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Published: September 27th 2007
Amsterdam In One Shot
A bridge, a canal and bicycles...so many bicycles.WARNING: This blog entry contains nudity, sex scenes, drug use and other phallic material. Discretion, and for some of you lot, parental guidance, is advised. Seriously - this is my most controversial entry yet - I really hope no-one gets offended...
Las Vegas may be known as Sin City, but this is a place just as deserving of the moniker. Famous for its liberal attitude towards prostitutes and weed, this was a hedonist's dream - and I was psyched.
We were meeting up with our mate Michael Gardner aka Gkee, from our high school/university days.
He was flying in from London on Saturday around 2pm, and then flying out around the same time on Sunday.
So the challenge was set - to have the complete Amsterdam experience in 24 hours.
Davies and I however, were to arrive on Friday and leave on Monday, so we had a bit longer to sample what Amsterdam had to offer.
Our journey from Brugge was just under four hours, having to change trains in Antwerp.
Amsterdam is indeed a pretty city. Old buildings, churches, trams and cobblestoned streets make it a typical European-looking city - and then of
Watch Out!
Look out for the trams, cars, one way streets, pedestrians and bicycles before you cross the road. A typical Amsterdam intersection. course, there are the canals. I don't what it is about these canals, but it tends to give every city that has them that extra bit of character.
Crossing the roads is a bit of a mission too - you have to look out for cars, trams, pedestrians and of course, bicycles. The place is absolutely (and famously) full of them.
Our hostel was an HI hostel - so if this place was to have a lockout during the day, then it was gonna be a really hard weekend because we were gonna need our sleep - thankfully, this place understood what people came here for and there was to be no lockout. Even check out was a generous 11am.
An old hospital, the Stayokay Amsterdam Vondelpark lacked a bit of character, but the rooms all had ensuites which was most welcome.
Described by Lonely Planet as "you won't get any sleep here, but you're bound to get laid", I was expecting another
Rising Cock. No cocks were rising here though, as I think the hostel was too big to really get that party atmosphere. It's really the smaller and medium-sized hostels that tend to get this
Koninklijk Paleis
The Royal Palace that was temporarily used as the town hall back in the day. atmosphere as those types of hostels feel more like a house, as you always bump into the same people in the common areas and they don't have so many rules. The big hostels need more rules to keep the place under control, but in turn this makes them too institutionalised.
Like Barcelona, Amsterdam has an insatiable, energetic vibe which can really suck you in - the place is just buzzing, and there are loads of street performers like there are on
La Rambla, including a dude juggling with fire.
Another parallel that Amsterdam draws with Barcelona is the creative vibe that seems to exist here, a by-product I'm sure of the liberal attitude which draws all the creative types to Amsterdam.
Unfortunately, the other thing that Amsterdam's liberal attitude attracts is scum. For example, there was an English dude who was really helpful in giving us directions and then asked for a bit of change. Davies reluctantly gave him 50 cents, and then he had the nerve to complain; "50 cents! If a mate helped you out and he asked for something in return, would you give him 50 bloody cents?"
A mate wouldn't ask for money
Leidseplein
The hive of Amsterdam's nightlife. in the first place, pal.
We were a bit wary about accepting help from people after that...
Didn't get up to much when we arrived (read: writing this blog), but on the way back to the hostel after picking up a quick eat - of which there are heaps of kebab/burger/hot dog stalls, which is perfectly handy for budget travellers and later on, for post-drinking munchies - the whole city seemed to be teeming with people. It was a Friday night after all.
With our hostel conveniently located close to Leidseplein, where most of the nightlife lives, I heard a big group chanting something from a side street, so naturally I went to investigate. A huge group of what seemed like about 30-odd hot Dutch girls were all in a massive group singing some Dutch song. Looked like a hen's night or something. If this is what it is going to be like, then we're gonna have a wicked time!
However with a big 24 hours coming up the next day, I resisted temptation (the first time of many here) and headed back to the hostel to ensure we were fully rested up.
