Friday, July 17, 2009

Amsterdam

Well, sorry its been so long!! I've been a little busy and very lazy with writing on here. I'll go back to the last day I can remember what I did---last friday! School, studied in a cafe after class with Allison. Then came home to meet up with Christine so she could spend the night. We went to a little cafe on the corner for dinner and drinks. I love bordeaux by the way--amazing!
Then we went to another cafe for just drinks(it was friday, cmon!). We had some more delicious wine and then headed back home for a semi-early night.
We got up super early--had to be at the train station by 745am so we had to leave my house by about 7 just to give us enough time. We got there and couldnt find the right machine to print my ticket out that I bought online...so I had to wait in line at the ticket counter to help me out. Finally got my ticket, then we had to find our friend Mike who was also traveling with us on the same train. Mike didnt have a phone and finding him in the busy Paris-nord train station was not an easy task. We picked up a cheese danish/quiche thing?? which would have been delicious had it been heated up. Ya, not so good cold.
I was surprised to see so many dogs in the station--apparently you can just take them with you. It made me miss Zoey so much though! there are so many dogs here, and every time I see one, I miss her even more. Anyways, boarded the train--unfortunately I was second class and they were first. They actually paid less for their tickets! So I had to sit by myself but I just attempted to sleep the entire time. OOOH ya! AND, I didn't even have a designated seat! so I had to wait until everyone boarded and sat until I could find a seat. I ended up having 2 seats to myself so it was nice but I was facing a couple that I had to watch be all lovey-dovey...that was kinda annoying to watch but made me miss Kev.
Long ride- 4hours 11min. Beautiful scenery! Passed by Brussels and some other cities I can't remember or spell the names of. The towns were so cute, and so much green!
We got to Amsterdam around 12:45 and found our friends, Roman and Cat who got there the day before, waiting for us at the entrance. We walked to our hotel---a 5star, Renaissance Marriot!! Mike got a really good deal for the hotel- 90euro for 2 nights/person. Thats better than you can get in some hostels for a single! And it was VERY nice. There were 2 singles so we got a rollaway bed too. The beds were so comfy! I will post pics of the hotel. We were all very impressed and it was nice to stay in such a nice place after the first hostel(that called itself a hotel) that I stayed in on the first night of my trip.
So we cleaned up and walked around town--hit up Dam square, another cool part of town with all the cafes and then some of them went into the torture museum. I was not interested in seeing it--not with the dreams that i have and already the lack of sleep--I didn't need that contributing to it. We went back to the hotel, then met up again for Italian food. The waitress was not very nice. She wouldn't let us order the appetizer and entrees separately and when we asked for something she would say...we can't do that.
After that, we intially wanted to go out, but we were all pretty tired so we walked through the red-light district. Ya, disturbing. I really did not need to see that either. We were over it pretty quickly so we headed out. As we were leaving, Christine and I walked by a window and apparently we looked like we were talking smack because the girl banged on the window really loud. We stopped and looked at each other like what the heck happened!? Then she leaned out of the door and screamed (I will bleep out the profanity) "You f*&$@ chinese B*&@#!!" It continued for several more lines. You get the point. oh ya, it is necessary to point out that Christine is in fact chinese, however, she is not a bitch- she is very nice :)
So, that was pretty interesting. I will say that if we were inthe US, I probably would have gone back and said something to her, because I am NOT ok with that. However, being in Amsterdam where it seems like just about anything goes, I decided to refrain from- for lack of better words- kicking her skinny ass. Sorry, but that kind of stuff really makes me mad.
We just turned around and left. After that I said, well, I think thats it for tonight. We went back to the hotel and went to bed.
The next day we went to Lydes plain (im not sure how to spell it), the flower market, and the Van Gogh museum which was awesome. Christine and I stopped by the "I AMSTERDAM" sign which was pretty cool. hmmm what else. We walked around the canals a lot- they were absolutely beautiful. That night we got a Argentinian steak that was awesome, and then went on a canal cruise which included wine and cheese plate. Again, beautiful. OH ya, and we got yelled at again. This time by the lady that was speaking over the microphone. Ok, so we were a little loud, but honestly, you can't expect 5 law school students to have a quiet conversation. Especially when wine is invovled. Oh and not to mention one of our friends Mike has to turn everything into an argument. So we were loud. And probably rude, but at the time we were having a heated discussion so we didnt know. Plus, she yelled at us afterwards instead of during the cruise. Im sure we would have quieted down if we would have had some warning.
Again, we were tired after so just went home and to bed.
Slept in the next morning and through our early plan to wake up to see Anne Franks house. We only got to walk by it because the line was around the corner. Christine and I walked to a pretty church there and all around town.
Our train left around 430 and this time I had a seat! Oh, and I found out that first class got food and drinks served! Bummer for me! thats about it for Amsterdam. It was beautiful- way more than i had imagined. I definitely had the wrong impression before I went. I was worried that everyone would just be smoking weed and picking up women but it wasn't like that at all. I definitely could smell people smoking, but I wasn't ever in a situation where I couldnt get away from the horrible smell. It is one of the coolest cities i've ever been to(which isn't many, but still).
K thats a long one! Love you all

2 comments:

  1. ooh, you know i loved reading every word. sounds wonderful. as you can now appreciate, those inconveniences like: getting up early for the train, second vs first class glitches, not getting the food cooperation you would like, all are worth it for the experience of going to and seeing some very interesting places/people. we didn't stop in amsterdam, but brugge and brussels were fantastic. glad you got out of town.
    but does that mean you missed bastille day in france? any celebrations around there? what do the locals do?
    still liking your classes, i presume? are you getting any licks in during arguments with mike? it's all such good experience for you. study hard, play hard, sleep when you get home. amour, liebchen.

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  2. I definitely did not miss Bastille day-- i am about to post stuff actually!
    As for Mike- i gave him a piece of my mind on the canal cruise when he tried to tell me that what he personally would pay for something is fair market value. he turned the argument around so that he said something different so I unleashed the wrath of Megan on him. Apparently people dont usually stand up to him...but I wasn't gonna let that happen. I basically told him what an asshole he is and how people dont like always being attacked everytime they open their mouth. A few other words were said. He quickly shut up after that. He doesn't argue with me anymore. Back to posting..

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