Saturday night Carla and I went to the open air theater of the Vondelpark. The music and dance event was called a 'Latin Summer breeze'. It was supposed to be summer but the wind was chilly, the rain had just stopped and people were wearing clothes which one usually wears in october. On the stage there was an exotic setting of banana leaves and coconuts, but it did not bring them in a tropical mood. The small audience was passive and hardly willing to dance on the salsa music. The peptalk of the presenter of the show did not help.

At the edge of the open space there were homeless people, some drinking bottles of wines at fast rate. They were wearing all kinds of hats, turbans and caps. There was no homeless who was hatless: they had a hat instead of a roof. It was a good opportunity for us to draw these people without embarrasing them. We did not care anymore what was happening on stage. After finishing my tea, which carla brought to me to get warm, I found out thatI could use the tea bag as a watercolour brush: to make a basic colour on the paper and to create shades. The drawing was drawn with a special pencil which solves in water (or should i say tea). I saw a Surinam father playing with his children lifting them in them air and playing games of balance with their bodies. I felt like drawing this father figure, as my my own dad was on my mind. I had to stop the' tea painting' process when finally the tea bag broke, and the crumbs were on the paper like tabacco from a broken cigarette. One of the homeless guys was sporting a huge summer hat which covered most of his face: one could only see a big beard. He reminded us of Claude Monet in his Giverny years and our sketches of him looked like we had personally met Monet at his waterlily pond.

At the end of the evening a new band began to play. The music was rocking and swinging. Salsa sparks lightned the crowd. Out of the blue the dance floor was full of experienced dancers. The Amsterdam cold was turned into a warm night in Rio de Janeiro. We felt we were in the middle of a salsa beach. We were particulary impressed by a couple who danced so natural and so rhythmical: a dark boy together with a girl dressed in red. They were born to dance If i could dance like this i would give up drawing. Seated on a tribune bench at a high point of view we could sketch this sea of dance motion. During this inspirational peak we were hardly knowing what we were doing and made more drawings in twenty minutes than during the hours before. My hands were black from the ink and other art materials. With black stains on my face i felt like a miner returning from work. I guess it was hard to see me that night.

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