\n(We don’t\u00a0know\u00a0“student campus” in Holland,\u00a0students usually\u00a0share
\na “normal” house) There where four girls in the house. Two of them lived on the ground floor, sharing a kitchen and bathroom, and I lived upstairs with Lenny. Lenny and I\u00a0shared\u00a0not only the\u00a0kitchen & the bathroom\u00a0but also our clothes, our thoughts, our sorrows… our lives!
\nShe\u00a0became\u00a0a very close friend, more like\u00a0a sister (we both never had) and
\nI still call her “sis” sometimes!
\nI don’t see her very often, she moved and I moved, but we write long letters and once\u00a0in a while we come together. Last Thursday we did, we had dinner in a nice little restaurant and she brought me a gift!
\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/maritspaperworld.com\/old-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/01_gift_len.jpg\" "\\"01_gift_len\\"")
<\/a>\u00a0\nIt came in this
\nlittle, paper bag
\n(although\u00a0Lenny doesn’t scrap, she shares my love for beautiful paper!) which made it look\u00a0somewhat mysterious…
\nbut\u00a0the gift\u00a0inside was\u00a0sort of a mystery too!\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n It’s obviously old. Slightly corroded and the ink dried up. I had to take a closer look (yep, right there,\u00a0on the clean white table linen in the middle of the restaurant – you would too don’t you?!) and took some tools out of the box.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0 But who used this? There are still words in the holders spelling “To sir…” and “Bridge Club”… A\u00a0LITTLE SOMETHING ABOUT JAN MALJERS<\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n This is gonna be a long post, ’cause today I received a mail from my dad with some\u00a0additional information about\u00a0Jan Maljers. If you saw\u00a0the scrap about my great-great-grandfather and liked it you should read further! It’s a fine little story about Jan! (And if you did not, or want to refresh your memory, I\u00a0made a short version of the family tree to go with this post (including the people\u00a0this story is about)\u00a0so you can take a look at the connections too… “De bijnaam van Jan Maljers was Jan Kuper (of de kuper) Op zijn tachtigste jaar kocht hij bij zijn schoonzoon (Eine Brasser, bijgenaamd Eine Kaan) een driewielsfiets. Eine Brasser gaf aan mensen die een fiets bij hem kochten desgewenst ook fietsles, maar dat wilde de oude Jan niet, vandaar de driewieler. Die fiets had hij nodig om zelfstandig naar Biggekerke te kunnen rijden en aldaar zijn dochter Maria te bezoeken.<\/em><\/p>\n Het verhaal wil dat hij altijd middenop de weg bleef rijden. Translation:<\/p>\n “The nickname of Jan Maljers was Jan “Barrel”. He died in 1941, when he was 96 years of age. Aunt Jans could tell great stories about him. When Jan was eighty, he bought a tricycle\u00a0from his son in law Eine The story goes that Jan always rode in the middle of the street.<\/a>
\nOK, that’s\u00a0one corner of the veil… it has to do with typography!
\nThe title says so, but what’s in this
\nlittle tin box?
\nAlphabets?
\nStamps?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nWOW, what the heck…\u00a0there’s\u00a0tiny little alphabets in it! And I see tools (tweezers, screws, butterfly nuts…) and an ink pad.
\nBut what are those wooden “things”…\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nThere are three wooden “holders” to put the alphabet in (using the tweezers I guess)
\nI also discover that\u00a0the holders\u00a0
\ncan\u00a0be connected by\u00a0using the screws…\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n
\n…like this!<\/p>\n
\nIt’s too small\u00a0
\nto be used in
\na\u00a0professionel
\nprinting office.\u00a0
\nMaybe\u00a0a toy
\nfor amateurs?
\nI really don’t know.
\nI’ve never seen something like
\nthis before!<\/p>\n
\nthat makes me soooo curious!\u00a0Who did that? Who owned this?
\nIt is a mystery!
\n(I didn’t ask Lenny where she got it from, that’s not very neat to do when you get a present, but my curiosity grows and grows so maybe I’ll ask her where she got this. I’m also planning on cleaning AND using it soon!)<\/p>\n
\ngo to the former post. What makes me think of this: in some comments\u00a0
\nyou defined him as “full of mischief” and “gentle soul” – I liked that!)<\/p>\n
\nThe\u00a0things my dad wrote about Jan Maljers:
\n(first in\u00a0Dutch, translation in English\u00a0after that)\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n
\nHij werd 96 jaar, stierf in 1941, ik zag hem nooit.
\nTante Jans kon er mooi
\nover vertellen.
\nZe deed daarbij haar ogen dicht, waarschijnlijk om
\nbinnenin te kunnen kijken.
\nJan was timmerman, vandaar mogelijk zijn bijnaam kuper,
\neen verzeeuwsing van kuiper.
\nIemand die houten vaten maakte of repareerde.
\nJan kuper ging op zijn negentigste jaar nog mee jagen. Jagen was toen nog niet omstreden en deel van het boerenleven.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nOok wanneer hem soms een auto achterop kwam, of\u00a0de bus bijvoorbeeld, hield hij zijn koers vast. “Ze rien je zomm\u00e8 ie d\u00f4\u00f4d” was desgevraagd zijn commentaar. Er is nog een mooie foto van hem met die fiets voor de winkel van “oba” Brasser.”<\/em><\/p>\n
\nWhen she did, she closed her eyes. Probably to look inside herself.
\nJan was a carpenter. That possibly explains\u00a0his nickname, “Barrel-maker”, someone who makes or repairs wooden barrels. Jan still went hunting when he was ninety. Hunting was not questionable and a part of the farmer live\u00a0in those days. <\/span><\/p>\n
\n(who was a cycle repairer).\u00a0Eine gave people who bought a bicycle also\u00a0lessons (if desired)\u00a0in\u00a0how to ride a bike\u00a0but old Jan didn’t want that. That’s why he bought a\u00a0TRIcycle. Jan lived in\u00a0another village, and he needed the bike to\u00a0ride\u00a0to Biggekerke independantly to visit his daughter Maria. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nEven when a car or a bus\u00a0drove right behind\u00a0him he hold his course.
\n“They don’t\u00a0bump up against\u00a0you just like that…” he commented in Zeeuws.
\nThere\u00a0still is\u00a0a nice picture of him with his tricycle in front of the store of grandpa Brasser somewhere…”<\/span><\/p>\n<\/a>
\nGuess what….
\nI have exactly\u00a0that photo for you!<\/p>\n