Wow. Take a deep breath. Actually, don’t do that. You never know what you might be breathing in…
As I walked into my hostel bombarded by the smell of burning hash, I wasn’t sure what I had gotten myself into. Not being into the whole drug and prostitution scene, walking around in such an atmosphere was not the most enjoyable thing in the world. It didn’t take long to realize, though, that there is much more to Amsterdam than the “legal” activities.
Canals run all through the city, with top heavy buildings leaning out into the streets at every corner. There are a multitude of museums, including the Van Gogh and the Anne Frank house, the two that I visited (sorry, no photos allowed). The Anne Frank house was very surreal. It’s hard to imagine how an entire family hid there for so long, and how discreet they really were. The idea of a trapdoor behind a bookshelf is something I had always thought to be such a cool idea when I was younger. However, seeing a bookshelf that not only guarded a trap door, but the lives of a family as well, shed some new light on that perspective.
The city has character, regardless of the activities you choose to participate in. Just be sure to look both ways before, during, and after you cross the road. In a city with more bikes than people, you never know when you may be a target of a maniac on wheels!