Amsterdam

It's an odd experience to be met with the reality of something that you've imagined so acutely before. Romantic notions are overcome by concrete truths. Amsterdam is a small city - it isn't boundless. It isn't an idea either. It's a real place. And it operates like a smooth machine. The mental map that you carry from all of those dreams is overcome by a real working-knowledge of the place. Wandering is key. Getting lost is key. This will become a real city for you. I've never been able to find my way around New York City, but after just a couple of days, there occurs to the Amsterdam tourist a kind of fluid sense of the place. Perhaps it takes a little longer to find and perhaps any sense of schedule need be thrown out the window, but when something falls into place and you find yourself exactly where you want to be, it is nothing short of serendipitous.



That sounds a little wishy-washy. I'll become more concrete. The flight over to Amsterdam was an interesting one. Norwich airport is a complete sham. There is the idea that it operates internationally but really it's a podunk little wisp of an airport that fools itself into believing it's important. I mean, a five pound "airport development" fee? Come on. That's just sad. Accompanying me on the flight was this rather jovial group of middle-aged women who, I believe, were heading to Rome or some other such place to celebrate some landmark in their lives. I love easy-going middle-aged women. They're really cool. Sure, they've only got a couple of jokes up their sleeve (fat jokes and old jokes) but they're charming drunkards that's for sure. I mean, if you're asking the waitress for cocktails on a 30-minute flight at 10 in the morning, it just screams "classy!"

Arriving at Schiphol was a breeze, a delight. Where a month ago (in a journey that I didn't recount because my computer broke) I was lost, confused and pissed off a Schiphol airport, now I understood it. I was in and out in ten minutes tops and on a train to Centraal Station (isn't the extra A so badass?). I guess those four hours of wandering the airport during my layover paid off.

My first glimpse of Amsterdam - like real glimpse, like not a torn view from the window of a high-speed train - was outside of Centraal station, once I had gathered Emily, or she had gathered me (she did seem more in touch with the surroundings than I) and we set out to find the hostel. This brief and overpowering view was not indicative of what I would come to see over the next three days: it was hurried, bustling, trains, people, loud, loud, loud. What I spent most of my time in was a slow-moving live-and-let-live cobble-stoned laid-back wonderland. Hyphenates rock.

Anyway, god this post is seeming more and more like the hazy memory I have of Amsterdam. So we found our hostel (Emily found our hostel), got settled (got yelled at by some very douchey guy who should've just booked a hotel), and were off for adventure. Emily gave me a brief synopsis of the tour that she had received two summers ago ("Do you see those hooks at the tops of the houses? It's to get furniture in because it doesn't fit in the door because here rent is based on how much actual space on the ground your house takes up."). It was awesome, though our main concern wasn't touring. No, Emily and I, unique intrepid travellers that we are, had something far more daring and elaborate in mind. And there it was; we just ran into it: The Bulldog, advertized as Amsterdam's very first coffee-shop. Who were we to argue? Plus, it was on the list....

Brief bee-line. The lovely, fantastic, beautiful Claire Santoro, who spent the last summer in L'Europe, and has, I believe, yet to be mentioned in this travel blog, gave me a wonderful guide. It was two pages, but just plain perfect. It was so Claire too. Like, if this list was given to me anonymously in the post, I would've read it, thought for a second, and then said to myself, aloud, like in a play, "It's got to be Claire!" It would be really dramatic. The curtain would fall. End of Act II (this is a V act play; and yes, I used the roman numeral; suck it!). Anyway, because I'm discreet I won't enumerate the ins and outs of the guide, but suffice it to say that the Bulldog was on there which was justification enough for Emily and I to go inside.

