Souvenir from Van Gogh Museum

Last night I met J for a movie. He brought a few things for me. 3 books of Jack Reacher and souvenirs from his trip to Europe.

It was interesting to see the connections sometimes when what he said would be exactly what I was about to ask, and that makes the friendship a little bit more fun. I was browsing the books and was about to ask him if I have to return the books when he said I could keep one of the 3, but have to return the other 2, as he plans to send them to his sister. I was about to ask, because nowadays I really don’t keep novels anymore. Instead of loving the books and keeping them on the bookshelf for the rest of my life without the time to read them again, I would much prefer to give them to friends if they are interested, and I encourage them to do the same if they turn out to like it. So I told J that he do not have to return the Jack Reacher book I gave him last week, and know it will end up being at his sister’s at least.

J just returned from his very first trip to Europe a while ago. We went through his photos together last week. He was really mesmerized by the geometry of buildings, doors and windows, and tooks lots and lots of photos of them. I happened to have done just the same when I was in Beijing in April. So I volunteered to upload mine for him to have a look. We had a good laugh.

He presented the sourvenirs he got for me while he was in Amsterdam. A box of chocolate, a postcard, and a refrigerator magnet from Van Gogh Museum. They are absoltely right souvenirs for me. We were then talking the stereotypes we have for each artist. For Van Gosh, we think of short strokes he is famous for in his self portraits and irises, but we are rarely exposed to his other talents and how versatile he was in painting. He said there are more then 300 Van Gosh’s paintings in that museum, and I was totally jealous that he got to be there to see them all.

I confess to him. From the photos, Nice looks nice, Cambrige looks gorgeous, Paris looks great, but I am only jealous of 2 things: he has been to Van Gogh museum and Musee d’Orsay, and for me, Musee d’Orsay is definitely the Mecca of arts.