A weekend in the land of the gentle giants. Review on Amsterdam

This might sound more like a travelogue of my exploits in Amsterdam with a naughty bunch of friends. But anyhow here it goes.

About the title, well dutch are tall! I read somewhere that dutch are among the tallest of our species and sorry dutch guys and girls I am just joking about the giant part.

Prologue:

It all started on a humid Saturday evening at my base camp in Malaysia when a bunch of friends joined hands (along with our trusty meowing steads) to master the divine art of cooking meat on a grill. Of course to master a divine art thou shalt need libations! Mere mortals as we were (not that much of a mortal now ;) ) could afford only the finest of Singapore's offering under the blue and gold label of Tiger Beer. We needed lots of it (3 cartons to be exact) and finally mastered the arts to become barbecue kings, a queen was made too on that glorious night. In the divine ecstasy and sheer retardation (probably dehydration) of our brains, we decided to embark on a journey to the land of the Orange Queen the very next week. Drunk in joy as we were, started booking our air tickets for the arduous journey ahead. When we woke up after the usual nightly slumber, a realization dawned upon us that we all booked different flights to reach our desired land. But that did not stop us from going to see the land of the Orange Queen!

Probably I should stop with the medieval talk now. And so a review of my onward journey on a codeshare Malaysia Airlines is available here under the title "Onward to Schipol".

The City:

Ah yes the portal to every country is usually magnificent and Schiphol was just that. Enormous single building airport. It was a Cold September morning that I reached Schiphol and it wasn't as bad as I imagined it would be. Temperature was a cool 8C with a light drizzle and a breeze to amplify the effects. As I said my friends where on different planes. 2 of them arrived at 7:10 AM on a Singapore Airlines, one more at 8:45 AM on a Lufthansa and the queen of the meats at 9 AM on a delayed KLM from Jakarta. On the waiting part all I could say is: Dogs. Lots of 'em on leashes walking inside the airport with their masters. Apparently Amsterdam is a very dog friendly city. Sounds like my cat's hunting grounds ;) . Anyway, there is actually a mall in the airport under the same name Schiphol. Shopaholics can start feeding their addiction right after landing.

After we regrouped, got a train to the Centraal Station from the basement at Schiphol. Oneway tickets were EUR 4.20 for the 10 minute ride. The train had 2 decks and mostly empty. The ride was pleasant and our queen went on a photographic expedition in the train. Reached the Amsterdam central station and tried to get used to the sheer number of chinese tourists around us. Which was a pleasant surprise to us. Hungry as we were, we fell for the famous Argentine steak scandals of Amsterdam and payed a mere EUR 20 each for a grilled leather shoe of a steak, but we tried to down with some Heineken and it worked. Next stop the Dam Square to see the statue of the phallus in front of the Orange Queen's palace. We couldn't resist the frites on sale and each of us got a nice 250gram cone of frites (french fries) with lots of mayo. while licking our fingers clean of the mayo, saw the famous Amsterdam Sex Museum right next door..

The entry ticket was EUR 20 each, got it and braced ourselves for an enlightening tour. Honestly it was pretty interesting to see all the ancient arts of eroticism and evolution of pornography over the ages as well as the chinese obsession with erotica in the ancient times. Simply wonderful. A blow to our manhood's ego was that there was is 10 foot high marble phallus( who could compete with that?) that every girl posed for a picture with. Our queen was no exception and I yielded to her persuasion and snapped a picture.

Next stop, finding our hotel and exploring Dam square on the way. Dam square is a square(of course what else would it be!) with the royal palace on 2 sides and a bunch of old buildings on the other with a giant phallus like statue in the middle. we walked through the shopping streets and all the way to the famous Rijks Museum. Fabulous Renaissance architecture with gorgoyls and the likes. Our hotel named "Van Gogh hotel" was behind this museum and a good 30 minutes walk from the train station. Not a bad place to crash in for EUR 75 a night. We all took a shower, change and ready to conquer Amsterdam by 2 PM with our stomachs growling for attention.

We found a cozy cafe called "Cafe Mankind" opposite to the museum right across the canal. The bartender was such a wonderful dutch. He actually made us the famous veal bitterballen piping hot and had a marvelous conversation. Dutch are such social creatures even though > 185 cm tall and blue eyed. We tasted his numerous beers brewed less than 2 blocks from his humble shop. Note that coffee shops are on every street in Amsterdam. They are excellent spots for people watching, sipping a beer or a coffee and relaxing with a book. We went to a dozen coffee shops and each one had a unique history to it. The oldest one was established in 1895 and still has the original ceiling and soot stained walls!

Since we are a bunch that's not into history (we prefer looking forward than backwards) we skipped all the museums and headed straight to De Wallen, the red light district. No we didn't go there to get hooked up, but to explore the window girls. Too bad when we went there, the windows were all empty. When we were walking towards the bulldog mack coffee shop at the end of the street, we could hear a glass tapping noise. Turned around to an ample lady of African origins exhibiting her bosom. Nice and thank you for showing us what the red light district might offer woman. We went back for the evening after that.

Next day, in between sessions of binge drinking, we went to the house of Bols located behind the Rijks Museum. It is an excellent place for spirit connoisseurs. We explored all the flavors of Bols for a EUR 50 package each. Even if you don't drink, this place is quite interesting with all the details of creating a good drink and has a lot of history to it. Then off to the Heineken factory. It was not bad and could be avoided. The Dutch rijsttafel is the europeanized version of Nasi Padang from Indonesia. As much as we love nasi padang, we gave it a try and it was not bad, the flavors were quite interesting. It's a must try for everybody!

Next day was mostly beer, coffee shops, tried to smoke cigarette in a weed shop only to be told it's legal to smoke pot inside but not tobacco. visited a couple of sex shops and it is a must for every conservative Indian just to see their expression ;) . Yes I am evil. Since it was our last day, we didn't want to miss out on the world famous erotic shows in Amsterdam. We went to Cassa Rosso in De Wallen and were waiting at the entrance to finish our beers and suddenly the neon pink elephant signboard start pissing on us. Yep that thing doesn't like people thinking too much and waiting. We paid the EUR 50 for 4 beers and the show and went up to the balcony seats. banana show was interesting and everything else is explicitly censored here. We were surprised how open the Chinese were. Families sitting together and watching the show! Wish one day India will be that open, so kids can talk about everything with their parents. Would definitely make India a better place me thinks.

That evening was our flight back. The End.