Christmas in Switzerland 2023

At the “Da Vinci: Genius” art experience in Amsterdam before leaving for Switzerland

We are in Switzerland with our Swiss family as we write this, and we have no big news to report. We still love living in Amsterdam and are grateful every day for our lives, our health, our friends and loved ones, and our 20-pound cat, Mr. Spaghetti, who seems to be happy growing old with us. We are slowing down a bit but still able to cycle and travel and keep our lives busy and interesting.

(Note: most photos have both a caption and a longer description. Depending on whether you are reading this on a computer, tablet, or smartphone, you may see all the captions immediately, or you might have to roll your mouse over a photo to see the caption and/or description. Clicking or tapping on any photo should bring up a full-size photo or a slide show with arrows to move between photos.)

Juicy Oasis

Juicy Oasis

View from the deck at Juicy Oasis

In January we spent a week at Juicy Oasis in Portugal. This was Sharene’s second visit; her first made such a positive impact that she convinced Harrison to go with her this year. The inspirational founder Jason Vale was there again for part of our week. We posted this link last year and it’s worth posting again: Jason’s Juice Tube channel on YouTube. We both had wonderful experiences and felt so good after our week there that we will repeat the experience in 2024.

Juicy Oasis attracts a wide variety of people including a bunch of British celebrities, but our favorite participant this year was a woman in her 30s who had just taken her very first international flight, coming from all the way from California to Portugal to spend a full month at Juicy Oasis. The most interesting part of her story was that she left nine children behind for her husband to take care of! She needed to get herself healthy so she could get her kids healthy. What a story!

Thailand

Living in Amsterdam, one of the world’s greatest cities, is such a gift and privilege. But it does lose its magic around February after months of gray skies and cold, windy, rainy days. We considered taking a sun break to Hawaii, our former home, but we decided instead to try someplace new — Thailand. We began with a quick stop in Singapore to see friends Doxie & Poh Bee, then it was on to Khao Lak, Thailand, where we stayed in a resort recommended by Berlin friends Regina & Uwe and had two perfect weeks of sunshine, beautiful ocean, fabulous food, long walks on the beach, and an overall wonderful experience. Add to that the genuine charm of the Thai people and throw in a daily massage and the overall affordability and, well, we’ve been converted. We had such a great time that we’re going back to Thailand in 2024.

Spring Events and Travel

We had a busy spring with many visitors and other events, ending with our first trip to Ireland to see family and friends and experience how green Ireland really is. It has lots of those rolling, emerald-green hills it’s famous for, but it also has the scariest, narrow, winding roads we have ever driven on! It was great to have the people (and alpaca!) connections there, because in the end, it’s people that can make a trip special.

Summer

Summer is our favorite time in Holland so we try not to go too far. We did make some nice bike trips here and there including a wonderful girls bike trip for Sharene. And we celebrated our 32nd wedding anniversary in July by going to the Rolling Stones exhibition in Groningen and seeing our friends Eeco, Suzette, and Fokko in the northeastern part of the country.

Harrison’s Trip to the States

While Sharene was out with her girlfriends, Harrison made a trip to Georgia and Florida for his cousin Phil’s 80th birthday. It was the first time all living Lindner cousins (Harrison’s cousins on his mother’s side who are like brothers and sisters) assembled in one place for something other than a funeral, so it was a joyful and memorable event. He then flew to Wisconsin to reconnect with a mother and daughter who were dear friends when he lived in Seattle in the 1970s. After losing touch for over 40 years, they all got back in touch via social media a year or so ago, and coming to America made it possible to reconnect in person. The mother is now a great-grandmother and the daughter is now a grandmother, and they are still the extraordinary women Harrison remembers from decades ago.

Sharene’s New Hip and a Quiet Autumn

Sharene had her 70th birthday in October and her gift was a new right hip — and a performance of Happy Birthday by our talented musician friends Stephanie and Paolo. Harrison was a wonderful post-hip-surgery caregiver, and after a few months she’s feeling well. Sadly, she had to cancel her annual Girls Trip (planned for New York City this year), but her friends were very understanding. Seems odd not to have them in our annual letter. Sharene will be back on her bike after the new year, and it hasn’t kept her from enjoying life with our friends, including Martin’s birthday and Thanksgiving at Monica’s.

 

Christmas in Switzerland

Our Christmas visits to Switzerland are always full, visiting lots of friends and spending time with our Swiss family — not to mention great food including fabulous cheese and chocolate that no place does better than this country. Special thanks Isabel and Martin for the brunch and the raclette dinner in their new home with their charming boys, and to Mick for Christmas dinner with his amazing adult children. As we have said many times before, there is your biological family and your ‘logical’ family, and we are so happy to be part of their lives.

Media Recommendations

We had heard about Ted Lasso and finally watched all seasons this past year. It has become our favorite TV series since The West Wing 20 years ago — a much-needed positive story with brilliant writing and acting. But we want to recommend just one film for 2023, and it’s a short documentary: The Last Repair Shop. Our musician and music teacher friend Pete (he played the flute in our Christmas letter last year) discovered it during a stay in Los Angeles. It’s about the LA City Schools musical instrument repair shop. That sounds boring, but it turned out to be a fantastic film, with amazing stories, production quality, and music. Sharene and I highly recommend it to everyone, but if you’re a musician, music teacher, or both, it will be especially meaningful. And it’s free on YouTube:


 

Peace Poster contest winner drawn by 13-year-old Anja Rozen of Slovenia

As we close another year that has been wonderful for us, we would simply like to wish you a healthy and joyful new year. But we can’t ignore all the tragedies that are happening around the world and the lasting impact they will have. For our generation growing up in the United States, World War II was something we learned about in school as history — it had almost no presence in our daily lives. Living in Europe has dramatically changed that perception because we still see the aftermath of World War II every day. Among many reminders, you’ll encounter little brass plaques in the sidewalk commemorating individuals and sometimes entire families who were forced from their homes to endure the horrors of concentration camps. Our close friends’ parents survived 17 of them. The impact of war isn’t just a history lesson here, it’s a part of our current experience, and it touches people we know affected by the wars in Ukraine and Israel.

Wishing for world peace might sound naive, but we do hope future generations will learn to be less judgmental, more compassionate, and open-minded about different cultures and religions. Power and greed serve no purpose in this world. We long for a future where understanding and kindness triumph over division and self-interest.

And we do indeed wish you a healthy and joyful 2024.

Love, liefs, and aloha,

Sharene & Harrison

Back to (a New) Normal

Sharene and Harrison 36 years

Visiting Hamburg to celebrate the 36th anniversary of our first date

Sharene and Harrison’s 2022 Christmas Update

Christmas Lady 2022

Our Christmas Lady is back on display after a long Covid hibernation!

Even though the world is facing challenges on many levels, we are glad to hear that many of you had a healthy year filled with family, friends, and travel. We are happy to report that after 10 years in Amsterdam we still love it here — our home, our friends, and each other! We also had a good year of traveling, visitors, seeing old friends, meeting new friends, and a wonderful summer of spectacular weather. And most important: except for the occasional illness and the universal issues of growing older, we remain in excellent health.

We have been writing a Christmas letter for over 30 years (and we love reading the ones we get from all of you). Before the Internet we addressed hundreds of cards with printed inserts and sent them by mail. The web version is still a lot of work, but it sure beats the old system. We often hear from people we see over the year, “Are we going to make it into your Christmas letter?” And the answer is, if we saw you this year, then most likely you’re in here somewhere… maybe multiple times! And because many of us felt bold enough and lucky enough to travel, you did and we did!

