Monday, May 17, 2010

Canals, Tulips, Windmills and Prostitutes



Netherlands is a completely flat land full of water bodies of various shapes and sizes. At Amsterdam, they have tamed the water and constricted them to canals, but even then the city ended up with more waterways than streets. Because of the infinite canals, the streets could not take the normal rectilinear arrangement common for most cities. There was something typical about the houses too, mostly 2-4 storey-ed and with sloping tiled roofs, and placed right beside each other without any gap. And somehow they gave me the feeling as if some huge crane has placed them one by one along the streets. And by God, if all three of us weren’t having illusions, some houses were tilted outwards with respect to the ones beside them.

There is a lot of graffiti around. I guess Van Gogh will feel proud from above about his countrymen. However, a striking point, especially if you are coming from Germany is that the city is very very dirty, unlike what one might expect from an European capital city. Rubbish strewn all over the place. Bottles floating on the grey-black water, the boats and launches shoving them to the banks. Diptarka started comparing the place to Calcutta, and by the end of the day concluded that this city is dirtier.

Our diet in Amsterdam consisted mostly of French fries. Diptarka and I had the intention to try new stuff, but we didn’t want our wallets to dry up so early in our quest to conquer Europe. We tried beer at a few places though. Netherlands is the home of Heineken beer and there is a museum on its history too.

From the station, we made our way to the main square called Dam Square through the bustling crowd. Street shows were going on there. We just kept walking, keeping Madame Tussaud’s to the right, reached Waterlooplein and Rembrandtplein. Bridges are called Brugs here. Blauwe Brug and Magere Brug look especially nice at night, but the day being long, we did not have the chance to see them in artificial lights.

We made some attempts to put up for the night. Again, 36 Euros for nothing but a bed was too much for us. At Museumplein, there is the Rijksmuseum and the famous Van Gogh Museum. But after last year’s experience, I didn’t have too much taste for them left in me. There is also a museum on diamonds for which we were too late. There is something about diamonds and Amsterdam. We saw a lot of diamond stores on our way too.

Another thing for which Amsterdam is famous, is its red light area near the railway station. The area is called De Wallen, and the directions given in most places was beside the ‘Oude Kerk’, kerk in Dutch meaning church. This was some experience for me. Women wearing just bare minimums and advertising themselves through glass doors and windows opening to the streets. Fixed rate. 50 euros. One could go for live shows too. The crowd was unimaginable considering that it is not Asia. Strangely there were people of all sexes and all ages among the crowd. And here we met an Indian guy, who put us to shame by bringing his parents and cousins along with him. “I came to this place alone yesterday and liked it; so I brought them along today,” he explained.

Initially we had decided to spend the night at the station, but Pranav had made friends with Martin, a student who worked part-time at Burger King. He not only helped us get free drinking water, but also advised us to stay at the airport if we have to spend the night at some public place, as “this is the capital of the wild wild west.”

And so we headed for Schipol, where we spent a peaceful and warm night.

The next morning we went to Keukenhof. The reason why I decided to come to Amsterdam the first weekend was precisely and just this. The Keukenhof Garden – Europe’s largest, opens for just 2 months every year and 16th May was the last day for this year. I am not capable of bringing out the beauty of the garden through my words. My photographic skills are better in this respect:

An all-in-one music machine in the garden. The stack of cards are music notes of different songs which when run in the belt plays them.

After Keukenhof, Diptarka saw that he had an opportunity to show me his city albeit for a short time, and make me taste some great food too. And so I almost ran through the city, saw Aachen’s huge churches and cathedrals, in a superfast tour which also included a grand dinner of pizza and chicken. All this and I returned to the station in just an hours’ time.

Cathedral in Aachen

On reaching Heidelberg at midnight by my 13th train ride over the past 2 days, I stayed over at Deepesh’s place before returning in the morning.

No comments:

Post a Comment