Klara's Trip to Amsterdam

“Amsterdam should be fun,” said Nico, winking at his little sister as she sat down next to him. “I wish you could go too, Nico,” Klara replied as she stirred her soup with a big metal spoon. “Too much work to do,” Nico sighed. “I’ve got to have all of the potatoes stacked and ready to go by next week.” “I’ll always remember the day that Father took me on a tour of the Heineken Brewery in Amsterdam for my twelfth birthday,” Nico said sadly as they finished their soup in silence. “Mrs. Van Der Neen gave me some cookies and extra money today,” Klara announced proudly as she took some coins out of her pocket to show her mother and brother. “You keep them, dear, in case you see something you want to buy in Amsterdam,” her mother said as she prepared the dough for a loaf of brown bread with raisins, the family’s stable food for generations. “Do you think there are many other red-haired girls in Amsterdam?” Klara asked her mother. “Yes, I’m sure there are, but not too many girls are lucky enough to have hair as pretty as yours,” her mother replied. Klara had inherited her bright red hair from her grandmother, who had died when Klara was six. Klara often stared at the beautiful picture her father had painted of her grandmother; Klara felt she could talk to her and that she was always watching over her.   The next morning Klara was the first to arrive at school and quickly took a seat at the back of the coach that was to take them to Amsterdam. Miss Oosting introduced the coach driver named Danny as the happy, laughing children took their seats. If only we lived in a house like that, Klara fantasized as the coach drove through towns with neat rows of peaked-roofed houses. Their spotless windows, fringed with lace curtains, sparkled in the sun, and their gardens overflowed with yellow, pink, and purple tulips. “Look, children, there’s a hunebed,” said Miss Oosting, pointing to a group of enormous grey stones leaning against each other along the roadside. “Drenthe is a very old province and is full of stones called ‘traveled boulders’ that were pushed by the force of the ice to the Netherlands from the North about 140,000 years ago,” Miss Oosting explained. “Many are in the form of megalithic graves that are called hunebeds, which date from about 5,000 years ago. There are 52 megalithic graves in Drenthe. A stone can weigh up to 22 tons, and they were covered with leaves and grass in ancient times.” When the coach arrived in Amsterdam, everyone crammed their faces against the windows for a look outside. Klara loved looking at the tall, skinny houses that were reflected in the canals. “Each house has a hook attached to the roof so that furniture, even grand pianos, can be hauled in and out by pulley,” Miss Oosting explained. Sometimes the bus had to drive halfway up the curb of the narrow streets to avoid pushing the bicycles and cars parked at the edge of the canals into the water. Klara searched the crowded streets for a red-haired girl, but the passing people blended into a blur of colorful cars and bicycles. “The canals are prettiest at night when they are all lit up,” said Miss Oosting as they arrived at the famous Rijksmuseum, which houses the finest masterpieces of the Dutch painters of the seventeenth century.   Klara purposely lagged behind the rest of her class, preferring to wander by herself from room to room. The largest and most important painting in the museum is Rembrandt’s The Night Watch, which depicts a militia company gathering on a street.   Klara remembered Miss Oosting telling the class the painting was named The Night Watch because it was so dark from dirt and soot, but, when they cleaned it in the twentieth century, they discovered it was really a day scene. Though the people in the paintings lived hundreds of years ago, they looked so real to Klara that she felt she could almost talk to them like she talked to her grandmother’s painting. Klara was startled when she heard her own name being called. She hurried to join her classmates, who were looking at a painting in a corner in the next room. “Come see, Klara,” they beckoned to her in one excited voice. Klara felt she was looking into a mirror as she gazed at the portrait of a smiling young girl with blue eyes dressed in a long dress with two bright red side curls peeking out from under her bonnet. “She’s so pretty,” commented a girl with straight blond bangs and long braids streaming down her back. “She looks pretty just like Klara,” said Jakob van Klingen, the mayor’s son.   Not used to being the center of attention, Klara shyly accepted their compliments. She was glad she had the extra money to purchase a postcard of the picture of Helena Van der Schalcke, the red-haired girl in the beautiful portrait.   Klara hated to leave the Rijksmuseum; she had to hurry to catch up with her class as they walked down the street to the modern Van Gogh Museum. “Vincent Van Gogh is the most famous Dutch artist of the nineteenth century,” said Miss Oosting. Klara was excited to discover that he had bright red hair like her own, though she was sorry to hear about his sad life.