Amster - scam

30.05.2006

Hello everyone!

Yes, yes I know it's been awhile. I've just been having way too much fun!

This weekend we went to Amsterdam and Jolanda and I met up with Erin from Canada who's on co-op in Germany. We had tons of fun and stayed at Jolanda's uncle's place who is only 26 and well... gorgeous. Haha. E-ron and I:

So here we were in Amsterdam shopping in the markets and I see this stand specializing in tea... and I think to myself, ".I have a friend who likes tea!" So I go in there and I buy some loose tea mix and a metal tea thinger that you put the tea in and then ya put in the water. Following?

Everything is peachy until I see Jolanda and show her what I bought. She takes a double glance at the package and suddenly bursts into laughter, "You bought BATHSALTS" she manages to get out between gusts of laughter. So basically, I was going to poison my friend with bathsalts instead of tea, cool. We ended up going back to the shop where Jolanda explained to the shopkeeper that I didn't understand Dutch, watched the shopkeeper also stifle his laughter and then was able to switch the bathsalts with actual tea. Heh.

Later on that night we went to the red light district which was so surreal. Skinny little girls standing in windows the size of a door with a tiny narrow room behind them would wait for guys to come up to their window. When the curtain was shut it meant a guy was in there with them. Sex was everywhere... it was pretty crazy.

Amsterdam is jam packed with canals throughout the city, so every corner basically looks like the last with a canal thrown in just to confuse you a little bit more. It's VERY pretty though and VERY packed full of tourists and well... people.

Tall houses characterize Amsterdam and allow the city to just pack more and more people in on top of each other. The houses are so narrow that little hooks exist on the top of each roof so that you can attach a lever system to lift things to the higher Bringing a couch up those stairs would simply be impossible.

Bikes are EVERYWHERE and the older and more junky, the better. Granny bikes, they call them. Biking paths are everywhere and watch out, they have the right of way!

So I'm off to Egypt tomorrow with a 8 hour stop in the island paradise of MALTA! So hopefully I'll get out of the airport with just enough time to lie in the beautiful foreign sun! Heh.
Ah yes, and my hair is a completely different colour; getting used to it is proving to be quite difficult. I'm hoping I look a tiny bit more like an Egyptian with my hair dark, although I'm sure when I speak absolutely no Arabic they'll realize I'm just a silly North American...