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Introduction Ah, Amsterdam. The land of BICYCLES. Forget the other "attractions" Amsterdam is famous for, this city is all about transportation. There are more bicycles than people in Amsterdam. I think I might be serious about this.
You call that a lot of bicycles? Pleeeeaaaase.
THAT'S a lot of bicycles. My sheer joy at the near-infinite number of bicycles in Amsterdam almost made me forget about the awful 3 hours I had to spend in the dumpy Brussels, Belgium train station sitting in a cold chair and trying to keep my butt away from pickpockets. By some miracle, the weather in Amsterdam was near-perfect every day I was there.
This part of my trip also really felt like the beginning of a new chapter. I started worrying less about where I would sleep as I grew steadily more excited about my foreign surroundings. After tossing most of my worries to the curb, I got comfortable and started going crazy with the pictures. Some of you may choose not to believe this, but my trip to Amsterdam really didn't have all that many nail-bitingly interesting stories attached to it. The hostel I stayed at had great food, but the internet and front desk were laaaaaaame and the sleeping accommodations were pretty gigantic and crappy. Unless you're totally into watching really boring Jesus slideshows during breakfast, I wouldn't recommend the place. For the sake of preserving its dignity, I won't mention its name. The second day I was in Amsterdam, I met up with another friend of mine (a native of the Netherlands who is 6'5", wears giant boots, and has long hair with a beard... awesome) and he showed me around the city. It was excellent, even if I was carrying around a backpack that weighed about as much as a small truck. I took most of my pictures during that time. And now, a visual tour of Amsterdam:
The city of Amsterdam is full of canals. Some of them are small, some of them are large, and they're all lined with boats. Cruise boats, motor boats, and rotting little rowboats half-sunk and filled with leaves resided along every canal's edge. I didn't take one of these canal cruises (see above picture) while I was here, but they were very popular. Some of them featured live music and food!
The boats added to the wonderful sounds of the city. Cars honked, people yelled, bicycle bells chimed, busses quacked and scooters chirped while the boats added to the din with a crisp "clang-clang." Every hour on the hour, the clocks of the city would chime at the same time with a slightly different melody, like school kids all yelling to try and get an answer right. It may be hard to tell from the picture above, but buildings in Amsterdam are wacky.
Maybe it's a little easier to see the wackiness from my drawing... this drawing is the same view and set of buildings as the photo pictured above it. While I was drawing, somebody came up to me and asked me for directions around town. I guess I looked like a local, or something. Personally, I think the unwashed hair and lack of make-up kind of just made me look homeless.
Homeless, local "artist," or both? You be the judge. To my credit, I usually don't look quite as much like zombie as this. By the way, that scarf? Everybody in Europe has one of those. It was the only thing that really tied me into European culture, since most Europeans don't look like homeless American zombies.
By the way, you know how I mentioned that Amsterdam has both a lot of bicycles and canals?
Well, I suspect they don't always get along. A couple of people from the hostel and I sat along the water speculating how many bicycles lined the waterways of downtown Amsterdam. My guess? Many. Also, they had been smoking one of Amsterdam's local "specialties," making the conversation all the more interesting.
It's a little easier to see the wonkiness of Amsterdam's buildings in the above photo. Notice how they lean out over the sidewalk. Apparently, Amsterdam was originally built on a swamp, and the buildings sunk into the ground after their construction, causing them to lean. There is a lot of work being done to preserve these buildings, as some of them would inevitably fall completely over if nobody took care of them. Some buildings have been replaced entirely, but great care was taken to make them blend in with the older buildings. The woman on the left is in sheer awe at the majesty of it all.
For the life of me, I cannot remember what building this is. I want to say that it's either the town hall or the courthouse, though, so it's probably one of those. It resides in this big square, where hot dog vendors (American hot dog vendors, according to that truck on the left) and street performers are out catering to the public as people speaking every language imaginable walk by.
