Halve MaenToday it is exactly 400 years ago that Henry Hudson left Amsterdam to find a faster ‘road’ to Asia and eventually found an island that was called Manna Hatta – many hills. Manhattan, New York City. We loved it. And in one of those incomparable, unbeatable American bookshops I bought ‘Island at the centre of the World’ by Russell Shorto, director of the John Adams Institute, in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, of which I was a member for many years. Yes. I’m reading the book now and tonight we went to an evening with lectures by Russell Shorto, Geert Mak and some Indian Chief, who should have been planned, but wasn’t and conquered the microphone. The evening itself was not so memorable: too many speakers. But you should read Shorto’s book and the small Volkskrant book (Forgotten History – Vergeten Geschiedenis). It made us understand why we felt so at home in New York. And, not insignificant, it’s nice that we can also be a little bit proud of what we’ve done in the past.

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