LEIDEN

Two things I learned going to Leiden: 

• 8 AM on a Saturday summer morning is early for the Dutch so I have the streets all for myself, subsisting on cigarettes since the shops are all shuttered until 10 AM, and  
• there are no luggage lockers in Leiden, the Visitors Information Center is not as friendly as Delft, so I walked around baggage in tow while trying to be a tourist. 

I've got no maps so I felt my way around, the instinct of many travels taking over, until I reached a marker and followed the arrows, which brought me to the heart of Leiden, the historic Blauwpoorts Harbour with its ancient ships and a windmill.

I followed more arrows along beautiful Rapenburg where I stumbled upon the house of noted Dutch physicist Willem's Gravesande (1688-1742) and the green and black Dutch bikes parked near its door.

More arrows took me to Leiden University and its famous garden, Hortus Botanicus where the first tulips in the Netherlands were planted.

Then the arrows disappeared as I paused to rest the poor small wheels of my luggage that's not really ideal for cobbled streets, and discovered a marker that said I was standing in front of the canal entrance to the old village of Lammen where the Dutch drove out the last Spanish garrison to finally lift the Siege of Leiden.

From there is where I saw the spire of the Pieterskerk, Leiden's oldest church, where narrow cobbled streets converge.

And through those streets I trudged, travelling bag in tow, to the Stadhuis van Leiden and a stirring Saturday market of clothes and nuts and cheese and everything else.

Another church spire pulled me through an extremely cobbled street, the massive Hooglandse Kerk, where curiosity took me to a stone arch through an open cafe and up the Burcht van Leiden that once guarded the intersection of two tributaries of the Rhine, luggage in tow, pee storage capacity at bursting point.  

Famished and thirsty, I went back down the market for a lunch of freshly cooked crunchy but tasteless kibbeling after which I decided I've had enough but not after shooting a frame of the catholic Hartebrug Church and a final last shot of some other church.  

And that was luggage locker-less and map-less Leiden in 4 hours.

I could have went back if the now open visitor center allowed luggage safekeeping like Delft's but they did not, so I went to Schipol and killed time with the free airport wifi. 

OF BANANAS AND BEER

We invented bananas.

These are endemic to Southeast Asia until marauding conquerors brought it to Asia Minor, and from there colonizers brought it to Africa, and then to the Caribbean by slave traders. 

That is why you can take way my dog, even my beer, but not my bananas. 

Africans and Asians first drank beer in Egypt and Mesopotamia before the Romans brought it to Europe where the Germans introduced the hops.

Asians also invented pasta, in China, which Marco Polo imported to Italy.  

China's roasted pig is said to be the origin of the barbecue, but the word which eventually denoted "slow cooking over fire" was from the Caribbean, where the bananas from Asia propagated and expanded into the "New World". 

I love our bananas, it's the whole basis of my Theory of Change, and dark beer too, invented by the English, which to me is liquid and foamy banana. 

The banana almost lost on Day 3 but bounced back strongly on Day 4.

And to that we offer an offering of white beer, dark beer, and wine --- an invention of the Georgians, Iranians, Armenians, and the Greeks --- in the altar of continuing friendship and solidarity.

But man cannot live by bananas and beer alone, so I marauded for rice that of course came from Asia [China], served with a platter of lamb tikka that of course was invented by Asians (Indians and Pakistanis], and a bottle of Indian beer that must have been inspired by the British. 

Summer has descended on The Hague, where the bananas and beer crossed...  

DELFT

Delft I thought

was Chinaware pouring out of workshops run by elves who paint the famous blue designs with their magic wands, 

burly cheese bearers in their white costumes and hats prancing the Edam cheese ballet, 

and multi-colored tulip fields blooming, canals rippling, and windmills fluttering.

But Delft 

is a half-finished Central Station with no luggage lockers

and the information center near the New Church where I left my baggage.

The New Church

old actually [1381] and later claimed by a protesting new religion who feuded with the pope,

guardian of the forbidden royal crypt of William the Silent's House of Orange-Nassau,

and host to the second tallest Dutch church tower that imposes over the Old Church.

The Old Church

old indeed [1240] and grave keeper of the famous and a Dutch master who died a pauper,

Bible stories shinning through its stained windows as church music echoed from massive organs,

tower a-tilt like Pisa without the the risotto, the pizza, and the pasta.

And lunch

is deep fried herring tempered with garlic sauce and washed with orange juice,

the famous Vermeer lady stared back with Delft-blue blank eyes,

as lesser churches got snubbed by habitual bikers and sudden Instagramers.

NIGHTS IN THE HAGUE

MAANDAG NACHT
(Boterwaag)

Hey Derk, is there a Dutch beer that's not Heineken? 

The next morning, Ed announced that somebody who forgot to pay last night's dinner owe him 30 Euros. He never found who that was and never got his money back.

TUESDAY NIGHT
(O'Casey's Irish Pub)

"You tell me" I told Derk who asked me my brew for the night.

Ed made sure it kept coming, so I had too many Irish beers and started calling Snehal as Justin, and ordered Irish breakfast for dinner.

Total cost: 34 Euros and several trips to the toilet the next day.

MERCOLEDI NOTTE
(La Liguria Ristorante Italiano)

No further comment, other than Italian beer is served in small glasses and the aperitif at Het Heden is fruity but with a mean Red Horse kick. 

I paid my 40 Euros, said goodbye, and walked to the hotel with Binbin.

AMAZING DUTCH CUISINE

Maandag

STARTER

External perspectives on the post-Paris scenario with cucumbers and Hollandse garnalen

ENTREE

Pannenkoeken with slices of 2015 achievements and GROW campaigning goals, with a sauce of post-Paris climate finance and an icing of shifting-the-trillions

DESSERT

A botterkoek of bilaterals and cluster meetings 

Dinsdag

STARTER

A frikadellen of WIN and 2020 with sweet and sour energy work mustard fruit

ENTREE

"Zero hunger, zero emissions" erwtensoep with a "human face of climate change" bread and smoked inputs for strategic planning

DESSERT

 A pepernoten on ways of working

Woensdag

STARTER

Smoked MEL overview with slices of thematic strategies and GROW priorities

ENTREE

ToC enhancement stamppot with smoked advocacy milestones and a gravy of South Africa insights

DESSERT

An appletaart of potential publications