"Madame Tussaud" is the name of this place, and it's a wax museum. I Googled the name to find out more... turns out there are several of these museums worldwide. You probably already knew that though, didn't you? I didn't go in there, but I sort of wish I had. The weather lent itself to lots of nice outdoorsy Amsterdam experiences. My friend (who I mentioned before) and I got pints of Guinness and drank them in the sun in front of an Irish pub, while a street performer harassed passers-by. It was great fun.
The above tag is the remaining evidence of an advertising campaign that I still don't entirely understand. Somebody handed me this thing, and tied to the tag was a single puma sock. I ran this translation from Dutch to English through Babel Fish, and the translation reads: YOU CANNOT WITH 2
IN 1 SOCK..? I think the idea was to have one person handing out a single sock, while your second free sock resides in the Puma store, where you would have to go and get it, and then presumably spend boatloads of money on other Puma merchandise. Here's the other side, and translation:
PUMA SOCK EVENT No clue what a "stuk" is, but I guess this was promoting some kind of sale, provided you bring in the single sock and the flyer. The real trick to this promotion was the fact that not more than 2 blocks away from where they were handing out one sock, there was another person also handing out socks. They were a slightly different size, but I managed to pick up two clean, fresh socks in the streets of Amsterdam to supplement the pile of already stink-ridden and festering old socks that I had packed. I have no idea why, but my feet stunk extra bad in Europe. I'm sure you wanted to know. I seriously considered disguising myself and walking back and forth between sock promoters to reap the full benefits of this sock deal.
Here is one of the socks. I am very sad to report that the second sock appears to be lost. Although it may be in my apartment somewhere, it is another equally realistic possibility that the sock is adrift; taken from me by the cruel hands of travel and circumstance. I hope to find it again someday. In case you were wondering, yes, I did put the above-pictured sock in my scanner. I will probably find amusement in this fact for years to come. I apologize for spending half of this page on SOCKS, but you have to understand.... socks are really something you take for granted. By the end of even a short backpacking trip such as my own, socks are a luxury item.
The end of my stay in Amsterdam is kind of a blur. Not because I don't remember it, but because there was a lot of miscommunication and hopping on and off of trains. The friend I keep mentioning was gracious enough to offer me a place to stay at his house in the city of Zwölle. Since I'm way into the whole posting-way-too-much-detail thing, here's the train ticket I used to get there. The ticket machines in Amsterdam were much easier to use than the ones in Germany:
Here's the rest of my adventures in the Netherlands, in a nutshell: I hopped the 2-hour train to Zwölle where my friend and I ate Burger King cheeseburgers together (something that was A MUST, since we'd talked about it since practically our first conversation and figured we'd never get the chance to actually do it). There were a bunch of anime characters in the Burger King.... apparently some kind of big expo was going on in town, so everybody was dressed up for that. I attempted to drink a lot of beer, but I was so tired I could scarcely finish two and then fell asleep. In the morning, my friend cooked up these AMAZING little breakfast sandwiches that included (upon later inquiry), chicken schnitzel, seasoned eggs, and bread with curry ketchup. You must try curry ketchup, by the way. The kind I had came in a tube, not at all unlike toothpaste. It had a unique and delicious flavor. I think it's generally considered a Dutch item, but I still plan on trying to get a hold of some here in the States, if I can. After leaving Zwölle that morning, the plan was to take a train to Amsterdam and from there, to France. Unfortunately, upon arriving in Amsterdam again, I found out from a (rather rude) lady working the train ticket desks that there was no way in the blue blazes I was going to be catching a train to Paris that same day... they were all reserved. Too tired to really panic or be disappointed, I asked her what was open the next day. She found me a train, and I spent the rest of the day sleeping in the same silly Jesus hostel I'd stayed in before. They all kind of gave me the evil eyeball when I'm came back, probably because I'd already given their hostel pretty crappy ratings for the service. Oops. The next day, I finally set out for Paris. |