So our letter this year is mostly a year in photos. We start with our Favorites of the Year, then move on to sections covering Travel, Friends, and Scenic Amsterdam before closing with some movie and book recommendations.

(Note: the photos have both a caption and a longer description. Depending on whether you are reading this on a computer, tablet, or smartphone, you may see all the captions immediately, or you might have to roll your mouse over a photo to see the caption and/or description. Clicking or tapping on any photo should bring up a full-size photo or a slide show with arrows to move between photos.)

Favorite Photos of the Year

 

Travel

Jason Vale with Sharene

With “Juice Master” Jason Vale

Yes, we contributed to the Revenge Travel boom of 2022!

It started with Sharene’s trip to Juicy Oasis in Portugal, a week of only juicing and exercise. She lucked out: Jason Vale, founder of Juicy Oasis, who lives in England, happened to be in Portugal during Sharene’s week there and even taught some of the classes. What an inspiration! Sharene loved her week at Juicy Oasis so much that we’re both going in 2023. We try not to proselytize in these holiday letters, but if you want to find out what they do, check out Jason’s Juice Tube channel on YouTube.

Greek Islands

We try to go someplace interesting with Amelia every year for Harrison’s birthday. Amelia couldn’t travel in 2020 or 2021, but she joined us this year for part of our trip to the Greek Islands. We followed our time with Amelia with a catamaran trip with friends from Seattle.

 

Lake Como

Harrison grew up St. Paul, Minnesota, just a few blocks from Como Lake, but neither of us had been to the original Lake Como in northern Italy until this past August, when we met Harrison’s cousin, Phil, and his new bride, Sue, in Bellagio. Such a gorgeous place and lovely couple!

 

Boat Bike Tour

Our friend Barbara from Portland, who with her husband, Rich, owned a beautiful home and garden on Hawaii’s Big Island not far from where we used to live, invited us to join her and some friends on a boat and bike tour of Holland called Hansa Highlights. We do a lot of biking in our home country, but we hadn’t been to many of the tour’s destinations, and when our best friend Martin as well as Annie (of “The Girls”) wanted to go, and Cathy (also of “The Girls”) offered to cat-sit for us, we decided to accept Barbara’s invitation.

 

Harrison’s Trip to the Pacific Northwest

Some of Harrison’s oldest and dearest friends date from the 1970s when he lived in Seattle and worked for KING Radio. He hadn’t been back for a visit since 2018 because of the pandemic but flew there in October and spent three weeks visiting friends in Washington and Oregon.

A photo of Pete and his flute doesn’t do justice to his wide-ranging musical talent. Here’s a short video of one of the pieces he played.

Hamburg

We ended the year with a short trip to Hamburg, Germany, to celebrate the 36th anniversary of our first date. (See photo at the very top.) The highlight of the trip had to be our visit to Miniatur Wunderland. It’s known as the world’s largest model railway, but it’s much more than that; besides trains, it has a fully functioning airport with planes taxiing, taking off, and landing, harbors and waterways with moving boats, roads and highways with moving vehicles, and models of famous cities, landscapes, and landmarks throughout the world including an erupting Mt. Vesuvius! Everything shows an astonishing attention to detail. The photos below were taken at “dusk” (the lighting changes from day to night and back again every 15 minutes or so). Looking at the first one, you might think you’re looking at an actual landscape, but in the second one you can see spectators walking by!

 

Visitors and Friends

Friends who came to visit, whom we visited, or who are part of our circle here and who basically make our life so full and fabulous; we hope you know how much you mean to us.

 

Scenic Amsterdam

As we said at the top, after 10 years here we are still in love with Amsterdam and we still find new things to do here and throughout the Netherlands. We feel incredibly fortunate and grateful to live here.

 

Movies and Books

We saw well over 100 movies in 2022 between our local Pathé theaters, Netflix, Prime Video, and Apple TV — and we don’t even subscribe to other major streaming video services like HBO or Disney. At this point we’ve forgotten many that we probably loved at the time. But these two really stand out in our memory:

And we read a lot in 2022 as well. Here are a few of our favorite books:

 

If you made it this far, then Thank You! Dankjewel! Mahalo Nui! We have known many of you for 30-40-50 years! (Or in the case of our families, much longer!) We have known some of you only since we moved to Amsterdam, but you have stolen our hearts and made our lives more full, more fun, more meaningful. We are grateful for all of you and for the wonderful life we have. We wish you all a healthy, stress-free, and interesting life full of whatever is meaningful to you. (One of Sharene’s favorite sayings is, “Whatever floats your boat and blows your hair back!”)

Happy holidays, all the best for 2023… and our sincere wishes for good health!

The Return of the Road Trip

Sharene and Harrison’s 2021 Christmas Update

The year 2021 has been good to us, although we know it has been difficult for many, and the world is struggling through crises on multiple levels. But this time of year we want to focus on the positive aspects of our lives and show our appreciation for the friends we have been able to spend time with. We haven’t hosted any big parties or house concerts, but we have appreciated seeing friends in small groups and we had the good fortune to be able to travel some.

(Note: the photos have both a caption and a longer description. Depending on whether you are reading this on a computer, tablet, or smartphone, you may see all the captions immediately, or you might have to roll your mouse over a photo to see the caption and/or description. Clicking or tapping on any photo should bring up a full-size photo or a slide show with arrows to move between photos.)

 

We celebrated two personal milestones: our 30th wedding anniversary in July and the 35th anniversary of our first date this month. We often travel somewhere for those occasions, and although we haven’t owned a car since we left Hawaii in 2012, the easily available public transportation throughout Europe used to make such trips easy. But the pandemic has made spending hours on trains or planes look much less attractive and even risky, so this year we rented cars in Amsterdam and took two three-week road trips. We’re on the second one as we write this.

In July we headed for Switzerland with a brief stop on the way in Koblenz, one of the prettiest German cities on the Rhine. We saw our Swiss family and friends in and around Zürich for the first time in 1-1/2 years. We then spent a few days in the Engadin, a picturesque valley in the eastern Swiss Alps that we had heard about for years. This was a triple treat: we were able to do some hiking surrounded by gorgeous scenery, we could see Sarah for a bit longer, and we got to spend time with Stephanie Trick and Paolo Alderighi and see them perform. Stephanie and Paolo played at our final pre-pandemic house concert in November 2019 and we got to know this charming and very talented couple personally at that time. They spent much of the pandemic at their American home producing a series of monthly streaming video programs, but they happened to be in Europe and performing live in Sils Maria, the very town we were visiting! We timed our stay so we could see them, and that was a high point of the trip.

 

Next we drove to the Alpine village of Arosa, where Harrison had visited before he met Sharene and wanted to see again. We made the most of our one night there by taking cable cars to both the Hörnli and the Weisshorn (mountain peaks) and hiking down what in the winter would be ski slopes. We felt like we were in the middle of a picture postcard.

We then headed north back into Germany to tour the Romantic Road in Bavaria—something we did 33 years ago! It was just as picturesque as we remembered and we made a number of fun stops. The best was in Lenggries to visit our friend Stephan, who was an incredible tour guide during our stay there. He took us on a bike ride that only a local would know, stopping at fabulous local restaurants. He took us on another cable car to the top of the 1,555-meter (about 5,000 feet) Brauneck, and again we hiked back down. The scenery, watching paragliders jump off the mountain, the incredibly blue skies, the fresh air, the company, and even the cows were fantastic.

 

That road trip turned out to be a wonderful way to celebrate 30 years of marriage, so why not do something similar in December for the 35th anniversary of our first date? We had to twist and turn a bit to meet all the rapidly changing corona rules, but as we write this we are over halfway through the trip and have made it into Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and back into Switzerland without problems.

