Nov 09 Survey - Amsterdam

I've been back for over 2 weeks now and still haven't written anything about Amsterdam. But know that, if Biscarrosse made me want to quit on the spot, Amsterdam made me re-fall in love with traveling and really excited for wherever the next survey will be. When people ask me about my favorite surveys, I usually differentiate between cities I most enjoyed while on-site, cities I would go back to on my own dime, and cities that I am grateful I had the opportunity to visit (i.e. that I most likely could not visit on my own since visas are really difficult to obtain). Amsterdam wins on all counts--although it's in the Schengen Area so accessibility isn't an issue. It’s the first city I’ve surveyed that I can really see myself living in. And it’s only three hours from Brussels by train, which made me constantly ask why we hadn’t come more often as a family (which apparently we did but I just don’t remember). Before this survey, I only had two concrete memories of Amsterdam: visiting the Anne Frank House as a child and coming to a Brown acceptance party with the Benelux Alumni as a senior in High School over 8 years ago. For all intensive purposes, Amsterdam was a completely new city for me.

One of many canals.

I felt at ease in Amsterdam in a way that I haven’t with previous surveys. It’s very… European… in a familiar way… with lots of canals… and Europeans… The only thing that took some getting used to was crossing the street as there are three different road systems that overlap each other. Clearly you have the roads for the cars, and then on the sides you have bike-lanes (which are really a whole second set of roads) and then overlapping all of this you have the tram lines. So crossing the street is no longer a simple exercise of looking both ways for cars, but now bikes and trams and taking into account the different speeds that they all move at and having eyes in the back of your head for the rogue biker that chooses to ride on the sidewalk in the opposite direction and then getting to the other side and realizing that you’re actually in the bike-lane and not back on the sidewalk quite yet. So really, the same rules that you use to cross the street in Africa apply here as well, namely Be Aware and Do Not Hesitate. And when I’m talking about bikers, there are swarms of them whizzing by, with equally unsafe mobile texting habits as car drivers. There are at least a dozen at any given intersection, none of them wearing helmets. But the whole system works surprisingly well… it’s like a chaotic conveyor belt where everyone seems mostly aware of their surroundings and are able to flow with and cross traffic without getting hurt. And given the organization of the city center, the best way to get around is by foot, tram, or bike. Leave your car at home.

The Mask (guy in orange), Death, and Darth Vader in Dam Square.

I think it also helped that we have an office in Amsterdam. I got to meet those colleagues for the first time and they were very helpful with suggestions on outlets and telephone calls in Dutch. Their presence gave me a sense of grounding that other survey cities lack: I wasn’t isolated in a foreign place. And people are so friendly in Amsterdam that I was randomly befriending strangers throughout the week. I mean, half of the streets of Amsterdam Centrum are populated by tourists, all consulting the same maps, using the same points of reference. People are open and approachable. Amsterdam reminded me of how positively spontaneous travel can be—something that I felt was missing in my last few surveys. It was the best possible way to end this survey.

I amsterdam, in front of the Rijks Museum, which is currently under renovation and only exhibiting a portion of its exhibit.