Oh The Places We’ll Go

I’m finally back in Europe after a missed flight to Belgium strayed my travel plans awry.  Originally I had planned on going to Amsterdam and Bruges before heading back to Cali to surprise Alicia for her 18th birthday, BUT all those plans got messed up thanks to Ryanair and their stupid flight checkin rules!  Bastards.  Never misread your flight departure time when it comes to flying Ryanair.  If you miss your flight, you are S.O.L.

Anyways, California was fun.  Baseball, eating foods that I’ve missed, seeing family and friends and everything.  Relaxing the first few days, then getting lazy, then scrambling at the VERY (and I mean VERY) last minute to get my last paper done.  It got done an hour before I left for the airport… so hectic but finished.  Of course, during the course of writing my paper I decided to go and get all ill and everything.  Lightheaded, woozy, unable to focus.  Not what you need with an entire day’s staying in airports and planes ahead of you.

I caught my flight from Sac to Seattle on Southwest and hopped on a flight from Seattle to Amsterdam on Northwest.  Northwest is a pretty decent airline.  The guy gave me the emergency exit row, so I had extra leg room, and there was no one sitting next to me so big bonus there.  Plus, thanks to my fantastic mother, I had the perfect bribing treat HOPING for someone nice to give me the bump up to first class but no such luck.  Instead I had to settle for Strawberry Shortcake.  Boo Hoo, right?  The flight was pretty long but at least I had the cool pop up TV thingy with movies and everything on it to keep me company.  I didn’t have to use my iPod once, which was great.  It was hard watching the movies for too long since my head kept getting fuzzy and the medicine I had with me wasn’t doing much good.  Lots of coughing, sneezing, wheezing, bathroom runs, fluids that I don’t want to talk about, etc.  All in all, flight could have been better minus the flu.

I got into Amsterdam bright and early on Monday morning and quickly departed my plane to exchange my currency over to Euros, get my bag, get to my hostel and SLEEP.  Amsterdam is a great place, I’ve decided, for people just starting out a backpacking trip.  It’s really English friendly, everyone speaks a good amount of English and no one has trouble understanding what you’re saying.  No culture shock, good times.  One snag hit my plans right away, however, when I got through customs and into baggage claim when I realized my bag wasn’t on the carousel.  What the heck?  I went up to the Northwest baggage counter, the lady told me to wait 15 minutes to see if it comes, and then come back.  When I got back to the counter she held out a ‘missing baggage’ form for me (AHHHH!!!!!  NOOOOO!!!!) and where to deliver my HUGE backpack to with ALL of my clothing.  Then, all of a sudden by some miracle of GOD, some saint from the luggage dungeon radio’d up and said he saw a bag matching my description, and sure enough…. it was MINE!  Woo hoo!

I got on my way from the airport into the city, which was an easy hop on the train.  3 euros, super cheap and easy.  Got into Amsterdam, hopped in a cab since I couldn’t be bothered carrying my HUGE bag without directions to the hostel, and arrived at the Heart of Amsterdam hostel for checkin.  Of course, I was too early and had to wait until the room was clean.  I managed to read my entire Steve Martin Stand-Up book while waiting for the room, walk around town a little bit, and get back with time to spare.  Finally when the room was done, I collapsed on my bed and fell into a deep deep sleep. The hostel was nice enough.  A few sketchy people here and there, but a perfectly good locker to keep my stuff safe so I wasn’t too worried about it.  Plus, TV with CNN and MTV (in English) AND Comedy Central!?  Why leave the hostel?

Of course I left the hostel.  Duh.  Not on Monday since I was so exhausted, but I got to walking around on Tuesday and did my museum tour.  I hit up the van Gogh museum and the Rjkmuseum (however you spell it).  JESUS these places are expensive.  I miss Greece- everything free with a student card.  Can’t I pass for 12 anymore?  Probably not.  These 2 museums were kind of a throwaway to speak the honest to god truth.  van Gogh’s was cool because it was… van Gogh but the Rjkmuseum whatever was a total rip off.  Both together were THIRTY euros.  Gimme a break.  After the museums I headed back to the hostel, got some food, and walked around Amsterdam a little bit more.

