catching up

hi everyone,

wow, i can't believe it's been five days since i last sat down and made an attempt to record my daily experiences here in Amsterdam...it feels strangely much longer than that, mostly because the days seem SO long here (endless lectures and a sun that never seems to go down, or at least not until around 10:30 or 11?) but it's also been flying by. i owe you all (especially my closest family, friends, and partner) an apology for being so removed from communication with you all in recent days. everything that i want to do seems to be getting ahead of me, and my routine here seems to consist of constantly being in a hurry to read/meet up with people/etc or feeling too tired to try and deal with my tortoise-like computer to upload pictures, email and write in the blog. anyway, i've been extremely scattered and i'm really sorry...i love and miss you all!!!

i'm not sure where to begin as far as recapping the week, so i guess i'll try to remember an overview of what i did. last weekend i spent a lot of time keeping to myself, which was perfect after a week of almost-nonstop contact with the other students and teachers of the Institute. i walked around the city for hours on end, and visited a quaint old (but fairly big) city called Haarlem, only about 20 minutes away by train. it was great to drift through the huge market there, stretching out in front of the gigantic cathedral, and spend the day watching people and enjoying being alone. Monday we started a new series of classes, with "Sexuality in the Political Culture of State & Nation-building" in the morning for all students, and either a research methodology seminar (for students working on their theses or dissertations, for example) or "Intersections of Sexuality with HIV/AIDS" for the rest of us. i can't believe these classes are already finished, given how long and in-depth the first week's classes were, but so they are...wow. Anyway, the morning class was really fascinating, albeit extremely theoretical, with lots of references to Marx, Gramsci, Foucault and other great thinkers that I have a depressingly surface knowledge of, as I quickly realized in our discussions...we had a chance to see the role sexuality played in the French Revolution, with examples of pop art from the time depicting the old French monarchy in any number of extremely graphic depictions of sexual deviancy...all you see in art history are the very lofty paintings of the elite upper class, so it was pretty amazing to see how sexuality was being used as a strategic tool for marking who was "in" and who was "out," even hundreds of years ago. ramble ramble ramble. The afternoon class about HIV/AIDS campaigns was really pretty disappointing to everyone, mostly because we spent all four days of class talking about the virus in extremely surface, general terms...I'm not sure anyone came out of it with a lot more insight into how to really implement effective sexual health and HIV prevention campaigns, which seemed to be the whole point of the course...? At any rate, I enjoyed the discussion we had and at least got a bit more background into the field of HIV/AIDS work, but it just seemed to be missing a lot...next week is "Sexuality and Human Rights" in the morning, and "Practicing Theory, Theorizing Practice" in the afternoon. I'm not sure I really even know what the latter means, but the morning class should be fantastic--it's taught by Alice Miller, who i mentioned at another point in this blog...I'm really starting to think that I want to pursue sexual and reproductive rights law, as opposed to sociology or public health (other career possibilities in the broad field of "sexuality studies"...) anyway, Alice Miller is a big name in the field of sexual and human rights, and I'm thrilled to have the chance to learn from her, if also a bit intimidated!

I can't remember what else I've really done this week, beyond my daily ritual of wandering aimlessly amidst the canals until i find a cool corner cafe, and having an excellent witbier (white beer) while I read my endless articles for class. On Tuesday I climbed up to the top of this crazy science/technology museum called NEMO just across the street (right on the Ij river harbor area,) where they have a bunch of deck chairs and beanbags set up to hang out. You have to pay 2.50 (euro) to get to the top, but you get a free drink and can stay there as long as you want, which seems pretty nice. There's an awesome, panoramic view of the city up there. Last night a huge group of us all went out to dinner at a small Italian restaurant that actually had reasonable prices (everything here is shockingly expensive...everywhere!! most restaurants charge between 12-18 euros for very standard restaurant fare...it's nuts.) Tonight a smaller group went out for Indian food, which I enjoyed tremendously...My nasty-ass apartment doesn't have any pots or cooking utensils, only a few spoons and a dried-up-food-encrusted dish drainer, so i haven't been cooking any hot food at all, but instead eating endless numbers of sandwiches, chunks of Gouda, apples...I can't tell you how much I enjoyed dinner these last two nights, it was pretty ridiculous.. oh, the things you take for granted (microwaves!!...pots and spatulas!)

Tomorrow a few of us are heading out to the beach resort of Zandvoort, which is only about 30 minutes away from Amsterdam by train. i'm so excited to see the ocean again, even though I was so recently in California. I love it!! anyway, I'm going to wrap this up so i can speak to Brandt on the phone before it gets TOO late here, but i promise more frequent updates, and a whole new batch of pictures sometime this weekend...

hope you all are well, please comment or send me an email if you can!!
xoxoxo
L