October 06, 2004
stepping stones
Crossing the Gerard Douplein I always end up doing some fancy footwork to avoid stepping on the plaque that marks the spot where Anja Joos was murdered.
Anja was a 43 year old homeless German heroin addict well known for years in the streets of the Pijp. A hard enough life you'd think but on Oct 6th last year life suddenly, if briefly, got harder, when 8 employees of the local supermarket who suspected her of stealing a can of beer chased her down the street and kicked her to death on the spot where she fell on the Gerard Douplein.
Bang, smack in broad daylight, on a busy shopping day, in the heart of the Pijp, a stone's throw from the Albert Cuyp market and in the same street where Andre Hazes was born. In same the street that Hazes used to escape to as a child when the poverty and violence of his home life became too much. In the gezellige Pijp, where traditionally the streets and cafes have been the living rooms of the students, artists, migrants, prostitutes and impoverished families living cheek by jowl in the overcrowded buildings. Its the one place she should have been safe.
Its a self-indulgent superstition but this is why I don't want to go stepping on her plaque. With bad luck like that she doesn't need me rubbing it in.
Today I was saved from my customary hop-skip-jump by several bunches of flowers marking the 1st anniversary of her death. Ironically and sadly there was also the news that two supermarket employees from Delft were charged with assault after breaking the leg of a man whom they suspected of stealing from their store.
(The 8 youths convicted of the murder of Anja Joos have been given sentences of three years, against which they are appealing).
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