After Brian and Rob saw the auction house, they caught a bus to Haarlem. Like most Dutch towns, Haarlem is very charming, even more laid-back than Amsterdam and there are a few cool things to do there, like seeing the Frans Hals Museum and the beautiful city square (-it's also a great town for shopping, so we try to take all the girls there when they visit).
Trying to get out of the cold, they went into the Grote of St. Bavokerk, the 14th century, obligatory, giant European church in Haarlem. St. Bavokerk is interesting for two reasons: it has a beautiful lantern tower:
and it has one of the finest church organs in the world:
That thing is 98 feet tall and has over 5000 pipes. Both Handel and a young Mozart came to Haarlem to play it.
The boys wandered around the church for about 15 minutes. It wasn't any warmer inside, but they were happy to be out of the wind. The interior of the church is, um, pretty much the same as every other Giant European Church, though the ceiling is cool, as it's made out of wood, and there is a 15th century wooden bench where bread was distributed to the poor. Here's a shot of the ceiling:
Anyway, as they were standing under the giant organ deciding where to go next, Brian sneezed. And, before Rob could say 'Bless you' or 'Gesundheit' or 'Gross,' the organ sounded off with a thunderous 5 notes and then went silent. It was awesome. It had been silent for the entire time they had been in there and it remained silent for the next 5 minutes as they made their way out, but for that one split second after Brian sneezed, God blessed him.
1 comment:
I obviously need to hang out with Rob more ;)
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