Amsterdam was the coldest city I have been to in a long time. It was almost as bad as that time Marcus, Mal, and I went up to Vermont. At one point, the wind was so hard to walk in, I had to bend forward and force myself to walk. One of my friends said a local said it was the coldest day of the year, but I think she was just trying to make it sound better.
Besides the cold, Amsterdam was good. It wasn't great or spectacular or beautiful. It was a nice city, but not what I expected. I hate using the word nice, but that's what it was. There wasn't really anything defining about it. It didn't take my breath away like I hoped it would, or make me want to buy a house boat on a canal and move to Amsterdam. I could take it or leave it, quite honestly. I was hoping it was going to live up to my expectations. I have been wanting to travel to Amsterdam for as long as I can remember.
It was a fun trip. There were twelve people, two of which were my best friends from home. It was strange though; my two worlds blending together, my home life and my new life. It wasn't bad at all, just different and foreign.
We left Thursday night on our 45 minute plane ride. We took the train to Meiderport, the station located near our hostel. We found our hostel and were greeted my the steepest stairs with the smallest platforms I have ever seen. My feet could not even fit properly on each stair; I had to turn my foot sideways to go up or down. They can not even be called stairs in my opinion- it was a ladder.
The next morning, we made our way on tram 9 to the center of the city. We ended up not having to pay for our tram that morning because the tram was running late and the driver wanted to leave as fast as possible, at least that's my theory. So we thought Amsterdam was a friendly city that just allowed people to go on and off public transportation for free. We were wrong and had to pay €2.80 for every other tram we took.
When we arrived in the center, we went for our first authentic pancakes. It was a single, flat, thin pancake on a big plate with what they consider to be syrup. I remembered from a Casey Neistat video that they do not have any maple syrup anywhere in the entire city and that their syrup is like "gloop". I could have done without the overly sweet syrup. It was like a crepe with molasses on top. It wasn't bad, just not what we expected and a little to expensive. We paid €4 for what was essentially an oversized crepe, but we did it, and I'm glad we didn't leave Amsterdam without trying pancakes.
We walked the city on our way to the Rembrandt haus. We found the Dam, the square that was basically our meeting place and major landmark. We saw bikes and canals and more bikes. There were people riding on the street in the bike lane and in many cases, we needed to watch out for bikes rather than cars. Luckily, they all have little bells to warn you to jump out of the way as fast as possible. We spontaneously went into a chocolate store, and I paid €2.50 for the best piece of chocolate I have ever had. It was absolutely delicious and I wanted to buy more, but I knew it would ruin it. The sales lady said people return to that store after years and say they remember their first piece of chocolate from that store, and I think we all knew why after finishing. Puccini. That was the name of it. I only remembered that it started with a 'P', but thanks to Google, I just found it. So I am telling everyone now, if you ever find yourself in this city, go to that store. We also came by a market that had antiques and my favorite thing about Holland, clogs. I eventually bought myself a miniature porcelain pair of blue and white clogs.
The Dam
Bikes, bikes, bikes.
House boat. They had a lot of them
here and Dad would have loved it.
We actually could have rented
one out to sleep on all weekend, but I
was afraid some people on our group
would get seasick.
Almond
They love bikes so much that they
make their ATMs into drive-thrus
We finally arrived at the Rembrant museum. It was the artist's house that was taken from him when he could not pay his mortgage. All of his possessions were sent into inventory and survive today. Now, there are paintings along the walls from the man himself, and from his biggest influences. It was definitely an interesting place to walk through, but I was more interested in seeing his works, which came at the very end. We were able to see original sketches and the detail was breathtaking. Rembrandt used such small lines to create beautiful landscapes or bible scenes. There were magnifying glasses near the works so you could see how intricate he was. I bought myself a postcard of his Windmill piece because it was so simple, just a sketch, but once you looked closely, you saw how fine the lines are.
I was in love with this tile.
I bought this in a postcard.
Beautiful
We made our way to the next artist exhibit. My man, Vincent Van Gogh. I had been looking forward to visiting the Van Gogh museum since I cried during the Van Gogh episode of Doctor Who. Unfortunately, the real Van Gogh museum is undergoing extensive remodeling so all of his works were moved to the Hermitage museum. It was nice that we could still see his works, but the Hermitage was about €8 more than the Van Gogh museum. Like Dublin, nothing in Amsterdam is free. I was ecstatic to finally be able to walk amongst his paintings. My second favorite painting in the entire world is
Almond Blossom by Van Gogh (my first is
Las Meninas by Diego Velazquez, which I will be seeing in person for the second time when I visit Madrid again in April). So I walked to the second floor and after discovering a new favorite work by Van Gogh,
The Harvest, I turned the corner and saw down the hallway that perfect blue background and white flowers and my heart warmed.
