amsterdam

i have been to the holy land. i have smelled the sweet cocoa butter air. i have traveled the canals. i have seen the brothels and sniffed the cannabis. i shall call it...amsterdam.

holland is now up at the top of the list. i would say it's one of my new favorite places in the world. granted, i have only traveled a little bit when you think of all the wonderful places on this planet. i'm working on that though.

i left on thursday night with caitlin and emily. we caught a night bus at 11pm. that was an experience. i've been on red eyes and night trains but i have never slept (if you can call it that) on a bus for an entire night. we stopped a couple of times for bathroom and smoke breaks in the middle of the night and it's hard to fall back to sleep after going out into the freezing cold, getting attacked by flourescent lights, peeing, and then trying to sleep sitting up. so i think in total i slept about 3 hours. we were pretty groggy and goofy when we got into amsterdam but that wasn't going to stop us!

we walked to our hostel and dropped our stuff in the lockers at about 7am and looked around the hostel. it was a christian hostel so there were big paintings that said "god loves you" and "jesus is lord." there was even a series of framed drawings telling the story of the wemmicks. if you have never heard of eli and the wemmicks, check out this link. i found it on youtube when we got home and it's the exact same pictures they had on the wall. good message i guess but kind of creepy at the same time.

anyway, we left the hostel and went in search of breakfast. there were these little coupons for a place called "sara's pancakes" and that sounded so delicious to our tired, empty little tummies. we forgot that in europe, pancakes mean crepes. so i was disappointed when i saw my food but immediately changed my mind when i tasted it. it was delicious. and they had actual molases instead of syrup! it was crazy!

after breakfast it was finally a decent hour (about 9am) and we headed over to the anne frank museum. let me tell ya, that is not a happy way to start your day. it was really cool and very moving but quite depressing. it is the actual house where the franks lived before being brought to the camps. more than any other emotion, i was totally awed. it is such an amazing piece of history and a famous work of literature. i felt almost star struck by the whole idea of being in her house. there were videos of people who knew the franks or who worked for otto frank and survived or were not jewish. there was even a video of otto frank speaking about his daughter's diary. that was the most emotional part of the tour. it was such a sincere commentary to anne's diary but at the same time it made you feel in a small way what it must be like to lose everyone you love. what it must be like to start over as a grown man and alone.

back to happy stories: we left the museum and got on the canal bus (which is a boat). there are man made canals all through amsterdam and they are cleaned 3 times a week. that's why the city smells and looks so much cleaner than paris. it was insane the way the boats navigated through the narrow, winding water. they had to reverse and turn all the time and we all thought we were going to crash into a bridge on a regular basis.

we took the boat to the rijksmuseum which is a classic art museum. it's beautiful from the outside - looks like a palace. the art was cool and there was a huge collection of rembrandt's work but i really enjoyed the exposition we went to. it was a contemporary piece by damien hirst called 'for the love of god' and it was a platinum cast of a real skull encrusted completely in diamonds. it was in a black box and it shined so beautifully. i even commented on it in the gift shop and they put it on the website! you can see it if you click on this link and hit 'normal: english' and then click on my floating head. crazy.

we also found the gay memorial that is this little marble triangle with flowers on it sticking out into one of the canals near the anne frank house. it's a monument to the gays who were persecuted, killed and tortured during WWII. pretty intense. it was very beautiful even in its ordinariness. that moved me more than the anne frank house i think - maybe due to the ongoing hatred and judging almost 70 years later.

we then went towards the gorgeous train station (amsterdam centraal which i think is a pretty name for whatever reason) and got some food. we found falafel - which i was SO in the mood for - and fries. they are big fry people just like the belgians. i warned emily that there is a serious and digestion related price to pay for the local favorite of fries doused in mayonnaise but she wanted to immerse and learned that lesson on her own. i just got my fries plain and took little tastes of her globs of mayo.

we walked through the christmas markets which consisted of ice skating rinks and festive food stands like proffertjes. i'm pretty sure that's what andrea's dad used to make us for breakfast when we were little. they were these balls of batter that were hollow in the middle and they covered them in butter and powdered sugar. david used to put butter and syrup INSIDE the balls but it tasted the same. anyway, it reminded me of the porters and how much i miss them!

our next move was towards the red light district. i had heard so many stories about it that i had to see it for myself. so we bravely ventured into the brothel district. in general it's pretty tame but there is one stretch of alleyway that is lined with glass doors and half-naked/completely naked women and a bed behind them. YIKES! and if you are even making a camera hand gesture let alone holding a camera they will bang on the windows and yell dutch profanities at you. i took a picture of a really pretty church near one of the doors and one of the prostitutes yelled 'PUNTA' at me which is not a nice word at all.

