We noticed big posters yesterday for the World Police and Fire Games. We saw contestants all around town. Greg spoke to one and learned that they are an international competition for police and firefighters. As the contestant explained, “Kind of like the Olympics, but you don’t have to be good. I’m not good.” Then we happened upon one of the competition fields this morning. We watched several one-on-one contests including such finely hewn skills as rolling up two fire hoses, stacking them atop one another, and racing with the stacked hoses to the end of the short course - all in full fire-fighting regalia.
Greg said he was disappointed that we missed the seven-floor baby drop-and-catch.
More fun architecture. From the side, the red building on right looks like a giant Jenga stack.
There’s even a Chinatown in Rotterdam.
The highlight of the morning was breakfast. We had fun watching the people who walked by our table, including a gentleman who realized his fly was unzipped and tried to rectify things surreptitiously until he noticed us laughing. (Unfortunately, no photo to record the event.). Greg especially enjoyed his double-decker hot chocolate, which came with hot milk and warmed Dutch chocolate chips that he had to stir into the milk.
A demonstration for Ukraine included speakers and a model using humans to show the extent of the Russian-occupied territory.
We took an Uber to the ship. Our driver immediately tried to engage us on Biden and US politics. We demurred. Then he entertained us with stories about the bombing in WWII and the newly-thriving film location business in Rotterdam.
From the ship, the Erasmus bridge. That’s Greg’s finger pointing to it.
The view from our cabin - which we really like. It’s in the front of the ship, a great vantage point. Hopefully we’ll be treated to sunsets when we start heading west, provided we can stay up that late when we’re a lot further north! It’s light until 10:30 already. The weather today and yesterday was delightful, sunny and in the 70s. Here’s hoping the weather karma continues. (we are expecting lots of rain in Norway, however).
Our cabin on the Rotterdam will be our home for the next three weeks. We’ll be cruising Norwegian and Icelandic fjords, exploring cities and villages in Norway, Iceland and Scotland, and (we hope) getting in some good walks. The Rotterdam is Holland America’s newest ship, launched only last October.
Our itinerary. The stops are numbered in the order we’ll be visiting them.
And now for a word about Erasmus, whom I mentioned yesterday.
Desiderius Erasmus (1469-1536) was one of Europe’s most famous and influential Renaissance thinkers. I first encountered him in college, when I read “In Praise of Folly” for a class. This 16th century work has never been out of print, an accomplishment claimed by few other books of this era. Among other things, he was an activist, a philosopher, a Christian humanist, a translator, satirist, theologian, monk and a priest. He was influential and at times controversial.
The statue above was installed in 1622, 86 years after Erasmus’ death. The bronze statue is considered to be one of the finest in Europe. The statue is not static; it depicts Erasmus walking while turning the page of a large book. (I can relate to being that engrossed in a book.) It somehow survived the WWII bombing of Rotterdam, a subsequent burial to hide it from the Nazis, fell headfirst off its base in 1996 (damaging the stones below), and was moved several times over the last 4 centuries.
I won’t be posting anything tomorrow. We have a day at a sea, so going to enjoy it and take a break. We’ll be in Norway Tuesday morning.
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