Last night Magi and I were sitting by a canal eating "puur" chocolate pastilles. We had just left a coffeeshop where we had some steins of deliciously Dutch white beer. The game was to try and think of a city that surpassed Amsterdam in its charm, quietude, efficiency, and overall personality. We could think of none. Amsterdam is a city that you can fall in love with immediately. Once you get away from the area around the train station, you can't help but notice the distinct architecture of the canalhouses and that the light bring bring of bike bells is heard instead of honking cars. Really, the only thing we would change about this city is how you have to pay to use bathrooms no matter where you go! Men have it a little easier since in alleyways and parks, there are freestanding chest-high plastic structures that four can use at once (free of charge).
When we arrived on Friday morning, we had just stepped off the plane with no more than two winks of sleep. It was very difficult to nap when there was so much to think about! Everytime I (Krishna) closed my eyes, I would think of different cities we are about to visit and I would feel a small rush of adrenaline. The flight was very enjoyable and the food served was delicious. A flight attendant even brought me two cups with hot cloths in them to put over my ears when she saw the discomfort I was in before landing (thanks to my poor sinuses). Magi and I got quite a laugh out of how silly I looked with the cups over my ears!
Our hotel room was ready when we arrived there shortly after 9 a.m. We showered and went out again quickly since we were going to try and stay up all day in order to offset the jetlag. We walked to a market and looked around, we passed by Rembrandt's home and strolled through the old Jewish quarter. We had some fries and then groggily snaked back to the hotel to get a quick power nap (ha!). About four hours later we emerged and spent the rest of the day wandering the streets.
On Saturday, we visited an organic food market for breakfast and then did a self-guided walking tour through some of the more interesting neighbourhoods in town to admire the historic landmarks. That ate up our whole day! The city is arranged around a series of semi-circle canals and with street names like Oudezijds Voorburgwal and Nieuwezijds Armsteeg, you can understand the temporary confusion. For supper, we had some delicious food and enjoyed the art at a vegetarian restaurant called Bolhoed.
Today we had great plans to go to a town about 25 minutes away by train and rent bikes to take through the countryside. By the time we arrived in Castricum the bikes were already all rented out! Instead, we came back to Amsterdam to rent bikes and rode them to Vondelpark for a picnic. The park was very crowded and we actually enjoyed the ride down the street to and from the park more than the park itself. Riding on main streets in Amsterdam is so wonderfully relaxing and the time we spend on our one-speed cruisers was the highlight of our time here in Amsterdam. Our rental bikes stuck out like sore thumbs since they are bright red, very new, and have big round disks on the front of the handlebars that identify them as rentals. But we figured the locals would be more forgiving if they knew we weren't from the area and this seemed to work since I didn't get cursed at too loudly when I turned right and almost knocked a fellow cyclist off his bike (oops).
Tomorrow morning we need to be at the airport by 7 a.m. to catch our first flight to Frankfurt to connect there for Delhi. How are we going to wake up in time? We have slept through our alarm clock twice now and wake up calls are "not possible" in our hotel.
Maybe we will just have to stay up all night.
"Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" is playing on the radio in this internet cafe. How fitting.
tothesea,
k&m