Bikes, bikes, bikes, everywhere. Everyone has an old, beat up, one-speed,
black bike. We saw maybe two mountain bikes our whole time here, and only
a few bikes with more than one speed.
This is as good a place as any to point out something that you don't read
about in the guide books, but is nonetheless striking: virtually every
single girl in Amsterdam is beautiful (Jen wouldn't argue, trust me).
Not only are they all beautiful, but they all have a very similar kind
of beauty. They are all blond, rail-skinny, fine-boned, and--the thing
that really surprised me--very fasionable. I had heard so much about the
"alternative"-ness of Amsterdam that I expected kind of a hippie
vibe, but far from it: all the girls wear long coats and high-heeled pointy
boots and perfect make-up and so on. It is a truly surreal sight: a tall,
super-model looking girl in a long shearling coat, dressed to the nines,
talking on her cell phone... while riding an old one-speed beater bike.
And yet we saw that very thing over, and over, and over... it got to where
we laughed every time. It gets kind of Twilight-Zone-ish after a while.
I don't really go in for the waifish pixie look--I like dark hair and
curves (hear that, babe?)--but if you're into that kind of thing, you
will find Amsterdam heaven on earth. |