Level 3: Amsterdam, night 1.
Mar. 31st, 2002 10:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
unbibiumFirst, my last meal in France: I go to some random place outside the train station advertising that it sells sandwiches. Most of the good bread and fruit shops are closed. So I order a "poulet frite" sandwich. I don't see a price posted for drinks, so I ask how much for a bottle of water and the immigrant behind the counter can't understand me in any language, so I give up. Yes, though, chili sauce sounds good. I take the sandwich, gee, it's heavy, and leave for the train station to get my ticket and drink.
I sit down on the bench and open the bag, gee it's shaped funny. Ah. They fried a complete chicken leg, bones and all, sharing a ten-inch sandwich bun with a handufl of French fries.
Well, the chicken was good. The fries were OK. Coulda used a napkin. But for those of you outside the United States, my primary complaint is that my friend has misunderstood the point of a sandwich. You're supposed to be able to hold it in one hand and just take bites out of it until nothing is left.
The train ride went without incident... a connection here, a brief conversation there, people getting up, sitting down, etc...
I get on the tram and get off at what some other tram-riders tended to agree was Vondelpark. I get off the tram, and there's no friendly map telling me where I am like there would be in Paris. I have truly reached Level 3. I would have to ask for help.
So, I find a cafe somewhere, and ask the bartender for some help. The customer at the bar seems quite eager to help, and grabs the phone book to try and find the address I give him. Since he was going in the same direction, he walked me there. He told me that actually a couple of nights ago, he met a Japanese tourist at that same bar who spoke very little English and actually couldn't find a room in any hostel whatsoever. And he spoke very little English, and of course no Dutch or German. He ended up letting him stay at his place that night. Looks like this is a pretty hospitable town.
I showed up here, and boy is this place ever swank. A huge lobby, an elevator and spiral staircase behind a huge common area and front desk on my left, a bank of pay phones and the bustling hostel bar-restaurant on the right. My room has five beds, with its own shower and bathroom, and I can stay for four nights as long as I change rooms tomorrow morning. A breeze compared to what I went through in France. The only thing that was missing was a laundry.
While doing Laundry I met an American woman who was here with her two roommates. She found her current hostel through, surprise, one of those runnners I heard about in Paris. Apparently a charming little family bought some extra apartments to rent out to backpackers, and they were staying there for an indeterminate amount of time. She invited me back to her room to hang out while our laundry was getting done, and their place is like a tiny apartment for the three of them. Her roommates were asleep in the far room, her bed was in the near room by the fireplace, and there was a kitchen. She introduced me to her napping roommates, and, well I kind of did a duh by rehashing the old couldn't-find-rooms-in-Paris story. Don't know whether that was good or bad; on the one hand it's not a good first-impression sort of story, and on the other hand they went to London and Paris as well so maybe they could appreciate it. I would have been better off telling them about all the wonderful things that happened in London. We walked back to the laundry, our stuff wasn't done, she left to go home and take a shower and that's the last I saw of her.
So I work my way back to the hostel.... a lot of people seem to know that I mean the youth hostel when I ask for Vondelpark. This place must be notorious.
Right now the bustling bar and restaurant is behind me. I arrived just too late to order food here, so I had to dip out and get a burger and mayo fries.
Boy, are there a lot of canals and bikes. I should rent a bike and take a boat tour.
Might not hurt to go into the bar and talk to people... but, well, it's loud and not the environment in which I function best. But, no guts, no glory.
But first, another few euros worth of websurfing to calm my nerves....
I sit down on the bench and open the bag, gee it's shaped funny. Ah. They fried a complete chicken leg, bones and all, sharing a ten-inch sandwich bun with a handufl of French fries.
Well, the chicken was good. The fries were OK. Coulda used a napkin. But for those of you outside the United States, my primary complaint is that my friend has misunderstood the point of a sandwich. You're supposed to be able to hold it in one hand and just take bites out of it until nothing is left.
The train ride went without incident... a connection here, a brief conversation there, people getting up, sitting down, etc...
I get on the tram and get off at what some other tram-riders tended to agree was Vondelpark. I get off the tram, and there's no friendly map telling me where I am like there would be in Paris. I have truly reached Level 3. I would have to ask for help.
So, I find a cafe somewhere, and ask the bartender for some help. The customer at the bar seems quite eager to help, and grabs the phone book to try and find the address I give him. Since he was going in the same direction, he walked me there. He told me that actually a couple of nights ago, he met a Japanese tourist at that same bar who spoke very little English and actually couldn't find a room in any hostel whatsoever. And he spoke very little English, and of course no Dutch or German. He ended up letting him stay at his place that night. Looks like this is a pretty hospitable town.
I showed up here, and boy is this place ever swank. A huge lobby, an elevator and spiral staircase behind a huge common area and front desk on my left, a bank of pay phones and the bustling hostel bar-restaurant on the right. My room has five beds, with its own shower and bathroom, and I can stay for four nights as long as I change rooms tomorrow morning. A breeze compared to what I went through in France. The only thing that was missing was a laundry.
While doing Laundry I met an American woman who was here with her two roommates. She found her current hostel through, surprise, one of those runnners I heard about in Paris. Apparently a charming little family bought some extra apartments to rent out to backpackers, and they were staying there for an indeterminate amount of time. She invited me back to her room to hang out while our laundry was getting done, and their place is like a tiny apartment for the three of them. Her roommates were asleep in the far room, her bed was in the near room by the fireplace, and there was a kitchen. She introduced me to her napping roommates, and, well I kind of did a duh by rehashing the old couldn't-find-rooms-in-Paris story. Don't know whether that was good or bad; on the one hand it's not a good first-impression sort of story, and on the other hand they went to London and Paris as well so maybe they could appreciate it. I would have been better off telling them about all the wonderful things that happened in London. We walked back to the laundry, our stuff wasn't done, she left to go home and take a shower and that's the last I saw of her.
So I work my way back to the hostel.... a lot of people seem to know that I mean the youth hostel when I ask for Vondelpark. This place must be notorious.
Right now the bustling bar and restaurant is behind me. I arrived just too late to order food here, so I had to dip out and get a burger and mayo fries.
Boy, are there a lot of canals and bikes. I should rent a bike and take a boat tour.
Might not hurt to go into the bar and talk to people... but, well, it's loud and not the environment in which I function best. But, no guts, no glory.
But first, another few euros worth of websurfing to calm my nerves....
