Mea from Atlanta

Amsterdam,

Mea's greatest hero in her 48 years old life is Martin Luther King, telling me all about him while I draw her portrait and patiently listen to her tirade against the white race and the benefits of being black which is beautiful compared to ugly for us the whities...

I listen to her explanation of Martin Luther King's retoric and aurasmatic admosphere which hung all around him when he was still alife, before his "execution" - as Mea called it - on the balcon of the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis, a sorry affair but not the only brutal death of those fighting for more civil rights in the troublesome sixties wether they were white or black...Robert Kennedy, John Kennedy and not to forget Malcom X...all men brave of heart and killed for the ideals they believed in, whether they were white or black...

Still, I let Mea have her say and thank her for her precious tourist time and the four Mandala games she bought...I watch her proudly taking back her place in the endless long line outside the Anne Frank Housde here in Amsterdam, obvciously pleased with herself having told that "whity" her "thing"!!!

Sorry Mea but I never managed to but in a single word and anyway you seemed to have forgotten your initial question about all these black people here in my beloved Mokum and where they all come from..I suggest you google it on the Sacred Internet.

Naked lady at the Lek Hotel swimming pool

Amsterdam,

I saw this topless bikini lady last winter at the Lek Hotel diving into the hotel's pool after her buffet breakfast...

The Lek Hotel in that Farang male paradise two hours drive by mini airco bus from hectic Bangkok - called Krung Thep by the Thais - where I went myself twice a week for the 110 Baht buffet breakfast, stuffing my tummy on a variety of breakfast dishes collected from across the globe, always admiring this tall well shaped blond whose nationality remained a mistery to me, no way to talk to her considering the notorious jealousy of my female Thai table partners...

At least they didn't mind me making this drawings..."me jealous Khe Mak, her much beautifull, not like me", and more of these comments while I was busy with my black pen and colored markers...

Unknown lady at the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam

Unknown male at the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam

Bob from Boston

Amsterdam,

Bob demonstratively folded his arms across his massive chest when he posed for me while his two daughters made pic after pic of me sketching Big Daddy who went on a long anti-Osama tirade...

"I hate Obama, maybe he got Osama but he destroyed our economy, man"!!!

I have never felt the need to correct my models, or people in general for that matter, of contrary believes, different points of deduction, another way of thinking maybe, especially so when my conversation partners are as big as Bob from Boston...

Maybe the destruction of the American economy, even the famous - infamous in some cultures I guess - American way of life probably started under Bush junior with President Obama having a hard time to reverse matters...but like I said, what is the point...I am, after all, a simple street seller here in front of the infamous long queue of foreign tourists waiting to see the notorious Anne Frank Hiding Place on the Amsterdam Prinsengracht...

Anyway, thanks for posing for my art project called My Customers At The Anne Frank House, Bob, and for buying two Mandala games for your photo-crazy duaghters...

And yet more visitors at the Anne Frank House

Amsterdam,

When I don't make my games, maybe feel bored bending silverwire continuosly while waiting for customers, I pick up my sketchbook....as yet again, the result...  

Sam from Friesland

Amsterdam,

Sam told me he was 28 years old, a fisrt timer to the Dutch capital and originally from the Friesian country site, the Dutch Friesian country site that is because part of Friesland can also be found in West/North  Germany, south Denmark and in the south of Norway, all of the Friesian speanking their own harsh dialect despite their difference in nationalities....

Sam also told how he grew up as a farmer's son in a small hamlet and works forty hours a week as a carpenter, how people keep telling him he looks a bit like a younger version of that Dutch ultra-rightist politician called Geert Wilders who presently keeps the Dutch govcernment in the palm of his hand, can make a strong fist any time he likes and thereby crumble our so called liberal administartion, Geert Wilders who is on a personal crusade against anything Islam, who would love to give all Maroccanproblem cases a one way ticket back to the Maroccan homeland on a slow faring freighter, deny them food and mineral water during the voyage and a serious army boot clad foot in the bottom for good measure...

Poor Sam could hardly be blamed for all these evil intentions of misterWilders being in nature a bit of a simpleton with no English in the Friesian head nor much Dutch to speak of but who seemed good natured enough...

Thanks for your time Sam and I hope your kid sister will like the Mandala game you bought of me, and YES, mister Geert Wilders does have peroxided blond hair where yours is natural...

A model from the dream world

Amsterdam,

A model from the dream world, a no-name lady that only exists in that gray brain mass of mine, these human brain cells that are so highly developed, so much more educatable than those of the fauna and isect world around us, these billions of small neurons and chemicals that make us into what we are, the same bio cells that despite these heightened senses of awareness need sleep and rest where they can amuse themselves by giving their human host spirits weird and sleep deprived dreams, nightmares and clammy sheets the result of hidden parts of our psyche...

