It's good to be back. :) But let me talk about Amsterdam for a bit.
I took so many photographs in Amsterdam that if I tried to upload them all into this one blog entry, I'd probably have people threatening to dismember me via email or something. So I'll probably just post a few here and then publish the rest on Facebook. (In fact, that is just what I did. You can view the public album here.) Besides, from only a few photographs you can already get an idea of what Amsterdam is like--vibrantly energetic even given the overcast skies and rainy weather, packed with an incredibly diverse international population, riddled with tons of canals and bridges, and apparently a Mecca for cyclists everywhere. I nearly got hit by three different cyclists on three different occasions, which of course is my own fault; this city is very much set up for bike riding with tons of specially designed bike paths, though that doesn't keep vespas
off them, or the bikes off the footpaths or the main roads.
I explored three roads mainly: Damrak, part of which is pictured here, Rokin, which Damrak turns into, and Spui. I didn't have a huge amount of time on my hands to explore, actually, since a good deal of my time was spent sorting out what I would look at in the city, buying a train ticket, etc. Damrak sports an incredible amount of personality though, and affords a pretty fantastic view of Amsterdam central station if you feel like turning around to admire it (which I did, of course). There are tons of shops and restaurants, which is no surprise because this is a large city, after all, but I was surprised by the number of Argentinian places I saw while wandering around.
I thought about checking out the museums, possibly taking the canal tour, but I always tend to do better in these situations if I'm just allowed to set my own pace and given my own space to roam--so that is exactly what I did. My friend Richard suggested that I look at the Begijnhof, which was home to the beguines in the middle ages and now is home to the English Reformed Church in Amsterdam. It's hard to get away from the sounds of city life in Amsterdam; everywhere you go, you're bound to hear bike bells ringing, trams trundling along, vespa engines buzzing, people talking and laughing loudly, etc. But stepping inside the Begijnhof mutes the rest of city life. It's serene.
Its original purpose wasn't to serve as a convent in the traditional sense of the word, according to the information placard attached to the wall. The women who chose to live here were Catholic and viewed the completion of good works as essential to their faith, but found the vows that were required for nuns to be too stifling. I took this photograph from one of the other exit/entrances; I'd intended to take more, but photography and taking video footage wasn't allowed inside the courtyard. The people who live here want peace and quiet, and who am I to intrude on that?
I'm sad that I had so little time to spend in this city, and sadder still about the circumstances that brought me to it. Part of me wonders if I should be so grateful for this experience if, in order to have it, my grandmother had to pass away, but that is only in my more maudlin moments. I know that if my grandmother were alive to hear me thinking these thoughts, she'd shut me up immediately and tell me to enjoy all these opportunities, because this is exactly what she wanted for me. I'm going to do my best to honor her memory by throwing myself wholeheartedly into these adventures, and I refuse to have regrets.
And I am definitely, definitely going back to Amsterdam one day. :)