Friday
EasyJet took me there with only an hour delay on Friday afternoon. From the Amsterdam airport (Shipol) it was an easy 20 minute train ride to the Centraal, the main train station in Amsterdam.At Centraal I met up with Lena, a Russian girl I met in Geneva a few months back. We grabbed some two day travel tickets of the trams and headed towards the expo centre RAI. I had managed to find an apartment via AirB&B for the weekend out that way. We dropped off our bags and were pleasently surprised at the beautiful place we got to stay for the weekend:
Since it was a pleasant day out we walked over to the museum district and checked out the van Gogh museum. Lean had already bought a city guide with discounts and tickets for many of the attractions around Amsterdam, which meant we got to skip the line. Gogh thing too, since we only have about 1.5 hours to enjoy the place, not nearly enough to see it all. Lots of beautiful art by van Gogh, his friends and inspirations. Along exhibition you are told the sad story of this clearly tortured soul. Well worth the visit, if I return to Amsterdam I shall want to return to see the parts of the museum I missed as we ran out of time. The guards did not seem too entertained by our attempts to wander past all stealthy like to sneak a peek at the Potato Eaters after the closing call. After being sternly asked to leave we found a nice pub for dinner and enjoyed some of the local Heineken. As you may expect it tastes different from a tap in Amsterdam than out of a can in Canada.Typical 30s apartment, close to RAI in Amsterdam
Welcome to Amsterdam! We are looking forward to rent out our apartment to you. It is build in the 'Amsterdamse school' style, architecture that is typical for the 30s and seen everywhere in the 'rivierenbuurt' (river district). View all listings in Amsterdam
Saturday
On Saturday I woke somewhat early and took a wonder around the apartments neighbourhood. A quite affair with some nice coffee bars, bakeries, and so on. Removed from the tourist overrun down-town this was a pleasant way to see what it must feel like to live in Amsterdam. Picked up some bread, cheese and meats for breakfast. The grocer I stopped by even made fresh OJ right in front of you to take along. During breakfast we made plans for the day: visit the science museum, the Anne Frank house, and the red light district in the evening. The Anne Frank house was closest so we headed there first, the massive line discouraged us from queuing right away. Rewarded us with a nice tour of the Joordan neighbourhood. I really enjoyed the place and made a note of returning here on Sunday evening. We also found ourselves some bicycles. With our new means of locomotion we headed for the Nemo science centre.Science Center NEMO
I am generally a big fan of science and natural history museums: I loved the Canadian Science Museum in Ottawa and the Science Museum in London. Though in both I noted that while the exhibits were nice it would be great to have some interactive displays to allow for experimentation. The Science Center NEMO had lots of that, in fact where it wasn't gift of coffee shop it was interactive learning displayed: a great place for families and kids with lots, but the lack of some more exhibitions on local scientific accomplishments was disappointing for me. I did really enjoy the science of love corner though (third floor on the left). It was dedicated in equal parts to explaining animal reproduction and human sexuality with some education about relationships and dealing with emotions to boot. Ten minutes in that exhibit were more informative than my entire sex ed course in high school.After having our fill of the science centre we took our leave to tour the town. On the way out I spotted a holographic postcard that reminded me of Bruiser, Karen's get betta fish. So I left with something to do in Joordan on Sunday afternoon and a postcard richer.
Central Amsterdam
The beautiful city centre is overrun with tourists. there are many inviting looking bars and cafes, ton's of shops, and plenty of beautiful architecture. It was beautiful first cycling about a bit, and once the crowds got to thick moving through the city on foot. Eventually we found a nice cafe that serves us pancakes and beers. Here we relaxed a while until we felt ready to once again brave the line at the Anne Frank house. Our hopes that it would be shorter with it being dinner time and the closing time of the museum coming up shortly were dashed as we arrived to see a line snaking it's way through the adjacent city square. So we formulated a plan: one of us hold the spot in line while the other goes exploring. This exploration netted a comic book shop, the tulip and the cheese museum.
After two hours of standing in line we were finally at the doors of the museum and one of the last groups to be allowed in. It was a harrowing experience seeing first hand the house in which the moving story of Anne Frank unfolded. Since it had been many years since I read her diary I on;t had a vague memory of her story. Seeing the museum brought back a lot of the unpleasant side of German history I recall too well from being a teenager. It bring close to heart one of the many personal tragedies that unfold in the horror that is war. Hopefully we are able to learn from our mistakes.
The Red Light District
Lena had been to here the night before but I felt my trip to Amsterdam would not be complete without seeing this part of town. This warren of a party town has everything you would expect of a neighbourhood dedicated to the baser pleasures of our existence: bars that will happily seel you drugs and alcohol, working girls vying for your attention from behind their red (and sometimes purple) light windows, and of course vast crowds of people here to enjoy a good time. About as many bachelor parties seem to come here as you may expect. We wondered the party palace making our way to the museum of prostitution. If you find yourself in Amsterdam visit this museum. For me it was an extremely interesting and educational experience, learning about the prostitutes that work in the city. Their life experience being so vastly different from mine, it was really a great way to expand the mind. I think my favourite exhibit there was a booth where you could sit down in the same place a prostitute would sit to attract customers. The entire "window" was a looping movie of an average night of passer-bys. A great way to make you think about how strong these women and men have to be. We finished off the evening with a visit to one of the many bars in the district and had a drink and a smoke.
Sunday
Since Lena was leaving early in the afternoon so we chose to visit the Rembrandt House for Sunday morning after grabbing a comfortable breakfast.
Rembrandt House
As the name implies the museum is situated in Rembrandt's former home. While some of his art is on display here, most of it is the story of his life as well as in introspective into life in the 17th century. After traversing up the house through the various rooms you arrive at the top floor where you can work on some fine art yourself. There is only one group session and they start at specific times three times a day it seems. Would have been interesting to join but unfortunately the timing didn't work out.
Rijksmuseum
After the Lean and I said our goodbyes I made my way to the Rijksmuseum. Because I had picked up a cold on the flight over she had lent me a scarf that we promptly forgot about. An excuse to meet for another European excursion!
The Rijksmuseum is organized into three floors, each dedicated to a set of centuries starting with the 17th going to modern times. It houses many of the masterpieces produced by Dutch artists, including van Gogh and Rembrandt. It also illustrates the history of Willam of Orange and the birth of the Netherlands as a nation. There are rich displays about the mercantile culture so prominent throughout the history of Amsterdam and the Netherlands, particularly during the imperial age. Many fantastic artefacts are on display either acquired from around the world, or made in celebration of the opulent wealth gathered by Dutch merchants of the time. There was also a special exhibition on Rembrandt hosted at the museum while I was visiting.
The Way Home
I still had a few hours in Amsterdam before my flight, so I ambled on over to Joordan and found myself a nice bar. As a walked in a woman was looking at me tapping the seat next to her, and entertaining coincidence as she was inviting a friend to sit down next to her, but my appearance had caught her attention. So I met a group of friendly Dutch folks. After a short exchange of jokes and stories over beers they departed and I found myself a place to sit by the shelf of board games, next to the comfy chair occupied by the bar's cat. There I sampled a few beers, had a fantastic burger, and wrote the postcard to Karen. After chatting with a few more folks that came and left around me I paid my bill and made for the airport. A very happy and content traveller.
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