amsterdam: anything goes.

after spending three days in rob, timmy and oskar's hometowns, we packed up and headed out to amsterdam for the weekend. duncan and harry, two guys who were on my fiji trip, flew over from the UK to join us... for less than 24 hours! we all stayed in an amazing hotel located across the street from central station. we had the most perfect location, as everything was nearby. dunky and harry stayed in a big suite, while the bromance and i crammed into one room... with one bed! i believe the concierge thought i was a bit... loose. in a span of about 30 minutes, i checked into the hotel with "mr. sundberg" (timmy), ran through the lobby to give harry and dunky a hug and kiss, and walked out holding hands with rob. the concierge even winked at me as we departed for the evening! haha. oops. with less than 24 hours to site see, we had a VERY crammed night/day!

-sex museum. single-handedly the most disturbing museum i've ever seen! 8 ft. tall penis chairs, pictures of porn printed from the internet and taped to walls, animated statues that flash you and give each other oral sex, "fetish" rooms... oh man. we had been walking through the streets when i saw a giant sign that said, "sex museum."

me: does that sign really say 'sex museum?' let's take a picture!

dunky: let's go in!

and then the boys all walked in, leaving me on the street. definitely entertaining, although i'm pretty sure i blushed the entire time we were there.

-following the sex museum, we hit up a couple bars... where i had to remind the boys that my drinking capabilities weren't quite up to par with theirs. as much as i appreciate them buying me rounds, i definitely can't drink 2 pints at every bar!

-dinner in the red light district... at a south american restaurant with a porn shop on one side and a sex toy shop on the other. very random.

-exploration of the red light district. i was under the impression that all the girls would be beautiful!... so not the case. luckily, the boys just looked and nothing more :) if you look too long though, the girls start trying to seduce you into their room. seeing oskar's face after a prostitute grabbed her (DD) boobs and rubbed them on the window was pretty priceless.

-more bars.

-me convincing (some) of the boys that a 40 euro "live sex show" was entirely unnecessary. the guy at the door told me that they even have "big wangs for the ladies," but that just wasn't quite enticing enough to get me through those black curtains.

-more bars. drunky dunky even got into a dance off with another guy... and a random guy bought me beer!

-coffeeshop. earlier in the night, dunky had asked the other boys if we should skip the coffeeshops. not knowing the lingo, i said, "nooo, if we see a starbucks, can we make a stop??" the boys nearly peed in their pants. apparently "coffeeshop" is code for "place where you can legally buy marijuana." silly me. duly noted. of course, we had to make a stop... but only one person actually made a purchase. such good boys.

-a long trek to some other part of town and more bars.

-sleep!

-brunch.

-canal boat tour. we floated past the anne frank house and many other famous locations. unfortunately we were all pretty sleepy, so we lost interest pretty fast.

-heineken museum. SO cool! very hands-on, with lots to see and do. the free beers throughout the tour were an added bonus. the tour left us all with an intense desire to drink heineken and buy accessories stamped with the red star and green logo. very savvy marketing.

-after the heineken museum, we said goodbye to dunky and harry. they left for their flight and the bromance and i went out to one last dinner together. after dinner, timmy and oskar left for home and rob and i spent one more night in amsterdam. very chill though... no more sex museums!

saying goodbye to the boys was incredibly difficult. i must've looked like quite a mess at the airport, as FIVE different people stopped to ask me if i was okay! it will be so strange at union college without them. however, hopefully i'll be back visiting holland soon or they'll be headed stateside for a computer science internship! oskar already booked a ticket back to oz to visit for a month in july/august. now i just have to win the lottery so i can get rob and timmy tickets to come as well!!