September 2009

I’m in Secaucus now after a great day in New York. I went to two museums today, and yesterday to the Met and to Danku, a Dutch restaurant in NYC, so it’s pretty busy. Busy, but a lot of fun.

And I have the opportunity to continue teaching Julian how to pronounce my name. When he says “one more time” to get me to do the drop-down trick, I make him say my name first and that’s a fair deal.

You know how you can feel guilty about not having read certain books?

Well, I’ve always felt guilty that there are certain books from high school I never got a chance to read. The last couple of weeks I’ve done some ‘catching up’ and I read a couple of the most popular high school books I’d not read yet.

• Slaughterhouse-Five — rambling, not interesting, boring
• Brave New World — nice science fiction. Author was ahead of its time by 70 years, very relevant.
• To Kill a Mockingbird — lovely, Southern
• The Catcher in the Rye — very depressing

So two were nice (I really enjoyed To Kill a Mockingbird) and two weren’t very good. In the mean time I’m working on a new project that I’m enjoying very much; more on that later.

The moon rock that was a prized part of the collection of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam turned out to be false. A few weeks ago researchers of the Vrije University announced that the moon rock was in fact petrified wood, possibly from Arizona.

The ‘moon rock’ had been a gift to Prime Minister Willem Drees by the American Ambassador when the three Apollo 11 astronauts visited the Netherlands in 1969.

After Willem Drees passed away in 1988, the moon rock was presented to the Rijksmuseum. According to Novum/AP this may have been where things got a little confused:

“Spokeswoman Xandra van Gelder said that after it received the moon rock in 1992 from the heirs of Mr. Drees the museum verified with NASA if this was indeed a moon rock. Without physical inspection, NASA said it was ‘possibly’ a moon rock. However, the rock was 89 grams — much bigger than most other moon rocks that the US government has given to other countries over the years.

The Epoch Times adds: “There is much speculation about the purpose of giving the stone as a gift. Was the stone intentionally given to mislead people, or did Drees misinterpret the gift?

Van Gelder continued, “On the card that was given along with the stone, it did not literally say that it was a moon stone … But what is odd about it: ‘Why would you give such an insignificant stone as a keepsake?’ I don’t get that.”

In any case, you won’t have to go without seeing moon stone in Netherlands this fall. The Boerhaave Museum in Leiden has extended their moon exhibition with 4 weeks, and through September 30 you can visit their display of undisputed moon rock.

Two tiny pieces of moon rock are on display in Leiden; one from Apollo 11 from Mare Tranquillitatis, the other from Apollo 17, the last flight to the moon. Both were gifts by President Nixon to Queen Juliana who donated them to the museum.

Today historical linguist Nicoline van der Sijs will present the first copy of her book Cookies, Coleslaw and Stoops on the influence of the Dutch language on American English and the languages of the Native Americans.

The book will be presented in New York City as part of the celebrations of New York's 400 years existence.

"From Santa Claus (after the Dutch folklore saint Sinterklaas) and his sleigh (the pronunciation of the Dutch slee is almost identical) to a dumbhead talking poppycock, the contributions of the Dutch language to American English are indelibly embedded to some of our most vernacular terms and expressions."

The Dutch title is Yankees, Cookies en Dollars -- it's interesting that different words were selected for the Dutch title than for the American title (Cookies, Coleslaw, and Stoops).