City of Heritage, City of Hope
Written: Sep 26 '01
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Kosher restaurants everywhere, Joods Historisch Museum, Anne Frank Huis
Cons: Dutch Resistance Museum closed Mondays
The Bottom Line: Amsterdam is a city openly proud of its Jews and their heritage. From the Kosher restaurants to the museums related to Jews, Amsterdam educated me and welcomed me.
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| quasar's Full Review: Amsterdam |
Amsterdam is a city proud of its Jews and their heritage. It was so nice to see because unfortunately this isn't a trait shared with many other cities.
Amsterdam proudly displays its 16th Century synagogues alongside its art enclaves and is home to three different museums celebrating the spirit of its Jews through centuries of strife and their contributions to the community and economy. Most famous of these is Anne Frank Huis, the building where Anne and her family and four other people hid from the Nazis. No less important are the Museum of Dutch Resistance concentrating on highlighting the resistance efforts during the Holocaust and the Joods Historisch Museum, a museum highlighting the history and contributions of Jews in Amsterdam.
Many of the museums in Amsterdam are closed on Mondays including the Dutch Resistance Museum. Unfortunately I didn't realize this early enough on Sunday to make a difference so I never made it to that museum.
The Joods Historisch Museum
Composed of four interconnected former synagogues, the Joods Historisch Museum offers a glimpse of what Jewish religious and secular life was like at various points in time, houses a wonderful collection of Jewish art and artifacts, and provides an interesting look at the contributions of Jews to industry in the Netherlands.
The first hall, the largest and newest of the synagogues, is a modern looking room with interesting angles and light. The first half of the room has a chronological accounting of Jews in the Netherlands starting in the 1500s (if I remember correctly) and moving on through the Holocaust and the creation of Israel. These exhibits are a combination of text, paintings, official papers, and posters. The other half concentrates solely on the Holocaust. The highlight of this section is a picture play painted by Charlotte Salomon while she was at Auschwitz. She was killed there on October 10, 1943. This picture play consists of 1000 panels of watercolors, some with words some only pictures that tells the story of her life. Not all of the panels are on display, but the ones that are were beautiful, powerful, and strange at the same time.
The second exhibit hall holds the temporary exhibits. When I was there the exhibit was photographs taken by a famous Jewish photograper whose name escapes me. They were mostly photographs of the rich and famous and I went through it very quickly.
The third hall was the main old synagogue and the only temple that still had a bima. It also had some gorgeous silver religious ornaments and many paintings of religious life. Some of the paintings were dark and obviously suffering from age but most were filled with brilliant colors or vivid details. Scenes of prayer, of services, of celebration joined with portraits of rabbis throughout the ages to really augment the many exhibits on religious life found here, exhibits covering most of the major Jewish holidays and the rituals and practices common therein as well as issues like kashrut and daily life tasks.
Before you get to the main floor of the old synagogue, also called the great synagogue, you must travel through the second floor balconies. There you will find the most unusual exhibit in the museum - a detailed history of the role of Jews in different industries throughout the Netherlands, complete with detailed biographies and objects related to the various industries throughout time. The oldest displays here date back to the events of 1796 and the newer to the 1940s. The displays cover such diverse industries as the stock market, diamonds, printing, textiles, metals and food industries.
The final hall houses the children's exhibit that illustrates what life and school were like for Jewish children in the early 20th Century. Including a selection of school books from the time and a series of artwork of Jewish scenes created by Dutch school children in the recent past, the main area here is an actual school room. It looked much like a normal elementary school classroom did in my youth, the only real differences being the stencils of Hebrew letters and the books. Still, it was an interesting look even though I wished there had been more information available.
The museum also has a small but nice giftshop complete with many wonderful books in both Dutch and English as well as a small Kosher cafeteria. I spent about 2.5 hours in the museum and thoroughly enjoyed it.
Anne Frank Huis
The Anne Frank Huis is perhaps one of the most famous buildings in the world. The building where Anne, her parents and sister, the Van Pels family, and Fritz Pfeffer hid away from the Nazis with only Miep Gies and Bep Voskuijl as links to the outside world has been turned into a wonderful museum and rememberance to the Jews who hid and the others who helped them.