Now, Emily and I spent a lot of our time in coffee shops, so I'm thinking that I'm going to use this first experience as a synecdoche for the rest (I just wanted to say synecdoche there because it's a cool word, but it fits right?). Anyway, if I deign it appropriate to discuss another, I will, but otherwise, this is it, all twelve(?) coffeeshops we went to in one. We walked in and were met by that smell. Now Emily and I - to appropriate a phrase - haven't been snorkeling in a while. For whatever reason, opportunity has not presented itself to us. So for me - and all of you who know me can attest to this - this was like my Mecca. This was like the feeling of coming home in a place that was completely unfamiliar. We walked up to the bar, asked for the menu, were told to go downstairs (by the way, this isn't an uncommon occurance but sometimes you get the menu at the bar so it's not a stupid American thing either). So we went downstairs, where a rather glib man directed us to a menu that you had to press a button to light up. We scanned it. Claire had suggested the supersilverhaze, but we were in kind of a rush so we got pre-rolled (I've abandoned my attempt at discretion) reefers and sat in a booth by the front. Now, all of the coffeeshops have different vibes - some of them awesome, like Hillstreet Blues (or the Blues Brothers, I can't remember which), some of them stilting and oppressive like Blues Brothers (or Hillstreet Blues, I can't remember which). I found that what would become my favorite environment was one where the music wasn't too poppy and I could sit by the window and feel the breeze. I like open places. I don't like coffins. By the way, the bathrooms in most of these places were like tile coffins, but I'll stop my digressions. Anyway, the Bulldog was kind of cool. I think we got white widow (Emily, help me out here) or something to that effect. We had the booth right by the front and the glib man seemed to be staring at us, which felt kinda uncool (oh, new digression - not all of the guys were as glib and unhelpful as guy 1; most were actually friendly and accomodating; some were even warm and inviting). So we took out two of the reefers, lit up, and ahhhhhhhhhh, what a feeling. Actually, comparatively, it wasn't the best feeling. It wasn't as talky as I would've desired and a little ridiculous, but in a bad way - like I can't control this crazy laughter but it's not funny anymore. But it was also my first time in a while so maybe it was mostly settling that I needed. Also, there were these crazy music videos (I don't watch music videos that often so maybe they're all crazy) and it was a little bit too loud and confining and overwhelming. But the great thing about Amsterdam is that if you ever get that feeling you can just get up and go somewhere else, which we did.

After spending a good hour in the Bulldog, we moved on. We did more touristy things, we went to more coffee shops, we had a really awesome time. At some point later in the day we saw this giant boat...that turned out to be a building, but we walked like all the way up it (at this point we knew it was a building posing as a boat). Anyway, from there we saw another boat, and Emily didn't know if it was real or not so we went down to check it out. It was there that we came across weird giant implements (like a giant sewing needle, etc. etc. etc.). Was it also during this excursion that we found the tiny car on the island? Well, there was a tiny car on an island. And the island had three spaces for cars but just the one car and we wondered how the car got on and off and whether or not there were two other cars but they were at work or something. <---This paragraph is pretty indicative of how I remember most of our journey.

At some point, I discovered chocolate waffles....mmmmm chocolate waffles. They're waffles with...wait for it...chocolate drizzled on them and....wait for it....sometimes sprinkles and sometimes the chocolate isn't chocolate at all but strawberry or vanilla frosting, which is also delicious. I think I must have had like eight of them. They were just soooo good and they are sold everywhere so you're never too far from a CHOCOLATE WAFFLE.

At some point, we tried to go on one of the tours, but it was our brilliant idea to snorkel before hand so I was feeling a little dizzy and frightened. There was this great twenty minutes where we stood around the fountain next to a bunch of other people standing by the fountain not knowing whether or not they were on the tour or not on the tour or on another tour or something similarly ridiculous. Anyway, we eventually found a tour guide. He was a Kiwi and was really awesome (as I'm sure they all were). I remember at the beginning Emily pointing out an attractive woman also leading a tour but we decided that it would be rude to totally snub this nice New Zealander for a hot chick. So we went on. It was after about ten minutes that I realized that the combination of like eighty people on this tour and the confined alleys of Amsterdam and the fact that things were moving more than they should've been was not a hospitable one. We didn't finish the tour, though I'm sure it was awesome and went off to chill in another coffee shop.

I feel like I'm rambling too much, and barely saying anything at all, so I'll wrap it up. Whoops! I forgot to talk about the prostitutes. There were prostitutes...everywhere, behind windows, of every shape and size. Also, my hostel was awesome. The bed was more comfortable than my one here in Norwich and after like 130 you could smoke in the lobby which was nice and comfortable. Ahhhhhhhh...Amsterdam. I'll be back soon.