Rotterdam, Rave-Ready Churches, and Succulent Sundays

So!

Traveling to Rotterdam was great fun. One of the other Fulbright girls, Mary, is at Utrecht University as well, and so we took the train together to meet a third Fulbright girl, Jessica, in Rotterdam. On the train, Mary and I were, to be perfectly honest, loudly discussing how she had bought a pizza called "Pizza alle Tunei," or something, and how it looked so good, and sounded like cool and Tuscan, and then she made it, and she realized what she thought was chicken was actually little tuna flecks. And, in her words, she "HATES tuna" and was totally shocked and disgusted. And about halfway through our lamentations over pizza with tuna on it, she kind of stopped speaking for a second, looked over at the woman across from us, and then got out her cell phone, and on it, typed, "Kelli, that woman is totally recording our stupid American conversation about tuna pizza." And I just looked at it, and burst out laughing, and then to cover ourselves, I was like, "Oh, man, that's a really funny picture, thanks for showing it to me!" Shortly after this exchange, the ticket woman came by and had a delightful conversation with us that went something like this:

"Are you American?"

Us: "Yes, yes we are!"

"So you speak English?"

"Yes, yes we do."

"So how can you not read the sign here that says that this is a silent train car?"

Mary, God bless her, was much nicer than I would have been (because I would have pointed out the fact that EVERYONE ELSE was also talking, but hey), and said, "Oh, we're so sorry ma'am, we must have completely missed it, we'll move to a different car." And so we did, and continued talking about tuna pizza, minus Miss Snoops-a-Lot-McGee with her silly iPhone, video-taping us. Ha!

At the art festival itself, the first sight I was greeted with was a giant metal sculpture of a tee-pee that was made of construction materials - like hazard signs, and road block tape, and little orange cones. And it was HUGE. So huge, in fact, that it needed a giant crane to hold it all up.

We ate a delicious lunch at this really nifty Middle Eastern restuarant. I got the "Grand Bazaar" breakfast, which looked like this:

It was very tasty. It included a hard boiled egg, apricot jam, cream, a half of a fluffy pancake-thing, a fruit bowl with Greek yogurt, feta with basil and olive oil, bread, and garlic butter, It was...very good. Like, very, very good. The perfect lunch.


At the art festival itself, once we got walking, I will admit, I did not see any toilets. I did, however, see some really bizarre art. Including this weird video of a chick writhing (to music? that we couldn't hear?) while bouncing one of those paddle-board-ball things.

Yes. It was as bizarre as it looks.

We also saw a wonderful art exhibit in a church that was done by an artist who makes the most beautiful, complex dresses, inspired by artwork he has seen. So the piece of artwork would be behind the dress, and then the dress would be displayed. They were beautiful, made with silk, and felt. Not meant to be worn, just meant to evoke the feminine image within them, I think.

This was one of my favorites. The dress features many of the faces, colors, and themes shown in the three paintings behind it.

The church where all these dresses were displayed (interestingly enough) also, apparently, midnights as a dance club/concert venue. Jessica (the other Fulbrighter) said that she had come on Friday night, and the church was full of loud music, and people dancing, and drinking. But then, when we asked, they said it's a completely normal, Catholic church come Sunday morning. I mean, this church must be over 300 years old. It has an old-fashioned pulpit (with windy stairs), and it's just so bizarre to me that they also allow (even if just for the festival) dance parties, and drinking in the sanctuary.

Anyway, meandering further down the art fest, we found some nice French lads who had built a nifty boat that partners with its other "brother" boats to clean up oil spills in a "swarm-like" fashion. That's pretty nifty, right? And we also found this friendly Dutch ice cream man who enthusiastically offered us "Bitterkokje" ice cream (Bitter cookie ice cream). So, since I ate the ice cream, and it was delicious, let's take a moment to discuss bitterkokjes. Bitterkokjen are some of the most delicious, wonderful cookies in existence. They are small, and chewy, and they look like ginger snaps. They are WONDERFUL. As the name implies, they aren't overly sweet, but yes, slightly bitter. It's the amazing chewy factor that I love. It's like nibbling on...a freshly baked, chewy cookie. Every time.

So, that is bitterkokjes. I will be bringing some home to share with some really lucky people. I may even try and learn how to make them like I learned how to make kroketten.

We also saw a very sweet little barbershop quartet at the art fest, which would normally be sweet, but this was just downright adorable - all these little old men, in their adorable little suits, with their cute Dutch accents, singing American oldies. It was great.

By the end of the day, my feet were super sore, and I had had an excellent day. Mary and I took the train home (and sat in the right car the first time and didn't have any McSnoopers).

I spent most of Sunday morning baking, hence the Succulent Sundays title. It was wonderful. I woke up early and kneaded dough for pull-apart cinnamon sugar bread, and sliced apples for making apple butter...By the time everything got going, the kitchen smelled out of this world. Like fall. In the best possible way imaginable. The apple butter came out splendidly, as did the bread. Here's some pics:

Apple Butter! Fresh from the pot, hot and tasty.

Pull-Apart Cinnamon Sugar Bread

I also went to an interesting tea luncheon on Sunday, but I think I will save that for another time. All the recipes for my food are under the links page, so if seeing that bread makes you drool (like it does for me), just go look it up and make some!!