Located at Westermarkt, hidden behind a large church if you come by public transportation, the Anne Frank Huis is a bit difficult to find. Once found, it looks like an ordinary office building overlooking one of Amsterdam's many canals. In fact, that is what it used to be.
Upon entering, you start walking up through the formerly public offices. These rooms are devoid of all furniture and decorated only with a few sparse quotes from Anne on the walls. The sparsity adds to the power and I found myself crying before I even got to the annex. The quote that really got to me was:
March 4, 1943
I don't think Father has a very nice business, nothing but pectin and pepper. As long as you're in the food business, why not make candy
I don't know why it got to me so much more than the others, other than perhaps it really embodied a feeling of optimism and of childhood.
After climbing through two stories of offices, you reach the entrance to the annex where they hid. The entrance was at the end of a seeming dead end narrow hallway, hidden behind a swinging bookcase now kept half open. The annex consisted of several bedrooms on the lower floor, each somewhat small and narrow but not tiny, at least not as tiny as I envisioned they would be. There was a single bathroom with little more than a toilet. These rooms are all empty too other than a few display cases with items that have been salvaged as the furniture had been removed directly after the inhabitants were arrested. Anne's original diary sits in her room in the annex. The walls of her room are still plastered with yellowing cutouts from magazines and show her love for American movie stars quite clearly.
Upstairs was the kitchen area which doubled as the living area and as the van Pels' bedroom. Again I was struck by the size of the room. Although not huge, it didn't seem as small as I expected it to be. I was fortunate enough to have one of the museum workers accompany me through the annex (I don't believe this is standard) and she explained a lot about the way meals were prepared and how the inhabitants really lived.
Leaving the annex by an old spiral staircase leads you to a room honoring Anne's diary. Here you will find copies of the diary printed in about 50 different languages and exhibits on the publication history of the diary and the efforts of Mr. Frank to get it published originally. Three different movie versions of Anne's story also run continuously at the end of this room.
The last set of stairs leads down to a museum area housing a series of kiosks with interactive exhibits about what life was like for the Franks and van Pels as well as the helpers. It talked about a lot of different aspects of life from how trash was handled to hygiene issues to how the helpers acquired food to lighting issue and just about every aspect of life in and surrounding the annex including some it hadn't occurred to me to think about before seeing them presented. I spent over an hour at the kiosk and it was an hour well spent.
The rest of this room houses special exhibits. There was a special exhibit on the history of tolerance when I was there. It consisted of a set of quotes on tolerance by various well known people. It was interesting but not anything too special. There was also a set of four short documentaries outlining Hitler's rise to power and these were quite interesting, made mostly from historical news footage.
The museum has a gift shop that sells many different books about Anne Frank and the Holocaust as well as copies of the diary in about ten different languages and a few postcards of the annex since photography isn't allowed.
I spent about 2.5 hours at Anne Frank Huis. It was one of the more powerful experiences of my life. Oddly I was more affected by the quotes in the empty office rooms than the annex, but nonetheless it was an experience I am very glad I had. I felt very connected to my past and very connected to the many people who filter through the museum looking for an explanation or some understanding or at the very least for knowledge. Knowledge of what life was like hiding from the Nazis, knowledge of what the helpers risked by providing food and other necessities, knowledge that although Anne Frank may be treated as the symbol of children who suffered and died in the Holocaust, she was just one girl with dreams of being a movie star just like so many other little girls then and now. Knowledge is a powerful and wonderful and sad and important thing.
The Atmosphere
This celebration of Amsterdam's Jews isn't limited to historical tribute. Modern Amsterdam welcomes Jews too. Nearly everywhere I went there was at least one Kosher restaurant. They seemed as natural as the beer halls and bakeries that proliferated the city. I can't think of any other city I've spent time in with such geographical diversity of Kosher restaurants. Maybe New York, but even New York has large areas without Kosher food. In fairness New York is larger, more populous, and I am much more familiar with it. Regardless, I was very impressed with Amsterdam. To a visitor at least, it felt like a most accepting city that both honored the past and looked to the future.
Recommended:
Yes
Best Suited For: Families
Best Time to Travel Here: Anytime
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