Passover in Amsterdam

I travelled central Europe with Alexander Marmar (nee Marmarovich), Esq., a good friend from college. He is seen above, in the composition "Hammerfest: Outside the Gate, 2007," which is a photograph I shot not 5 weeks ago outside of the casa de Gutman, on the Brauersgracht in Amsterdam. We stayed with the family of Felix Gutman, the uncle of my other good friend from college, Roy Blumenfeldensteinmankrantzblatt, for Passover. The house was absolutely amazing, and there was good cheer all around in commemoration of the Jews' liberation from slave life in the Land of Narrows to split-subdivision pre-med life in Garden City, NY. Rejoice!


...a hearty dayenu


...brisket, game hen, lamb chops


...old Israeli conversation, between old Israeli men

The craziest thing about Amsterdam (besides the weed), was once again the degree to which rich Europeans exaggerate their problems. Amsterdam is, quite literally, one of the most beautiful cities in the entire world, but all you see is stuff like this:



I'd live in a police state too, gladly, if half my income was subsidized by the government, if the entirety of society got off work at 4:30 and lounged at canal-side cafes, if marijuana was not only legal, but bred, studied, and produced by the world's top botanists, and if my house looked like this...



And if evenings on the Amstel looked like this...



Roy's uncle Felix owns Canal Bus and Canal Bikes, the two biggest boat services on the canals of Amsterdam. There is minimal competition, and if you've been on a tour there, you've probably padded Felix's retirement fund. It was good for me and Marmar, though, because we got free rides everywhere, with open bars and delicious dishes...



Indonesian soup with bamboo shoots and green veggie broth...



Various peanut-sauced and spicy wet-gravied Indonesian meat dishes. Indonesian food is the jam right now, all over Europe. It's delicious...



This is what a staircase looks like in a canal house. It's somewhere in the neighborhood of an 80-degree angle. The house are buily high and narrow, understandably, to fit around the canals. In addition, some of them are about 400 years old, which is an amazing thing to see, especially when the years are carved into stone plaques on the outside...



Some of them have been slowly sinking into the Dutch mush over that time. This picture is not taken with a fish-eye lens, but it looks like it. The houses are actually tilting in on one another. This is a back street somewhere in West-Central Amsterdam.



Here are some of the "modern" canal houses. It literally doesn't stop. Just miles and miles of houses with incredible views, beautiful facades, and monthly rents that make you turn down your ears and let your tail go limp.



The Bjorn Borg motorboat. Amazing. There's a hot new clothing brand in Holland named after the fashionably ridiculous Dutch tennis star. We wanted to buy some underwear -- you know, to gird our loins in the glory that is the John McEnroe foe who inspired the character of Richie Tenenbaum. We never got around to it. So we took a snap of this boat instead.



A bike, strapped to a canal overpass. Discuss.



Lovely day near the Anne Frank House.



And the man, himself, Felix (center) instructing Roy and friend Joe in the intricacies of billiards. We had a tournament later. I out-drank everyone, but ultimately lost the table games. I won in spirit, though. Damned if I didn't...