Day 45 and 46_Maastricht, The Netherlands

With the exception of perhaps Hawaiian, Dutch must be the language with the longest words.  My hotel is on Endepolsdomein (street) next to Heerderdwarsstrasse (street).  I asked at my hotel front desk clerk  if they have to use a lot of hyphens here.  Maastricht is an effiicient couple of train hours southwest of Duisburg and the location of my conference.  My trip is definitely slowing down from the frenetic pace of last month with me lazily doubling blog days into one.  Monday and Tuesday I was alone to explore this very ancient (first city in the Netherlands) and cultural city.   I had one place in mind that I wanted to see:  the bookstore Selexyz Dominicanen.  An abandoned Dominican church since 1794, it had previously been used for housing the city archives to storage for motorcycles and bikes.  In an inventive re-use of the building, it is now a bookstore where the freestanding, two story shelves do not negatively effect the 15th century architecture.  Grave stones in the floor of the church can be clearly seen, and the former apse if now a cafe.  While it may seen sacrilegious to create an altar-shaped table here, somehow it seems appropriate and reminds us of the building's former sacred use.  The height of the bookshelves brings you closer to the ceiling to examine the paintings and details that usually require a telephoto lens.

The city of Maastricht lines the Maas River with old bridges connecting both sides, some adapted to large barges which could otherwise not fit under the ancient stone arches.  The buildings are butted tightly together, San Francisco style, with each having its own architecture, but all having steeply pitched roofs.  (Usually the roof is the give away for weather in a place, as snow needs to quickly get off these roofs to minimize water and weight damage.)  The weather the past couple of days has been 6 C with light rain and wind--not great walking weather.  I popped into a cafe for an all you could eat soup bar which I was going to put on my ears to warm them.

Like many places in Europe, Maastricht is rather newly affiliated with The Netherlands, joining in the mid-1800s.  It has gone back and forth between being part of France and Belgium and the language shows it.  I was listening to several people, thinking it sounded French, then German words would be inserted.  The language seems to combine many of the past conquerors.

The Netherlands is known for its liberal drug laws and I saw a funny sign for a shop in town.  (And it was not in the shady section of town either.)