i meant to post a little bit more today and a picture from the ferry, but didn’t get around to it yet. i haven’t dug out the camera adapter. i got settled into the hotel at around 3:00 this morning and then basically went to sleep. i was able to hook up with greg (works for yanks abroad and former dino player). it’s difficult to hookup with people when you have no phone. you can’t call out with the phone in the hotel room. according to greg, it’s not uncommon to not have landlines in the older buildings. it’s fantastic to have greg here to show me around. he took me to an indonesian place for lunch. that’s got to be a first for me. it was excellent. then had a doner (turkish gyro, maybe?) for dinner. also excellent.
tomorrow i’m going to hopefully get up in time for the hotel breakfast and then wander around a bit and get a pass for the tram. at 13:00 i’m going to meet up with greg to play a little football in a pick up game. it’s been as long since i’ve played as i’ve driven. should be
his roommate sara, who posted some comments before, turns out to have gone to italy so it looks like i won’t get to meet her.
i have to say that you can instantly tell a drastic difference in the atmosphere between amsterdam and london or the u.s., definitely a lot more bikes.
Indonesian food rocks the house. I have a friend in Atlanta that’s half-Indonesian and he took us out to an Indonesian place one night. It blew my mind. One of the best meals I’ve ever eaten.
I read in The Thinking Fans Guide to the World Cup that the Netherlands have more bikes per capita than anywhere else in the world.
according to this brochure for a bike tours thing, there’s 1 million bikes in amsterdam which is more than the total resident population.
Ok. Amsterdam at last. We’re sure to get the debauchery now. Have your friend take some pictures, as you don’t seem to know where to point the lens
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Bring on the lewdness & debauchery. From what I hear it’s not hard to come by in Amsterdam (no pressure!). Ha!
Let us know how the pick up game goes. Should I take cleats?
bringing cleats may be a good idea. for me, it wouldn’t have been that great since i would have only used them once so far. according to greg, it sounds like there will be quite a few pickup games in germany.
re: pictures. it’s more difficult to take pictures in amsterdam because pretty much everything is photo worthy. i think it’s photo-op overload.
Are you going to try the space cake? Don’t eat cake and ride!
What is Indonesian food like? What flavors/ingredients are used to cook it? I am curious, would like to try it.
greg or someone mentioned the space cake, but i’ve forgotten what it is.
the indonesian food i had was chunks of beef in a somewhat sweet sauce. some sort of seasoned rice (not really a rice fan) and green beans mixed with corn and some other stuff. the beans were cooked in some sort of vinegar or something that kind of tasted like 3-bean salad or whatever it’s called. one other interesting thing i left off about the indonesian was at this place they had a sort of ala carte thing where they get a plate and scoop on it what you want. after each thing, the weight it. so, you only pay for what you want. i’m a big fan of this system since normally it seems like everywhere gives you a bunch of food that i don’t end up eating. this seemed especially common in england.