Bizarre Bazaar

Finishing out the weekend....

So on Sunday, I had every intention of going to church.  I promise.  I looked up the bus number (just to make sure I knew) and headed to Central Station in plenty of time to make it to church.  Unfortunately, what I didn't realize was said bus went in both directions, like the time I tried to go to my local and went the wrong direction.  I did it AGAIN!  This time, I thought I was headed in the right direction....but then ended up at the beach and it was too late to rectify.  45 minutes later, I was back at Central Station, having missed all of church.  I gave up and after a quick stop at Starbucks to drown my sorrows in hot chocolate, I headed to Haarlem on a train.

Quick side point.  I realized that I've only been discussing what Rick Steves guidebooks say.  That ended this weekend, as my Lonely Planet Netherlands guide came with the shipment.  I didn't get a lot of LPs, just countries I knew I'd be spending a lot of time in....Netherlands, Belgium/Luxembourg, Germany and Italy (wishful thinking).  I'm so glad I got it for the Netherlands...has much more detailed off the wall things things to do.

So I didn't plan much, just knew I was going to go to Haarlem and then go from there.  As I was reading about Haarlem on my slow train, I realized that essentially most of the town is shut on Sundays.  So I started to research a plan B - day trip from Haarlem.  I found a listing for Beverwijk, which has a bazaar open on Saturdays and Sundays.  The listing said it attracted more than 80,000 people every weekend and was worth a trip.

Since I got a late start, I figured it couldn't hurt to spend a few hours there.  So I got a train ticket in Haarlem and hopped on the 30 minute train to Beverwijk, caught the bus from there to the Bazaar.  Here is where LP is more useful - I found the details on the bus/train much better than RS.  I didn't get lost once....but that might have had something to do with the 40,000 other plus people headed in the same direction and less to do with the guidebook.

The bazaar was just...bizarre.  I know that sounds lame, but I don't know how else to describe it.  It was an assault on the senses....stuff as far as the eye can see, smells of unidentifiable and questionable natures, people shouting....but it was all orderly in its maddening chaos.  There are 2 pieces to the bazaar....the part you pay to get in, which has "professional vendors" (whatever that is) and the free part with "everyone else".  I went first inside the pay part.  The pay part is much more organized...while crowded, everyone seems to know what they are doing and they speak Dutch or English.  There were boothes with antiques, tools, fishing poles, clothes (lots of them), socks, underwear, questionable paintings and smoking perphanelia, drug store looking places, make up, perfume, etc.  The best way to describe it is like Harwin in Houston....but so much worse.  Doesn't even come close to what I saw.  It was relatively orderly though.  I wandered through that for a bit, bought a scarf and some leggings.  Prices seemed decent.  I'll talk more about that in a bit.

After wandering for 2 hours, I got hungry and chose a food court area (there were tons of places to eat).  The further you moved back into the bazaar, the more middle eastern it became.  At this point, I was thick into the middle eastern culture and the only options were: Turkish, Pakistani, Indian, Afghani, Surinamese or Morroccan food.  I decided to "go big or go home" and went Afghani.  It was ok...not my favorite, but served the right purpose...fill the stomach and move on. 

I then ventured into the free part, which was completely middle eastern.  This portion actually contained almost all parishable type goods like produce, spices, olives, nuts, cheese, etc, all with a middle eastern flair.  I couldn't even name the vegetables and fruit they were selling.  It was abundant...the aisles got smaller, the vendors got louder and the croud became distinctly Arabic.  If I ever need a hijab, I know where to get one now (I won't - don't worry, but I now know where they are sold).  The smells were incredible...between the spice stands, the fruit, the shear smash of people and the incense, my brain was on processing overload.  Incredible experience - probably the closest I will ever come to Kabul, Islamabad, or Damascus.  Totally worth the train rides - I really believe strongly that as a nation we can't reach out to these countries without first understanding the culture...but yet I would never get on a flight to Islamabad.  At least for Sunday, Islamabad came to me.

I had one moral dilemma in watching all of this unfold.  While I'm sure some of the market was on the up and up, a good portion of it was probably in some way connected to some pretty crappy stuff, exactly as Harwin in Houston is connected to human trafficking, drug cartels, etc.  I'm not one to fair trade shop normally, but I did find myself thinking that I wouldn't buy from booths because of the schwarmy feel I got from a lot of the displays and what was going on.  I don't think the controls are in place to make sure you aren't supporting something uncouth.  I've had the same internal debate regarding rugs....In Netherlands, it's perfectly acceptable to see carpet stores with rugs from Iran.  Not sure how they were imported in, but it leads to a perfect internal debate...do I buy something from a country so clearly sanctioned by my own (perfectly legal here) or do I stand by what my government has determined to be the right thing to do.  With EU sanctions, I'm not entirely sure how the carpets are imported (similar sanctions), if they are actually from Iran (and not China) and I also feel for the shop owner if he really is on the up and up.  Poor guy escaped a totalitarian regime only to have little me judge him based on his nationality and not buy from his shop.  That doesn't seem right either - but you really have no way of knowing what is clearly a transparent, clean business and what is not.  They need to come with a sign in the front window....something like "Fraud done within" or "Sanctioned carpets supporting terrorism for sale".  That would make it clearer.

A bit heavier on the blog topic today with no bullets.   Always next time.

On another note, I'm 7-0 in fantasy football.  Luck be a lady...and a bit of skill doesn't hurt.