Low Country Life 4This is a featured page


The first person we bump into on German soil is Johnny Parker, veteran jazz pianist and long-time crony of Coops. They egg each other on with tales of the old days. "So Coltrane comes down to my place trying to buy my straight soprano sax," brags Coops. "So I told Louis to try this Swiss laxative," trumps Parker.
DusseldorfBy mid-afternoon, in a famous Dusseldorf beer hall, we are well into a jazzers' convention, drinking small glasses of dark alt beer served by genial blue-clad waiters who replace every empty glass with a full one unless prevented. A few yards away, the dignified boats and barges sail down the broad sweep of the Rhine with grace.The afternoon passes hilariously. Back in England they close the pub in the afternoon just as you start enjoying yourself.


The weather changes in Amsterdam. The sun beats down and the canals shimmer. We have two days off and Coops, still grumbling about "children and burgers" heads back south to our Eindhoven base. I decide to stay on and enjoy the city. It's good to be on my own for a while, just wandering where I please...I realise how responsible I have been feeling for Coops, always having to find things to keep him amused in the daytime.
I look at the Rembrandts in the Rijksmuseum and look adoringly at the wonderfully restored Nightwatch, now de-gloomed into its former grandeur. Outside the museum a mock-up of the painting has been set up on the pavement with holes cut in place of the main characters' heads for end-of-the-pier style Dave & Anniephotographs. Is that funny or sad?
Dead cats and other nasties now float in what I remember as clean canals. The girls of the red light district posing in their shop windows haven't changed. Nor have the sex shops apart from their wares becoming more explicit. As I settle my hotel bill, the resdent cat purrs at my feet. I stroke it and see that my hand is adorned by four tiny black fleas.


Sunday afternoon in Rotterdam. It could easily be Croydon or Hemel Hempstead, all shopping precincts, parking lots and modernity. Hardly surprising as the Germans flattened the place early in WW2. We eat in one of the thousands of Chinese/Indonesian restaurants, magnificently dragon-decorated, but my chicken and its sauce have only been introduced in the past two minutes.
The Hook of Holland, our boat and Blighty beckon. I'm still in partial shock after being a pretend-professional musician but Coops is already making phone calls, doing deals and setting up gigs and trips.


My desk awaits me in the morning.

Top picture: Coops and Johnny Parker outside a Dusseldorf watering hole.
Below: My lifelong friend Dave Smith and his wife Annie outside their Eindhoven home. Dave organised our tour and died in 2006 at the age of 83, Never forgotten by your many friends, Dave...


JamieEvans
JamieEvans 		Latest page update: made by JamieEvans , Sep 19 2009, 5:11 PM EDT (about this update About This Update JamieEvans Edited by JamieEvans

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