Thursday morning we were up bright and early (actually, dark and early) to get to the airport bus in order to make it to our flight to Amsterdam. The flight in was bumpy. I was not feeling all that great when we landed, but the wooziness disapated quickly. By the time we got to our hostel, it was about 4 pm.
A quick note about hostels. We've been staying in International Hostels with great luck. We usually get a private room, so we have our own bath, or share with one other room. It's kinda like renting a dorm room for an night. You get wooden framed beds and table. Usually breakfast is included. We don't need frills like internet service, a tv, or a phone. Cheap hotels don't always offer much more, and we've found them to be scary and dirty. Hostels work out great.
We deceided that we had just about enough time before closing to hike it over to the Heineken Experience, a brewery-turned beer-themed amusement park. We went on one ride that took us on the journey from an empty bottle to a bottle of Heineken (kinda like a high-tech Picture-Picutre), and a second that made it look like we were in the driver's seat behind the Heineken horses trotting around Amsterdam. The tour ended up with .75 liters of free samples each (Pepsi for me) and a souvenir glass for each of us. It was good cheesy fun after a day of traveling.
We ate well in Amsterdam. Thanks to the early Dutch explorers, Indonesian food is popular fare, and we ate Indonesian twice, with relish. (gusto, that is) Our third dinner consisted of stampot (mashed potatoes, carrots, and onions with sasauge, for John) and pork tenderloin (for me). It was great to go out to dinner at a reasonable price. We did have pancakes for lunch one day (cheese, bacon and tomato for me, cheese, bacon and ginger for John), with cocoa, so we didn't miss out there, either.
The museums were great. I really, really enjoyed the Van Gogh museum and the Rijksmuseum, which had a great collection of the Dutch Masters. The colors in Van Gogh's work never seems to reproduce well, and Rembrant's attention to detail is more impressive up close and personal. Amsterdam was a good stop for art.
In between the museums and food, John and I walked the city, several times over. We crissed-crossed town, exploring the side streets, and took a canal cruise. To be perfectly honest, Amsterdam is not my favorite city. Perhaps it was because the weather was dreary, perhaps the great quantity of construction interfeared with my ability to enjoy it. While it had a historical flavor, it is a very much lived in city. I preferred the gothic feeling of Prague, or the museum-like qualities of Venice or Stockhom's Old Town. It may not be practical, but there you go.
The Red Light district was interesting, only because it felt much like the rest of the city, but with partially naked women in the windows (most looked combative, or incredibly bored. John claims one was knitting), and more coffee shops. We didn't pass through too late, maybe we should have gone at night.
While wandering John and I ran into the Mother of All Art Supply Stores. This was heavy duty stuff- you could even buy the ground pigments to mix your own paints. I picked up a set of soft pastels (good ones), which can't be found in Denmark. (Danes claim pastels are too toxic. I know they are, but the way I look at I've already inhaled so much pastel dust in life one more box ain't gonna kill me.) Incedentially, they triggered the security system on the way back home. Apparently the guards couldn't see through the packaging. Since the box was still shrink wrapped, they let it through.
I've become used to the traffic in Århus, which carefully separates pedestrians from bikes and cars. In Amsterdam it's everyone for him- or herself, with bikes on the sidewalk and cars in the bike lane. Bike bells sound out from everywhere, and I can't tell you how many close-calls we saw between bikes and cars. Jaywalking is often the only way to cross the street. It made for hectic sight seeing.
We picked an interesting weekend to visit. The Dutch traditionally celebrate Sinter Claus's arrival at the end of November. Traditionally, Sinter Claus is the bishop from Spain, who arrives for a long visit with his helper, Black Peter (usually portrayed as a Dutchman in blackface). At the end of their visit, December 5 or 6, children leave their shoes out at night and Sinter Claus stops by and leaves them a gift if they're good. If they've been bad, Black Peter is supposed to toss them in a sack and take them back to Spain.
While the idea of 'Black Peter' bothers some, we read that recent attempts to change him to 'Blue Peter' or "Green Peter' haven't quite made an impact (because they're downright silly, in my opinion), and some people are re-tooling Peter as the fellow who carries Sinter Claus's gifts in a bag (which makes him more like servant). In any event, Amsterdam was decorated for Christmas last weekend, and many stores had black dolls dressed in tights and a feathered berret hefting bags in their windows. Some stores were using a caracture of a black-faced gingerbread looking thing as their version of Black Peter, making me wonder if some folks think turning him into a fantasy character, instead of any type of human, might solve the race issue. On the way back to the airport, John and I saw Dutchmen in blackface rapelling down a few of the taller buildings downtown . . . apparently Peter and the Big Guy had just arrived.
Until last weekend I didn't know that the Amsterdam flag is red with a black horizontal swatch, with three white x's placed across it. That just cracked me up.
We arrived home last night, glad for the trip, but bracing for our next challenge: The Move Across Town. We have ten days. We just found out that we can move in on the 30th after 5 pm, so we will not be homeless for one night as we feared. Once everything is packed I'll start shuttling things across town to John's office so we can move in that night. It should all work out.