The next
Dam Square
The main square in Amsterdam. Notice the memorial obelisk (phallus no.1) in the middle of the square. day, we went to a sports bar to watch the All Blacks' first match of the Rugby World Cup. A very impressive 78-14 owning of the Italians, who are not such a bad team anymore, left us in a very good mood, as did the Heineken here. Now, I'm sure some of you know that I absolutely detest Heineken - I can't stand the taste of it - but over the here the Heineken tastes different, I swear. It's absolutely delicious over here, I loved it. Must be something in the water.
We then went to the main square in Amsterdam, Dam Square, to meet up with Gkee - underneath the appropriately phallic-looking memorial obelisk in the square.
As you may or may not remember, Gkee is my friend in London that
I was meant to meet up with before I left for Paris at the start of my Euro-trip. So I conveniently got him to bring me over some more warmer clothes, as we're not in Spain anymore, and so we went back to his hostel to pick the stuff up.
Accommodation was scarce and expensive for this weekend because of the European Championship football qualifier being played here this weekend between
Oude Kerk
Church right in the middle of the red light district. No, it's not Gkee's hostel, but that is Gkee's ear bottom right. The Netherlands and Bulgaria, and thousands of fans were out warming up (mostly dressed in orange of course) - it would be a great night tonight if The Netherlands win.
Not that Amsterdam needed it, but it really livened and coloured things up that day. Was good to see the two sets of fans mingling too, which reminded me of my trip last year to the World Cup in Germany.
Anyway, the accommodation shortage meant that Gkee could only get accommodation at a Christian hostel. The hostel was therefore adorned with Christian slogans and of course, had many rules. Not that it stopped Gkee's roommates who quickly stubbed out their joints with guilty faces as he entered the room. Funny.
The most painful rule of this hostel though was the 2am curfew. After that you are not allowed to enter the hostel until 7am. Which means on Gkee's 24-hour stint here, he would have to either come back before 2am, or go the whole hog and stay out till 7am. Me thinks that option one is not going to happen. Hilarious.
Oh, and one more thing - this Christian hostel was located smack bang in the
Dam Square (Again)
From another angle, including some Dutch supporters in orange warming up for the big game. middle of the red light district, on possibly the seediest street in the red light district. Priceless.
Our mission of course was to have the complete Amsterdam experience - sex, drugs and alcohol.
The first stage of this most unholy triumvirate that we were to fulfil was the drugs - so it was off to the Siebeles "coffee shop".
Now, none of us are regular weed smokers by any stretch of your imagination, and none of us had ever bought weed before. So imagined how it looked when we approached the counter to look at the "menu". We had no idea what we were doing. To save a little bit of face, Davies decided the best thing to do was to admit that none of us are familiar with the weed-buying protocol and asked for a "recommendation". The chick behind the counter cracked up and recommended that we buy a pre-rolled joint since none of us could roll to save ourselves. We ended up buying a joint of "skunk" weed for 3€. The coughing at our table must've cracked up the other patrons at the cafe too. Amateurs.
Have to say though, that the joint had
Myself, Davies & Gkee
For some reason, the joint is always in my hand in all these photos. little effect.
Next, we thought that we would try some "space cake", that I was told I "had to try" by a dude I met at Cat's Hostel in Madrid. So it was off to the Bulldog Cafe - the Starbucks of "coffee shops", as they're all over Amsterdam - and we ordered one cupcake of "space cake" for 6€. Davies had the curiosity and audacity to ask the dude behind the counter the difference between hash and weed. The guy was nice enough not to laugh however and kindly explained the difference to us. I've forgotten though, so if someone wishes to enlighten me (again), please do.
Still no effect from either the joint or the space cake. Did we get ripped off?
Then we thought we'd go grab some dinner, and went to one of the many Argentinian steak houses here. Why there are so many, I do not know. And for 9€, the steak was very good and tasty.
After dinner, it was time to find a pub for a few Heinekens before hitting a nightclub.
For the next hour, we wondered through the streets of Amsterdam trying to find our way.
I didn't participate at all in the navigation discussions (in fact I had no idea where we were going or where exactly I was and was completely disoriented) and was at least a couple of metres behind the other two as I was too busy being distracted by neon lights and other people's conversations, even though they were mostly in Dutch (Amsterdam is a truly bilingual city though, and almost everybody speaks English, which was nice after being in Spain and Portugal for a month).
