First of Many..

Sooo its been a while since I've updated so I am going to break them up into a few posts so I can include some pictures and what not. Anyway...last friday, June 18th I went to the "ghetto" of Rotterdam with Margreet. She wanted to take me there to show me the very first windmill.  On the way she told me about how it got the name Rotterdam, the river that goes through it was named the Rotter and people used to travel just by water (since we are below sea level that is why there is water everywhere) and after they started to build they named it Rotterdam.  We drove through a not so nice part of Rotterdam where asians, arabs and blacks mostly live and she showed me the apartment she used to live in.  She told me about how she used to sleep with a gun under her pillow because the apartments behind hers were empty which meant that the "bad guys" (as she calls them) would move in there and do all their buisness.  She lived on the top floor and one night she heard them walking on the roof and after telling her dad about it he immediately moved her out of there.  Her dad is a very successful man who was a doctor and is still playing tennis to this day.  Her mother just turned 80 on monday.  Her mom was held in a Japanese camp during the war so she has seen a lot in her lifetime.

As we went closer to the windmill there was a draw bridge and right before we were going to leave later a ship came through so we got to see it go up and the huge barge go by us. I took pictures!!

After we parked and started walking down to the windmill we passed by where many old boats were on the water and people live on them still and can take them out.

When we got down to the windmill Margreet was sad because it wasnt turning that day..there were guys there doing maintenance on it. But it really is so huge...when you see it from far away you don't realize it until you are right below it. We got to walk inside and look up and it just keeps going and going and going.  We walked all the way around it and Margreet was telling me how the dutch people would trick the Germans by having someone up at the top and when they saw Germans coming they would turn the windmill to a certain angle so that those hiding Jews would know and could safely hide them until the Germans left.  After the Germans left they would turn the windmill back to the original angle and they would know that they were gone. Very clever if you ask me.

***remember that you can see any picture better by clicking on it!!