Oct 4, 2017 Day 3 The Hague 1

Oct 4 The Hague 1

I have a bad case of jet lag. I woke up about 3:00 am and could not get back to sleep. After a few hours of that I finally went downstairs to the empty hotel lobby. No breakfast yet, so I sucombed to an expensive candy bar. On the computer I tackled the unanswered questions regarding the Park City apprentice ski instructor offer, trying to nudge Alta on its plans and looked into renting the house in addition to reading the NY Times. Ate a leisurely breakfast while doing that. There is an extensive cold buffet at the hotel that was very good.

It took a while for me to get out of the hotel. It was cool, but not raining, so I walked over to the government complex. No available tours until the afternoon so I made a reservation and then walked over to the Prison Gate Museum, Museum de Gevangenpoort. (Dutch names are long).  10 euro entrance fee. I initially took a self guided tour of part of the former prison and then was part of a leader led tour. Unfortunately that was conducted in Dutch (understandably), but I was given a headset with an English narrative. The leader spoke English and answered my questions.

The prison was created over 500 years ago. As described, conditions for prisoners, except for VIPs or rich ones, were pretty brutal, Little and rotting food, water from a nearby polluted pond, very little light, extreme crowding and very limited toilet facilities.I imagine that was pretty standard for the time and I wonder how many survived that treatment.

As needed, confessions were extracted through torture. An impressive arrey of torture devices were on display, although not as extensive as we had seen in Lujbiana. A rack, stocks, branding irons, leg clamps and for the truly non compliant, a green gallows for hanging. (Women were garroted so no one could see up their dresses.)  It seemed credible that most accused simply pled guilty rather than be subjected to torture. however there is an interesting quirk in the Dutch system. Even after confessing, the accused must repeat  the confession on open court before a judge to ensure that the confession is "voluntary".

There was an ornaitely decorated room that held rich or VIP prisoners. they received good food, wine and visitors. Of course they had to pay for that. One of the occupants of that room in the 17th century was a de Witt brother. He was accused of treason, attempting to assacinate the ruler, one of the William's of Orange. He denied the charges and was subjected to extensive torture. Still he refused to confess. His Nathen Hale statement allegedly was, "torture will not drag out of me what is not in me", and called upon his brother, who was a high ranking official to get him out. The brother did that. However at that time Holland was involved in wars with 4 other countries that were not going welland the public was pretty mad. So when the de Witt brothers were leaving the prison, a mob lynched them.

I then went over to the ProDemos Visitors center for a tour of the Dutch Parliament complex, Binnenhof and Knightshall. 10 more euros. The Hague is the capital of Holland and in this complex we toured the Knight's Hall, the Dutch Senate and House of Representatives and the Prime Ministers office tower. Next to the complex is a small lake that freezes over in the winter and becomes an ice skating venue. The Hall building occupies the center of the complex and portions of it go back to 1250 when the Count of Holland established a small castle here next to the small town of Das Haag. He was in line to become the Emperor of the Holy Roma Empire, but he was assassinated before he could assume the post, so he missed out on a meeting with the Pope. One of the main functions of the Hall now is to host the annual King's speech to Parliament on the third Thursday of September. The monarch is driven to the event in a golden carriage. It is a large space with no columns. the roof is held up by very large curved wooden beams.

The Senate has 75 members who serve 4 year terms. They do not meet that often and they were not in session when we toured the facility. Perhaps that is why there was no security to enter. In contrast, we had to pass through airport style security to enter the House of Representatives. It was housed in a 1990 building that still looks new and modern. Lots of glass and light. 100 members also elected to a 4 year term. We were handed a color coded chart showing where the different parties sat and how many there were. The extreme right wing nationalist party has 20 seats. Several members were milling around and we witnessed a speech about EU monetary issues.

The PM's tower is a very old facility with limited room. Its office has much more space in the downtown government office buildings that make up the skyline of The Hague.

By now it was about 5:00 and I was very tired. I walked back to the hotel and promptly fell asleep. I woke up about 10 and could not easily get back to sleep. So the jet lag cycle continued.

Torture rack

Rich prisoners Room

Knight's Hall

Parliament Lake

   

Off to Eurpoe Oct 2017

Oct 2 and 3, 2017, Days 1 and 2, Traveling to Europe

Woke up early and after breakfast finished cleaning up the house and final packing. The taxi came earlier than scheduled and we got on the road right on time at 7:30.

As we were driving up commuter crowded PCH/Sepulvada Blv'd I wondered what happened to airport travelers whose taxi's were involved in an accident and how they would be able to reschedule their flights. Then, as we were going through the intersection at PCH and Imperil in the right lane with a green light I saw a car turning onto PCH and thinking this is going to be close. Then we were hit in the right passenger side by that car. Jolting, but the end result was that no one was hurt, the rear of the taxi was badly damaged, but the cab could still drive. The drivers took about 30 minutes to deal with their issues. All this when we were just short of the airport entrance. However, unusually for me, I had left lots of time before our schedule 10:20 departure, so even with the heavy congestion on the departures roadway (we should have gone in on the departures level and walked up.) the confusion in check-in terminals (Delta's website said Terminal 2 for international, but since we were going to Salt Lake City first for the connection to Amsterdam we had to walk to terminal 3 for check-in.),  we had enough time to check in and go to the airline club. A calm environment there and some eats and drinks. I was surprised at the number of people drinking at that early hour.

The first leg of the trip was fine and we arrived on time. No snow yet on the mountains in Utah. We had an almost 2 hour layover, so off to another airport lounge for more eats and drinks. That side trip somewhat detracted from the joy of landing at gate D 10 and departing from Gate D 6.

The flight to Amsterdam was very long. Lots of young, fresh faced Mormon missionaries on the flight. As usual, I was unable to sleep on the plane so I read several days of NY Times and watched two movies. We saw the sunrise over the sea and landed almost 30 minutes early. That however was dissipated by an inability to use a jet way, so we waited as buses ferried the passengers to the terminal. We waited a long time since we were seated in the very back of the plane.

Easy transition through immigration and I got the first stamp in my new, but abbreviated (only 2 years) passport that I had obtained for the aborted trip to Iran. We had to wait a bit for our luggage, but then walked right though customs without inspection in the entrance for "nothing to declare". That did not provide a warm feeling about security.

We met up with some of my wife's co-conference participants just outside Customs and began a debate about the best means to get to The Hague, Uber or the train. The latter is cheaper and we were not sure that an Uber car could accommodate all four of us and our luggage, so we opted for the train. It was very conveniently located just below the airport and the tickets were about $12. We just missed a train and had to wait almost 30 minutes, but the 30 minute ride was smooth, comfortable and offered a view of the very flat landscape. Lots of agriculture, small towns, canals and a few large windmills.

When we got to The Hague I got a bit confused leaving the train station, but once I got myself oriented it was a 10 minute walk to the hotel, Holiday Inn Express. We were able to check-in even though it was about 10:00 am. The desk clerk spoke excellent English and was very helpful.

I was tired and should have gone to sleep, but instead I went out into the rain to get oriented and do some shopping, convert money and buy transit tickets for all. The dollar has weakened a lot against the euro since our last trip. I was surprised at the very small amount of auto traffic and the large use of bicycles. There are dedicated bike lanes and as a pedestrian one must look out for the bikes.

I finally collapsed around 2:00 pm and took what I had hoped would be a short nap to try to get on local time. Instead I slept too long and was unable to get to sleep on normal European time. Instead I walked around a dark city taking in the sights. Woke up way too early and went down to the hotel  lobby at about 4:30 am. Worked on my email and response to ski apprenticeship job offer. What to do?