Adventures in Amsterdam text and pictures by Mara Infidelious

[January 2003] 16 hour busride from Prague to Amsterdam. I'm seated next to a lady enacting a finger puppet and banana show from the bus window, hopefully to the enjoyment of someone, but I don't look to make sure (what if no-one's watching?). Later the banana disappears down her gullet, she dons her fleecy travelling slippers, emits a few satisfied grunts, and dozes off.

Czech border control, 2 old beehived ladies are called out, luckily neither of us is. Night by bus is boring. By the time it's day we're in Holland. Everything is flat and there are fields seperated by narrow irrigational canals. There are windmills too, the only real ones we'll see for the next seven days.
Amstel: we mosey on through the station and end up in a train which miraculously takes us to Centraal Station. We wander around town with our big backpacks gawking at everything and getting run over by all the byciclists. They ignore bike traffic lights and I ignore bike paths - ending in quite a few mishaps. We stop in a small "brown caf?Ä?? " for tea, the interior is all brown wood with traditionally carpeted tables to soak up spilt beer. Later, night falls and we begin to get lost. We've walked in circles for 14 hours straight with our heavy backpacks, crossing and recrossing canals. Each time ending up in the same place: A flat concrete deck that leads nowhere, but looks out on the river. Funny how Spuistraat can dissapear like that at night! We give up on Spui and finally succumb to a helpful samaritan who leads us to the cheapest hostel in town, Kabul, then mangles 10 euros out of us for the service, hissing 'I can make trouble' if we don't fork over. Kabul hostel is huge with winding staircases that get smaller and steeper as you go up, eventually becoming winding ladders which lead to tinier and tinier hidden hallways. Crooked and creaking floors, junky faux-gold frame mirrors and fascinating red carpets everywhere. You could get lost, and probably end up in a 14h century Arabic medina before finding your way out again.
It costs around 20 per night. Beds, sheets, breakfast included. First night we sleep alone. Next night we brave a 16 person dormitory. Never again. There are more mice then men and they eat half of G's bread. For the rest of the week we opt for the 6 person room. Bad enough. Noisy phlegm-spewing early morning rising toothpaste insurance salesmen. Silent creeping bald men. Mummies under sheets, you never see them, always early to bed and early to rise. When it's full (on the weekend) we've got one rancid smelling Italian (bravo fumare), one fat New Zealand Elvis, a lanky hairy Australian, and someone else whom I never saw. At night someone always passes gas. Or goes to the toilet too often.

Breakfast in a big cafeteria overlooking the river and 'Da Hotel' (once Dam Hotel I guess). One egg, four slices of bread and two little jams. Tea or coffee. Staff at Kabul are all probably from the city Kabul, and part of the same family. They are always stoned, or at least seem to be.

The rest of Amsterdam? Gates to consumer wonderland. Posh smart shops with ecuadorian shrooms for the rich yanks. Commercial coffeeshops blasting bad R&B or so-so reggae - 50 cent toilets, groovy wall paintings, hemp seed smoothies, everything to get the tourists into "Jah, Love n' Money" mode. Outside again: shops, shops, shops, canals, cars, and cheap bycicles. A man cycles by, 'wanna buy a bike?' We see him later that week selling a different bike. Then in a grand caf?Ä?? trying to sell polaroid snapshots.

We drink enough cheap pickwick at all the coffeeshops for a private Boston teaparty. Visit the museum of hemp. The Rembrandthuis. The Heineken brewery (3 free beers and a free beer glass!). The Holland Experience (cheap 3D movie about Holland, extremely corny sideeffects like "See the tulips, (get bombarded with shitty flower perfume) smell the tulips!" Moving seats, (simulates the landing of a Boeing! etc) perhaps it could have amazed someone 300 years ago but now it just seems cheap. We don't visit the Anne Frank huis. Or the Van gogh museum, too reccomended. The Museum of Modern Art contains lots of 'I don't get it' pieces (empty art films playing for empty rooms). De Ruimte gallery, lots more empty art films in empty rooms, indy style.

Killing time till night when we can go to the squat bar which opens after 9. Good cheap beer and a place to sit and recover from feeling like a chump all day. From all the voices whispering: "Coke! Extasy! LSD! Heroin!" at you from every corner. From the helpful young men who will show you the way when you get lost...for 4 euros. The Red light district. Lots of gawking tourists, for me it's just another aerobics show behind windows. Same girl each time! Curly long hair, saggy butt. Howe does she manage to move from window to window so fast?

By the end of the week we aren't walking in circles as much, and usually know where we are. Now whenever we hear "Ecstasy, coke!" we just laugh. Noone needs to show us our way for a price anymore: we wave them off - by now we can find our way alone!

Our last day we walk through Vondel park and back to the center, then drained of all energy we sink into La Canna (tourist trap coffeeshop-hotel-smartshop-etc for one night standers) where we clutch our teas for at least an hour. In the evening we visit a punk shop. Everything to fit out your rich neo-sk8erpunk! Brand new Dead Kennedys Hoodies 40 euros, hats, belt buckles, CDs, prefab patches, sk8boards....sickening. Our bus leaves at 9:30pm. We go to the supermarket to buy food for the road, and beer, it's cheap here - only .50 a can! Then we go back to Kabul to pick up our bags. Off to Centraal where we wander for half an hour until the kind policemen show us how to buy tickets for the metro. Amstel. We eat our food and drink beer. Then it's boarding time. We sleep all the way to the Czech border.

Death Metal Border Patrol

8am Czech border. Passport control. The whole busload is herded into the police barn. Our luggage is lined up in rows on the floor. We stand in rows in front of our baggage. Wow, on the wall there's an In Flames poster, never thought Czech border patrol would listen to Swedish Death metal. A policeman comes in with a poodle. This dog will sniff out all the drugs that have been hidden in the bus. It barks excitedly. This is just the first dog. One bull terrier and two german shepherds later, they turn to examine the luggage. One dog at a time they methodically sniff each bag - twice or even three times. A policewoman also sniffs the bags, and rabidly growls 'Good! Good!' when the dog finds a bag with a smell. One of the dogs is goofy and has big floppy bat ears. Goes to sniff head police commandants balls. No weed there. The police take the suspicious bags and ask us in Czech whose they are. Noone answers. He yells his question louder. "Perhaps," we wonder aloud, "you could say it in English for the tourists?" "IN CZECH REPUBLIC WE SPEAK CZECH!' And we are punished. G is strip searched but I am not. Instead I cheerily go through the contents of my bag with Head Commandant and one more. Warn them about the dirty underwear bag, when asked tell them I'm not an anarchist and only smoke tobacco. Around me there is a tumult of eager cops, all vying for attention- "I found 55 milligrams more then you!" Finally they let me back on the bus.
Sherlock Holmes comes to have a word with me. Was I sitting alone during the busride? Where was my friend, which one was he? He was sitting across from me? What where we throwing into the plastic garbage bag during the journey? Beer cans? WHAT ABOUT THE BAG OF HASH, DID WE THROW THAT IN TOO?!" I don't know. "That's all I need!" pleased as punch he recedes down the bus stairs. In the end they let everyone back on the bus, noone is sent to jail or given a fine. When the bus starts rolling G crawls under the bus seat for a joyous reunion with the Hash he'd stuck on the bottom of the seat before the border. G spent the rest of the trip scraping it off with a key. The italians in the back are just as lucky, most of their weed wasn't found either. Eventually I fall back to sleep. Wake up in Prague. It seems surprisingly sad everywhere but I'm glad to be home.

THE END