Most of the trip so far has been in Italy, beginning in Milan to visit that city for the first time but especially to see Stephanie and Paolo again. They were perfect tour guides and we had a very special evening together in Bergamo, a medieval town dripping with charm, especially with the winter lights.

 

After Milan, we made our fourth visit to the Cinque Terre, a string of centuries-old seaside villages on the rugged Italian Riviera coastline. Colorful houses and vineyards cling to steep terraces in each of the five enchanting towns, and the hikes are incredible. We discovered this region of Liguria almost exactly 10 years ago—mid-December 2011—and this time we had the same sunny and warm weather we had then. We were in t-shirts hiking one of the trails and we practically had the trail to ourselves.

 

The road trips were the highlight of 2021, but we also had a short vacation in August with friends to Ameland, one of the Wadden Islands off the Dutch coast. We biked the island for days beside its dunes and beaches and had some great meals, good laughs, and saw some sun! In September Sharene resumed her annual Girls Trip (over 20 years!) by flying to New Hampshire to reconnect and spend a week with her best friends. Our Amsterdam guest room has been mostly unoccupied, but we did have a few guests stay with us this past year. With the world the way it is, that was just enough for 2021.

 

In the fall we completed a big construction project that extended the back of the house. The extension is only 60 cm (that’s about 2 feet), but it’s all glass, including a glass roof, so Sharene now has a much brighter and more usable office space. And the double-paned windows make the house warmer and use less energy. Once again we feel so grateful to our friend and contractor Co for making our home in Amsterdam even better.

 

We’ll refrain from any political comments here; if you know us, you know how we think, and if we don’t agree, we won’t change each other’s minds. We’re healthy, vaccinated, and happy to be living in Amsterdam. We still study our Dutch daily and we are still not fluent, but we will keep trying! We still have Mr. Spaghetti, now 12 years old, and we feel honored to have him living out his older years on our sofa. (Tip: if you own a black sofa, do not get a white cat!)

We wish one and all happy holidays and a healthy year ahead. And we think the best present we can give each other is to be kinder than necessary and spend time with those you love.

 


Speaking of spending time with those who mean a lot to you, please take a look at the photos that follow. If you spent time with us this year, we probably captured it with a photo. We thought we would close with a slide show containing some of those special times as well as other memories from 2021. On to 2022!!

2020

HKSK Merry Christmas

Wishing Our Friend Cees a Merry Christmas

Sharene and Harrison’s Update from Amsterdam

What an epic and challenging year on many levels—and for many the most historic and imposing year in their lives. For the two of us, it has been a reminder that the last 60+ years have been—for the most part—wonderful. We have remarked more than once how grateful we are to have grown up and been educated in the ’50s and ’60s; to have had the career opportunities afforded to us in the ’70s and ’80s; to have been part of the Internet explosion of the ’90s; and to have lived together in beautiful places including San Francisco, Hawaii, and Amsterdam. We are also thankful to have good health and to live in the Netherlands as we go into our older years.

The coronavirus certainly has been a global disaster, but if we look carefully we recognize that positive things have also happened this year. We have had the opportunity to reflect on our lives, what they mean, and what’s really important. Some of you have been able to spend more time with your family. Many people became more active in politics or with charities or other good works. There was some hopeful progress on racial and gender equity. On another positive note, the American elections had the highest voter turnout in over a century and they were free and fair with no signs of significant foreign influence. Not all of our preferred candidates won, but the most important ones did and that’s reason for hope.

Some of us have taken up hobbies or projects we’ve been putting off. After seven years in our Amsterdam home, Harrison finally unpacked his boxes and completely redecorated his office! When you spend so much of your life in one place, as many of us do these days, it’s nice to have comfortable, functional, and attractive surroundings there.

Harrison’s Office

 

We miss the days when we could hug and shake hands, and even the Dutch custom of three kisses when you greet each other seems so far away now. We barely noticed many of our little social customs but we miss them now that they’re gone.

We have been together as a couple for 34 years, and we’ve been sending out a holiday letter for most of those years, recapping friends who have come to stay with us, dinner parties, interesting travel (including Sharene’s annual “Girls Trips” and Harrison’s annual birthday trip), and visits with our Swiss family. (The letters since 2001 are available on this website.) We have wonderful memories of all those events and the people we shared them with, and we have photos that help make those memories real.

When Sharene takes a photo at one of these events, we often hear, “Will this make it into your Christmas letter?” Sadly, there weren’t many opportunities to ask that question in 2020; it was a slow year for “Christmas letter events.” We did manage to see a few of those dear to us, although there were many more we hoped to see but couldn’t.

We flew to Florida in early March. The plan was to go on our first-ever cruise, a Caribbean “theme cruise” chartered by Garrison Keillor of A Prairie Home Companion. We had been fans for over 30 years, and since the entire ship was only for him, APHC performers, and people like us who adore him and the show, we thought this might be the perfect sun break for us. Our timing could not have been worse! We arrived on a Monday with the cruise company saying the ship would definitely sail. We enjoyed a visit with Harrison’s cousin Phil on Tuesday. On Wednesday everything changed: Trump announced his travel ban, the cruise was canceled, and airlines started canceling flights. We headed back to the Orlando airport on Thursday and managed to get seats on the last direct flight from Orlando to Amsterdam Thursday night, arriving Friday morning after only four days away, lucky to make it home before travel became almost impossible.

We were a bit like deer in the headlights by late March. All the restrictions took effect, we were glued to the news, and yes, toilet paper was a precious commodity here, too. But we ordered our groceries online and were thankful that we didn’t have to reinvent work life—one of the many benefits of being retired. And in the Netherlands it remained possible to go outside for a walk, run, or bike ride, so it has been easier to stay healthy.

(Note: most of the photos below have both a caption and a longer description. Depending on whether you are reading this on a computer, tablet, or smartphone, you may see all the captions immediately, or you might have to roll your mouse over a photo to see the caption and/or description. Clicking or tapping on any photo should bring up a full-size photo or a slide show with arrows to move between photos.)


 

We have friends who had to figure out how to work from home, including our neighbors in the three apartments above us, so we came up with something we could do to help. We started our Soup For Friends program, Soep Voor Vrienden (SVV) in Dutch. Each week throughout April and May we prepared and delivered soup, bread, and a goodie to a group of friends. It felt good to help out in a small way, and at one point we were up to 17 people! When the weather got better, the infection rate came back down, the cafes opened back up, and we stopped. But our friends said they appreciated not having to think about dinner once a week during those first difficult months.


 

On the Oudegracht

Because the Covid-19 numbers dropped to near zero during the summer, we managed a few trips within the Netherlands. The first was a 4-day drive yourself boating holiday on the canals and rivers of central Holland. We reserved a small houseboat from Le Boat, but the company upgraded us twice and we wound up with an 11.9-meter (39-foot), 3-bed, 3-bath yacht! Our dear friends Regina and Uwe from Berlin joined us. The peak moment of the trip was a magical early morning ride down the narrow Oudegracht canal in the middle of an almost perfectly still Utrecht. Captain Harrison drove the boat under the 16 Oudegracht bridges, with a center clearance of only about 25 cm (10 inches) above the 2.75-meter (9-foot) boat!

 

Another trip took us to Terschelling, one of the Wadden Islands off the Netherlands coast, with three of our closest friends. We rented a large house and biked every day, played games, read books, and even had a barbecue one night. A fun getaway with fresh air, a charming island, and good company.

Sharene and few girlfriends also took an overnight bike trip (led by Monica!) to celebrate Charlene’s birthday. They had great weather, wonderful rural scenery complete with windmills and canals, and they topped it off with a special dinner.

