The city also had the "2009 Parade of Elephants"-differently designed elephants in all parts of the city, I took quite a few pics of a lot of them but here is one of the funniest ones, I think its name was "KISS":
The hotel was literally 4 beds in a room and a tiny bathroom. After lunch we decided to head to the Van Gogh museum which was incredible - it was interesting to learn more of his story and see some of his original works in person, except it brought me back to my Art 1 days and how I "earned" a B as a junior...
When we checked into the hotel I grabbed a free guide book and noticed one of the attractions was the "House of Bols - the ultimate cocktail and genever experience." Emma was craving a cocktail after walking around the Van Gogh museum and conveniently enough the House of Bols was across the street! We arrived at 5:45 just wanting to grab a drink at the bar and we found out it was more of a museum type deal where you have a short independent tour and the bar is at the end where you get a drink and a couple tastes of the different flavored purees and their own genever (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenever). So of course we bought the tickets and had a blast finding our way to the bar as we were the only people remaining on the tour. I chose the double dutch cosmopolitan and the banana and peach flavored purees.
After 5 drinks and about 15 tastings between the 5 of us we were feeling a bit warmer and ready to go to dinner. Where would we go? (Of course I was quick enough to ask the cashier at the beginning of the tour if she had any restaurant suggestions, being a local and all, and she suggested a place called “Bazar,” which was a Middle Eastern genre where you get lots of food for a little price.) So we went to Bazar, and it was in an old, large synagogue converted to two-level restaurant – she was correct, good food and everything totaled to be less than 20 Euros a head.
After dinner we headed back to the hotel so the girls and I could freshen up a bit because they were in the same clothes since Friday morning and me because I was in the same clothes as Friday morning…! It was finally dark and we headed over to the highly anticipated red light district to see what it was really like. After one walk through it, we found a quaint little pub and we discussed what we had just witnessed because it was not quite what we had imagined and our curiosity was racing. [My thoughts: it was much more organized / commercialized than I thought, all of the girls are in buildings behind windows (doors really) with red lights above them, and if someone is interested they walk up to the door, the girl opens it and if the price is right then they close the door then the curtain…] After ten minutes of conversing we came up with the following competition (Disclaimer: this exercise was being performed strictly for educational purposes only :-) ). One of the questions we were discussing was “How much?” So we decided there was only one way to find out.
Rules:
On the back of your coaster, write down how much you think it is for each of the 3 categories:
1) Very attractive
2) Somewhat attractive
3) Unattractive
The level of attractiveness will be agreed on by the entire group before going to ask how much. The winner will be the lowest sum of the differences for each category.
I suggest you do the same and take the "Red Light District Challenge" and see how well you would have done. The answers will be at the end of the blog, so keep reading!
After this challenge we found a pub with an empty table so we went in – after about 5 minutes we realized why it was somewhat empty – because it was a karaoke bar! Did that stop us? Of course not, we ended up stealing the show and owning the microphone while we were there singing “Come on Eileen” and “Shout” and also singing louder and more accurate than the group that sang “Poker Face” and we didn’t even have a microphone. Unfortunately, they could not find “Sweet Caroline” or “Wannabe” but we still managed to have a good time with it and we have the entire ‘Shout’ performance on video, it’s hilar!
Caption: Sorry, but I just think this picture of the karaoke screen is hilarious...
We were all exhausted so we decided to head back to the hotel and almost made the guy at the front desk cry because he did not have the authority to make a decision on whether or not we were able to sleep 5 people in our room, because we checked in with 4 people – so we made up a story, walked all over him and slept 5 people in our room. (For whatever reason, they are extremely particular on the number of people in a room and we were not even allowed to take our key out of the hotel, we had to leave it at the front desk when we left.) So we paid the 30 bucks for an extra person when we checked out in the morning. We woke up early as we wanted to get some pictures by the “I Amsterdam” sign and see some more of the city before we went to the “Heineken experience” museum at noon.
Caption: Amazing feature on my camera.
The museum was definitely an “experience” and was again definitely worth the money spent. We were able to learn a bit more the evolution of the brand, how they make their beer, and were even able to make this amazing dutch video (http://heineken_singalong.bitmove.tv/bitmove/cgi/receive.jsp?uid=9A96D4E6A58DD1F27C3837859E7BE129&format=wmv)!
We stopped at a McDonald's on the way home and it tasted exactly the same, and their American meal of the week was the "Chicago Works." We then drove back to Belgium and the drive was full of traffic and heavy rains so it took longer than expected but Hugo was nice enough to drive us by the world Expo Atonium and take some pictures of us in the rain!
And now what we have all been waiting for… the results from the educational exercise. Well the big winner in our group was Jessie. She was an amazing $5 off:
Official Results, total difference:
1) Jessie - $5
2) Hugo - $30
3) Matt - $140
4) Emma - $155
5) Jaclyn - $325
Needless to say we gave Jaclyn a bit of a hard time. So the answers you are waiting for:
1) Very attractive = $50
2) Somewhat attractive = $50
3) Unattractive = $25
Total - $125
* The asterisk on this incredibly unofficial study was that there were no questions on service provided and that is something that we had no desire to tackle...!* Overall, phenomenal weekend in a beautiful city.
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