Feb. 26 2012
So the beginning of my nonstop European adventure began with meeting Megan
in London and heading to Amsterdam. The trip there was seamless until we went
just a bit to far and ended up in deer country on the train. The trend of
having a few directional issues continued but I just see it as opportunity to
discover new places. We saw pretty much the entire city by foot in the time we
were there as we did tons of walking. This walking included an amazing free
walking tour. It may have been one of the best city tours I have been on and it
was free (you can't go wrong with that).
Interesting facts we learned along the way:
1.
The Dutch keep their
blinds open and don't feel the need for privacy. We walked by many
apartments that had open curtains and everything was in plain view. Megan
loved seeing in the houses she is she is so noisy.
2. Everyone really does ride a bike.
If you leave your bike in the wrong place don’t expect it to be there when you get back as it
will most likely be throw in a canal. A crane pulls out bikes every day from canals all over the city.
3. The stairs are like climbing a ladder. Steepest stairs ever!!!!
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Now that is a lot of bikes
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Canals
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This is public housing in Amsterdam
is was pretty amazing! |
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Need to know where to park your bike?
Wooden Shoes and Tulips, how much more Dutch can you get? |
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| One of many coffee shops we saw around town (aka places to buy and smoke weed) |
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Most narrow house in Amsterdam.
The man who lives there is taller than his house is wide.
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| Canals create the lay out for the city |
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| Bikes and Canals, what Amsterdam is all about |
You can't go to Amsterdam without experiencing the Anne Frank Museum. I certainly
learned more about the treatment of the Jewish during the holocaust than I knew
before. Reading the diary of Anne Frank is defiantly on my reading list now. It
is amazing the insight and resiliency of a young child in such terrible conditions.
It is hard to believe that because of a person's religion a person was made to
endure such horrible treatment. I guess this fact fits with almost any
maltreatment of another person with no consideration of race, age or religion.
What gives someone else the right to harm another human being? How many times
in history and in present day will one group of people have the right to harm
another group just because they exist? We all know the negative treatment of
specific groups happens every day. Will people ever be able to see that all
people are the same? I have seen many cultures on my travels and truly we are
all the same! Being at the Anne Frank House made me think a lot about what I
learned about the Khmer Rouge and the Genocide in Cambodia. When will the
negative treatment of people end?
Amsterdam is really a place like no other. Where else do you smell weed and
see an almost naked women in the window walking down the street. We went on a
multiple tours and learned about both the sex and weed culture within
Amsterdam. Let’s start with the fact that we stayed just outside of the Red
Light District our first two nights and in the Red Light district the third
night. We were right in the middle of it!! On our tour in the Red Light
District we learned that one of the allies was called Tranny Ally (this is a
true fact from what we could see). So would you believe our last night we
stayed in a hostel on Tranny ally. To make it that much more interesting it was
a Christian hostel. What a weird place to put this type of hostel that had Christian
music playing and religious pictures all over. Megan and I end up staying there
because it was cheap and a little because we wanted to say we stayed on tranny
ally.
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One fact to remember about Amsterdam is once you step out of the Red Light
district Amsterdam is a completely different city. We learned lots about the
current laws and rules related to sex workers and weed. Our tour guide talked a
lot about the fact that Amsterdam is a place of tolerance. I completely agree
as people who live there appear OK with the cultural norms within the city.
Each woman in the sex industry must be licensed and pay rent for her window. We
were told that the women were like entrepreneurs with their own business but I
find it hard to believe that every woman in a window is there by choice. We
were told that the base price women have is 50 Euro for 15 minutes, and it cost
more for "any extras". The guide that did our tour appeared to
normalize the sex culture in the city, but Megan and I struggled with her limited
insight into the other side of the story. Whether or not women are choosing to
engage in this work , they are still being marginalized by men. We saw many
women in windows, young and old. We were told that there are currently about
300 windows throughout Amsterdam, but they may be trying to decrease this
number as a way to make the Red Light District more family friendly. Not sure
how they can make it family friendly but those were their exact words. I know it
is not a place I would want to wander around with my kids. Every time Megan and
I walked through the Red Light District we were still stocked and never became desensitized
by the culture of that area. We saw a few transactions or attempted
transactions. One was a happy man as he was leaving while the others were the
sex worker getting mad at men including opening their door to kick the man or
through a cup of pee at them (on the tour we were told most women have a cup on
hand). The interactions and things I saw while in the Red Light District were
unlike any other. There was really sex everywhere from custom condom fitting
stores to sex shows.
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| Provocative sculpture right in the street. |
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| Crazy condom shop |
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| You can get a life time supply of personally fitted condom if you like. |
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| Crazy condoms |
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This is a window without a women obviously.
Not such a good idea to take a picture with a women,
who know what would happen, but it would not be good. |
I was not aware of this before I arrived but Holland has great cheese.
Megan and I did a wine and cheese tasting including learning about how the
cheese is made and matured and how to assess and grade cheese. I was actually
laughing out loud while Megan was attempting to cut the cheese! I am certainly
not a cheese expert now but I will have to test my skills at a wine and cheese
party when I get home. After this experience we seemed to see cheese
everywhere.
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| Now we are cheese experts |
You can't go to a new country and not try some Authentic food:
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| Raw herring with onions and pickles- it was pretty good |
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| Not my favourite beer but we had to have some local beer while we were there |
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| Megan loving her pancake |
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| They might be right the pancakes were awesome |
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| How good does that look? YUM |
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| Sprinkles on Bread |
As I write this I am still amazing
that it happened. At the end of the walking tour we did on our first day I saw
Eva, who I met in Laos and lives in Amsterdam. Who meets someone randomly they
met on the other side of the world just walking down the street...me I guess!!!
I yelled her name and from there their were lots of hugs. It really is a small
world. I had the great privilege to meet up with her twice for during my time
in Amsterdam. She took us on a cool walk through some local markets and we had
lunch at her apartment with lots of Dutch food. We had a great opportunity to
ask her questions and experience real Dutch life. I feel so lucky to have met
so many amazing and generous people on my travels. I love the opportunity to
interact with locals rather than just being in the tourist culture. I am
positive meeting locals has been the best part of my trip. So many amazing
learning opportunities have resulted because of these interactions. Thanks Eva
for giving us a true Dutch experience!
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| Cheese Market... so good! |
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| Eva's super cool apartment |
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| Kitchen |
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| What a beautiful city! |
