Status Updates From Heren van de thee

After his wife's death, Rudolf finds out that his wife had been unhappy, disappointed and disenchanted from early on in her marriage. This vomes as a complete shock to him, but for the reader... Well the woman didn't speak any local language, and all she had to do was be pregnant and give birth repeatedly.

'wat was dat gistern tussen Vader en jou over dat boek? Zat je weer in Nietzsche te lezen?'
' nee, in een roman van Couperus. Vader vindt dat smaakbedervende en decadente lectuur, hij ergert zich er dood aan...'

Therefore she reads Coperus in her room and "treasure island" outside of it!

1895 rudolf's salary (so he must by this stage be effectively the employee of his shareholders rather than the proprietor of the plantation) will be increased to 420 gulders, which was the same amount of moneythat his father had begun to earn as soon as he stepped off the boat about thirty years earlier - this really is not a cash generating business!

Rudolf writes to his mother that he wants to own his plantation completrly just as his father owned his own plantation, but that he is trying to sell a fourth share in the business.

I get the impression that the plantation is not generating much money.

Returning from a holiday to Holland, they find the plantation a wildeness and half the work force gone. This foesnot give a positive impression of the plantation as a business!

The Assam (from Ceylon) that Rudolf previously had planted, rurns out to have been a hybrid which is a relief for me. Now he has some real, authentic assam and has great hopes for it. The Javanese highlands are not, I think, entirely like Assam, so I have my doubts...

Main character Rudolf's uncle Eduard tries to convince him to plant Assam tea from Ceylon???!!
Previously the discussion was I thought about the virtues of Ceylon tea vs Chinese tea and do you want to go for black tea for the European market, or Green tea for the thirsty Asian market.
I drunk Assam and Ceylon teas, but Assam from Ceylon is new to me

Discussing the daughters of the Roosegaarde-Bisschop's: "Rose is wat langzaam en stug, Jenny de intelligentste, en een schat, Marie een schoonheid, maar kattig"

Now I imagine Marie drinking bowls of milk, barking at birds, climbing into trees and getting stuck

"ik ben blij dat Adriaan mijn raad heeft opgevolgd, en voor zijn volk nette woningen heeft gebouwd...geef de mensen goed onderdak, goed gereedschap, dan zullen ze met vreugde werken en alles naar behoren onderhouden..."

Hmm, maybe it was a mistake not to have read max havelaar first?!

On this page I found a reservation ticket from a previous borrower from the library. Did they find this book about tea and coffee plantations too dry and give up reading here? ;)

On a visit to adriaan holle"s tea plantation.

1) it is plain that this is industrial agriculture already in the 1870s
2) his assistant is in favour of buying a machine for rolling the tea leaves which will save labour and so costs, however Adriaan holds back because "we want to create jobs for people" (Suetonius' Vespasian understands completely). I wonder if this will be a theme?

Discussing the aftermath of the Paris Commune: " hoe ver moet man gaan in het bestrijden van radicale elementen..."
Is this original, ir is Haasse packing out the text with what she thinks the characters would have or should have thought?

Pregnancy of Rudolf's sister Berta is " pijnlijk zichtbaar" . This doesn't feel like a phrase from her source material (letters and journals of the family) so is this how Haasse herself perceives pregnancy? Something better not seen?

The main character takes ship from the Netherlands to Java, the journey takes 120 days, this is shortly before the Suez canal opens.
Having read around the world on 80 days, i can't help wondering if going across the Mediterranean to Egypt then over land to the Red Sea and sailing from there, might have been faster!
On board they eat chicken and drink beer (there aren't many passengers)