Getting to Amsterdam was in itself a challenge. Keeping in mind that the Netherlands is a small country, that the Randstad is one of the most densely populated areas in the world, that everybody wants to party in Amsterdam on Queen's Day and that there is great reliance on public transport; it was packed on the trains and train stations. Halfway to Amsterdam, the train stopped and dropped us off in Haarlem as people were reported to have been walking on the tracks and some trains were defective.
Luckily, the bus dropped me off right on the doorstep to Vondelpark, my recommendation for any Queen's Day visit. The Vondelpark is a large natural green space in Amsterdam, the rest of which is tightly packed and tightly ordered around semi-circular canals. The park hosts the Vrijmarkt stalls, secondhand flea-market and festival activity stalls run by eccentric families and charismatic children. It is Vrijmarkt (Free Market) because there is a tax concession on selling things this day. My favourite stall featured a girl pumping flour through a papier mache volcano (labelled with an Icelandic name) with a handheld pump; and her apparent parents inviting passerbys to land paper planes at 'Schiphol Airport' - designated by a cellophane and paper landing strip. What a creative and topical way to entertain the crowd!
I bought transcribed piano sheet music for Caro Emerald's "A Night Like This" from a lady wandering through the crowds.
There was also an awesome drumming performance by a precocious young boy, and his two young charismatic brothers, who danced to the fast beats of the former.
I then exited the park and entered utter chaos. The ground was carpeted with rubbish and it was only noon. There were people wearing orange everywhere. More people were selling food, drinks, t-shirts, secondhand things. There were people paying to throw eggs at people being paid to be thrown eggs at. I had warme beenham, thinly sliced then grill-heated ham on white soft bread rolls with mustard. It was the biggest street party I have ever seen and it involved the whole city, and people of all ages. When I said that Dusseldorf Karneval was big, I had not seen this.
By far the highlight of the day for me was stumbling upon 'The Famous Unknowns', a Spanish guitarist and an Australian dulcimerist. Playing at the centre of a semi-circle of enchanted spectators, behind a box of their CDs and a busking money box, in front of a turquoise vintage Datsun embellished by a scattering of worldly artefacts and trinkets, they blasted their sublime music around their little corner of Queen's Day Amsterdam. This was guitar tapping, dulcimer and a beat sampler. They are the best street performers I have ever seen. I even heard that they "point blank refused" a Sony Records offer to do a label. http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendId=356737800&blogId=444832651Download their music at: http://plixid.com/2010/03/29/carlos-vamos-famous-unknowns-2cd-2007-mp3/
The kindly dude who sold me a secondhand copy of Khalil Gibran's "The Prophet".
After this I arrived just before closing time at the RADAR Art Gallery where they were exhibiting the work of Laser 3.14. For those playing at home, his graffiti was earlier featured in my first Amsterdam post. The very picture I took of what I thought was an obscure unknown scribble on the wall is coincidentally the picture used on the website to promote this famous graffiti poet who writes deep, meaningful and humourous aphorisms on temporary structures like scaffolding.
I then headed back to Vondelpark where I finally met up with London (ex-Sydney) family friend Joshua, his fiancee Busara and her sister Ning. This is after eight text messages which arrived hours after being sent and a few calls, due to the sheer number of people around. We caught some music on Leidseplein, then headed over to the much bigger Museumplein stage, which was absolutely choked with people. Making up for the previous day's omission, we made it, half by effort (following the word on the street), and half by luck, to Caro Emerald's performance on the biggest stage in Holland's biggest city on its biggest day. I also saw Sidney Samson, the mastermind behind "Riverside", perform."Father and Friend" is a sweet song about father and son, performed by father and son Alain Clark (There was a genuine connection between the two on stage that day): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbqF6Xv1mNU
Caro Emerald - A Night Like This: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74LXx0wSqMI
No space left on the ground - so onto the tram stop shelters!
Post-apocalyptic Amsterdam!
Like yesterday, we left after one good act and missed the following main act: DJ Tiesto, the Netherlands' most popular DJ export. Like yesterday, when I got back to Leiden, I went to party with my friends, some of whom were too lame to make the effort to get to Amsterdam.