Scenic Holland

 

HKSK Des Indes

Celebrating Sharene’s Birthday in October—No Party This Time!

The year has been manageable for us and a reminder of the importance of simple pleasures that we used to take for granted. Like many of you, we now have a collection of masks, we have socially distanced, we have stayed in more, socialized less, sent out funny videos, we have Zoomed, Skyped, FaceTimed and WhatsApped regularly with friends and family around the world. Harrison even had two online reunions, one for his Stanford Business School class and one for his high school in Minnesota. Connecting creatively and regularly has been an upside to this very odd year.

Amsterdam Evening

A Beautiful Autumn Evening in Amsterdam.

Living in Europe is a constant reminder that things could be much worse. Seventy-five years ago Nazis were dragging away Jews to concentration camps, war planes were bombing cities near our home, people were eating tulip bulbs to keep from starving and burning furniture to keep from freezing, loved ones lost contact for many years and sometimes forever. So although 2020 has been unsettling and uncomfortable, we are always aware that our lives are extraordinarily luxurious compared with much of even recent human history.

HopeNow we are on to 2021, with hope that the world will begin to heal from corona and perhaps in other ways as well. We send you our wishes for a positive, healthy year. We thank you for being in our lives, for the laughs and interesting conversations we have shared. Who we are today is a sum total of those we have invited into our hearts.

We hope to see you very soon and give you a big hug. Be careful, stay safe.

Love,
Harrison and Sharene

Happy New Decade

Harrison & Sharene at Palazzo

Celebrating a special event at Amsterdam’s Palazzo.

Sharene and Harrison’s 2019 Christmas Update

Here we are at the beginning of 2020. Seems like just yesterday it was the turn of the century; now we are already two decades into the new one. Life moves fast but we always take a moment to recognize how lucky we are to be living in a place we love with those we love.

The year’s highlights:

  • We’re healthy! We’re still biking and walking and going to the gym regularly. (Yay!) But our hearts go out to those close to us who are struggling with declining health every day. 
  • We went to Florida again last winter. We got a break from gray, cold Amsterdam and had lots of sunshine. We saw friends and family (one relative for the last time before she passed away). We saw lots of Florida, including Key West, which had a real Hawaii kind of vibe.
  • For the fourth year in a row, Amelia joined us in late May to celebrate Harrison’s birthday. We started in Venice and took the train to Trieste, where we began a wonderful bike trip down the Coast of Istria in Croatia. Mostly good weather, beautiful scenery, interesting cities and towns, and of course great company.
  • Harrison traveled to Iowa in June to join his cousins and other family for a melancholy but ultimately joyful celebration of life, and Sharene went to California in October to see family and friends, a visit that included her annual Girls’ Trip.
  • We were honored to host two home concerts. The first was in January with Ralph Rousseau playing the rare viola da gamba in a unique program of meditative music. In December we returned to the piano jazz repertoire with Stephanie Trick & Paolo Alderighi. Stephanie, from St. Louis, and Paolo, from Milan, play four-hand piano arrangements of material ranging from ragtime and other early American jazz, to swing, and all the way to Broadway musicals and even the Beatles.
  • We had lots of company of course—it’s what we do! Dear friends Rick & Maggie, who have been part of Harrison’s life for nearly 50 years, finally made it to Amsterdam, followed by their daughter Laurel two weeks later. Dave & Dorothy, also friends since Harrison’s years in Seattle, visited as well. Later in the year we hosted a fascinating group that included two of Harrison’s Stanford Business School classmates.

Favorite Films

We saw lots of movies, both in theaters and on Netflix. Some of our favorites that might have escaped your attention (in no particular order):

  • Resistance Banker (Netflix): amazing and moving true story about Dutch resistance during World War II.
  • The Game Changers (Netflix): fascinating and compelling look at the benefits of a plant-based diet.
  • Yesterday: a must for anyone who loves the Beatles.
  • The Rolling Stones Olé Olé Olé (Netflix): whether or not you love the Stones you’ll gain new respect for them.
  • Two films about the extraordinary Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg: RBG and On the Basis of Sex.
  • Mary Poppins Returns: best musical we’ve seen in years.
  • Hustlers: phenomenal performance by Jennifer Lopez and a different take on sex workers.
  • Downton Abbey (the movie): a must for fans of the TV series.
  • The Crown (Netflix series): the sets and costumes of Downton Abbey but history instead of fiction.
  • The Professor and the Madman: surprisingly gripping story about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary.
  • The Great Hack (Netflix): how data is weaponized to wage cultural and political wars and change election results.
  • Liberated: The New Sexual Revolution (Netflix): disturbing look at current attitudes and behaviors of young people regarding sexuality.
  • Ask Dr. Ruth: the incredible life of sex therapist Dr. Ruth Westheimer, still going strong at 90.

Photos

Sharene is the photographer in the family and takes lots of photos every month. At the end of the year we choose which of those photos best reflect our year, and Harrison reformats and captions them for this WordPress website. The following photos are arranged in galleries and almost all photos have both a caption and a longer description. Depending on whether you are reading this on a computer, tablet, or smartphone, you may see all the captions immediately, or you might have to roll your mouse over a photo to see the caption and/or description. Clicking or tapping on any photo should bring up a full-size photo or a slide show with arrows to move between photos. Enjoy!

February Trip to Florida
May Bike Trip
Joan’s Memorial in June
Lindner Cousins

All surviving Lindner cousins (Harrison’s mother’s side), together with some of the spouses, joined Phil in Des Moines, Iowa, to celebrate the life of his wife, Joan, who passed away in April. The cousins from left: Beth, Harrison, Phil, David, Susan, Rick, Jean, George. Dan, the 9th cousin, sadly passed away in 2008.

Home Concerts
Our Garden
Garden Spring

Our garden is tiny compared to what we had in Hawaii, but it’s Sharene’s pride and joy and the perfect size for our Amsterdam home. We use it almost every day from spring through late fall. 

Visitors
Life in the Netherlands
Amsterdam Bikes

Amsterdam is the “City of Bikes”. Now and then we come across some great examples of “bike art”.

Sharene’s Fall Trip to California
Holiday Celebrations

 

Harrison & Sharene 33 years

Throughout our lives, we seem to have reinvented ourselves every 10 years or so. After seven years in Hawaii, we could see another reinvention coming and were already preparing to sell our business and home. We have now lived in Amsterdam for over seven years, but we don’t see ourselves leaving. It remains the perfect place for us at this stage of our lives.

In December we celebrated the 33rd anniversary of our first date in San Francisco. As we look back on our 33 years together, on 28 years of marriage, and on the year 2019, we are grateful to live in a home we love, surrounded by friends and beauty, and to continue our journey in a place that is right for us. 

We wish all those in our circle of family and friends much love and good health in the coming year. And for the United States of America, where we were born and spent most of our lives, we wish and hope for a change in leadership, and we encourage our American family, friends, and other readers to do whatever you can (at the minimum, vote in the next election) to make that happen.

Harrison and Sharene

A Year of Contrasts

 Sharene and Harrison’s 2018 Christmas Update

The two of us had another good year: lots of time spent with people we love; unusually wonderful weather in Amsterdam; memorable travels in the Netherlands, Europe, and the United States; and topped by Sharene’s unforgettable 65th birthday party.

But it was a very bad year for many others. We have to start by recognizing the devastating lava flow near our former home on Hawaii’s Big Island. Our old house Hale Kakahi — just four miles from the lava — was not directly affected, but many of our friends and former business colleagues lost their homes, and everyone in the area had their lives severely impacted. This video shows what Kapoho Bay — one of the most picturesque areas on the Big Island where we had many of our vacation rentals — used to look like. If you have any connection to Hawaii, we hope you will take a couple of minutes to watch. It captures the spirit of what was a unique spot on this earth and honors this very special place.