anyway, we got out of there and went to see some of the famous head shops and coffee shops. now, when i say coffee shop i do not mean a place where you can buy coffee. i mean a place where you buy weed. i don't even think they have coffee. it's a local phenomenon though and i have to admit, as someone who went to amsterdam for everything but the weed, it was a pretty cool approach to the sport of getting high. it's much less hyped and very relaxed. the locals are not all complete potheads like they are imagined to be. in fact, i'm sure there are plenty of people who live in amsterdam and don't smoke at all. there is very little smoking of tobacco and barely anyone smokes in the street. it is illegal to smoke weed outside in public but you very often catch a whiff of wacky tobacky while you're walking around outside. it's a much nicer smell than cigarettes though so none of us minded.

we walked around the shopping area a little more and saw some of the christmas lights at night. i was in the christmas spirit full force. at one point i started belting 'it's the most wonderful time of the year' as we walked past a local news station filming a street interview. i hope they put it on tv. i think i was running on pure sugar at that point. no sleep, no real food...

we got back on the canal boat (it was a hop on hop off for 24 hours...totally better than the metro) and proceeded to fall asleep for a half hour. we were so wiped. i was a little disappointed in myself for not paying attention to the tour guide and missing some history but there was nothing that could keep me awake at that point. we got off and went back to the hostel where we showered for the first time in 2 days and thawed out from the full day of 0 degree, windy, misty weather.

that night our friend, betsy, joined us at the hostel. she had to catch a later train on friday. we all passed out as soon as our heads hit the pillow. i'm a pretty deep sleeper so i didn't move an inch until the next morning but i guess caitlin kept getting woken up by someone snoring. she thought it was betsy which was hilarious...it was the girl on the other side of the partition from betsy. that's probably not so funny to you but we thought it was wonderful.

breakfast was free which made it delicious. there was even a little kitty who lived there. emily and i fell in love with him and could barely focus on the food. i miss my cats so much. (9 more days!) after breakfast we walked to one of the famous dutch windmills. it was BEAUTIFUL! my mom loves windmills and i think it has rubbed off on me. it was about a 25 minute walk which felt really good to my aching muscles. we took some pictures and then found a cafe for our second breakfast (we ate a lot). it turned out to be the coolest cafe ever and the waitress was awesome. she taught us about sinterklaas and the celebration they have on december 5th. it's a bigger deal than christmas for them. once we knew this story, the little kids dressed up as bishops the day before made much more sense. she also gave us little round cinnamon biscuits and little candies that are sinterklaas tradition.

after breakfast number two, we walked back into town and did some souvenir shopping. we found a small flea market on one of the canals and looked at all the jewelry and crazy rasta clothes. i was proud of myself for not buying anything and we moved on to the free public library. the girls at the front desk of the hostel told us to check it out because the view from the top floor is really beautiful. they were right. the inside was totally awesome too. it's a new building and there are computers with free internet lining the walls.

that night after dropping our stuff off at the hostel we decided to go out for a round of drinks. caitlin had been to a bar she really liked the last time she was in amsterdam so we decided to go back. it was called bourbon street and there was live music and cheap drinks. perfect. we had a lot of fun dancing and singing along to the classic rock but we only stayed for a drink because we were tired. we headed back to the hostel, showered and thawed, and went to sleep.

we had to catch the bus back to paris at 11 so we grabbed breakfast at the hostel, went to a cafe for coffee and headed to the bus station. it was much nicer to make the trip during the day but my tailbone is still sore from all the sitting. we stopped a few times in holland and twice in brussels so the ride back took about 9 hours. it only took 7 on the way there. it was a long ride. we had fun though and made it back to paris at about 8 at which point i had to create a lesson plan for this week. guess i should have done that before we left. it's ok though - i am teaching them about american christmas so i get to listen to christmas carols and talk about rudolf all day. (9 more days!!!)

it's been requested that i list the funny moments that made us nearly wet ourselves this weekend. they may not make sense to you but...for the sake of memories:

leah: i gotta piss like a racehorse! AH! sorry jesus!
emily: did you just say sorry jesus for piss?
caitlin: racehorse?
leah: rape?

caitlin(6am): we were going balls to the wall into the red light district.

prostitute: *THUM*...PUNTA!
emily: did she just say punta?!

betsy: check you later homes.
leah: lederhosen?

leah: you know him! he's a really well known scottish poet.
emily: maybe we don't know he's scottish?
...moment of silence...
leah: WILLARD SCOTT!
(the answer, ladies and gents, is sir walter scott. sigh.)

leah: you can't smoke in front of hellen keller's house!
betsy: anne frank?

emily: *aaaaachoo!* OOP! i just peed a little.

...girl snoring...
emily: is that betsy snoring like a sea beast?

caitlin: my hips are loose. they do what they want.
(referring to flexibility and not...)

bus driver: la toilette est ouverte mais uh...juste pipi, ok?
...2 minutes later...
bus driver: seulement pipi!