Sunday brought a trip to Leiden and Den Haag. The Dutch rail service was its usual cheap and efficient self, and I had the unexpected pleasure of sharing a carriage with a group of young English men headed to the ferry at Hook of Holland after a cultural weekend in Amsterdam. Their conversation ranged across topics as diverse as the strength of the cannabis smoked, the excellence of the ’shrooms they consumed, the technical expertise of the women in the windows and the witty banter they engaged in with said women, the attractiveness (or otherwise) of the transvestite who ran their “hotel”, and the likelihood of their ferry capsizing in the North Sea (if there was a God . . .). Their forthright opinions were delivered in ringing tones and with the requisite amount of effin’ and blindin’, to the “delight” of the entire carriage. I’ve become accustomed to not understanding and therefore tuning out the conversations in Dutch around me; to be forced to listen to such strident and ignorant English was a real shock to the system.
I would have chastised them for not visiting the Rijksmuseum, but must shamefully admit that I haven’t made it there in the nearly five years I’ve lived here. Oh, the shame of it!
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Living in NYC I bump into my fellow Brits from time to time. They are nomally trendy couples from Croydon being all lardy dah and waltzing about 5th avenue. I don't begrudge them their vacation, I just don't get in their way. At least we dont get the stoner teenage lads brigade, they'd last about 5 seconds in this town!
Hey, at least the teenage Brit brigades have some kind of edge about them. It seems like all the Americans I see on the loose here are decked out in incredibly expensive, silly-looking travel gear a la Eagle Creek or North Face, enabling them to scale the face of the Rijksmuseum when you know they're planning to do nothing of the kind. A canal boat tour, Madame Tussaud's, an exotic pannekoek or two, perfunctory walk through the Red Light District, and maybe a brave foray into one of the famed coffeeshops, the most benign glimpse of Amsterdam one can imagine. I guess I just don't see enough brash, piss-drunk members of my countrymen out there to lend me any faith in the place of my birth.
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