NYT: Alkmaar: A Dutch City That Still Likes to Speak Dutch
Premise Checker
http://select.nytimes.com/preview/2005/10/30/travel/1129798216990.html?8tpw=&emc=tpw&pagewanted=print
[I know Alkmaar from the first stereo recordings of the great Helmut
Walcha in the St. Lauren's church. Having listened to them many times,
thought his mono recordings in Cappel, Germany feature a better organ,
it's nice to learn something about the town.
Day Out
By BRUCE BAWER
AMSTERDAM is many wonderful things - the cosmopolitan gateway to
Europe, a living repository of glorious Dutch art, architecture and
cultural treasures - but it's not exactly an immersion course in
contemporary Dutch life. Indeed, in a city where about half the
population is foreign and where you might imagine that English is the
official language, ordinary natives can be lost in the shuffle,
overshadowed by the spectacle of street-corner drug peddlers (few of
them Dutch) or scantily clad women (also non-Dutch) posing in
crimson-flooded windows.
Fortunately, a healthy dose of more typically Dutch life is close at
hand. In the sandy, marshy lowlands of the North Holland peninsula, a
half hour by train north of Amsterdam, lies Alkmaar, a municipality
with just under 100,000 inhabitants that last year celebrated its
750th anniversary. In 1573, it was the first Dutch city liberated from
the Spanish, an event that set the Netherlands on the road to the
golden age of the Dutch Republic. Today, this old trading center is
known primarily for its soccer team, AZ, and its weekly cheese market
(actually an elaborate simulation served up for tourists); for me,
however, it's a place that can balance out some of the misleading
notions about the Netherlands that Amsterdam can, alas, nurture.
Trains from Amsterdam to Alkmaar (11.90 euros round trip, or $14.52 at
$1.22 to the euro) are frequent. Ten minutes out, you're gliding
across rolling meadows broken by yard-wide, algae-green canals and
lines of trees out of a painting by Albert Cuyp. Sheep and cattle
graze; at track side, men and women work communal gardens.
And then - in no time at all - you're in Alkmaar. A 10-minute walk
from the station brings you to Grote Sint Laurenskerk, an imposing
15th-century church in the Brabant-Gothic style (like French Gothic,
but with a more ornate exterior) that marks one end of the main
thoroughfare, Langestraat. Now a pedestrian-only shopping street, it
has many of the chain stores that are found along Kalverstraat, its
counterpart in Amsterdam, as well as convivial cafes with names like
Bacchus (No. 12) and de Nachtegaal (the Nightingale, No. 100).
But Langestraat can feel less like Kalverstraat - that roiling sea of
heterogeneous humanity - than like a Dutch version of Bedford Falls in
"It's a Wonderful Life." One recent Saturday, a man and his little boy
moseyed along lapping at ice-cream cones, while a mother marched her
brood from one clothing outlet to another.
Enhancing the quaint small-town feel was a huge street organ (a fading
Dutch tradition); its proprietor shoved it up and down the pavement as
it tooted "Toot, Toot, Tootsie, Goodbye" and "Five Foot Two, Eyes of
Blue." (I recalled this fondly the next day when, at a family-filled
restaurant in Amsterdam, I went bug-eyed at the obscene rap lyrics
blaring from loudspeakers.)
I love the splendor of Amsterdam. But I also love Alkmaar's low-key,
old-fashioned - dare I say corny? - charm. I savor the little touches
of Dutch culture: you buy a magazine, and the cashier briskly rolls it
up and slides a rubber band over it; you order fries, and they ask
you, "Ketchup or mayonnaise?" In Amsterdam, one sometimes glimpses my
favorite only-in-the-Netherlands spectacle: a dad or mom chauffeuring
two moppets on a bicycle, one riding fore, the other aft. But in
Alkmaar this sight is ubiquitous. I love Alkmaar's immaculate streets;
at street crossings, with no traffic in sight, even visibly restless
teenagers wait for the light to change.
I also love the feeling of safety. To live in Amsterdam these days is
to be gloomily aware that the Netherlands is suffering from
formidable, and deepening, urban problems; strolling around Alkmaar,
you'd hardly know it.
