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To put it simply, in Amsterdam. Got the photos to prove it.
(159) is Monday, 14 June 2010.
Stacey and Robin, two of my friends from the Isle of Skye tour, happened to be going to Amsterdam and Prague the same days as me, including the same flight to Amsterdam. So, we checked into our hostels, wandered a bit, got cheap sandwiches for lunch, and eventually settled for an hour or so in a lovely little patch of grass on a canal.
Walking back was my first run-in with the World Cup. Naturally, I don’t follow sports, so I had no idea it was going on, but it was really funny to walk around while the Netherlands-Denmark game was playing to packed houses in every single bar. First of all, nobody was working today, and second, you could follow the game without watching it AND quickly locate every pub in a two-block radius from the collective cries, cheers, and other group reactions echoing in every bar in every little street.
I had gotten on a bus out of Edinburgh at 4 AM (incredible part: it was getting light out), so while I was really happy to have taken those sunrise pictures at the airport, I needed a siesta now. I did wait, though, to first make sure Netherlands had secured a solid lead of 2-0.
Stacey, Robin, and I met up again after our naps and wandered again to get dinner. We were staying near the fabled Red Light District (for those of you less familiar with the place and/or its legend, it is not nearly as dangerous as the name would have you believe). But, being what it is, okay: sex shops, fine, don’t pay them much heed, walk past the mannequins in the window, and those ones, and oh my goodness that one moved. Wait, that’s not a mannequin, that’s—
O-KAAAAAAAAY!
Welcome to Amsterdam.
(160) is Tuesday, 15 June 2010.
After my Sandeman’s free tour brochure was unclear about the meeting time and place for the tour, I wandered Amsterdam rather unproductively for several hours. I eventually found lunch at Walk to Wok, a good stir-fry place that puts Wokbar, one of my haunts near Reid Hall in Paris, to shame. It’s a little pricier, but so much better.
My next stop was Der Dampkring, a the world-famous coffeeshop where they filmed the Matsui scene in Ocean’s 12.
After that, I went on to the Van Gogh Museum… It’s a great collection, and a notably good exhibit in terms of putting Vincent in artistic context, but it’s too much money (14 euro, no student discount) and a an awkward floor plan to the exhibition rooms left you stuck behind lots of people trying to look at each painting.
Stacey, Robin, and I had dinner at Eat Mode, a decent pan-Asian place on the Chinatown street. And yes, there's only one such street. Yay multiculturalism!
(161) is Wednesday, 16 June 2010.
I took the tour, which was okay... I'd already found most of the stuff and the guide was pretty funny, but I don't know if it was worth 3 hours given the experience I already had with the city center. Definitely do it first thing in Amsterdam, though.
There were some funny tidbits, though... if you look in the photo album, you'll note some tipping houses. Since flooding used to be a major problem in this city, stores' wares used to be housed upstairs. To get the goods up and down easily (rather than risking it on those nearly vertical staircases), they used a pulley system: the hooked bars extending from the roofs of many of these buildings. But, there's also wind to consider, and if the wind blows your goods too hard into the house, you risk breaking your windows, your products, or both.
"Okay," House asks his team, "Differential diagnosis on goods breaking windows."
"Well," says Thirteen because she's my least favorite, "If you tip the front of the house forward a little, the goods will be able to swing farther without colliding into the facade."
"Brilliant-- let's do it!" Foreman exclaims.
It's not until 35 minutes and 44 seconds into the 43-minute episode that House gets his epiphany, which is to simply double the length of the beam extending from the top of the building.
I had one last thing to do in Amsterdam before catching my train. This was to get a haircut. It had been three months; I was due. But this was a cool experience; I went to the Kappersakademie, a hairdressing school. We're talking 13 euros for a semi-professional stylist's haircut (no problem when my particular style request is "short"). That semi-pro, by the way, was a lovely red-haired girl named Jena with solid English. Many of the other students were also attractive Amsterdam girls (which is kind of redundant). It was fun to watch everybody buzzing about the one big room with several sinks on hinge arms that moved to meet any one of several nearby chairs.
I like to think the haircut came out okay (hopefully upcoming pictures will let you judge for yourself), and it's nice to think that everybody gets something out of the arrangement; students practice, school gets money, I get as good a haircut as possible without breaking the bank on style I wouldn't know what to do with, anyway.
So, final thoughts on Amsterdam... Either I'm a spoiled pedestrian or they're spoiled bikers. I don't like it in Paris when motorcyclists take to the sidewalks (even to park or mount and take to the street), so the constant, omnipresent threat of being mowed down while I try to admire the scenery didn't sit too well with me. Also, they barely warn you: they ring but don't slow down: thats all you get. A chipper little bell has never terrified me so much.
I left with a tremendous respect for - but zero understanding of - this city.
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