Today, we did a lot more exploring of the city, from the streets around central Amsterdam to the canals. We started out the day with a tour of the city led by Ian, who enthusiastically introduced us to lots of information about the history of the city and how it became what it is today. He made sure to point out the clear presence of bikes, making the comparison of soccer moms to bike dads as it is impossible to get your kids to school on time without biking into the city. Another of the things we learned about was the mayor, who is left leaning and in the green party, and who has made some big changes that have mixed reactions. One of her initiatives is to change Amsterdam’s reputation from one of prostitution and drugs to of a cleaner, safer city (although the city was voted safest town in the world in 2019). To do this, she moved the Red Light District farther out from the city center and replaced those buildings with local women-owned businesses, and kept the international chains out of those areas. Another initiative she enforced was to make redeemable glass bottles. However, this had an adverse effect because people throw them out in the trash, leaving them for homeless people to collect and redeem for change which leads to trash left all over the streets of Amsterdam. To combat this, trash trucks go around at least once a day in the center of the city to clean up the mess left behind.

After the walking tour, we had a chocolate tasting led by Salome. This was definitely a highlight of my day, as I love anything chocolate. My favorite was the 70% dark chocolate made in Ghana, but we also tried other dark, milk, white, and flavored chocolates. One of them had a secret ingredient in it, which turned out to be garlic! It was such an interesting taste that I could not figure out until someone else said it, and immediately all I could taste was the garlic. Another interesting one was a super spicy chocolate, which Salome warned us all about, and even provided a caramelized cacao bean to help with the pain. Throughout the tasting, we learned about the problems within the cocao industry, like how most of the beans are grown in western Africa and then sold to other countries that only end of using 1% of them to make chocolate. This means there is a lot of waste within the industry, as well as exploitation of both the workers and the long process. There are some efforts to combat this though, like using other parts of the plant besides just the bean. Things like cocao juice can be made from the fruit and flooring can be made from the ground up shell. It was such a great experience to be able to learn about the troubled past of chocolate and how it can be more ethical.

In the afternoon, we got the chance to go on a canal cruise, which led us through the picturesque canals all throughout the city. It was cool to be able to see the city from a different angle and viewpoint, as it provided a broader perspective of the streets. We learned about the history of the canals and bridges while snacking on some dutch gummies (complimentary of Dr. Kurtzmann). Overall, the day was such an educational yet engaging experience to not only learn about the city as it is but also how it got there through political changes and community organization!