Due to the holiday nature of this excursion, a good deal of these pictures were taken with a highly portable point & shoot camera. Not much time or inclination to walk several miles taking photos with a heavy camera around my neck. Hope the photos don’t look too ‘holiday snaps’.
On arriving in Amsterdam, getting soaked and finally finding the hotel, took a few hours to walk around the city (but only because I couldn’t check into the hotel and sleep for the day). Maybe it was a bit of a harsh introduction to such depravity for an innocent young fella like me, but I was mentally scarred the first day after walking around the red light district and viewing the many varied windows that apparently only came out at night.
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The above is a view from more or less outside the hotel on the fringes of the red light district; a sea of sex shops (complete with the hugely hygenic ‘booths’), window dressing (or undressing would probably be more appropriate), crack dealing hoore pimps and homeless people with perfect English. Never in one hour have I had hard drugs offered to me so much. Every few seconds you’d hear a little whisper in your ear, the funniest of which had to be “Hey man, cocaine ecstacy? Is good for the sex!” Eh no. I’m perfectly happy with the soft stuff, if only by that I mean getting knocked on my arse by the rotten stench of hash every time you pass a coffee shop. Having said that though they do sell the most magnificent muffins. Odd flavour but hugely pleasing after savouring for several minutes. After some enquiries, it seems unlikely that I’ll be able to source said muffins in Ireland. How unfortunate. The whole red light district had me feeling rather uneasy for the first few days, but that’s possibly because I’m not used to the whole thing. I’m sure if I went back there (raging drunk) I’d have a simply splendid outing.
The rest of the city was a complete mirror opposite. Well, almost complete. There were tacky souvenir shops a plenty and of course I had to visit every single one of those no less than twice. There was a certain degree of shopping undertaken as I searched for other things to do. The famous flower market was, although seemingly not in full bloom, quite a nice sight.
Image may be NSFW.
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One thing that disturbed me greatly was the price of the beer. For the week I drank mostly Heineken, which averaged out at roughly €5.50 per half litre (in metric world). It even rose to €6.50 in one place, but we only went back there, ohh three times or so. Teasers. A pub to be reviewed if ever there was one. I feel that myself and Eoin should go on a fact finding mission to Amsterdam solely to review Teasers. Although the drink is pricey, I can’t help but feel that you’re also paying for the entertainment.
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Above you can see quite a conservatively dressed Teasers girl. The rest of them, I can only presume, either do not know what the Dutch translation for ‘conservative’ is or don’t care. I certainly didn’t care! So to recap; visit Teasers, where you’ll be served by half naked women while watching more half naked women dancing suggestively atop the bar. If all that doesn’t fill you with a wonderful sense of stiffness, you can also partake in a ritual known as a ‘bodyshot’, a term which confused me greatly up to this point. I don’t think I need to explain it. I’ll just say that if you’re going to get one, have €25 at the ready and make sure you get the first one of the night. Otherwise, contracting a communicable disease is a huge possibility.
In the days that followed came an orgy of shopping, dining out and generally taking it easy. Nothing really that warrants an extra paragraph. I did venture to Rotterdam on one rainy day but I’ll cover that in the next post. Speaking of rain, it did rain on and off for the first few days which didn’t lend itself very well to photography. Thankfully in the last few days it was quite nice and I even managed to leave the hotel without raincoat and umbrella. Perhaps spring isn’t the ideal time to visit a country below sea level?
Would I go back there? I’d wait until the weather gets nicer and perhaps then only for a couple of days. A long weekend of drinking and general sexual mayhem perhaps…
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
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