Amsterdam
Hallo jeder! Here’s my weekend post for last weekend, April 1-2. I’ve been busy this week, so it’s a bit late, but I hope you enjoy it nonetheless!
After my trip to Essen (see previous post), I had a mostly normal uneventful school week. The end of March/beginning of April is time for mid-semester exams in Germany, and I took my English exam on Wednesday. English class in Germany is pretty interesting, because it shows you what it’s like to learn your own native language, and what some of the most difficult nuances are. It’s also a nice course to have because it’s very easy, of course. But it’s definitely not a beginner’s course. In Germany, English is a mandatory course, and they begin very early in elementary school. By 10th grade, which I’m in, most students are already very proficient, and have no trouble speaking English. It’s generally a very different method than in the US, where foreign language courses often are not so helpful.
After the end of a fairly normal school week, I was really looking forward to my trip on Saturday. I had planned a quick day trip to Amsterdam about a month ago, and it was finally here. Saturday morning I was up very early to go to the train station, where I met with my friends who were coming along. We all got on the train and were off by 6:30, towards Amsterdam! We arrived at 9:30, and immediately got to work exploring the city. We first walked to the St. Nicholas Cathedral, and then went into the canals to find something to eat. We stopped by a bakery, and then headed to a museum in the area. On our way, we briefly ended up in the red light district, by accident, which we thought was funny.
The museum was called “The church in the attic”, and was a preserved house-church from the 17th century. Around that time period the city fell under Protestant rule, and the practice of other religions in public was no longer allowed. So many religions built house-churches, which were completely normal houses from the outside but a fully decorated church on the inside. The museum was really interesting, and was a great glimpse into 17th century life in Amsterdam.
Afterwards we headed to Dam Square, where we saw the Royal Palace and National Monument. From there we walked to the bench where the famous scene from “The Fault in our Stars” was filmed. I haven’t actually seen the movie (and still haven’t) but it was a cool stop.
Next was the Bloemenmarkt, where they sell famous Dutch Tulips. The flower market was really big, and also very crowded. They had thousands of tulips, and the scenic location on the side of the canals was really beautiful.
From there we made our way to the Rijksmuseum, with the famous “I amsterdam” sign. We took some cool group pictures, before we went to another museum. I was really excited, because we were going to the Van Gogh Museum. It has the world’s largest collection on Van Gogh pieces, including some of his most famous, like: “The Potato Eaters”, “The Yellow House”, and many more. It was amazing to see so many famous pieces in person, and to learn more about the story behind the artist. Pictures from inside aren’t allowed, but I don’t think a photo would have done them justice anyways.
We then took a canal tour, which was also incredibly beautiful, like the rest of the city. We also took this as a photo-shoot opportunity, so we’ve got some funny photos from the canals.
Our time left in Amsterdam was starting to get pretty short, so we hurried to our final stop, a place called “De Foodhallen”. I can only really describe it as a mall food court run by hipsters. It was a big venue made up of a bunch of small stands, each making something super interesting and delicious. After much thought, I decided on a completely from scratch hot-dog, with onion rings. It tasted as good as it looked.
Finally, our day in Amsterdam was over. We were back on the train by 6:30, and we arrived in Köln before we knew it. It was sad to say goodbye to Amsterdam, because it’s such a beautiful city; but hopefully I’ll be back some day.
Sunday wasn’t too eventful; I met Sean in the city, and we briefly attended an EU rally. The generally positive outlook on the EU in Germany is very reassuring, and from here it seems like the EU is fortunately here to stay. Besides that, not too much happened Sunday.
Tschüss!
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