Amsterdam: Saturday and Sunday

Saturday

I woke up at 7:30am and sleepily rode the bus, the train, and the metro to Copenhagen Airport. At 9:30am, I met up with Jaimie and we went through security EASILY (compared to America) and then we went to Starbucks and I got a Pumpkin Spice Latte (which I had been craving since all the posts on Pinterest are fall-themed and delicious-looking) and a bacon-egg sandwich . Then we met up with Madhuri and we waited in the hallway because they don't open up the gate until pretty much right before boarding.

I slept through the 1 hour flight from CPH to AMS (Amsterdam Schiphol Airport).

We took a half-hour train ride to Amsterdam Central Station...

And it's beautiful!

Jaimie is on the left and Madhuri is in the middle.

We walked around a bit until we found our hostel. It's a Christian hostel and there are paintings of "God Loves You" and there are bible readings and prayers at night. We didn't go to any of them.

This is our room. 16 beds.

I got the top bunk like always.

The courtyard.

And we were in the Red Light District, so the Sex Palace was at the end of our street.

We had sandwiches from this cute cafe for lunch, and then we bought fruit for dinner from the grocery store.

Then we planned extensively so that we could fit in everything we wanted to in three days.

Sunday

The hostel served a really good breakfast - crepes (they call them pancakes), or muesli and yogurt, or bread and jam. I, of course, picked pancakes. And we get a free hot drink so I got a mocha, but they make it with melted chocolate so I was eating little bits of chocolate as I drank.

It's not buffet style, so we only get one serving, but it was a pretty big portion.

This is the cafeteria.

And this is Oliver the female cat who lives at the hostel and isn't super friendly but who let me pet her often enough for me to be happy. Madhuri and Jaimie don't like cats so they thought I was weird and gross.

Going to the flea market!

And we passed by the tulip market, and besides tulip bulbs, they also sold things like marijuana seeds and cannabis lollipops.

Walked by the National Monument.

We were going to pay for an hour long cheese and wine tasting, but we decided to do our own free version instead and then we bought some delicious cheese.

Lunch at a cafe called Piqniq!

I got a mocha (they didn't know what it was, but told me they'd figure out how to make it) and croquettes and an Italian sandwich.

We were doing a self-guided walking tour of the Jordaan (Your-don) neighborhood from a TripAdvisor app. One of the stops was a cafe that supposedly makes the best apple tart (basically it was apple pie) and we ate it so fast I didn't get a picture.

We saw a lot of canals, haha.

Jaimie and I saw the Anne Frank house, Madhuri had already seen it with her mom, and it was really amazing.

This is the outside of the museum/house.

I remember reading her diary when I was younger, but I guess I had forgotten about the part where she dies in a concentration camp one month before the liberation. Her dad was the only survivor and he's the one that made sure her diary and other writings were published and that the house was kept almost the same so that people would be able to see it like we did. The museum had videos of people that survived the camps and of Otto Frank (Anne's dad) and Anne's friends and it was a pretty moving experience.

For dinner, I had a chicken and tomato and four cheese crepe.

Then we bought some sangria and went out on a walking tour of the Red Light District in action.

Sex Palace

Theatre Casa Rosso - most hoppin' place for a "live show"

More live shows...

We couldn't take pictures of the prostitutes but it was actually very interesting to see. Red lights everywhere. Our hostel's street had a lot, too. The women and men are of every shape, size, and color.

And then we went to a club to dance. It was far away from the Red Light District.

It was Sunday night, so I was kind of surprised to see it so packed. We had to show our IDs to get in and we just danced for two or three hours. I think a few guys were checking us out but only about three guys tried to talk to us and no one was dirty dancing/grinding because Europe is...classier than that?

I went home and showered and by the time I went to bed it was 3:30am.