Impulsive Trip to Amsterdam

In 1996 I left graduate school and began working for JSTOR, a digital library project, as a computer programmer.  During one of our technical team's weekly conference calls, one of the team members mentioned that he had seen "cheap airline tickets to Amsterdam."  We checked them out and found that they were $150 round trip.  After being couped up in graduate school and now finding myself with a job and some spare cash, I had a serious itch to travel.  I had never been to Europe before, but had long ago made a trip to Europe a lifetime goal.  These tickets looked to provide the opportunity with one catch, our departure date had to be sometime in the next two weeks.

I'm not one to follow my impulses.  I certainly didn't think that we could arrange this trip within a two week period of time.  Afterall, my wife, Angie, didn't even have a passport.  When I applied for my passport the year before, it took a month to actually receive it.  Passport aside, I wasn't even sure that my wife would be interested in the trip.  To my surprise, when I told her about these inexpensive tickets and asked her if she would like to go, she said, "Yes.  Let's go."  But still, how would I get her passport in time?  The next day I found information on the worldwide web on how I might obtain a passport fast!  I found all kinds of services that promised two day or less turnaround, but they were all expensive.  Then I found that there was a passport office in Philadelphia which would issue the passport on the same day that the application was submitted.  My wife and I filled out the applications, took them to the county court in Trenton, N.J. for authorization, and then I hand delivered them the next day to the passport office in Philadelphia.  After handing in the applications, I took a walk around Independance Hall and the Liberty Bell.  I found a local cafe where I sat down to eat a sandwich and read my Lonely Planet guide to Amsterdam. After lunch, when I returned to the passport office, the passport was ready.  We were headed for Amsterdam.

Our flight to Amsterdam left Newark airport early one Semptember morning and 6 hours later, we found ourselves on the other side of the Atlantic ocean in a completely foreign land.  This was the first time I had visited a country where english was not the "official" language.  This gave me some cause for concern.  Everyone told me not to worry because so many people in europe speak english.  I didn't know whether to believe them or not.  But, we found pretty quickly that english was used quite commonly.

After landing at Schiphol airport we boarded the train that would take us into the city.  On the train I saw several advertisements written in German.  Even though my two years of german were taken four years before, I found that I could read them.  It was very exciting for me to put my language studies to practical use.  It was also exciting to know that I was only a few hours away from Germany, a country I had wanted to visit since studying the language in college.  But this train was not to take us to Germany.  Our final stop was to be Centraal Station.

Stepping out of the station, we caught the tram that was to take us to our hotel.  The trams were very narrow and crowded, but also very convenient.  They ran very frequently such that if one looked just too crowded, all you had to do was wait a few minutes until the next one arrived.  On the first day we had no idea how the ticketing system worked.  Our solution to this problem was to not buy tickets, but just freeload instead.  It wouldn't be until the second day when we figured out the system of purchasing tickets and stamping them yourself.
 

We booked our three day stay at the International Budget Hotel.  We didn't particularly want to stay in a hostel and wanted to have our own room, but we also didn't want to pay very much.  Lonely Planet described the hotel as "a popular backpacker hangout in an attractive old canal house."  This sounded appropriate.  When we arrived, we found something amiss.  It was obvious on the sign for the "Hotel" that an "S" had been painted over.  Although the name said Hotel, it remained a Hostel for all practical purposes.  All the same, we did get a private room, even though we did have to padlock our belongings in long tall lockers.

Not wishing to dwell on, or for that matter at, our accomadations, we immediately went in search of some lunch.  Our neighborhood was located just outside the city Centrum in the network of canals that defined the city blocks.  Our walk carried us past many canals, locks, boats, bridges, and rowhouses.

After lunch we visited one of the city's main attractions, the Oude Kerk.  This church was built before Christopher Columbus landed in the new world.  I think the relative age of these buildings is always an impressionable concept to us Americans.  The church contains several items of interest.  The floor in large part is made up of grave stones, many of them quite ornate.  The best known is the grave of Rembrandt's first wife, Saskia.  The church also has many beautiful stained glass windows.  The windows display the coat of arms of the city's prominent families and depict scenes and symbols from the city's history.  Outside of the Oude Kerk we snapped a picture of a peculiar little truck parked on the side of a very narrow street.

Our next stop was the Old City Hall, now the Royal Palace.  This is Queen Beatrix's official residence, but she spends most of her time in the Hague.  Although the courtyard in front of the palace was very busy, we didn't find any people actually entering the building for tours.  The church next to the palace is the Nieuwe Kerk, through which we also did not take a tour.  Well, time was short.  Behind the Royal Palace was an enormous building called Magna Plaza.  This used to be a huge post office, but is now a modern shopping mall.  On the inside it was very similar to american malls with department stores, music stores, shoe stores, and the like.

The next day our schedule was more organized.  We decided to tour the Rijksmusem in the morning and then take a bus tour in the afternoon.  The Rijksmuseum is the city's museum of classical art containing national art archives.  The museum has several Rembrandt and other period paintings.  When we visited there was an exhibition of watercolors and drawings by the american artist Winslow Homer.

Later that day we took a bus tour to a Delftware factory and to the Hague.  This small Delft factory was actually located in the town of Delft.  I'm sure you are familiar with deftware, although you may not be familiar with the name.  Delftware are white ceramics with blue designs.  This was a form of pottery making copied from the Chinese during colonial times.  Our final stop on the bus tour was at the U.N. courts in the Hague.  This is where international war crimes are prosecuted.  At the time we were there, the gardens in front of the building were in full bloom.  You can see the influence of Andrew Carnegie, benefactor of this building, in the architectural design.  Also located in the Hague are more royal palaces, including the Knight's residence.

Altogether it was a great trip, even if it was organized at the last minute.  Not bad for a first taste of Europe.  It also turned out to be pretty good preparation for our trip to Germany which was to follow two years later.