[December 2019 note: Sadly, the Vimeo video we had here was removed by its owner. The YouTube video below is a nice alternative.]

 

In just a few days in early June, that entire area was obliterated, covered by a fast-moving river of lava. The three photos below, courtesy of the U.S. Geological Survey, show lava approaching Kapoho, filling in the bay, and the aftermath. What was a pristine bay is now a stark, black lava peninsula. Something like 300 homes were lost just in Kapoho, and the lava took out much more — over 700 homes in total and a vast amount of uninhabited area.

We’re focusing on Hawaii because it was a big part of our lives and our hearts, but our West Coast friends have also been affected by the many fires in California and Oregon, and both Harrison’s and Sharene’s families have had a challenging year of health issues. All of the good times we had this year were tempered by the suffering of so many people we care about. So we’ll forego our usual details and photos for the year and just give you a summary with the high points.


Travel

As most of our friends know by now, what sounds like a lot of exotic travel isn’t so exotic when you live in Europe and so many fascinating destinations are just a short flight or train ride away. Our trips this year together or separately on this side of the Atlantic included Barcelona, the Canary Islands, Doha (Qatar), Basel, Portugal, the Cinque Terre in Italy (twice — first in May with Amelia for Harrison’s birthday, and again in October for Sharene’s annual Girls’ Trip), Berlin, London, two Greek islands, and our 2018 Christmas celebration will be with our Swiss family near Zurich.

We took two trips to the United States this year. For a winter break in February, we flew to Savannah, Georgia, to spend a few days with Harrison’s cousin Beth and her husband Bob. Jean, another of Harrison’s cousins, joined us from her home in Indianapolis. We then drove to Nocatee, Florida (near Jacksonville), to see another of Harrison’s cousins, Phil, and his wife Joan. From there we drove across Florida to Venice for a visit with Sharene’s friend Ann and her partner Frank. Great visits and nice, warm weather to help break up the winter cold.

In October, Harrison flew to Seattle for a 3-1/2 week road trip. He spent the first weekend with dear friends Rick, Maggie, Brianne, and Laurel, and he had a nice visit with Doxie & Poh Bee. The Seattle high point was a KING Radio reunion. About 30 people who worked for KING in the 1970s gathered to celebrate a place they worked at 40 years ago — a testament to that organization’s impact. Harrison then drove Jim, KING’s then-manager who hired Harrison for his first big broadcasting job, back to his home in Dayton, Washington, and spent two days in a setting right out of the Andy Griffith Show. Next it was on to Portland for a weekend with Pete & Jan, Margie & Dave, and Barbara & Rich. Then he drove to the Bay Area for a busy week seeing Kevin, Farhad, Andrea and her daughters and several mutual friends, Laura, several colleagues from CellNet Data Systems (where he worked only 20 years ago!), Mari & Bill, Rocky & Serena, Jerry & Jeff, Jane, Steve & Kim and their son Sam, and the Stanford Business School (where he graduated 28 years ago!). He visited Laurie Lewis and Tom Rozum, who played at our home in Hawaii, and he took in a concert of theirs. He was able to visit Linda & Ralph, Sharene’s sister and brother-in-law, in Stockton before heading to Sacramento, where he ended his trip at the West Coast Ragtime Festival. There he saw both Mimi Blais and Carl Sonny Leyland perform, both of whom have played home concerts for us over the years. A fabulous time, long to be remembered.

As you know, Amsterdam and all of the Netherlands is a biker’s paradise. We had the best weather in 40 years this summer and fall, so in addition to our foreign travel we took advantage of the good weather by taking bicycle day trips to different parts of the Netherlands. The country is covered by signed cycle junctions and many cycle routes have been defined using these junctions. Holland Cycling Routes has a map showing hundreds of cycle routes, many of which are circular and intersect with a train station. You can print out a set of directions for each route that takes you from junction to junction (e.g., 60→61→5→96→95→60). We put our bikes on the train, got off at the closest station to one of the bicycle junctions, and rode from there. Beautiful memories in a beautiful country. We feel very fortunate to live here, and we are thankful now to have both our permanent residence permits in place.


Visitors

The number of visitors has come down a bit since we first moved to Amsterdam, but we welcomed quite a few old and new friends this year. Els visited from Barcelona. Janice & Walter came from Basel. Venki stopped by on his way from the United States to India. Hal & Kathy from Hilo can hardly be called visitors anymore because they come several times a year. Our Swiss family — Sarah, Amelia, Hallie, and Isabel — visited us together or separately on several occasions. Barrie was here all the way from Maui. Margie visited at the end of a working cruise across the Atlantic. Siobhan housesat for us while we went to Italy. Marty & Laura from tiny Green Bank, West Virginia, visited on their way to an astronomy conference. Harrison saw Dave one afternoon during a flight layover on his way from Seattle to Spain. Deborah & Frank — who winter in Mexico and summer in Oregon — stayed with us for a few nights. We had a nice dinner with Ben & Mary Lou during their annual trip from Seattle to Amsterdam for the IBC show. We met Susan & Rod the month after we moved into our Amsterdam home and they came through Amsterdam again this year on their way to other European destinations. Long-time friends Laurie & Joe visited on their way back to Seattle after a month in Nice. We also had many dinner parties and friends dropping by for coffee or wine, and this year we even had a traditional American Thanksgiving dinner. Maybe the year wasn’t so slow after all!


Sharene’s 65th Birthday Celebration

The high point of the year was Sharene’s 65th birthday. The celebration began with her 23rd annual Girls’ Trip with her best friends Cathy, Kate, and Ann. For the past several years Sharene has gone to the United States to join the others, but this year they came to Europe and celebrated the fact that, as of this year, all four are retired! They started off in Italy, spending 10 days in Porto Venere, the Cinque Terre, and Lucca. They came back to Amsterdam just in time for the only birthday party Sharene has ever planned for herself, and it was a smashing success. We had it at the Schreierstoren, a 531-year-old building in central Amsterdam. Henry Hudson set off on his voyage to North America from this very location (he was English but the Dutch had the best shipping technology in those days).

About 75 people joined us for an evening of love, friends, food, music, and celebration. Our friend Frank acted as emcee, and about halfway through the evening he announced a surprise. It turns out that ever since we lived in Hawaii, Sharene has wanted to surprise Harrison by dancing the hula for him. She discovered Harry, a kumu hula (hula master), who has his own hālau (hula troupe) right here in Amsterdam. Harry choreographed a hula from the beautiful song Kipahulu, about a remote spot on Maui that is Harrison’s single most favorite place in all of Hawaii, and Harry taught his hula to both Sharene and our Swiss hānai daughter Amelia. They did all of this in secret, and they surprised Harrison and everybody else at Sharene’s party with a beautiful performance that brought tears to Harrison’s eyes — and those of many other guests as well.

One of the guests captured the hula on video, so we put it up on YouTube together with a slide show to remember the people and the party.

 

Harrison turns 70 next year but he’s not even attempting to top Sharene’s party!


 

Harrison and Sharene 2018

Although it has been a tough year for many of those we care about, we wanted to end our annual Christmas letter on a positive note with the video and photos from the party. We have now been together for 32 years, married for 27, and writing holiday letters for about 25, and every year is different. For this year, we send our heartfelt aloha to those in our families, in Hawaii, and on the West Coast who have suffered so much, and we wish everyone a safe, happy, and most of all healthy 2019.

