When she was invested as queen (not crowned as the crown sat before her during the ceremony but was not placed on her head), the first act Beatrix proclaimed as she turned lovingly toward her abdicating mother, Queen Juliana, was that the 30th of April, her mother's birthday, would continue as the official celebration of the Queen's Birthday. On Friday night, with Drew and Freeman visiting from abroad, we went to the Concertgebouw to hear Neeme Jarvi conduct Mjaskovski's Violin Concerto (with an impeccable performance by Vadim Repin) and Shostakovitch's Six Symphony. Afterwards, we walked over to the Pink Triangle Memorial by the Westerkerk - ostensibly to watch the 'crowning' of the Gay Queen. Being New Yorkers, Freeman and Drew left immediately. Richard and I departed not long after ourselves but not before I recognised Evert standing before me. When asked the weather prognosis for the following day, Evert replied that it would be 'colder than it is now - along with some rain'.
To be sure, on Saturday morning, the skies opened and the rain descended. But that was it for the day. Our sleeping house guests had missed it. And while the day was decided cool, when one was in the sun which prevailed throughout the occasion, it was blissfully warm and magical. The birthday is the 30th of May, but as this year the day fell on a Sunday, the Protestant coalition objected that this was the Lord's Day of Rest, and so the Dutch authorities in their pre-eminent practicality made the decision to celebrate on Saturday the 29th this year instead of Sunday the 30th.
Everyone was on their own for the day. Marion and Leslie had wandered by the remaining Christmas twin, Gary, in the morning and found themselves next helping to put up balloons and other decorations for his coffee house, Back Stage. Richard and I began the prowl of the flea-market presentation across the town. People everywhere were offering odds and ends for sale - usually 50 cents or one euro. There were many great bargains and useable items, but we were reluctant to burden ourselves with extraneous things to carry. Visiting Warren at his card shop, we found him thrilled over the prospect that despite all stores being closed for the day, he had a couple from Korea who had come expressly to see his art books, and he had left them free in the main shop to peruse to their wishes. In the past, Warren has managed to suggest doing things that had rarely conformed to what he had billed them as, but on this day, he completely redeemed himself and suggested that we visit the Jordaan, an old semi-bohemian district adjacent to the city centre.
People were everywhere, walking, sailing, clustered around the countless music stages that had been erected ubiquitously. Sometimes it was a tight squeeze to pass through an area, but for the most part, there was a gentle movement from one stage to the next. Free toilets had been supplied by the city, but the provisional urinals were hopeless because already by 10 AM they had filled up. There were beer stands, sangria stands, hamburger and hot dog stands, waffle and poffertje stands and endlessly more. The predominant colour was orange - representing the royal house of Orange-Nassau. People wore orange leis, orange t-shirts, or, like Richard and I, orange caps that we could purchase on the street.
And then it happened. Suddenly there was an emotional chill that swept across everyone and people brushed a tear or two away as the realisation sank in on how special this whole occasion was. Nederland was celebrating itself - and it has so much to celebrate. This already stunningly beautiful city of Amsterdam was literally draped with people - orange clad for the most part, but just happy, contented people - everywhere!. The banks of the canals were packed, and the bridges were as well. The city was more alive and glorious than I had ever seen her. Boats of every kind - row boats, motor boats, yachts, barges - moved festively across the sun-sparkling waters. It was a regatta unlike any other. All in all, it was the most marvellous Brueghelesque scene as only the Low Countries could produce. There was only relaxation, good cheer, no undue drunkenness, no anxiety, no one rushing to get anywhere. There was simply that joy of comradeship and a people celebrating who they were. Richard and I realised that it would take us hours to get back to the house. I had never seen the streets so full, but nothing mattered. We just moved with the crowds and soaked in the many, many delights in the process - stopping to have a bite from one of the stalls, or a drink, or to digest anyone of the countless panoramic views. I knew that this was a spiritual and atavistic occasion - something so special that it was virtually indescribable.
Nederland was celebrating everything about itself - including its capitalistic spirit for which it could just well be the original seminal breeding grounds. I came to see Amsterdam as the homeland of capitalism but an oasis and legacy of capitalism as it was meant to be: relaxed, sharing, aspiring yet moderate. Status is to have a water vessel, and those that did had them today out on the waters in celebration. At one point, an entire barge of exuberant energy, everyone wearing red, emerged from beneath one of the bridges spanning the Prinsengracht. This was followed by another barge but this time with everyone wearing white - also exuding a pristine dynamic. Finally, an entire barge of blue-clothed people emerged - all ironically subdued, muted and 'bluish'. These three vessels represented the red, white and blue of the Dutch flag. All laws seemed to be suspended for the day in this already exceptionally tolerant of lands. Police were present but mostly just as observers, occasionally to dance momentarily with a reveller. Early in the morning, the students in the house across from mine had strung up a rope extending from their attic grenier across the waters to a tree on my side of the canal, and then they proceeded to charge three euros from anyone who wished to take the pulley-ride from the top of their house to the street level across. When Richard and I finally reached home, we set up chairs in front of the house from which to watch the activities. Marion and Leslie joined us with some tea. We were occasionally implored by passers-by if we would allow them to use the toilet in our basement flat. We could have ourselves made a fair profit for the day if we had wanted, but we always refused their offer of change and were on one occasion given some cans of beer in gratitude. We could also have gathered any number of discarded plastic glasses and collected the one euro deposit by returning them, but there was too much to enjoy to think of such things.
Freeman and Drew took in much of the delights from the secure vantage point of the first floor balcony window - ensconced under earphones listening to music of their own choosing. Finally, I virtually ordered them out into the street so that they would not have completely missed the unique dynamic of this unrepeatable event. They expressed afterwards that they were glad I had. There was countless choice of music on the streets - from the usual rock, to classical and some excellent jazz. If one venue was not doing it for you, it was easy and fun enough simply to move on to one that did.
All in all, this was an unforgettable day. It was a nation thrilling over itself, relaxed, joyous, colourful beyond expression. It is a nation and a peoples who have every right to celebrate who and what they are. If this was patriotism, it never smelled patriotic; if it was chauvinistic, there was no trace of chauvinism. It was instead a peoples who had captured the spiritual essence of who they are, why they are and how they are - a people who are completely at home with their own who, why and how. This was a true democracy, unpretentious and as it was meant to be.
Michael