Almond Blossom was even prettier in person. I stood in front of it for about seven minutes, having separated from all of my friends. When Hayley walked up, I turned to her and said "This is the reason I am here". It was a surreal experience. I walked into the other rooms, looking at the self-portraits, and ended up going back to look at the
Almond Blossom twice for a few more minutes. Before I left, I found another painting that my dad would love,
Seascape near Les Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer. I bought myself giant postcards of
Almond Blossom and
The Harvest and bought my dad one of
Seascape for the shore house. The Van Gogh exhibit was well worth the €17. I had an amazing experience and was so grateful.
Rembrant square.
On my wall already. Almond Blossom.
Google it because it is beautiful.
The Harvest
For Dad.
Kelly Mac
Tiff
The cheese store. Amsterdam
loves its cheese.
To end the day after walking around and dinner, we went to Anne Frank's House. My friends bought tickets online before leaving for Amsterdam, but I didn't. I never read her diary in school and really didn't feel a strong connection to her story. I knew who she was and everything that happened, but her museum was not on my top to-do list like Van Gogh was. Zack didn't buy a ticket either, so the two of us were just going to go walk around while the others explored her house. When we got there; however, we asked if I could buy a ticket and go in with my friends rather than wait in the long line outside and the man behind the counter was very sweet and allowed me to. So I walked through her house, and I have to admit, I am glad I did. It was such an eyeopening and emotional experience. The house is not furnished, but there are a few things that survive, like Otto Frank's map of Europe with pins indicating the Nazi takeover. There are quotes from her diary written on the walls in every room you go in, and I began to cry as soon as I walked into her bedroom. There are still pictures cut from magazines pasted to the wallpaper. Photos of movie stars and family members. It made me think of being a child, having posters on your wall or photos of your friends or boy band crushes. Anne was a normal child cooped up in a small section of a house in Amsterdam and was not able to live her life like you or me. It was one of the saddest things to see. I bought myself a postcard of a snapshot of that wall to remind myself that life could be worse and I need to learn to appreciate every little thing in my life, whether good or bad, because sometimes I do not realize how lucky I am. There was a quote in that room as well.
“I long to ride a bike, dance, whistle, look at the world, feel young and know that I’m free, and yet I can’t let it show." Anne taught me to love life and to notice the little things that are all too often glossed over.
These two are hanging above my bed.
So we were all depressed after that experience and went back to the hostel. Kelly came into our room and sat on the top bunk with me listening to music and it was one of the nicest nights I have had. She, Tiff, and I took turns playing music from our ipods and we were singing and life just seemed so easy at that moment.
The next morning, we got waffles for breakfast and went to find the 'I amsterdam' sign. On our way, we stopped at the Amsterdam Tulip market and walked the flower shops. It was absolutely amazing.
Dried flowers lined the ceiling.
You can buy tulips by the handful.
Cacti, cacti, cacti
We eventually found the sign and each took a letter and posed for a picture. It was fun to just take pictures and laugh with everyone. We stayed there for quite a while then headed back to the city center to go to lunch.
Then we found some graffiti.
Van Gogh
The detail is incredible.
Some of the girls went to the Tulip museum, but the rest of us went to a pub for lunch. We stayed there for a few hours, relaxing and talking to two guys from Texas. Afterwards, we did some shopping and went to the Red Light District. It was only 7:30 so there were not too many prostitutes in the windows. I thought I was going to be disgusted or saddened by women standing in the window selling themselves, but after walking through, I found it fascinating and like any other business. The girls were wearing either bikinis or a bra and underwear. They were not revealing anything more than you would see at the beach or on television. The only disturbing thing about the area was that there were sex shops one after another and children were walking around. Why would you ever bring your seven year old anywhere near Amsterdam, let alone the Red Light District? Sometimes I just want to punch parents in the face. Just stomp up to them, square them right between the eyes, and grab their child and take them away from the situation. People are absolutely idiotic and disgusting.
We went home to the hostel and all had a picnic in the bigger of the two rooms. We all had cheese from the Cheese and More store and banquettes from the bakery. We went around playing Never Have I Ever, Telephone, and Indian Chief. I love going on trips because the majority of the time, we are too tired to go out to a bar or pub so we just hang in the hostel. Sometimes, that is better than going out, especially when we go out in London all week. Trips are for exploring during the day and relaxing with friends at night.
Amsterdam was interesting. It was not my favorite place I have visited, but that might be because I hyped the city up for myself in my head for years and when I finally got there, it was not as good as I hoped. It was fun though, and I am glad I went.