But for some reason, walking through the streets of Amsterdam, I was starting to feel really paranoid about everything around me. I could even hear people's conversations from 10 metres behind me. Weird.
We finally made it back to Leidseplein and the National Theatre.
Suddenly, loud music came on and the facade of the theatre lit up. Then three ribbons fell down in front of it and down came three performers who started twirling around the ribbons to the music, Cirque du Soleil-style. They were hanging from the ribbons the whole time, so their upper body strength must be incredible.
I was absolutely mesmerised. It felt like the most amazing
The Sugar Factory
Not worth the 12 euro cover charge. thing I had ever seen.
Then it was over, and attention shifted to the football which was playing at the sports cafe next to us. The Netherlands had won so a good night ahead looked likely.
We went to an Irish pub (again) and had a couple of beers while watching Italy vs France. I was feeling very unsociable and I don't think said anything for ages.
Eventually the effects of the weed and space cake finally wore off and I was myself again. Remind me never to smoke weed
before I go out ever again.
It was 0-0 between Italy and France and it was off to find a club.
The club we decided on was The Sugar Factory, with a cover charge of 12€.
Inside it was mostly trance music, and it probably wasn't worth it. Not when you consider we paid 15€ to get into
Razzmatazz in Barcelona which came with a free drink.
So we decided to move on to News Cafe, which was a lot better, as they played more recognisable music, and there weren't so many guys. The place closed at 4am though, and with 3 hours to go
Rijkmuseum
One of the sights in Amsterdam. until Gkee was allowed back into his hostel, we decided to check out the red light district.
I have to say that the women in the windows are a real novelty. No matter who you are, you get a wink and a "wanna come in?" from every girl you pass.
And some of them are really,
really hot. And they're yours for 50€, which gets you 20 minutes.
There are also some nasty ones too. Fat ones, old ones - every taste is catered for.
However, it must've been the time of the day/night, because hardly any of them were doing business.
I was also told of a street where the girls are really hot at one end of the street and then get progressively worse as you walk along the street to the fetish section - I can't say I saw it though. The red light district is more like a maze of lanes with windows rather than one main street. There are a couple of "main streets" but none of then stood out.
And at 5am, everything was shut.
Even all the food stalls were closed and we were starving. Have
to say, we were a bit disappointed, as we thought Amsterdam would go on all night, like Vegas. Guess not.
At 6am, we were back at Leidseplein, sober and extremely tired. So tired in fact, that Gkee went back to his hostel albeit with still an hour to kill. Not that there was anything to do anyway, as everything was closed.
Luckily for Davies and I though, on the way back to our hostel a hot dog stand was just opening up.
The next day, we met up with Gkee in the Vondelpark next to our hostel, which was "Vondel-average" according to Davies. He's such a funny guy. In any case, the park was no Central Park that's for sure.
Poor Gkee got 2 hours of sleep before he had to check out of his hostel at 10am. We met him at 12pm, so he had been reading the paper in the park for two hours.
We then grabbed a bagel each before heading to the Sex Museum.
The place was pretty tacky, with plastic butts that fart at you as you walk past, an ugly moving statue of a fat woman who reaches
More Phalli
Not the property of Amit or Black T. out to try to grab you unexpectedly, a sailor relieving himself in a cabin and then squirts the cabin window with water when he's finished and other sorts of cheesy paraphanalia. Most of the museum is in fact just old pornographic photos and videos, although the history of pornography is quite well documented. There was one video though, of an old lesbian movie from the 50's that was pretty hot.
Then it was time for Gkee to catch his plane home. He thought he'd had a good taste of Amsterdam and would be back again one day.
He also kindly took back some stuff to London for me - what a champion. Thanks Mike!
We spent the rest of day walking around Amsterdam's sights - of which none of them really stand out at all. It's mainly the canals and bridges that make the city rather than any sights in particular. Oh, and of course the coffee shops and the red light district as well.
We then got some 5€ pasta for lunch before taking a siesta.
Our experience was not finished yet however - there was a pub crawl taking place that night in
Pub Crawl
More phalli. Geez, what kind of bartender would get a hot girl to something like that...? ;-D Leidseplein, so we had to complete our second stage of the unholy triumvirate - alcohol. Taking in five bars and a club, it was going to be another big night.
