Amsterdam

I hope everyone stateside and abroad had an amazing Thanksgiving either celebrating in traditional fashion, or making new memories. I know that my Thanksgiving definitely leaned towards the second, given that I was in Amsterdam!
Before I give the breakdown of the trip, let me first say how amazing the city of Amsterdam is. Given that it's basically famous for sex and drugs, I was expecting to see kind of a grungy, dirty, somewhat sketchy city. Boy was I surprised to see this


So the journey began Thursday morning at 7:30 AM when I left my house, stopping at La Tahona (the deadly bakery on my block) grabbing a raisin bun for Emily, and a chunk of freshly baked, warm, raisin bread. This raisin bread is a new obsession/addiction that really deserves it's own post, so we'll talk about that later. Anyways, after that necessary stop I met Elena and James at the bus stop and we were off to the La Coruña airport. Everything went smoothly until we realized that we only had a 45 minute layover, and since we (for some unknown reason) decided to book our two flights separately, we were still going to need to go through security. So, we got to Barcelona, and we ran. We ran like chickens with our heads cut off. We finally found a stand called transfers, and the woman gave us our tickets and sent us off. We finally got to our gate and saw our friends Drew and Liz who had come from Palma de Mallorca, an island in Spain.

We got to Amsterdam, and to our dismay realized that due to the fact that we're traveling within the European Union, we weren't going to get our passports stamped. This did however save us the hassle of going through customs, and allowed us to get Starbucks quickly. A toffee nut latte in a Christmas Starbucks cup on Thanksgiving in Amsterdam? Heaven on earth. From the airport we then took a train into the city, and then a tram to get us close to our hostel. Thank goodness for Drew's blackberry that told us exactly what trains/trams/streets to go to. Once we got to the hostel we met up with 2 more of our friends, Emily and Andy (remember? the ones that visited me?) and 3 of their friends in Leon who are actually from England. For dinner we all went to the Hard Rock Cafe. Although they offered a special Thanksgiving dinner, it was kind of expensive and knew that it would not even compare to Uncle Lenny and Aunt Maureen's thanksgiving feast in Berlin, CT. So instead I went with the not so typical thanksgiving meal of a pulled pork sandwich, fries, and baked beans. Although it wasn't typical, I didn't realize how much I missed barbecue sauce until I was eating it!

The next morning we woke up early to get the free breakfast at the hostel, and go out on the free 3 hr walking tour. Honestly, that tour was probably the best thing that I did the entire weekend. I learned so much, so let me share a few fun facts!

* Amsterdam is a tiny city with less than 1 million residents, but very diverse with over 170 nationalities represented.
* House taxes were determined by the width of your house, so due to very narrow staircases, every house has a hook on top of it. They still use these hooks along with a pulley system to move people's belongings like mattresses and furniture into their houses.

* The first stock market was in Amsterdam
* Amsterdam was the only city in Europe to stand up to the Nazis
* Possession/use/selling of Marijuana is actually NOT legal in Amsterdam, it's just not illegal

After the tour ended we met up with my roommate from last year, Audrey, and my friend Mary! We all then grabbed pizza for lunch and split up from there. Mary, Audrey, James, and I went back to the hostel to grab our tickets for the Heineken museum, while everyone else already had theirs so they went ahead. The Heineken museum was really cool, and came with 2.5 free glasses of beer! After that we grabbed dinner at 1 of many hot dog stands in the city. We all went out that night on a pub crawl which is basically like a guided tour of the nightlife. You pay money up front, but get free drinks and entrances into the bars/clubs. Lots of fun!

The next morning we woke up early again to get breakfast, and then headed off to the Van Gogh museum. Although I would like to say that I'm cultured enough to have truly appreciated it, I can't say that I am. Audrey and I quickly (as in before finishing the 1st floor) grew bored of Van Gogh. On a trip to the bathroom we did stumble upon a temporary exhibit called, "Illusions of Reality: naturalist painting, photography, and cinema" that was really cool and we enjoyed a lot. After we went through that small part though, our patience grew thin. We found ourselves sitting on a bench, literally crying from laughter talking about the fact that Van Gogh had just "decided" to become a painter despite not knowing if he had any talent, and making up an overly dramatic and completely fictional biography for Audrey, which consisted of suicide attempts and modern art. Clearly we have a little bit of black humor...

After getting out of the museum Audrey, Mary, and I embarked on our own walking/eating tour of Amsterdam. I say eating tour because throughout the day Audrey and I ate: cereal and toast at breakfast at the hostel, 3 AMERICAN style pancakes with syrup, Dim Sum (Chinese food), bratwurst, Thai food, chocolate covered strawberries, and hot chocolate made out of chocolate ice cream.
Sunday morning we were up at 7 again to get to the airport. We were waiting at the bus station for longer than expected, and ended up getting to the airport late. For a fun image imagine me with one of those dorky luggage carts, legitimately running and weaving through the airport. Moving sidewalks were not exempt from my workout. Of course, it all worked out and we got on the plane on time. Funny observation, in Barcelona at the ticket counter their was a special counter for "Last Minute." To quote Elena- Spaniards WOULD need a "Last Minute" counter.

Over all it was an amazing weekend. If you have another minute I would highly recommend that you read Audrey's Blog to get more fun stories and another perspective on the weekend. Also, for those non-facebook users, click here to see all of my pictures from the weekend!

Next weekend I leave for a whirlwind tour of Paris, Strasbourg, and Madrid so get ready for a book of a blog post! After that, Christmas is right around the corner! Love you all! Remember, emails and blog comments are always enjoyed!