Amsterdam 🌍

February 25, 2023 – March 5, 2023

~ Uitwaaien ~

[out-vahyn] (Dutch) (v.) to take a break to clear one’s head; “to walk in the wind”

successful red eye across the pond last night // head is already much clearer

February 26, 2023

Geld moet rollen

Written March 3, 2023

“Denk aan al het mooie wat er in jezelf en om je heen groeit en wees gelukkig.” – Anne Frank

I haven’t comprehended that we walked behind the bookcase today into their secret annex. Or that my Oma is the same age as Anne’s older sister, Margot. I think I’ll need to sit with that a while longer.

For now, feeling immensely fortunate

Written March 4, 2023

Verandering van spijs doet eten

Translates to “A change in food makes one eat!”

A Dutch saying meaning it’s good to change things up once in a while to keep things interesting

Written March 5, 2023

“Were she better, or you sicker, then the stars would not be so terribly crossed, but it is the nature of stars to cross, and never was Shakespeare more wrong than when he had Cassius note, ‘The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars / But in ourselves.’”

The Fault in our Stars (Book by John Green)

Below are comments from my original post:

I did some research and read it many times over and I think I decided I like it. The significance here is this quote is from the book A Fault in Our Stars by John Green and this bench is in a scene from the movie. Specifically, where one character tells the other they’ve had a PET scan and it is positive for cancer, again (they met in a cancer support group). So, they knew their stars were crossed (fate was messy) from the start because they met under the pretenses of being sick. The Shakespeare quote they reference is slightly contradictory and therefore, I think, so elegant, because he says the fault is not in fate (our stars) but in ourselves for not acting in the best way we know how. Then the end of the original quote says “we are underlings” meaning, I think, he recognizes we are underneath heaven/underneath a higher being, but that still doesn’t mean we can’t take some of the fault for the direction our lives are going. So, in the book A Fault In Our Stars, they meet with their faults of having cancer and their stars pointing towards a premature death, yet they take it upon themselves to ignore the stars, fall in love, travel to Amsterdam, and so on. With my scan coming up soon it feels like a really beautiful reminder  In this line, however, they’re pointing out that they feel the fault is with the stars, because it’s very unfair and random to have cancer! Both can be true, I think. We can shout at the Heavens, and look inwardly all in the same breath.

If you want more context about the Shakespeare quote, it’s from his play The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. Cassius is hoping to call Brutus to action to overthrow Caesar – noting their fate doesn’t have to be in the stars – it doesn’t have to be inevitable that he rises to power, the fault or responsibility can lie in ourselves.