UTRECHT....Okay, Nijkirk is really a little to the north of Utrecht. I'd heard about it for years. The Polish pottery store was a shopping destination for the teachers I worked with. Nothing I heard about the place really prepared me for what was there.

According to what I found on the internet, the shop was only opened on Fridays. That meant everyone interested in shopping showed up at about the same time. And, there were American and Japanese women all over the store. I was amazed with how much English I heard as I strolled the aisles.

It was warehouse shopping. You grabbed a cart, filled it with ceramic treasure, blindly handed over your credit card for payment, and then bubble wrapped your purchases. I had a lot of practice with bubble wrap.

MARTIN