A Girl From New Amsterdam Visits Amsterdam

Let me state the obvious - the "illustrious" or "depraved" (depending on the person) scent of marijuana is prevalent throughout the city at all times.

Sure, I knew there'd be "coffee shops" where weed was legal to buy and smoke, but I had no idea how many of them there would be.

Interspersed between sagging narrow brownstones with ornate gable tops, were thousands of randomly themed coffee shops, varying from a safari to Picasso.

In general, the streets seemed littered with XXX shops, places to buy shrooms or weed, and of course, those red lit windows.

Don't get me wrong though - I thoroughly enjoyed Amsterdam. Because of all the history and the beauty of the canals themselves, it doesn't feel like a sinful place, although some may write it off as one.

I liked our hostel, the Meeting Point, just fine - perhaps that's because of the mantra ingrained in my head from Oktoberfest, "Anything is better than camping in the cold." The Meeting Point's interior was extraordinarily ordinary and served it's purpose - a warm place to crash. The location, however, was anything but ordinary. Welcome to the infamous Red Light District.

Although half-naked women beckoning men from their windows lacks subtlety, the Red Light District wasn't as terrifying as I imagined it to be. Despite the overt sexuality and undertones of misogyny, the area seemed so touristy and gentrified that I felt pretty safe.

The only time I did not feel safe, was at night, when a drunken man handcuffed to an Oompa Loompa said to a prostitute, "No deal - he comes with me; it's a two for one deal."

Ok, I still felt safe, I just wanted an excuse to share that little anecdote.

Of course we saw some cultural icons like the Foam photography museum (it gave me TONS of ideas for photos I have no means to produce! Let's talk Aunt Helen!!!!), the Van Gogh museum (cool, but overpriced), and took a ride on a canal bus.

We'll be headed back to Amsterdam in November, for Supperclub (thanks for telling me about it Uncle Peter and Aunt Kathy), a classical concert, and who knows what else...

Next Weekend's Destination: classy Monaco!

Lederhosen and Camping in 0 Degrees Celsius! (Opening Weekend of the 175th Oktoberfest)

DISCLAIMER: My experience in Munich/Oktoberfest was shrouded by a dense haze of perpetual drowsiness and a sinus infection, so keep that in mind as you read on.

People in Munich are too hardcore, they chug Jager and liters, or "steins," of beer at 6am. I do not condone this behavior. It makes me nauseous to even think about it. I think that's because I'm not a guy.

Maybe the people in Munich want to be in a hazy state of drunkenness at all hours, because their city is so depressing.

I think Munich’s name in German (München) is a lot cuter than Munich itself. Munich is so gray and monochromatic – until you reach Oktoberfest.

Oktoberfest is like your state fair, only a more cracked-out, drunken version.

There was a main drag with different food stands, which were decorated really vividly and campy (see pictures below), but the food inside those stands was another story. I simply don't have a taste for German food. A whole fish with a slice of bread around it, disguised as sandwich, just doesn’t do it for me.



^This is a food tent^


The key attraction was naturally the 14 beer tents scattered throughout the festival. I naively thought that they were going to be real tents, but they turned out to resemble giant warehouses on the outside, and nicely decorated cafeterias on the inside.



^A Beer Tent^



^Inside the tent^



Each tent had a different theme, but I don't know much about them, because I wasn't very concerned with drinking beer. Here's a link to the official site if you're curious about the themes: http://www.oktoberfest.de/en/03/

My friends and I got there at 7am, and thought we’d certainly be able to get a seat. WRONG. The tents were all full by the time we got in, although we were pretty far ahead in the line. We didn’t know we’d be seatless as we waited in the cold, back-to-front with strangers until the tents opened at 10am. Waiting outside one of the beer tents was like getting pushed around at a concert in Roseland Ballroom. It was torturous, but kind of fun to a degree.

The sheer volume of people at Oktoberfest was insane (and I thought the amount of people at the NY State Fair was bad enough!). Attempting to walk against the traffic of people would be truly stupid, but didn’t stop me from trying.


I’d estimate that about 75% of the people who attended beerfest, were dressed in lederhosen and dirndl skirts.

OH and if you were wondering, I didn't dress in the traditional garb (regrettably).


My friends and I spent the night at a campsite a few miles away, called Wies n’ Camp. We had a ton of fun, except for the fact that it was about 20 degrees (NOT CELCIUS) at night and we each had one thin blanket. Needless to say, we didn’t do much sleeping and soon became delusional.

We were supposed to camp out for two nights, but we could only take one freezing night, so we left early. We arrived at the train station, Munich HBF, at 10pm. After a flurry of confusion and false information, we discovered that our train didn’t leave until 3:40am.

We entertained ourselves by observing the characters at the station and talking about politics and hot celebrities, for good measure. We even tried to walk around Munich, but it was so cold and the only buildings we passed were strip clubs – not very enticing.

My favorite character at the station was the friendly (and very drunk) Bavarian guy who sat down next to us on the floor and began asking us questions like why our troops were in Afghanistan. Even though he was asking some pretty heavy questions, he seemed really light-hearted. Maybe it was due to the fact that he wasn’t really sitting with us, he was lying on the floor with his (hairy) midriff showing and he looked like he was posing like a pinup girl from the 40s.

The train ride back wasn’t as excruciating as I thought it would be, because I was passed out the entire time.

To sum it up, the trip was grueling, but fun and I’m glad I experienced it with the people I did.

This was our first major excursion, and keeping that in mind I’d say we did pretty well for ourselves.

Next weekend’s destination – Amsterdam!

A Testament to My Vanity

Ah, the joys of packing. Rather, the joys of cramming a semesters worth of your crap into two suitcases.