Leiden

Pronounced "Lay (with a soft a) den," and apparently with an amazing University?, this little town 40 minutes southwest (zuidwesten) of Amsterdam just had a festival that was basically the whole town coming to life.  It lasted all weekend, starting Friday, and ran morning to evening (basically morning again), and features carnival / faire - like attractions (small roller coasters, ferris wheels, cotton candy, many many side vendors, &c.), as well as bands on barges, street parties and dancing, randomly-placed DJs with blasting music, people giving away sunflowers, &c.  In the course of about 2 hours, I heard a band play their (outstanding) rendition of With A Little Help For My Friends, Eminem & more Beatles blaring from storefronts, and various ABBA songs in a medley from a DJ in an elevated stand by the old castle / cathedral.  We obviously danced and sang to the ABBA songs, because that is what you do when ABBA songs are playing.  It just is.

The town features beautiful structures and ornamental bridges, enduring outcroppings of a medieval castle, old old old roads, parks, and just a wonderful design in general.  Buildings were shorter than in Amsterdam, and roads and waterways were more open, reminding me of various French streets in a way.  It's a very historic town, obviously, and very linked to its maritime heritage.  We passed several very old boats anchored to the canal sides, and a historic fishermen's choir singing traditional, boisterous tunes and playing old flutes and drums.  It was just very picturesque and quaint, and clearly with a distinct and artful culture of its own.

Yesterday (zaterdag), my whole flat (minus one person, but plus another friend) went to the festival together, and we stayed there for a good three or so hours.  Some people arrived earlier, but we all left together, around 7pm or so.  As one of my friends and I were walking along a main canal street, a womyn with large bundles of sunflowers was closing up shop and began giving out the remaining flowers to all the passersby.  My friend went around to all the bikes she found and put a sunflower in them.  It was so beautiful.  I held onto mine, and when I would walk places carrying my bundle of free & gifted sunflowers, random people would smile or grin at me, or call out to me, or make special room for me to get by so I wouldn't crush the flowers.  One random semi-drunk man said, "Oh, dat zijn mooi bloemen" (Those are beautiful flowers), and not only did I understand him, but I thanked him in Dutch ("Bedankt!") and felt pleased with myself that even drunk strangers could be so nice and warm and out-reaching...and not even in creepy ways.  Plus I'm learning to discern Dutch words, and split them separately up so they're not a string of guttural sounds without pauses between, and occasionally recognising things.  But I was very proud of myself for understanding him--constructing basic sentences is one thing, but learning listening skills is another.  Another group of guys, as I walked past, started hollering excitedly when they saw the flowers and saying things in Dutch that I didn't understand, and beckoning for me to bring the flowers back (which, I mean, I obviously didn't do because that is mildly creepy).

So it was basically a combination of a gigantic county faire and then a gigantic open street festival.  It was wonderful.  Plus, we spent a healthy chunk of time up in an old out tower of the castle, wandering the turret and taking pictures and translating signs that were already translated into English at the bottom.  There was an old tavern at the base, outside of the tower, that was fitted snugly into a little turn in a very old cobbled road / side-road, and the lights were all coming on early, and it was just...well, yeah.  Plus Autumn is my favourite season, ever.