Waking at 8.30pm, we got talking to our American roommate Shaun, who gave us a preview of Copenhagen, where we were headed next weekend. "It's like Amsterdam without the sex, drugs and canals", he told us.
He came out with us for a bite, but declined the pub crawl, as there are "too many guys on these things".
Well, it didn't really turn out that way as there were plenty of girls.
We had got there late so we had missed out on the free unlimited vodka shots - and looking around at everybody, it looked like we had a lot of catching up to do. The guides though were pretty enthusiastic and poured vodka-and-something-sweet-and-fruity into everybody's mouths before every place we went to.
At the first place - "Amsterdammed" - it was 2 for 1 Heinekens. I don't think I've ever drank so quickly! I love the Heineken over here.
At the next place, Pirates, the bartender got one of the hot barcrawlers
Fire Show
Bartender makes up for his lack of judgement with this spectacular fire show. to suck whipped cream off a banana. I had definitely caught up by this stage, and so I have photographic evidence. What a champion - I bought her a beer.
The bartender then breathed some fire after that which was spectacularrrrr.
They played some good tunes here as well, though I don't remember exactly what they played - whatever they played, me and a whole lot of English guys were jumping up and down to it. I do remember they played Peter Andre's "Mysterious Girl" though.
At the next place - which by this stage I was never gonna remember the name of - I got talking to some cool Canadian guys, two English girls, an Irish dude and a Brazilian girl among others. The only other things I remember was going nuts to The Arctic Monkeys' "When The Sun Goes Down" and the Kaiser Chiefs' "Ruby, Ruby, Ruby, Ruby!", which me and another drunken Manchester United fan made into "Rooney, Rooney, Rooney, Rooney!"
Unfortunately for one of the Canadian guys, he got totally sucker-punched by some drunk guy for no apparent reason. One of the guides told us that Dutch guys become senselessly violent when
Always Remembered, Never Forgotten
Somewhat ironic putting this poster up at the club at the end of a pub crawl. drunk - I guess this was the evidence.
After that, we ended up at the club for the night, that I don't remember much about apart from the photo I took - "Always Remembered, Never Forgotten". Haha, how ironic. Not this time! ;-D
What I do remember though, very clearly, is that they charge you for using the toilet at every place! By the time I got here, I had run out of 50 cent pieces, so had to hold on. Absolutely ludicrous!!
We then realised that the pub crawl was indeed over and that the guides had completely ditched us. Then we remembered that we still had one last stage of the triumvirate to complete - sex.
So off to the red light district we went - after being ripped off by paying 4€ for a hot dog at a bakery.
I must admit something - some of the girls were so hot, that I was tempted. Perhaps the worst place to be after a drunken night out. I walked past a group of 4 young ladies who were absolutely stunning. I literally had the 50€ note in my hand.
Did I go
through with it?
In the end my conscience wouldn't let me. I don't think I could live with the fact that I would've paid for it - I'm too young and ahem, handsome to do that. Although, one of my friends from back home who shall remain nameless, said that "he wouldn't hate on me" if I had done it, because these would be the hottest chicks I'd ever sleep with. Haha.
Anyway, 50€ is almost an entire day's budget that I can't afford.
To my boys - I would love to have taken some pictures for you - but I had heard that if you do take a photo, 10 bouncers will come out of nowhere to kick your ass, and then throw you and your camera into the canal. I wasn't too keen on finding out whether that was true or not, but I guarantee you that if you were to hire one of these ladies, they would be, in the words of a friend I knew who came here last year, "the hottest girl you'll ever f*ck".
So the last leg of the unholy triumvirate is to go uncompleted - but I
A Grand Building
I wish I knew what this building is - memory loss is a side-effect of doing the complete Amsterdam experience. still feel I had the complete Amsterdam experience. The city is definitely a cool place, I reckon I could live here one day.
Which brings to an end my report from Amsterdam - I hope none of you were too grossed out from what you have just seen and read - if so, then maybe what happens in Amsterdam, really should stay in Amsterdam.
Cheers,
Derek
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gkee
non-member comment
woohoo I'm famous! Good account of our time Derek. We definitely have to go back, for more than 24 hours next time!