A message from Lord Morpheus realm, maybe, to the land of the living, the corporate world of mankind, a serious warning maybe to the awarable spirits that this weird and unpredictable God seems to have to have his ways with...

Lord Morhpeus dream world still ruled by naked femininity!!!

Or at least in my case waking up last night, feeling dislocated from my house and bed, my familiar world and excistence here in my beloved Amsterdam, back in my dirty old clothes moving around the world in my younger years, always a keen eye on possible female conquests, not bothering much about race or color, a backpack strapped on female shoulders could count on my willing tonque doing the blablabla in the multitute of lingos I have mastered for exactly that purpose, the Queen's English would would have done just fine on the international Lonely Planet backpack trails but NO I had to get more and more crammed into these aforementioned gray brain cells of mine, impress international Yings with well placed Paroli in their own Bla Di Bla...

I did this red head in blue bikini last night when I woke up feeling so disoriented and all that...she brought me back to the here and now...ten minutes of drawing can do that to me!!!

Ben from Leiden

Amsterdam,

Ben looks a bit apprehensive when I ask him for a bit of spare time for this sketch but after paging through my sketchbook, he agrees telling me "Mooie Tekeningen, Joh", Dutch for a serious compliment on my artwork...

Thanks Ben and hope you will like the outcome when you find it back tonight on this blogspot..oh, and thanks too for the three games you bought... 

Charly from Plymouth, England

Amsterdam,

This is Charly from Plymouth, the south of England and whose long slender legs fascinated me though I was less impressed with her French boyfriend who kept poking his massive hands at himself as though trying to tell me Mano A Mano "Moi, Je suis Le Boyfriend while keeping the place in the Line for her, that endless long queue of Foreign tourists waiting patiently outside the Anne Frank House for their turn to experience an emotional cascade touring the Anne Frank House Achterhuis...

Paper hand kerchiefs at the ready, dear visitors to my city though I have a strong suspicion Monsiuer Moi, Je Suis Le Boyfriend will be too busy trying to overcome his bout of Frog jealousy...spoil your 8.50 Euro entrance fee, Mon Ami but at least you will keep your eyes dry and thereby save on the cheap paper hand kerchief...

Ronaldo from New York.

Amsterdam,

This is Ronaldo from New York but who originated from that American protectorate called Puerto Rico in the Caribean, whose parents decided that chasing the American dream can be best done on real American soil, not the soil of an American protectorate where the streets of the local villages were dusty and filled with rusty Buicks that Al Bundy from All In The Family would have been jealous of...

So our Puerto Rico Amigo Ronaldo grew up in the violent world of the Bronks in New York where violence was as rife as the aforementioned Buicks in his native Puerto Rico, where the cops - he called them Pigs and Swines, sometimes lapsing into his Mother's Spanish and refering to them as Puercos Fatsos Y Gordos, obviously having grown a distinct hatred for them...

Drawing Ronaldo and listening to his stories of his childhood in the New York Bronks, his contacts with the American constabulary, it seemed obviuous to me his parents never found that American dream they were after when they took that plane to the American main land...

Hope at least you liked the Anne Frank House, Ronaldo, and thanks for your time...and stories...

American twins at the Anne Frank House

Amsterdam,

I met these two talkative American twins today at the Anne Frank House while selling my games...

I drew them as two small faces in the bottom of this page, mostly because their incessant chatter was dominating the who conversation I had with them...all their upcoming intentions for their short one week stay in Amsterdam, the Dutch capital that doesn't house the country's governement - at least they got that particular bit of knowledge about my good old Mokum right - but that does host a shit load of interesting coffee shops which they planned to visit En Masse...

"We wanna see the Dutch windmills while smacked out on good Nederweed",

"we wanna walk on wooden clogs with a few pills of extacy down our twin throats", 

"We wanna do the Heineken Brewery tour with a spliff into the bargain and free pints of Heineken beer, yeah, rush up that tour so we start on the free beer"'

"but most importantly we wanna meet all these tall Dutch blondes we have heart so much about"...

On and on they go and I have a strong suspicion these two baldies will have a grand time here in Holland's capital that houses no governement but does play host to a shit load of interesting coffee shops...

Their words, not mine!!!

    

Vanessa from Paris,

Amsterdam,

Vanessa from Paris whom I drew today at the Anne Frank House where, by the way, I sold 15 games though not much of a line outside to speak of...

Vanessa who seemed thrilled to have this direct interaction with, as she descibed it, a famous Amsterdam artist..I could have told her otherwise, more something like a simple street seller in the Amsterdam centre, nothing much to speak of but I felt unwilling to spoil her highten state of mental excultation...why deny the lady a free dopamine high when she would pay 3.50 in stupid Euros in one of these infamous Amsterdam coffee shop for a Mary Jane - Marijuana you know - joint in order to reach the same sort of gray brain cells flying lessons...

