hours. Let's hope we can get a ride in on Sunday.
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