…it’s A-m-s-t-e-r-d-a-m!

Ciao tutti!

(Or rather I should say “goedendag!”)

Last weekend I went to Amsterdam with my friend Adrienne for three full days to explore this Dutch capital city. I should also mention that I know absolutely zero Dutch (“hallo” and “goedendag/goedenmorgen” are pretty much my extent of the language) but thankfully, most everyone in Amsterdam speaks English; and what’s more is that the city is so incredibly beautiful that it truly speaks for itself.

The hotel that Adrienne and I booked was listed as a “bed and breakfast,” but we ended up having our own private apartment! It was three floors, with a terrifyingly steep spiral case (see below), but also with a great balcony to look out onto our quaint little street. The place definitely took some getting used to (I learned the hard way not to wear slippery socks when using the stairs), but it was a great place to stay. We even had a kitchen with a fully-stocked fridge!

Our apartment. Most of the first floor is
occupied by a barbershop.

View of the death-trap spiral staircase from the living room.

Our balcony :)

Our plane to Amsterdam left Bologna at 6am Friday morning, so we arrived there earlier than when we typically wake up! But it allowed us to have a completely free first day to explore the city. As such, one of the first places we saw was Dam Square, just down the street from our apartment.

The Royal Palace and Nieuwe Kerk on Dam Square

The National Monument

A view of Dam Square from the crowded steps of the National Monument

After exploring the square, we headed to the local movie theatre to see The Hunger Games (I know, I know… most people don’t go to Amsterdam to see an American movie). But hear me out – Adrienne and I both read the books and we feared it would no longer be in theatres back in the US by the time we came home from studying abroad. Plus, the theatre in Amsterdam played the movie in English and furthermore, we had three full days to see the city. Anyway, the movie was great. Plus, the Dutch subtitles were hilarious. We noticed that many Dutch words seem to be like English words pronounced funny (see pictures below).

"Fries" + "Drink" = "Frisdrank"

"Hold your card here" = "Houd uw kaart hier"
(sign in a tram car)

After the movie, we walked across town to the Anne Frank house, which is the house where she and her family (along with four other people) stayed for two years in hiding before being discovered and deported to concentration camps by the Nazis. Walking through the house was very powerful, and the museum does a great job giving insight into Anne, her diary, and what she and her family had to go through during the Holocaust. No pictures were allowed inside (understandably so), but here is a picture of the outside of the building:

The Anne Frank house with the Westerkerk in the background.
As you can see, the front of the house-turned-museum is
pretty new, but the secret annex, where the Franks were in
hiding, is still original

A map showing the Anne Frank house in its vicinity within Amsterdam

We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering the beautiful streets that line the canals, as well as enjoying some Belgian fries (traditionally served with mayo… although they put way too much on! Delicious, but hard to eat)

**FUN FACT: Amsterdam is a very bycicle-friendly city, and there are as many bikes in the Netherlands as there are people! (16 million)

Our second day in Amsterdam we decided to visit the Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum in Dam Square. I had never been to one of these before, and to be honest it was a little creepy, but fun nonetheless. Plus there were a bunch of wax figures of Dutch royalty and celebrities whom we had never heard of, so it was also interesting to learn a little bit about them.

Me and my pal George

The next James Bond

Marilyn

Mr. President

Victoria Beckham. As Adrienne rightly put
it, "it's hard to make a realistic wax figure
of someone who already looks like a wax
figure in real life."

The legend himself, Pavarotti

Getting a workout in with Lance

I won the Olympics!

We then had lunch at this place just down the street from our apartment called BurgerBar. It was amazing. It had been so long since I had a quality burger. And this one was perfection. I highly recommend BurgerBar to anyone planning on visiting Amsterdam!

That afternoon, we walked to the southern end of the city to the Heineken Brewery, where we took the self-guided tour (which was, interestingly enough, all in English). It was really cool to learn about the brewing process of Heineken beer as well as its history. Plus we got to enjoy a lot of free beer so that’s always a perk!

We learned that in Heineken's logo, they have
signature "smiley e's" (the e's are angled up a bit)

Proost!

TV screen made from Heineken bottles

After the brewery, we headed over towards Museumplein, a big park that is surrounded by different museums, including the Van Gogh museum and the Rijksmuseum, as well as a diamond museum. The museums were closing just as we got there, so we unfortunately did not get to visit any of them. But we did spend some time at the park and took some pictures with the “I Amsterdam” sign (which was swarmed with tourists like ourselves).

The Rijksmuseum

"I amsterdam"

'A' for Augie and Adrienne!

Museumplein

Later that evening, we dared to explore the infamous Red Light District. It was… interesting, let’s put it that way. There were several guided tours going on, and many tourists (as well as maybe some potentially interested customers… I’m not here to judge) were filling the streets of the district. We didn’t stay long – just long enough to say we saw it!

A public urinal. These were all over Amsterdam.
I had to include it in this post somewhere.
Might as well be in the RLD section.

On our last day in Amsterdam we spent the morning/early afternoon taking a canal boat tour through the city. FUN FACT: Amsterdam has more canals than Venice. It’s true. The boat tour was great, we got to see and learn a lot about the city we had been exploring for the past two days. Plus the weather was absolutely beautiful.

Our boat for the canal tour

A three-tiered bike storage area

NEMO, the national science museum

"the Amsterdam," a restored ship used today
for various events

a houseboat!

Westerkerk

Of everything we did and saw in Amsterdam, though, by far my favorite was visiting the Olympic Stadium and museum! If you know anything about me, you know that I absolutely love the Olympics, so this was a real treat for me. Thanks, Adrienne, for putting up with my excitement! The stadium itself is nothing to shake a stick at (Amsterdam hosted the Games in 1928, so the Olympic Stadium is not as cool or modern as some of the newer stadiums in Athens and Beijing, for example). Nevertheless, I thought it was awesome.

The Olympic museum (Olympic Experience: Amsterdam) attached to the stadium was also really interesting. Plus, we didn’t have to pay because the exhibits are all in Dutch and we were tourists who obviously don’t understand any Dutch. But still… it was all in Dutch. Thankfully there were a lot of pictures and other displays that spoke for themselves, so I enjoyed the museum very much, despite not being able to read anything.

I'm in heaven.

The Olympic motto: Swifter, Higher, Stronger

Olympic posters throughout the years

The back of the stadium

The front of the stadium

The best ending I could have asked for to a truly spectacular trip (my first outside of Italy so far this semester!) I was a little sad to leave Amsterdam (especially knowing that I was coming back to a couple of very busy weeks in Bologna, full of studying for 4 final exams that all take place before Easter!) But I was nonetheless excited to get back to my home in the Bo, where I can (pretty well) understand and communicate the language.

Ciao for now,

Augusto