dear amsterdam

Dear Amsterdam,

If we were three 22 year old Spanish dudes, we would have hopped onto the tram heading toward Dam square, taken a pee outside in the outdoor urinal (men only) and found the closest bar possible to get drunk and head off to the red light district. We would have really whooped it up, and we may have met some greek dudes and become buddies with them and gallivanted around the city together, drunk stoned and excited to be alive.

Since we are not 22 year old Spanish or Greek dudes, we had a far different experience. The train station in Amsterdam is one of the most chaotic and confusing places we have ever been. With very heavy packs on, it was pretty stressful to try to find change to pay to go to the bathroom and then squeeze past the gate to the bathroom and somehow go pee with a large pack on. Some of us got wedged in our bathroom stalls. Some of us could not find out way our of the bathroom.

Once we figured out how to exit the bathroom and the train station, we waited in a long line for 48 hour tickets for the tram. This is the greatest gift we could have ever given ourselves, Amsterdam, because the tram is really the only way to go from one end of the city to the other without wandering aimlessly behind drunk Spanish dudes and hundreds and hundreds of tourists from all over the world.

The thing is, Amsterdam, your city is teeming with history. Your canals are beautiful (the water is stank) and even though many of the buildings lining the canals are sinking, we think the architecture is beautiful. Personally, I enjoyed buying Heineken from the store and taking it with me on the boat tour where we learned a lot about the city, including how much litter people put INSIDE OF THE CANALS while they are on boat tours.

We walked your streets, got lost, saw the sights, teared up a bit in the Anne Frank HUIS and were well informed at the Van Gogh museum. There was a tender moment in Dam square (our least favorite place) when a white guy (Canadian? American?) with a guitar played “Wish you were here” and sang into a microphone and a swaying crowd gathered around him as the sun set behind the Madame Tussaud wax museum, but then he began singing a song by the band “Bush” and lost our attention, just like you did Amsterdam, when you really laid it out straight for us and we still had no idea.

We admire your progressive approach to marijuana and sex work, but the bottom line is that you, ciudad de Amsterdam, were a lot to handle in two days. We may never come back, but if we do, I only hope it is in our next life when we are reborn as three teenagers from Grenada just looking for a crazy weekend away from home.

Love,
Pam, Allison and Jennifer