Only skinny people live in Amsterdam

Confused? Have you seen the houses in Amsterdam?

Let me start from the beginning.

When my friend Frei from Thailand told me she was coming home to The Netherlands for a month, I immediately booked a flight.

I mean, we have the same birthday – how could I not go!

This was the husband’s first time to Amsterdam, so he was quite excited. I had been twice before so already knew how to blend in…..

It is easy to say the Amsterdam is merely a city of sin and partying. And it is. But there is also so much more to it.

We spent a day with Frei, walking the canals and taking a boat tour. The city is a zig zag of canals and narrow alleys, with houses, offices, ‘coffee shops’ and of course normal coffee shops.

Frei made me try raw herring….apparently it’s a ‘thing’….

This time around it was the houses that fascinated me. Back in the day you paid for property based on how wide your front entrance was, hence a lot of the houses are rather skinny. Rumour has it that the smallest house is only 1.8m wide.

All the houses are built on poles in the ground to help with movement and flooding. I say help because the basements regularly flood and almost all the buildings have a lean. Most of the city is below sea level, with the airport being 3m below! The houses also have a hook outside at the top of the house to use as a pulley to get furniture into a house. Ingenious!

See why only skinny people can live here

Despite having visited Amsterdam twice before I still hadn’t made it to the Anne Frank House. If you have ever seen the queue there you will understand why. Thankfully, husband had managed to get me a ticket (the only one left!) for Sunday. It was fascinating. The annex (house) is unfurnished making the story even more real. It is very well done, with videos, photos and diary excerpts throughout the house. At the end you can even see real diary pages. Sorry, no photos allowed.

We also got cultured and did a wine and cheese tasting (YUM) and found a festival.

For those of you curious about the ‘alternative’ Amsterdam, yes, you can just walk in to a coffee shop and buy weed. It is everywhere and as such, is not a huge problem for them. In fact, not so many Dutch people do drugs, it’s mainly the tourists. Often tourists on bucks nights.

I have never seen a city with so many groups of men dressed in the same outfit, feeling the need to advertise their upcoming night of debauchery. Drinking from breakfast till they pass out. It does make for entertaining people watching though.

It is the same situation with the ladies of the night – it seems to be the tourists (I’m looking at you England and Germany) who are most interested. Tourists can easily wander through the Red Light District and look into the windows of ladies in their underwear on their phone or doing their nails. It is said if you stop to take photos they will chase you down the street…needless to say I wasn’t taking the chance!

Amsterdam, again you were amazing. Frei, where are we meeting next time?