As it turns out, as much as Amsterdam is known for weed and prostitution (and believe me, there’s lots of it), who knew it was absolutely BEAUTIFUL?  Loads of canals running all throughout the city lit with the sparkly lights along the bridges.  People walking around everywhere, little boats tutting along the canals.  Very picturesque.  There are bikes EVERYWHERE so it reminded me a bit of UCSB.  You have to be on the lookout for crazy people on bikes, especially when you have your earbuds in.

The hostel I stayed at was in the Red Light District, which I thought was pretty funny.  Most people in Amsterdam are high or selling weed, so you come kind of immune to the smell after a while.  I was too sick to do anything of that nature (plus it’s just not my cup of tea in the first place so I came out of Amsterdam compeltely clean).  All of my roommates were completely stoned the entire time, laughing at this crazy Chilean guy in our room.  Quite an amusing sight.  As for the District itself, there’s lots of very graphic posters up everywhere.  Did you know you can go and see a Live Sex Show?  It IS exactly what it sounds like.  Plus walking around the district you see a good amount of very scantily clad women in these little windows up for ‘display’, if you catch my drift.  If you like what you see then well, you know.  During the daytime these window women are lagoon creatures, shall we say.  They belong in small closets, shoved away for no one to see ever again.  Nighttime girls are alright looking.  At least attractive, but you know they’ve gotta have some crazy diseases.

Lots of my time, I’m sorry to say, was spent sleeping, sneezing and coughing in Amsterdam so I didn’t get to go out and socialize much OR do anything crazy.  I just couldn’t be bothered and WAS bothered too much my the nose/head combination going on.  I got out a couple of nights just to walk around the city and it was absolutely perfect.  Great weather for a t-shirt and a pair of jeans, checking out the crazy people in the porno windows, avoiding pimps and people trying to sell you drugs.  All perfectly legal (scarily enough).  It’s not really scary though, funnily enough.  People don’t stalk you (like they do in other countries).  They ask once and leave alone.

Traveling this time around is a little bit funny.  You can immediately tell the difference because it’s so much quieter and feels so much more LONELY.  Still good but sometimes I wish I had someone to crack jokes with and make stupid observations with.  I’m a lot calmer and figure things out much quicker when I’m just doing them by myself though, so that’s good.  No Thomas to beg for the Rick Steves book.  It’s in my hands… all the time.  No questions asked.  I’m a little proud of myself though.  I’ve managed to find everything on my own AND, my biggest challenge, lift my bag into the overhead thingy on the trains!!  I couldn’t believe I did it, but I did!  Suck it, Thomas.  Who’s the heavy lifter now?

My only other sight seeing adventure in Amsterdam was the Anne Frank House, which was my mission for today.  Funnily enough I was thinking about not going and then decided I was being an idiot- of course I have to go.  The line was HUGE to get into the house but it was well worth it.  So creepy, the actual journal is in there, the bookcase you see in all the pictures, all the rooms they were living in, all these videos from people who knew the family and everything.  It’s crazy to see everything in person AND to see how many people the story has affected.  It’s translated into just about every language.  There’s this quote in the museum from Nelson Mandela saying that when he was in prison loads of people used to read the diary as a source of inspiration.  Nelson freakin Mandela.  There’s a letter in the museum from Elanor Roosevelt too, crazily enough.  Long line but definitely worth it.  One of the best museums I’ve been to in Europe.  But don’t go when there are CRAZY ANNOYING kids running around… they’ll ruin it for you.  Trust me.

After the Anne Frank museum this morning I hopped on a train to Antwerp and from Antwerp into Bruges.  The train ride through the Dutch countryside was BEAUTIFUL.  Just like you think it would be.  Tulips, little windmills, canals, these weird teeny houses lining the canals and the tug boats and everything.  I saw an entire FIELD of crazy coordinated lines of tulips in their designated colors.  Absolutely amazing.  Once you’re into Belgium though, the architecture changes a lot.  I can’t really describe just yet since I haven’t been in Belgium long, but when I figure it out I’ll let you know.  I literally JUST got in but from what I can tell it looks like a really cute place.  Not too much to do, which sounds perfect for me.  I’ve got to figure out how I’m going to get to Denmark next, my next planned adventure, so that’s my mission for tomorrow.  I may have to end up staying an extra day here depending on train schedules and everything.  I haven’t really figured it all out or anything.

I hope that’s a good enough starting off point for this leg of my blog.  One country/city down, many more to go!

-Catherine