Harrison and Sharene

Fijne feestdagen
(Holiday Greetings from Amsterdam)

Iamsterdam

Photo op at the Iamsterdam sign near our home

Sharene and Harrison’s 2017 Christmas Update

Last year we began our update with a short film, The Tale of Kat & Dog. (If you didn’t watch it last year, click the link — it’s a wonderful story that illustrates why we love living in Amsterdam.) But we have to be honest, life isn’t perfect here. (We hear the gasps!) This year, in a modest attempt to be “fair and balanced” about Dutch life, we start off with The Dark Side of Living in the Netherlands:


Five Years in Amsterdam

In October we celebrated our 5th anniversary of moving full-time to Amsterdam. While we will always treasure our years in Hawaii, these past five years have been the most extraordinary either one of us have ever had. The lifestyle, culture, values, physical surroundings, and of course the Dutch themselves — pretty much everything except the weather — are a perfect fit for us in this time of our lives.


Farewell (Tot Ziens) Hanneke

Hanneke van Mierlo

Hanneke van Mierlo

Hanneke van Mierlo was the very first person we met when we first came to Amsterdam in 2009. We had arranged to stay at the apartment of her friend (and now ours) Frank, and while Frank was hiking in India, Hanneke came to Schiphol Airport to welcome us to Amsterdam. She was a wonderful tour guide, and when we came back in 2011 for four months, and then moved here the following year, she became one of our best Dutch friends.

Hanneke was always in a good mood and loved living. Unfortunately, her body didn’t always cooperate, and she suffered from health problems for many years. She was diagnosed with cancer this past February and died 14 November at the age of 56. We’ll think of her often, especially at Christmas, because she gave us several beautiful, hand-stitched holiday cards, and when we have mussels, a favorite Dutch dish, because she taught us how to prepare them. Tot ziens to a lovely friend.


Aloha Hawaii

It was time to say goodbye to another part of life as well — our connection to Hawaii. When we moved to Amsterdam, we still owned three rental properties there and thought we might come back for a few months each year and use them. We realized within a short time that our focus was on Amsterdam and Europe, and traveling halfway around the world was not that appealing. The three properties served their purpose as excellent investments, but over the last few years, as the Hawaii real estate market improved, we knew it was time to sell them. So one by one, we have divested our ties there and continued the process of simplifying our lives.

In June, Harrison traveled to Honolulu and Maui to get the final two properties ready for new owners. While there, he was joined by our friend Els, a Dutch woman now living in Spain, who had never been to Hawaii before. We have spent so much time in Hawaii that we tend to notice the imperfections and miss “the good old days.” It was fun to show Hawaii to Els and see its still spectacular beauty through her eyes.

Our long journey that led us to this wonderful life in Amsterdam started almost 10 years ago in Hawaii with a decision to retire and reinvent ourselves, as we had done both separately and together several times before. We sold our home and vacation rental business first, and after we found the home in Amsterdam that we hope will be our last, we started eliminating other complications. We are very happy that by the end of 2017 we will be free of all business and rental real estate obligations. It’s a great feeling finally to have achieved that long-term goal.


Sharene’s Dutch Driver’s License

Last year we described Harrison’s ordeal to get his Dutch driver’s license, and this year was Sharene’s turn. It’s not easy here; 70% fail the written exam the first time, and then no matter how long you have been driving in another country (for Harrison it was over 50 years, for Sharene 47!), you must take driving lessons with an instructor. Sharene’s story:

Sharene Driving

Cool car compliments of our friend Monica… but the thumbs up and smile is because I passed!

“It was painful! After studying for six weeks, I failed the first written exam badly and barely passed on the second try. I thought that was the hard part, but no way. I had to take 22 hours of driving lessons with an instructor I didn’t get along with, and I was ready to give up. But I didn’t, and in all fairness, driving here is unlike anywhere else. There are cars, trucks, buses, trams, motorcycles, mopeds, pedestrians and tourists (a different sort of pedestrian!), and oh, about a billion bikes, all moving at the same time. And lots and lots of rules. So now after all that effort, time, and money, we can now both drive in the Netherlands. And we have, twice! End result: I’m happier on my bike!”

Driving Test

Who has priority?

Our American readers may have trouble understanding how a driver’s license exam could be so difficult, so here’s just one sample question from the study guide for the 40-question written exam (which requires 87.5% correct to pass). In the figure on the left, who has priority? (Priority is the European term for right-of-way.) In other words, what is the crossing order? This is important to know not only for the exam but also in real life; it’s a common intersection and you might be the man in blue or the woman with children trying to cross without getting hit! See if you’re surprised by the answer: 1. Red convertible; 2. Motorcycle and woman with children; 3. Car at stop sign; 4. Bicycle and man in blue.


Nearby Beauty

No, we’re not referring to the women in the Red Light District! Our Christmas letters tend to focus on people — house guests and other visitors, friends and family we see when we travel — but we also take a lot of photos of beautiful and interesting places we come across on our bike rides or walks. Here’s a sample (roll over photos for captions; click any photo for a slideshow):


Travel

We love Amsterdam so much that we hate to leave it, but we do from time to time! This year we traveled to a bunch of places, some together, some separately, some with friends. In addition to Harrison’s trip to Hawaii (mentioned above), after which he flew to Seattle for a few days, Sharene traveled to California for her annual “Girl’s Trip,” where she also saw her sister and brother-in-law. One or both of us also visited the Dutch island of Terschelling, Eindhoven (for a Barbershop singing competition), Vilnius in Lithuania (for a Tommy Emmanuel performance), Berlin, Sardinia, Maastricht (for a concert by Dutch favorite André Rieu), Barcelona, the French town of Uzès, and Herentals, Belgium (to visit a high-school classmate of Harrison’s). Some photo highlights:


People and Activities

You’ve probably heard anecdotes about people who retire, get bored, and die within six months. We’re in the other category of retired people who are so busy they don’t know how they ever had time for a job! Between activities in and around Amsterdam and time with local and visiting friends, our challenge is to find quiet time for ourselves. But we loved having all of our visitors and showing them around Holland.


Harrison’s Other Piano

A fun lost and found story. When we moved from Hawaii to Amsterdam, we shipped two pianos. One was the Baldwin baby grand that Harrison has had since 1974 and now graces our living area, but we also shipped the small Everett console piano that Harrison learned on and has been in his family since 1960. We didn’t have room for two pianos, but there was no market on the Big Island for used pianos so we thought it better to move both of them to Amsterdam and sell the Everett here. We consigned it to an Amsterdam piano dealer and he sold it for us in mid-2013.

HK Piano

Harrison’s other piano

Jump ahead four years to 2017. Amsterdam has a prominent music store called Concerto. We’ve passed by it regularly since way back in 2011 when it was close to one of the apartments we rented during our four months in Amsterdam, but for some reason, in all that time, we had never gone inside — until this past summer when Harrison was on a walk and noticed that Concerto served coffee. His story:

“I went inside and found a cute little area with tables and chairs, part of which was raised and could be cleared of the seating and used as a stage. Off to the side I saw a small upright piano. It had the same shape as my old Everett. And the same color. I moved closer. I saw the Everett label. Could it be? Then I saw the consigner’s logo sticker on the front. Yes! After four years, I had found my old piano. Perhaps only another musician can relate to my joy in discovering it, because of course I never expected to see it again.

“I told the Concerto staff my story, and they said that they have regular live performances in that space and my piano is used often. I sat down with my coffee while soaking in the ‘energy’ of a piano that had been a part of my life for over 50 years. I haven’t been back to hear it being played, but it’s nice to know where it wound up, and that it’s being used regularly by people who can actually play it well.”


