Wooden shoes and tulips

This weekend was off to Amsterdam (Holland), Netherlands. The dutch language is very guttural and I managed to only get Please and good night. No One minute Dutch is available so not really my fault. Plus every Dutch person speaks English. Almost perfect english. My phone of course updated to the distinctive windmill motif. Saw a couple off the train. A few tulips and wooden shoes at the flower market along on the canals.

Here is the Red Light District. We enjoyed a walking tour through the area with several other couples on the "Randy Roy's Red Light District tour." I cannot make this up. It was given by a long time Amsterdam resident American guide. She gave great information, a bit of history and we all had a drink afterwards. Chad and I were on the next canal and never would have known what was lurking right around the corner. The "windows" are grouped by certain characteristics (Asian, African, Silcone....). The girls are supposed to wear at least a bikini, some were quite skimpy. Think what you will of the idea of prostitution, it was kind of humorous as the bed is right there just off the window. 15 minutes for 50 Euro. Some of the "girls" are not girls at all. The oldest is 85, I know! And if a blue light is overhead, you may not have a "girl" at all, wink wink. The busiest time is actually in the morning when the wife wouldn't suspect... The government is trying to take over and one of the owners is taking notice. He bought 100 swans to put in the canal in front of his shops and parlors to spite the charge his clubs were distracting with all the lights and such. Take the tour if you can, hilarious!!!Chad and I were blessed and the Heineken Experience re-opened after a lengthy renovation just last week. Of course still some bugs to figure out in the building but here is Chad practicing his pouring skills. It was fun, and we ordered a CHEZ NICKELL customized Heineken bottle. You have to come to Paris to see it. We got an idea for our media room while there. A ceiling of bottles with 6 giant screens and projectors. Awesome. Start saving your bottles for us!

You will have to click on this picture to catch why I took it. The shop is called THE HEADSHOP. For those in the know, it sells as we say in the United States "tobacco only products." Ha haa haa. Just an homage to my fellow chemists back in Arizona and Harris County. I couldn't get up the courage to go into a coffeeshop, just would have been too weird. Smelled plenty of the marijuana on the street and past the more popular coffeeshops.

We did visit the Anne Frank house. It did strike me that her father Oskar survived Auschwitz and we were just there two weeks ago. Amazing to see the tiny space and see the original copy of the diary. We bought tickets online and missed out on standing in line in the rain. Got to love Holland weather!

We struck up a conversation after the RLD tour with a German couple. They reinterated the English as the unifying language of Europe even though there are 120 million German speakers in Europe. He especially pointed to the international sites that the British or Mother England started (Hong Kong, USA, Bombay) and then all the mass of popular culture that gets imported. MTV is number one so he thought it was very easy to pick up English. Hooray for popular culture. I stick with the fact that French is very hard, and guarded like a secret of the Templar Knights. I try!!!

And I do have to mention this. We got in to Centraal Station and got on the tram to get to our hotel. The stop we needed was Hobbemstraat, pronouced "Obama straht." We ordered Barack lattes (made with chocolate milk instead of white milk). Overall it was a very positive to be known as Americans this trip. We kept running into them as well. Too easy the night where NFL was on Satellite NFL with ice cold Heineken and Amstel. And as our German drinking buddies pointed out, the other figure to get over 200, 000 supporters this year in Germany was Pope Benedict and he is German.

Overall I like Amsterdam. Laid back and friendly people. The food was a bit odd (chocolate sprinkle sandwich aside). The Dutch special chicken offered at several restaurants was smothered in spicy peanut sauce (very similar to the Archer Farms Thai peanut sauce that Chad enjoys). Not sure how Dutch so if you have any ideas, leave it in the comments. We did give in once and got the King. The Burger King, but in our own defense we did need some grease in our tummies to settle the after effects of some ice cold beers.

Side note, no postcards will be sent from this location. Not sure why (again comment) but postcards were 1 euro a piece. With an international stamp, that comes to 1E85. A beer cost 2E15. We drank your postcards, so cheers and wish you were here!

My feet are stuck in Paris for the next whole 11 days. I will be not travelling except to my walking tours. We are officially Parisians now, our first year is up today. We officially moved this date last year. 2 to go, plan accordingly. Next week is Beaujolas Nouveau or the unveiling of the young fruity and cheap beaujolas wines. Mark your calendar!