A message from Yaya

Hi All!

It is me, Yaya. I promised Igor I'd tell you guys about our day in Haarlem last weekend. So here it goes. I invited a special guide to show us around Haarlem, her name is Miss Wilma and she is a girl rat and lives in the church where the Noord-Hollands Archives are located. When she showed up at our cage Algernon went all red and ran into our wooden house *giggle*.

After Igor gave him a peptalk (I swear I saw him showing Algernon how to rumblestrut) they came out of the wooden house and we went downstairs where another surprise was waiting..

Wilma brought her special bike! After Igor told me about Algernon's excitement about the bikes at Amsterdam Central station, I thought he would appreciate a real bike ride (gathering from his response, I think he did). So.. Wilma and Algernon crawled in the little basket, and I worked the pedals ;-).

The first thing we saw when we were riding along the river Spaarne was the former Droste Chocolate factory. Wilma explained that humans were very interested in that factory, we were slightly bored, so we kept on going along the riverside.

When we arrived in the city centre, there appeared to be a Mechanical Organ festival. The centre was littered with mechanical organs and you could hear their music everywhere. Wilma also told us that the St. Bavochurch on the market square houses the famous Müller organ, which was played by Mendelssohn, Händel and even Mozart when he was only 10 years old.

Next to the church, Wilma explained, was a statue of Laurens Janszoon Coster, the alleged inventor of the printing press. The dutchies long thought he invented the printing press, but there is some evidence that Gutenberg in Germany invented it, and there is other evidence that the chinese invented it, several hundred years before they started printing in Europe. Ah well, at least it makes a very interesting story.

Another interesting building on the market square is the city town hall. On nice days you can see newlyweds coming out of the building (Wilma blushed when she said this.. hmmm.. )
To be continued..

xoxo
Yaya