Yet it's no Mayberry, either. Wander a bit beyond Langestraat and
you'll find an inviting maze of narrow, cobbled lanes, one of which -
the seven-foot-wide (I've measured) Magalenenstraat - is packed with
elegant little boutiques that wouldn't seem out of place on the
Champs-Élysées. On Achterstraat, the high walls of one airy emporium
are covered, library-like, with shelves - tightly packed not with
books but with big cylinders of yellow cheese. Yet another tiny
passageway, Fnidsen, boasts the elegant Twin Arts (No. 87) and
Lifestyle (No. 89), both crowded with high-end furniture and
decorative items.
The Dutch are top-notch at street markets, and on Nieuwesloot there's
a bustling one, where vendors hawk bargain-price items ranging from
fish to underwear to CD's. A square called Waagplein is lined with
sidewalk cafes, where patrons sip coffee and snack on broodjes
(sandwiches on rolls) to the sound of church bells. In Amsterdam, such
cafes swarm with tourists and chic local residents; in Alkmaar, the
weekend diners are mostly families - some with tots, others with
teenagers - enjoying a leisurely lunch. (To be sure, this being a
Dutch city, even family-friendly Alkmaar has a red-light district - a
long block called Achterdam that parents will want to steer clear of.
Mark your maps!)
A guaranteed highlight for youngsters is the popular and recently
renovated Hoornse Vaart swimming complex (Hertog Aalbrechtweg 4). A
five-minute bus ride from downtown along a scenic canal - and past a
couple of photogenic windmills - it has an Olympic-size swimming pool,
a large wave pool (wonderful fun) and a children's pool (with
toddler-scale water slides). Easily the most congenial - and
immaculate - place of its kind I've ever seen (you'll seek in vain a
single bit of graffiti or chipped tile), it overlooks a beautiful lawn
and an inviting open-air pool, which is, of course, closed in winter.
(Admission is 3.75 euros for adults; 2.50 euros for those under 18.)
Want a taste of residential life? Saunter out of the center city along
Kennemerstraatweg, a major artery where you'll pass few pedestrians
but hundreds of cyclists, many of them families pedaling to town
together. After ambling by a handsome windmill - Piet's Mill, built in
1769 - make a left and start meandering. You'll find yourself
exploring a pretty neighborhood of neat, one-lane brick roads and cozy
brick houses, their curtains pulled back (a resilient Dutch tradition)
so you can peer in through the spotless picture windows at the
uncluttered rooms, gleaming tabletops and meticulously arranged
bric-a-brac. (Domestic fastidiousness is a Dutch byword.)
Yes, Alkmaar has immigrants (on a downtown street called Gedempte
Nieuwesloot, you'll see kebab shops and signs in Arabic); but compared
with multicultural Amsterdam, it feels unmistakably Dutch. Height is
part of it: even in the Netherlands - where the people are the world's
tallest - folks from this region are known for their stature.
Then there's language. In Amsterdam, menus are printed in English and
Dutch (sometimes just English); in Alkmaar, they're in Dutch, period.
I long ago stopped addressing Amsterdam waiters in my shaky version of
their tongue, since they invariably replied in mine; during my recent
day in Alkmaar, however, the waitress at a convivial cafe, Prego
(Langestraat 12A) actually replied to my English in Dutch, which she
continued to speak throughout all our transactions. She plainly did
this, I hasten to add, not out of rudeness but out of provincial
insecurity; anyone who finds this incident off-putting rather than
delightfully atmospheric should rest assured that the last thing to
worry about in the Netherlands is finding someone who can speak
English. (The 4.95 euro weekly special, by the way, was an appetizing
broodje with smoked chicken, walnuts and curry dressing.)
Peter Visser of Henry's Grand Café (Houttil 34) sums up Alkmaar's
appeal beautifully. It has, he said, "the character of a small town
and the aura of a city." The rising social tensions that already
afflict the major Dutch urban areas, however, seem destined, sooner or
later, to alter life in places like Alkmaar. Best, then, to catch this
town's gentle pleasures while you can.
Peter T. Daniels
>
> Premise Checker <che...@panix.com> - Thu, 27 Oct 2005 09:00:57 -0400:
>
> > Alkmaar: A Dutch City That Still Likes to Speak Dutch
>
> was this article posted here?
So that in the preamble he could say he doesn't like the organ there.
--
Peter T. Daniels gram...@att.net