SIX GENERATIONS OF FIRST BORN WOMEN: CAN WE LIVE IN AMSTERDAM?

Patricia said I reminded her of her own mother. OH CHRIST! I thought to myself, the kiss of death. "Do you like your mother?" I asked. Might as well find out the bitter truth. "Yes, I like her very much" was the answer. My own daughter sat by my side. We talked about our experience on Friedrichshof. I started to tell the story about the photo SD with Otto. My daughter immediately tensed up and said I had it all wrong. "My mother exaggerates" she said.

"O.K., you tell it." She proceeds to describe in brief, what happened, leaving out the part about being naked from the waist up, and the tension filled moments prior to her getting into that state. Patricia said my daughter must learn to speak for herself.

Flo, Nadja's mother, is in the room with us. I've always liked her. She has 3 kids. Two  of them are the most talented ones on Friedrichshof. Her son, the middle child, is becoming very popular and is an excellent musician. My daughter and I noticed him during the children's palabra. He is becoming a leader. Flo is a cute, tiny 36 year old. There were immediate, very strong, very positive feelings between us. She is now in the Amsterdam Group after 9 or 10 years living on Friedrichshof. She's here to learn English and become a business woman. We've had a lot of fun together the last couple of days. She wanted me to help her with English. I gave her a book I'd brought with me, a collection of essays on art criticism. She is one of the people I regretted leaving when we left for home. We sat around drinking coffee and eating oranges and tangerines.

Later, my daughter and I walked around the city. She immediately loved it and said "I could live here, no problem!".

Later that evening, we had dinner with the group. I had bought a large bunch of red and yellow tulips. They were in a big white vase in the center of the table. I've noticed that they are very careful with our dishes and the food we touch. All our dishes have special little red tags on them. Our food is set aside on separate serving dishes. We enter the room for dinner. About 30 people people are sitting around one big table. Antoine is there. He's a genius at the piano. Anthony, a short, red haired Englishman, who I liked immediately, seems to be one of the top people here. Joshi, a young woman, is #1 and I couldn't figure out why until we were almost ready to leave for home. At the moment, Patricia is leading the dinner conversation.

It's as though they were waiting for us to enter the room and on queue two of the men stand up and sing a rousing welcome song about 2 American women (us). It was wonderful. Different people were asked to sing something. Luckily Antoine was at the piano and that helped.  I sang a very short history about my love affair with Friedrichshof. Joshi has been assigned to us as a sort of guide. Apparently the idea is to help me make as much contact with the second Amsterdam Group as possible. We are scheduled to go with her over to their house at 9:30 for a second dinner. These lower tiered groups are generally made up of people who were part of the 1st Group at one time and for various reasons dropped out and formed separate groups. There are 2nd tier Groups here in Amsterdam, Berlin and Paris. The Paris Group is splitting up for economic reasons. Some are going back to Friedrichshof, some to Amsterdam and some to Berlin.

We step out into the cold night air with Joshi. The house is only a three minute walk from where we are now. The Group has only occupied this space for 6 months. Both houses are rented. There is a severe housing shortage in Amsterdam. Some people (not Group people) are living in houseboats, frozen in along the canals.

We arrive at the front door and Joshi rings the bell. A tall thin young man answers the door and extremely politely takes our coats. His name is Tone. This house and atmosphere is shockingly different. We are led up a steep flight of stairs. Stiff and awkward, but still feeling gay, shaking hands, introducing myself, my ego overwhelms me. I sense I am more powerful than anyone else here. There are only 4 men in the 2nd Group and 11 or 12 women. All young, in their 20's.

Still much to write about Amsterdam. The upshot with the 2nd Group is that I could never survive it. Neither could my daughter. Intellectually primitive, inexperienced, "I know more than they do mom," said my 15 year old daughter after our first meal with them. They work very closely with the 1st Group. They are improving their organization and on our last evening there, Saturday, there was an important, historical (they felt) get together with representatives from the other two 2nd tier Groups in Berlin and Paris. There was a lot of talk about competition among them. Otto evidently has been very encouraging and supportive of their development. Still this was not anything I had bargained for.