Holiday Thoughts

SKHK 31 Years

Celebrating 31 years together

It’s hard to believe, but this month we celebrated the 31st anniversary of our first date back in 1986. We had no idea what adventures awaited us! We are grateful each and every day for our good health, the extraordinary life we have been able to enjoy, and the people who have touched us. If you’ve made it this far in our long update, then thank you, mahalo, and dankjewel for being a part of this magical journey. We wish you and your families fijne feestdagen (happy holidays) and an enchanting and interesting 2018.

Harrison and Sharene

Four Years in Amsterdam

Back in Switzerland for our 25th Wedding Anniversary

Back in Switzerland for our 25th Wedding Anniversary

Sharene and Harrison’s 2016 Christmas Update

We’ll start off this update with a home movie! (Well, it’s a movie about our home. Does that count?) The Holland Marketing Alliance has a very successful award-winning series of tourist videos called “Holland. The Original Cool.” The videos have been so successful that they are cutting back on promotion because there are too many tourists! But we want you to see one of the latest videos because it’s almost an allegory for our life in Amsterdam. We know nearly every place shown in this 18-minute film (we live close to many of them) and the sweet love story filled with magic isn’t that far from our own experience here.


 

It was a year of milestones: 30 years together, 25 years married, four years living in Amsterdam, and the most discouraging presidential election of our lives. But the big event for us was our long fall trip back to Hawaii. We visited four islands: Oahu, Maui, the Big Island, and Kauai. Our Dutch friend Martin was with us for part of the trip and it was fun to see Hawaii through the eyes of someone who had never been there. After so many years away, we had a fair amount of work to do at our rental condos in Honolulu and Maui, but we still had time to enjoy ourselves and of course appreciate the warm weather.

On the Big Island, we saw our former home, Hale Kakahi, and we were able to visit with quite a few friends, most at an open house we held at the home of one of our former vacation rental clients.

We had some more nice times with friends and family in Honolulu and on Maui. Sharene and her sister, Linda, have birthdays only two days apart in October, and the wedding anniversary of Linda and her husband, Ralph, is almost at the same time. It meant so much to us that they took the time and effort to come to Hawaii to celebrate these events with us. We had dinner with Steve and Iku; Steve was our business partner on the Big Island and now he and Iku are real estate agents in Honolulu who have been very helpful with our own properties there. Sharene learned that Dominic, her boss at WorldRes during the first dot-com boom in Silicon Valley in the 1990s, was visiting Honolulu while we were there, so we had breakfast with him. And on Maui, Sharene cooked dinner for Matt, the son of her best high school girlfriend, Linda. Linda owns a condo just down the street from ours and Matt and his girlfriend were staying there during our visit.

Our 1991 wedding took place at a home in Kona on the Big Island owned by Pat and Phil Bickel. We had met them two years before on our first trip to Hawaii together, and we liked them and their home so much that we asked to get married there on the day before a total eclipse of the sun was to occur. Because the eclipse was a big deal in Hawaii, Pat and Phil’s daughter, Lindsay, brought her two children, Noel (9) and Max (6), from their home on Kauai to see it. Since they were at the house for the eclipse, they attended our wedding as well. It was a very small wedding; there were only nine people including the minister and us, so Lindsay and the kids were a third of it! We later met Lindsay’s husband, Greg, and discovered we had a fascinating connection to him as well. We became and have remained friends, watched Noel and Max grow up, and mourned when Phil and then Pat passed away. We visited Lindsay and Greg in their elegant home on Kauai, and on Sharene’s birthday, when we were in Honolulu, we were given royal treatment by Max, who is now 31 and a skilled mixologist at Top of Waikiki, a rotating restaurant overlooking Honolulu.

Harrison hadn’t been back to the United States at all since we moved in 2012, and while Sharene had traveled to the U.S. several times, she hadn’t seen Hawaii for over three years. We feel extraordinarily fortunate to have grown up and lived most of our lives in the United States during what very well may have been its peak years. However, our time in Hawaii and on the mainland (Sharene also visited San Francisco and Harrison stopped in Seattle) just reinforced our decision to move to Amsterdam. We enjoyed seeing familiar places and visiting old friends, but it was crystal clear to us that our lives in Amsterdam are much happier, healthier, and just overall better than they would be in the United States.


 

We took another trip down memory lane for our 25th wedding anniversary in July. Way back in 1988 we took our first vacation to Switzerland together and visited Riederalp, a beautiful village in the Bernese Alps that Harrison’s mother read about in the San Diego newspaper. Many years later in 2009 on another trip to Switzerland, our “adopted daughter” Amelia took us to Ascona, a charming city in the Ticino, the Italian part of the country. We hadn’t been back to either place since, and they’re not too far apart, so we decided to visit both again for our anniversary. Riederalp sits near the top of a mountain at 1905 meters (6250 feet) and is car-free; you leave your car in the valley and take a 3000-meter-long (nearly two miles) aerial tram to the charming village. You keep going up, up, up, like Jack in the Beanstalk, until you’re in a different world and can’t even see the valley anymore. It’s primarily a skiing village, so when it’s quiet in the summer you can hike almost alone along the Aletsch glacier, an amazing alpine experience. The weather was spectacular, we got in some great hikes, and we took some fabulous photos (including the one at the top of the page).

After hiking in the Alps, we headed to Ascona. It’s only about 60 km (40 miles) away, but what complete cultural opposites! They speak Italian there, and you might as well be in Tuscany (except it’s Switzerland so everything is more efficient). Our dear friend Sarah (Amelia’s mother) joined us for this part of the trip (we were also in Switzerland with her five years ago for our 20th anniversary) and we walked through the hills, took a boat ride on Lago Maggiore, and had some nice meals together.

We visit Switzerland often but it’s usually to see Sarah or our “adopted daughters.” This was the first time we have played tourist there in quite a while and it was nice to be reminded what a gorgeous country it is. A great place to celebrate 25 years of marriage and the amazing love and life we have shared.


 

Once again our year has been full of visiting family and friends. We like to think they come just to see us, but we know that Amsterdam remains one of the most attractive tourist destinations in the world so it all works out! (After watching Kat and Dog, how could you not want to come here?) Here are some of the highlights.


 

Sharene continued the long tradition of her annual Girls’ Trip with her three best girlfriends. This was their 21st year of traveling together — every year the place is different and of course so are their lives. This year they chose Martha’s Vineyard as a celebration of Cathy’s retirement from teaching, so now two out of the four have joined the big “R” club. Martha’s Vineyard was a perfect choice, and by coincidence Sharene could also see two more friends from our days in Hawaii — Linda and Ann — who just happened to be in Massachusetts at the same time. Once again Sharene feels very fortunate to have such beautiful women friends.


 

Another special moment came during the trip to Hawaii when we laid the ashes of our nephew’s husband to rest in front of Hale Kakahi. Junior’s wish was to be with his late husband, John, on the ocean, where years ago we created a little family memorial. On a more fun note, Sharene cheered up Jennie by throwing a Girls’ Party for her. (The slings were for Suzette who broke her arm and couldn’t make it.) And Martin and Sharene helped our friend Monica celebrate her husband’s 70th birthday at a ’70s Birthday Party. They really rocked it with their outfits!


 

One of the big reasons we moved to Amsterdam and love living here is that we don’t have to own a car. But that doesn’t mean we never want to drive. We can get pretty much everywhere we want to go in the Netherlands by foot, bike, tram, bus, or train, but every now and then a car would make it just a little bit easier. We could rent a car, but we couldn’t drive it, because under Dutch law, once you have lived here for six months, it’s illegal to drive here without a Dutch driver’s license — your foreign license is no longer valid. We can’t simply exchange our American licenses for Dutch ones, we have to start from scratch and pass both the theory and practical tests just as if we were learning to drive for the first time.

