Guus Bosman

After my work I took a train back north, to Utrecht, where I took an intercity to Amsterdam. I am traveling quite a lot this week. Today I saw Rotterdam, Utrecht and Amsterdam in one day.

I met Jelly in Amsterdam! It was so nice to see her. We had a few drinks in a bar at the train station (a nice Dutch brown cafe called "1st class"). Of course we stayed in contact by e-mail etc but meeting in person is always better.

I took the train from 7.00 pm to Hoorn, where I waited a bit and then took the the bus to Middenmeer.

In Amsterdam I bought a few books, of most interest Ayaan Hirshi Ali's autobiography. Even though I do not always agree with her, I find her a very courageous woman and admire her for the way she has dealt with what came her way after the murder of Van Gogh. As I discussed with my father, there is surprisingly little literature on "current affairs" in the Netherlands. After everything that has happened in the last few years (Fortuyn, Van Gogh, Ali's story) you would expect at least a few books on Dutch politics but the bookstore on the station in Amsterdam only had Ali's autobiography. The book was 19,99 euro for a paperback -- very expensive if you ask me.

A parrot in the cafe.