The diary of a Scot in Amsterdam

Now, since we have all been such good boys and girls, Liv decided that we could all use a treat. The plan was to go for a meal first, and then in time-honoured company-night-out fashion do a bit of 10 pin bowling. Jo and myself skipped the meal in favour of yummy Japanese food from Eat Mode on the Zeedijk (check out the link for cool panorama thing); just as well since the staff night was in a steak restaurant (I’m now the only veggie on the payroll). We came along anyway for the bowling, though.

The place was ages away in Noord, at the end of bus line who-knows-what in Buikslotermeer (looks a lot like Cumbernauld), but in the end worth the trip. It was a really good laugh (our team came last of course), and of course plenty of beer (and later Jaegermeister) was consumed in the process.

Of course no-one was taking it too seriously, but what was kind of strange was all the people there who obviously do; plenty even had their own uniforms. I suppose some people just have to have something to obsess about.

So, after a very long weekend of work and DAI before that, it has been time to take it a bit easier. Jo is visiting this week, so we have mostly been hanging around doing coupley things and sleeping very late. Cool.

Although it’s getting much colder these days, it’s kind of nice to feel a wintery feeling about the place. Stalls have sprung up all over town selling Oliebollen (a kind of delicious oily doughnut), every shop has Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet in the window (it’s not racist, he’s just covered in soot – that’s one of several versions of the story at least…), and I reckon there’ll be snow any day soon. We sat in a bruin café (a sort of typical Dutch bar) on the Grimburgwal today eating toasties, drinking beer, smoking fags and deciding what famous people the passers-by looked like; better than working behind the bar, I can tell you.

Another DAI week is over, after the usual intense 5 days of activity from dawn ’til dusk (and beyond). More information about our trip to Turkey on Monday, studio visits on Tuesday-Wednesday, then lectures all day Thursday. Friday was a bit strange as it happens, since we were visited by 2 artists from Berlin who had decided to mount a sort of “action” in response to what they saw as the shortcomings in their own masters program. The problem was that it seems that we’re all pretty happy here (for the moment), and so the task which we had been given for Friday fell slightly flat. This task was to design a magazine within one day, which in itself is a pretty tall order, and since we couldn’t think of anything horrible to say we wrote little love letters to the tutors in the style of the “I Saw You” adverts that appear in The List etc. A bit lame but it was the best we could think of.

The shitty thing was that I was scheduled to work on Friday evening, so ended up having to leave pretty early. Also, an evening shift ’til 3am in the Sláinte after all that was about the last thing I would have asked for. “Geld moet maar verdiend worden” – Money’s gotta be earned, though.

I have a really nice armchair which I found close to our old house a few months ago. It came with us when we moved house, but it was immediately obvious that it would not fit in my tiny wee new room. I could not bear to throw it away, and so decided to bring it somehow to my studio at the DAI.

That would be easy enough if I had a car or van or whatever, but I don’t. So instead, the decision was taken to try and get it halfway (more than that actually) across the Netherlands by tram, bus, train, and elbow grease.

God dammit, but I actually managed. My arms have been aching for the last few days, but it is finally here in my studio. Thanks to Julien for lifting assistance from the DAI house to the station.

Such a journey was it that I can hopefully make some art out of it!

This rucksack lives across the Hoofddorpplein from my house. I think it is the biggest rucksack in the world. In fact, when I first saw it I thought that perhaps it was for two people (conjoined twins?) but no, it’s meant for one beefy motherfucker. Look at the size of the straps! They don’t even reach halfway up!

These pictures do not do it justice, it really is fucking enormous.

And here are a few pictures of it next to my bike and some people, to give a sense of its massive girth.

My new bedroom is extremely small. I do not mind this (it’s a lot cheaper than my last room), but decided that the best way of compensating for lack of space was to make sure that the furniture therein was exactly sized to fit the surroundings. This seemed like a good wee DIY project, but as is usually the case it kind of grew arms and legs, so to speak, and has taken me about 2 weeks to finish. I am quite pleased with the end result, which consists of a desk, a shelf above this, a long bookshelf, and finally a bed, complete with headboard as can be seen. And all of it is built from recycled timber off the street, so cost me fuck all, too.

Oh, and one other thing. The pink wardrobe is not mine, it was there when I got here. Wouldn’t be my choice. Enough said.

Sónia from my course was holding a little party last night at her house (which she shares with about 10 other people or something…), which was great aside from the fact that I needed to be up at 8am this morning to go to work. Ouch, not for the first time. Also, it was on completely the opposite side of the city from our new house. Myself and Julien found ourselves cycling home at about 5am in the pouring rain, fairly drunk and without too much of a clue to the correct way home, but about an hour later we finally made it back (should have taken about half that time). Nice to see the other students outside of Enschede, though, and there was yummy things to eat which always keeps me happy!

Saw this poor specimen just round the corner from the house. Someone really had it in for the poor thing.

I love second-hand things, and so I was very excited to hear about a huge vlooienmarkt (fleamarket) being held this weekend over in Noord. It certainly was pretty big (500 stalls, said the poster), and was held inside a huge former shipbuilding shed. I think I must be getting a bit sensible and/or old though, because for once I came away without huge quantities of useless & dangerous (usually electically powered) items, as would have been the case in the past. This is probably a combination of the fact that I have just moved into a tiny room, the fact that I am (as always) very short of money, or because I was not really in the mood after 3 hours sleep (was working last night ’til 3am), but it still worries me a bit. I quite like the impulsive, compulsive side of my nature, and I think that I am still far to young to be losing it just yet.

It was discovered recently that tuning the TV in the Sláinte to a particular channel will in fact show what is being recorded by the CCTV camera in a takeaway further down the street (it is somehow being transmitted over the airways). The poor guy who works there doesn’t know anything about this, and is still confused when Sláinte folks (particularly Sean) run in to his shop, do a little dance for the camera, and then run away again.

Most amusing, to be sure.