11 October 2014

Amsterdam Part 1

I left the United States on 26 October even though my study abroad program did not start until 30 August because my international flight stopped off in Amsterdam and that seemed like the perfect chance to do a bit of exploring.

First of all, Amsterdam is certainly one of the most beautiful cities in the world.  There's not much that could compare.  I mean, it has canals.  Second, the city is made for people.  You can walk just about anywhere, you don't have to get a bus or own a car.  Most cities I've lived in up until now are built around cars, which is great if you have one, but it means enormous thoroughfares that are extremely difficult to cross.  Sometimes in Albany, NY, I feel like there are no people living there, only cars, because you can walk great distances and never see a person outside of an automobile.

Amsterdam, over the centuries, has really learned how to use space.  Everything fits together.  Everything has a purpose.  And the less space it takes up, the better.  But it's all functional.  There are, for instance, hooks suspended from the top floor of every apartment building to assist with moving furniture.  It's practical, and I can see their benefit, having moved my stuff several times by myself from one three-story building to another.

Anyway, I was really tired when I got to Amsterdam, as you might imagine after having been on a ten-hour flight.  My father was there to meet me, as he was on his way back to the US after a business trip.  It was a stroke of luck that he could be there, and very good for me, because my flight arrived at 7:30 AM and I couldn't check into my hostel until 2 PM.  We therefore returned to his hotel and I took probably the best shower I have ever taken.  Then we ate some crackers and I tried not to fall asleep on his couch.

Several indistinct hours later (it was all very fuzzy due to lack of sleep), I changed clothing and we went to a bakery for lunch.  That goat cheese and lettuce sandwich was straight from the gods...it tasted SO good, and there was cold mint tea to boot.  It was wonderful.  I tried to take a photo before eating it, but when I went back to iPhoto later to look at it, it seems that I had my finger over the lens.

Kids, don't take photos when you're trying not to fall asleep on your lunch.

My father, reminding me that the best thing for jetlag is to stay awake until normal sleeping hours, proceeded to drag me around the city.  It was good, I guess.  We went to the royal palace:


Fun fact: yes, Netherlands still has a king.  He doesn't have any real power, though, like most other monarchs in Europe.  He's a figurehead.

I remember being very entertained by the clusterfuck of pigeons that frequented the plaza in front of the royal palace.  People would come to feed them and get a little more than they bargained for when 1000 birds (no exaggeration, probably) swarmed around them.  These little suckers were so friendly that, if you stood still, they would come and land on you.  They know their audience, I guess.

I botched the photo of our next destination too, a used book market near the red-light district.  Anyway, it was a very interesting place.  It was sort of a half-outdoors hallway with tiny storefronts selling every kind of used book you could imagine.  The shelves inside each one were probably at least 20 feet high.  I don't know how you looked through the uppermost shelves.

One seller had a huge collection of vintage maps, which were a lot of fun to look at.  I wanted one of Spain, but the few they had weren't that interesting.  Old maps can be like works of art, but these didn't have the gold lettering or fancy compass roses, so I decided not to purchase one.  Who knows, anyway, how I would have transported it without damaging it.

Around 4 PM I checked into the hostel.  It was a Christian youth hostel called Shelter Jordan.  Despite their stated religious mission, there was no pressure to convert or anything.  It is actually kind of cool, because their staff come from all over the world to work there for a set length of time.  I guess they get free room and board for their troubles, which is a super benefit when you consider the beautiful city they get to live in.

Maybe in the future I'll shove my misgivings about religions and clean bathrooms there for a month just to be in Amsterdam.

The room was basic but adequate.  It had six bunks and a sink.

As with most hostels, the bathrooms weren't perfectly clean.  For the price, though, it was great.  And I even got free cooked breakfast, a feature I always search for because I hate looking for food in the morning when I'm tired and hungry and grouchy.

For dinner I ate a pizza (or was it pasta?) that I hardly remember.  Then I somehow made it back to the hostel (don't remember the walk) and went to bed.

The next morning was much better.  I didn't get lost finding my father's hotel room, which was more like a super tiny apartment than a hotel room.  He even had a kitchenette and this super '50s-looking fridge!  I ate all of his yogurt for breakfast.

After taking a shower, we left to find some activity for the day.  It was warm enough to not need a jacket, and people still weren't awake, so we got tickets for one of those canal boat tours.


That was our boat.  It was good to see the city, though I know from the length of the English-language informational dialogue that they were saying a lot more in Dutch and German than in English (or Spanish, when they had it).

We saw some interesting things.

For instance, it seemed kind of strange that they'd just leave a half-sunk motor/row boat in the canals:


Also, this enormous bike parking garage (three solid floors of bikes, nothin' else) exists near the train station:


Since the city isn't exactly vehicle-friendly, I guess it makes sense that they'd need a parking structure for bikes.  But it's still super strange.  An American city probably couldn't even fill one of those floors.

We also saw some more scenic things, like the Hermitage museum:


There wasn't time to go in, and I have to admit that I'm not partial to art museums, but it's a beautiful building.  The Hermitage is a satellite of the Hermitage Museum of Russia.  They have it in Amsterdam because, according to the museum information, Netherlands has a good relationship with Russia.  There are two sides of the coin, I guess:  if you have a bad relationship with Russia they send you surface-to-air missiles, but if your relationship is good they send you art museums.

Go figure.

To finish off my second day in Amsterdam, my father and I went to a super-fancy fusion Japanese restaurant.  I tried some kind of Japanese-European-style salad with hazelnuts that was very good.  I also drank legally for the first time, since I was, at the time, 20 years old and still not able to obtain alcohol legally in the US.  Europe's drinking age is 18.  Take that, US.

My father's plane left early the next morning from Schiphol airport, so I was on my own for two days until my own flight to Alicante.  Details in my next post.  Until next time!

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