I miiiight be a little obsessed with Amsterdam

Where to begin!

First off, I’m sorry if this blog gets boring because I’m essentially just going to repeat how much I love Amsterdam. As of now, it is one of my favorite cities, if not my favorite city, in the world.  We did lots of exciting things there so I’ll break this up into parts so it’s better to look at.

Rotterdam

First stop on our trip was Rotterdam to stay the night with Noah and visit Penn kids before touring Amsterdam. We went straight to Rotterdam from the airport via a Harry Potter train. Private cabins meant that we could blast the jamzz, and I quite enjoyed being deejay and reciting various HP quotes.

After about an hour of literally bouncing up and down in our seats, we arrived in Rotterdam where Noah so nicely greeted us, paid for our tram ride (which we tried to avoid) and welcomed us to a pregame that was in full swing in his room. So strange, and nice, to see ruit tables set up and red solo cups decorating the space- flashback to America hollaaaaa. First stop was up to the roof to …show us the scene of Rotterdam from above, and of course introduce us to some international friends and the Colonel. Then back downstairs to rep the U. S of A with a game of ruit. Afterwards, we headed off to club Hollywood which appeared to be the scene of a 14 year olds birthday party (baby blue and white balloons were decorating the ceiling and there was a big “14” plaque). We went inside to see a crowd of people that was quite younger than what we were used to. Although it was in fact not a birthday party (rather the 14^th anniversary of the club), we were amused to find many teenagers on the dance floor (one of whom literally nuzzled my neck when he danced with me- awk central). We decided the dance floor wasn’t really our scene at the time, so we purchased coins (yes, coins at a club) and went to the back patio to buy delicious mini pancakes from this Dutch woman (you couldn’t pay with Euros, only with coins which seemed pretty silly to us).

We danced some more and then headed out around 3 to go get K___ which is terrific after-club fare: French fries with thinly sliced shwarma with a little cheese and lettuce and garlic sauce. In retrospect, this sounds kind of disgusting, but I swear it was amazing. Finally off to bed alongside the ruit table. Frattyyyyyy

Amsterdam Day 1

The next morning we dragged ourselves out of bed (literally dragged) and trained back up to Amsterdam to sightsee. Despite the rain, we walked through an outdoor market, where we equipped ourselves with touristy looking, but functional, hats and gloves. Then we went to the Heineken Experience which is what it sounds like. Mix of educational video clips, ‘rides’, and of course various taste testings. When we were done, we took a walk around to get a feel for the city (including the red light district which was filled with bored 20-something year old girls in bikinis just standings in windows and sometimes texting) and experienced some of Amsterdam’s culture.  After relaxing inside for a little, it was pretty dark and still raining, so we headed home.

Allison and I stayed in a B&B on account of needing to sleep before our Sunday run, and got a glorious fluffy bed, sofa, kitchen and clean bathroom to ourselves. Heaven.

Amsterdam Day 2

On day 2 we had planned to go on a bike tour, and the weather cooperated with us surprisingly. We went to Mike’s Bike tour to find our hippy guide with dreads ready to go. Score. She was actually really knowledgeable and gave us a brief (very interesting) version of Amsterdam’s history before we started off on our 4 hour adventure. Highlights include: going to a cheese/clog factory in the Dutch countryside, complete with samples of course; seeing a windmill; going through Vondel Park; and of course biking along beautiful river boats, canals, reclaimed land, parks etc etc. We also got to be a part of Dutch culture by ringing our bells at stupid tourists (role reversal) and learned some super fun facts. Only 20% of Dutch people have tried weed (our guide didn’t try it until she went to Australia ironically enough), whereas 40% of Americans have; there is a biker’s union and a prostitute’s union in Amsterdam; the number one crime is bike theft; the city symbol is XXX (the connotation with porn came because porn was shipped through Amsterdam’s port and thus each box was stamped with XXX); and their first Dutch king was William of Orange. This is the (unfortunate) reason that the country loves orange. In my opinion, this is its only downfall…

After the countryside tour was finished, we walked into town and Allison and I saw the Anne Frank museum. This was also really interesting and something I truly enjoyed. The museum is incredible in the artifacts that it holds: a map on the wall where Otto Frank (Anne’s father) traced all of the Allied troops’ movement as they neared the Netherlands; marks on the wall showing the changes in height of the children; pictures/postcards that Anne had glued to her walls; Latin homework between Anne and her teacher (with corrections in red); documentation of the family members and their journey through concentration camps; and documentary footage of Otto Frank (the only one of the 8 living in the Secret Annex to survive) when the museum was completed. Powerful and educational. A must-see in Amsterdam.

Later we headed to Vondel Park to pick up our running packets for the race the next day!

Amsterdam Day 3: Race day whaddup

RACE DAYYYYY!!! After carbo-loading the night before with a homemade pasta dinner for 2 (romantic, eh?), I was ready to run.  I met up with Lane and Rick McVey as we prepared to dominate the 8k course. We started at 10:30 just outside the Olympic Stadium, ran 8k through Vondel Park and Amsterdam city, and then finished on the Olympic Stadium Track. It was pretty awesome because it was my first race, I got to see Lane, I got to see a new city in a whole new way, and I got a medal! Sweeeeet. To make everything better, I finished in about 46 minutes which was under my goal time. All in all, very exciting

Then while Allison ran her ½ marathon, I shopped around Amsterdam and found some quite interesting things…

We met up again and headed to the airport where they stole my face lotion (I swear the bottle was not too big UGH), and obvi suffered delays because of strikes in France- how typical. But other than traveling woes, Amsterdam was an INCREDIBLE trip. Sorry this is absurdly long but seriously, what an amazing city.

ps. along with cheese, you gotta try stroopwaffels - DELISH- got free samples of cheese, chocolate, and these cookies at a store across from a coffee shop (typical) on a side street near Dam Square. ah-mazing