"The Earth Laughs in Flowers"
My parents may be pleased to know that by the end of my trip I was in fact upset that I had not seen as much art as I would have liked. While we did not have enough time to take on the famous Rijksmuseum, I made the executive decision for myself that I would at least go to the Rembrandt House Museum on my last morning in the city no matter what. To my own self-detriment, I am normally an avid people pleaser often sacrificing my own desires so that others can fulfill theirs, but over the course of this semester, I have realized the importance of voicing my own opinion and sticking up for myself. And the nice thing about this now as we are growing older is the ability for us to be comfortable and happy with each other doing what we each want to do without it creating any disagreements or problems. So while not all of my traveling companions wanted to come to the museum, I was deeply excited to go. I loved the museum because of its interactive components and how much I learned about and felt immersed in the artist’s life. They held demonstrations on both how Rembrandt and others in his time made prints as well as how paints were made in the era. I loved the alchemy and chemistry of the natural world involved in how oil paints were made.
I was a bit skeptical to do so but our next move was to walk through the red light district. I wasn’t really sure what to expect but I was still taken aback by the women wearing only bras, underwear, and heels dancing or just scrolling through their phones in the windows that lined the streets. An avid supporter of positive sexuality, bodily autonomy, and the many positive effects of decriminalizing prostitution, I still have some more personal issues with condoning sex as a business and the associations I have with it in relation to sex trafficking and forced prostitution, which I learned a lot about in high school. Of course if this is really what these women want to do with their lives and this is what makes them happy and fulfilled, then by all means, I’m glad they have a safe, regulated environment in which to do it, but I personally find it hard to fathom that this is their dream job. I also find it difficult to rationalize the motives of the men who patronize these businesses… I could write much more about my thoughts on the subject but in case you’re interested, at the end of this post are some articles I found on the topic offering different perspectives.
After our visit to the red light district and a famous condom store within, our last and final stop before the airport was to make up for our time spent waiting in line in the rain on Saturday and finally get to the tulip gardens once and for all. Today there was no line at all, we just hopped right on the bus but wow would that line still have been worth it! The gardens are massive – I could have spent the entire day there had we not had to catch our plane. There were fields and fields of stunning flowers; tulips in shapes and colors I had never seen before, with other species sprinkled throughout each flowerbed creating stunning color pallets of complimenting and opposite colors that made everything pop and flow at the same time. In addition to the incredible flowers, there were also lots of food stands, so my friends and I loaded up on some last classic fries and stroopwaffle before we had to say goodbye… And what a sweet sorrow it was!
Here are some articles that talk about prostitution in Amsterdam: (1) (2) (3) Interestingly, most of the articles I found online in my brief Google searching critiqued Amsterdam’s laws as not doing enough to protect the women working in the industry such that the benefits of legalizing it do not outweigh the risks that still prevail. But please, see for yourself!
The quote I use as the title for this post is by Ralph Waldo Emerson.