One Night and Day in Amsterdam

There's a saying: When in Dam, do as the damned. The city that puts Las Vegas to shame definitely lived up to the expectations that were placed on it.  I went to Amsterdam last weekend with several guys from our Maastricht group and two girls. We left Thursday around 6ish in order to catch the train. It's about a two hour trip. On the way, one of the girls lost her passport and credit card--talk about drama. Good thing she had money on her and her EuroRail. She wouldn't have been able to come back so easily.

When we arrived in Amsterdam, it was already dark.  We left the train station having no clue where we were going. We had to stop and ask for directions quite a few times and finally decided to have dinner at a nice pizza place that I forgot the name of. That night we nearly got run over several times by bicycles and most of the city smelled of weed. There was a coffeeshop on almost every corner! (exaggerated slightly) Amsterdam definitely is the weed capital of the world. A group of guys and I booked a hostel for our one night stay in Amsterdam. The hostel was called Youth Hostel Meeting Point, which sounds like a weird name for a hostel. The inside of the hostel was even more sketch. We were in a room that bedded about 18 other people. We met two guys while we were there, I shall refer to them as "G" and Nathan. G was from England and I believe he was Indian--maybe Pakistani. Nathan looked like he was from Spanish descent but also from England. We decided to check out the nightlife of Amsterdam and invited G and Nathan to come with us.

Inside Paridiso. It was packed!!

The first thing we did was try to catch up with some other guys who came before us. We spent most of the night trying to find them to no avail. We then decided to do some touring of our own. We saw the Red Light District--it was hard to miss, seeing as how our hostel was one street down from it. The Red Light District is more like a canal and several streets on either side of it. There was every type of girl imaginable on that street. Did you know that it only takes 50 Euros to have sex with one of the prostitutes? Disgusting. After the Red Light District, G said that he could lead us to the area where there was bound to be some clubs. In a nutshell, we got lost. Finally we took some taxis to a club called Paradisio, which was supposed to be one of the most popular clubs in Amsterdam. It was amazing. I've never been to a club that big before. The club was built inside an old church so the acoustics were great plus they had light shows going in time with the music. Great simply great. We must have left around 2:00 in the morning. I was really tired. I think I was falling asleep while dancing!

The tour guide, Michael

The next morning, the entire group of guys was together--minus G and Nathan, thankfully. We ate breakfast at a local restaurant that served really nice omelets. After breakfast, we partook in a free tour around the city of Amsterdam. The tour guide's name was Michael and he was originally from the Solomon Islands. He was hilarious and very informative. One of the things I learned is that the Netherlands government is trying to close down the Red Light District by buying up the windows that the women work in. Also, the government is making it such that foreigners will not be allowed to purchase weed.  Kind of ironic that the most liberal country in the world is trying to be a bit more conservative. I also learned that the first stock exchange was Dutch and saw the building where the Dutch East Indies Company did business. Some other interesting facts: Holland has a queen, Amsterdam is sometimes referred to as the Venice of the North, and the triple Xs do not have a naughty meaning. :) Also, Amsterdam was the only city where the citizens rose up against the Germans in defense of the Jews. That makes me think better of the city.

After the tour of the city, which took like three hours if you included the lunch break in between, some of the guys and I decided to tour the Anne Frank house. They wouldn't allow us to take pictures inside, but just to see the conditions that those people lived in, all packed in that small space, was worth it. I don't know if I could live in that place. I probably would have gotten claustrophobic. After seeing the Anne Frank house, we headed home and thus ended our trip to Amsterdam. I have to say, I was limping by the time we got on the train because of all the walking we did. My feet were so sore and I was glad to put them to rest for another two hours. To be honest, if I hadn't seen London first, I probably would have been more impressed with Amsterdam, but I certainly enjoyed my trip to the Devil's city. :)