Harrison’s Driving Test

Passed the driving test and happy to be done with this ordeal!

At first we heard that the tests were given only in Dutch. Later we learned that you could pay a little extra and take the tests in English, but by then we were so busy enjoying life that it wasn’t until this summer that Harrison finally took the time to study for the tests. And study he did! You would think that someone who has driven safely for over 50 years and who graduated from two of the finest universities on the planet wouldn’t find a driving test much of a challenge, but you don’t know the Dutch driving test! It took almost three months of concentrated effort and 18 hours of driving lessons to prepare for the tests. Harrison is a licensed pilot and these tests were harder than the U.S. private pilot exams!

We have heard from many expats (and a lot of locals) that it took them multiple tries before they passed, so Harrison is pleased that he passed both tests the first time. Sharene, however, is not looking forward to the process herself! She’s still getting over the fact that she has had not one, but two bikes stolen since she’s lived here!


 

We never get over the extraordinary but approachable beauty of this city, our wonderful apartment, and the friends who embody the welcoming spirit that Amsterdam has shown throughout the city’s history. (We overlook the bike thieves!) Here are just a few more photos of some places we love and friends who deserve to be recognized for making our time in Amsterdam special.


Important note: If you’ve made it this far, you have read our letter and seen the small photos. But in case you haven’t already figured it out, you can roll your mouse over any photo to see the caption, or click on any photo for a slide show of full-size photos. (Some computers, tablets, and smartphones may operate differently.)


 

We end this year’s update with a bittersweet farewell to our dear friend Eva, who passed out of our lives earlier this year and moved on to new and exciting times. Eva, you were truly a gift and the amazing experiences we shared were high points of our lives. Love always and we wish you well.

With Eva and Bogi

With Eva and Bogi at the Bohém Festival in Kecskemét, Hungary


 

We have now lived in Amsterdam for four years. By the time we had been in Hawaii for four years, we had already begun to recognize the challenges and limits to a happy life there. Here, though, life remains just about perfect. Perhaps something surprising will happen to make us say, “We didn’t see that one coming,” but so far all the surprises have been positive and we can’t imagine where else in the world we would ever want to call home. We hope that wherever you call home, you find the joy that we have in Amsterdam.

Sharene Harrison Merry ChristmasDank je wel for taking the time to read our letter. We love hearing from the people who have touched our lives, and we appreciate your letters, photos, cards, or comments using the form on our website. Wishing our families and friends a very merry Christmas and a safe, healthy, and happy 2017.

Harrison and Sharene

Merry Christmas 2015

With Martin and Eva in the Garden

With Martin and Eva in the Garden

Sharene and Harrison’s Annual Update from Amsterdam

This year started out with a bang! The first week of January Sharene got hit in the head by a champagne bottle that came flying out of an overhead compartment on a flight home from Vienna. Ouch! But things went up from there and 2015 turned out to be another fabulous year — one of the best years of our lives.

We only had 16 sets of overnight guests this year — slow for us! — but all were fascinating in their very different ways. We got them on bikes and canal boats, took them to King’s Day celebrations, tulip fields, museums, concerts, and picnics, and we always dragged them outside to our new garden for a glass of wine! We had four sets of friends from Hawaii bring us lots of aloha. There were friends from Germany, Austria, Switzerland, California, and Washington, all with truly fascinating conversations. In October Harrison’s cousin and his wife from Iowa were here; it meant so much to us for them to make the trip.


 

All of our “Swiss family” — Sarah, Amelia, Isabel, and Hallie — came to see us (Sarah came twice!), which was the most special of all. We still wonder why they love us, but whatever the reason, we’ll take it! We will spend Christmas with them in Switzerland this year after hosting them in Amsterdam in 2014.


 

Sweden, Norway, Berlin, Vienna, Switzerland, England, with a “toe dip” into Hungary were all on our European itinerary this year. But the two travel highlights for Sharene were her annual Girls’ Trip with her three best friends — this year at a fabulous house on the coast of Maine — and a quick trip to Kansas City to see her brother and his family and her sister from California who met her there. The Kansas City Royals happened to be in the baseball playoffs that week, so having been away from the mainland USA for 15 years and having zero interest in sports, she felt a bit like a fish out of water. But seeing her family made up for it and Kansas City is gorgeous.


 

We try to support local musicians as much as we can. We’re often at the Concertgebouw near our home or at a little venue called the Pianola Museum, and we also hosted two Gypsy Jazz private home concerts this year with new friends we have met in the music community.


 

We continue to meet the most fascinating people here! After living here for three years we still marvel at our good fortune in finding a place that is such a perfect fit for us. We spend a lot of time with our two closest friends, Eva and Martin, and we have taken some fun trips together to one of the islands off the Dutch coast, several other charming places in Holland, and to Hungary. Of course Frank, Hanneke, and Tanja — friends we have known since the first day we arrived — are still very much in our lives. We continue to meet new friends all the time but we do our best to stay connected to those we have known for many years. (It’s true, Facebook helps!)


 

We had lots of dinner and garden parties. We redid our garden in the spring and we spend as much time out there as we can when the weather is nice — and when it’s not we tell our guests to put on a sweater! It stays light until 10 pm in the summer so it’s great to be outside. It’s not the 3-acre oceanfront garden we had in Hawaii but it’s much more manageable! And the scenic beauty we experience every day just by living here is extraordinary.


Important note: If you’ve made it this far, you have read our letter and seen the small photos. But in case you haven’t already figured it out, you can roll your mouse over any photo to see the caption, or click on any photo for a slide show of full-size photos. (Some computers, tablets, and smartphones may operate differently.)


 

Christmas Tree 2015Christmas Greetings 2015Our eclectic, well-dressed 2015 Christmas tree is a perfect reflection of our life in Amsterdam. We are truly grateful every single day for the healthy, happy, extraordinary life we have. Our wish for 2016 is that the people we love will know the same joy we have found.

Wishing you all a wonderful Christmas season and hoping you can create your own dream lives in 2016.

Harrison and Sharene

Christmas In Amsterdam 2014

Greetings from Amsterdam

 

Our second full year in Amsterdam was even better than our first, and we’re ending it on a high — our first Christmas in Amsterdam after spending the past three in Switzerland. This year we convinced most of our Swiss family to come here for the holidays. Sarah, Isabel, and Hallie will be here; unfortunately Amelia has commitments that tie her to Switzerland, but we have seen her several times this year so we forgive her!

Through the magic of Facebook, Skype, email, SMS, WhatsApp, and many personal visits, most of you already know we still love living in Amsterdam. Moving to Europe from half-way across the world in Hawaii wasn’t crazy after all — this is a perfect fit for our personalities. We are still pinching ourselves that we get to live in what is (in our humble opinion) the most interesting city in the world. We appreciate all the visits from our friends and family members — we have had over 60 people stay with us since we moved two years ago, not counting repeat guests! And we have met many more new European friends so our life is very full.

We are breaking from our annual tradition of writing a long newsy update and giving you a review in pictures of highlights from our past year. You can roll your mouse over any photo to get a caption, and click on any photo for a bigger version and a longer description. Or you can view the entire slide show by clicking on the first (or any) photo and using the arrows to cycle through all of them.

We are healthy and grateful every single day of the year. We wish you all a happy Christmas season filled with music, holiday decorations, good food, and lots of love. Our sincere best wishes for a healthy and happy 2015.

Harrison & Sharene