Friday November 16. In hibernation.

Written by Jack van Ommen on November 16th, 2012

It is just a few degrees above freezing. I just took the hand washed laundry from the life lines. Wednesday the sun broke through the overcast but no such luck yesterday or today. I had to hang out the nearly dry laundry all through the cabin. Guus Bierman mailed me a complimentary ticket for the METS exhibit in the RAI. This is the world’s biggest trade fair for the leisure marine industry. This is where the manufacturers and marine organizations meet their distributors/customers. It runs for three days but it would be impossible to see all the different exhibits in those three days.

  • Over 1,300 exhibitors from over 39 countries
  • Over 19,000 professionals from over 96 countries, 15 National pavilions

I took a look last Wednesday. It was amazing. I saw sheet winches of  24 inch diameter that would sink my boat and hardware designed for baby prams. It was a Babylonic linguistic confusion. I heard them all. The USA was well represented taking up a good part of one of the pavilions. My cover page article on Botters was displayed in the Wooden Boat Magazine and Professional Boat Builder Magazine booth and I enjoyed meeting Carl Cramer. Guus Bierman of Contender Sailcloth introduced me to his crew and a few of his sailmaker customers. I had a nice chat with the representatives of West Epoxy in the European agent’s exhibit of  Helge von der Linden. Von der Linden also assembled a NAJA, like mine, at around the same time in 1979. I made a new friend in the West Marine/ Port Supply exhibit. Franz Steidl, of their international division. I should have rode in there on my West Marine folding bike that Marlys and Greg Clark gave me on April 1st 2009 in Fort Lauderdale. My West Marine coat passed down to me by Louk Wijssens widow in 2007 was in my back pack. Franz was born in Sudetenland in 1945. He is writing a book about the experience of the aftermath of the flight from this German enclave in then Czechoslovakia. He married a Nisei and published a book on the 2nd WW on the Asian front “Lost Battalions”  about the Japanese American battalion: http://www.amazon.com/Lost-Battalions-Franz-Steidl/dp/0891417273/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1353095689&sr=8-1&keywords=lost+battalions#reader_0891417273

And on the subject. My very dear friend Maria Boonzaaijer, who grew up a few blocks away from me in the Waalstraat, published her 2nd book,”Het Vreemde Meisje”:

https://thehouseofbooks.onlinetouch.nl/3/29/Maria-Boonzaaijer—Het-vreemde-meisje#/28

This is  a good reason for anyone who does not read Dutch to come and attend my one week “total immersion” course for $5.00, next month. If the canals are frozen over you will receive a rain check.

The below picture was taken when the sun managed to burn through the overcast, on my way back from the METS show, through the Beatrix Park. This park was our playground where I grew up. The trees were then spindly sprouts. There are many reasons that I should be planting trees, like these. I have done my part in my former profession to fall the giants of the forests for profit. Mea Culpa, mea Maxima Culpa….

Beech Trees in Beatrix Park in Amsterdam-Zuid

Wednesday evening my twin brother,Jan, and my brother in law, Herman van der Linden came to take me to dinner. I had not seen my brother since 2010. He looks good for his age. People tell me that I look like him.

 

 

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