And anyway, I seem to remember quite enjoying the sight of her purple T-shirt, female breasts braless underneath...but I guess that is a typical male point of view, the word VIEW can be taken quite literally here though is not meant to be female unfriendly...

Thanks for the three games you bought, Vanessa, for the ten minutes of your precious tourist time posing for me and last but definitely not least for forgetting to put on a bra this morning...  

Laura from Canada

Amsterdam,

This my other couchsurfing guest from last weekend, Laura from Canada...
Laura impressed me with her unlimited energy - cycling on my spare bike all the way to the Schaanse Schans - and general positive outlook on life, still young but already having travelled the world extensively...


I could see no objection whatsoever when she asked to stay one more day then we had agreed on...

Thanks for letting me do your portrait, Laura...

Michelle from Canada ( part two)

Amsterdam,

Michelle was one of my three coucsurfers last weekend and kind enough to allow me to sketch this portrait of her...a bit of a quiet personallity but 100 per cent a lady...

I already uploaded the portrait I did of Michelle yesterday but she was kind enough to let me make this photo of her together with the sketch....good propaganda if ever I wanna get more serious about this ametuer hobby of mine...

Thanks, Michelle and it was great to have you staying in my house!!!

Michelle from Canada

Michelle from Canada, one of my three young female couchsurfer guests from last weekend

Back in the Tweede Mijl

Amsterdam,

Back in the Tweede Mijl on a rainy monday morning, back in that Amsterdam homeless centre run by dazed volunteers from the Dutch Hinterland who speak Pas D'Anglais, never mind the Polish Lingo spoken by their countless Polish visitors who live it up on free soup and sandwiches - better as the half eaten Mc'Donalds hamburgers I sometimes see them take out of dustbins at the Anne Frank House, Back to my friend Allie who would have done better getting herself interned in some obscure Kloster somewhere south of Franch...Pas De Francaise Ici Aussie but at least no constant complaining about my incomprehensible English in these f*cked-up blog stories...

Back to my drawings of Tweede Mijl Habituees, down and out rejects from the Amsterdam streets who whisper among themselves about the Good and the Ugly, the coppers tolerant to the max and those that tolerate Pas De Merde...

It is the time of singing together, religious Chansons about the love of their personal Numero Uno hero, that misguided martyr who came out of pre-dawn Palestine and would have done a whole lot better clamouring his Message in the here and now, the time of mass comunications, In The Name Of Jesus, Our Lord...returning to their Devout Christian Hamlets back in the Dutch Hinterland, sipping Black Earl tea and chatting about their good deeds done in the Sodom and you know what back in Amsterdam, help out the needy, thrilled to have interaction with those that are willing to take the Hand of Jesus but are high on coffee shop shit and cheap supermarket beer, a sniff of crack in the morning to make the day's start easier.

But maybe I am way too crytical about these matters of eternal soul and mortal body...better return my mental energy to my three young female couchsurfers from last weekend and the great weekend I had with them, showing them the infamous Red Light District and the fun talks we had in my house here in good old Mokum while enjoying the sweet taste of Red Wine...

Mehmet from Jeddha, Saudi Arabia

Amsterdam,

When Mehmet first stopped by my little one-man street shop - just a stupid scarlet red old curtain with my little battered Mandala suitcase on it displaying my handicraft - he instantly reminded me of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, the fleshy nose and typical Arab goatee....

Maybe the big black BMW, private Chafeur driven and all that - CD licence plates - Corpse Diplomatique you know - patiently waiting outside the world famous Anne Frank Achterhuis should have been a dead give-away...still...

The Royal House Of Saudi probably counts up to 20.00 memebers I have once been told...but most likely the first time I had one of them buying one of my funny little hand made games....

Having all these oil dollars and still wanting the lowest price possible wasn't very fair, Mehmet but thanks for posing and the two Euro game will supply me with a 1.98 Euro 80 centiliter bottle of Mooi Kaap tonight...   

Nagisa from Kyoto, Japan.

Amsterdam,

This is Nagisa from Kyoto, Japan and probably the first Lilliputtian I ever drew a portrait off...

Nagisa told me she was on a world tour, having safed the necessary money for most of her working life, telling me "we lilliputtians don't usually have a long life span, mister", "better I travel now while I still live" while patiently waiting for me to do this stupid sketch...

I told her about my Japanese lady friend whom I met in Thailand in the mid nineties and was accidentally also called Nagisa and who grew up in the same Kyoto but moved to Tokio when she was in her teenage years...the same Tokio where I stayed with her for six weeks surviving on my caricature drawings I did in the Tokio streets. five bucks in local Yen but soon doubling the price due to the popularity my caricatures had among the populace of Japan's capital...

Domo Arigato for posing for me, Nagisa and I hope you will live to a ripe old age...