Day 1: We safely arrived in the Amsterdam airport around 5:20 a.m. and headed for the hotel with our tour guide, Enno. We dropped our bags off, had breakfast, and started our day by taking the metro to “Centraal Station.” At 10:15, our canal tour started where we saw the beautiful architecture of downtown Amsterdam. My favorite was seeing the historic brides, houses, and boats along the canal. The bridge in the photo, attached below, was the first of seven in a row where you could see through all the arches.
After the canal tour, we wandered around the streets, grabbed a bite to eat along with some tea, and visited a flea market. We then started our walking tour and sustainable chocolate factory, Cocoa and Spice, visit. Here we learned more about the rich history of the Netherlands including the importance of trade routes and the presence of queerness throughout the city. At Cocoa and Spice, we got to try lots of ethically sourced chocolates, talk about the malpractice of child labor, and discuss the process of eco-friendly produced cocoa. We concluded the day with a wonderful restaurant where we ate fries, risotto, mixed vegetables, naan, chicken, and roasted potatoes.
My favorite parts of day one were meeting this beautiful stray cat, exploring the city, and trying new foods!
Day 2: Today, I woke up feeling nice and refreshed, as I got almost 10 hours of sleep! My roommates and I went to breakfast and visited the local supermarket, Jumbo, before we departed for our next adventure, the scavenger hunt! This scavenger hunt took us all around central Amsterdam, where we traveled to new places, learned some cool Dutch history, and got to collaborate as a group. During this event, I noticed a lot of trash cluttering the sidewalks, see photo, with very few trash cans around. Thankfully, most of the trash was away from the canals, but it could be combatted all together by adding more garbage cans along the streets.
Afterwards, we went to lunch followed by free time to explore. We decided to visit the FOAM museum, which included the exhibit , “Very Modern and Rather Ugly,” by Martin Parr. These images were by far some of my favorites as they were vibrant and brought more recognition to everyday life that can be taken for granted.
After this wonderful exhibit, we traveled to a store which featured Miffy, a Dutch bunny, merchandise. Following light shopping, we ate stroopwafles at a local bakery. Oh my goodness, this was one of the best desserts I have ever had, would highly recommend.
We then met up with the rest of our group to travel by tram to the House of Denim, a sustainable denim factory and store. We got a guided tour, met a very cute dog, and learned a ton about sustainability. One of the most interesting facts was the use of plastic stones over pumice stones to get a stone wash on jeans. At first, the tour guide joked and said the brown “rocks” were cow poop, but surprisingly enough, the stones were made from recycled plastic that was recovered from the canals! The use of these plastic “rocks” allowed for them to be used over and over again and uses less water during the washing cycle. I hope these “rocks” can start making an appearance throughout the world as they address issues with water usage and plastic pollution. We were also introduced to their fabrics which were very neat to see, produced with less water, used fair labor practices, and some were made from recycled cotton materials from hospital sheets.
We concluded the day events with dinner at a local restaurant which offered creole style food. We headed home, visited the local market for snacks, and wrote our blog posts. Today was also Remembrance of the Dead holiday, and at 8 p.m. sharp we took a two minute period of silence to honor those who gave up their life for this country and the civilians lost in war. Experiencing this moment of silence allowed me to truly reflect on the service of those from every country. Tomorrow is Liberation Day, the day the Dutch gained their independence from WWII, and I am looking forward to all of our adventuress planned!
