2002 Letter excerpt about a very interesting exhibit in City Hall

Today, May 19, turned out to be a bit difficult. We left for the city in the morning, and got off where we thought there would be a flea market. Closed on Sunday. But we saw a lot of tourists and a guide in the building next to the Metro. Found that there is an exhibit in the town hall that shows the level of the sea in relation to Amsterdam and in relation to you standing there. There are three large hollow tubes and the water levels in two of them are the actual level of the water. The third shows the level that the water got up to in a terrible flood in 1953. All of the levels are well above one’s head, clearly showing that if the sea came in past the dyke system, it would be way over your head. And the sea is very close. That was a little disconcerting to say the least.

(If you look carefully at the bottom picture, you will note that the tube on the right changes color as you look from the bottom to the top, from darker grey to lighter grey and then to a sort of light yellow. The abrupt change from the lighter grey to the yellowish color near the top of the tube marks the level of the sea near Amsterdam at the height of the 1953 storm. That level is more than twice Adelle's height.)