doing the 'dam thing

we are in amsterdam!

Yesterday we took a 14 hour bus ride from Tours to Amsterdam, and I'm loving it here so far. I spent the entire ride listening to a playlist of songs by Sleeping At Last (recommended to my by Andrea), and when the instrumental version of Uranus came on it was a cinematic experience. The sun was streaking in and out of my eyes, lighting up everything in gold as the bus raced down the highway. Leftover raindrops from the night before were crawling across the window, looking like faling stars in the reflected sunlight. I wish Noah had been there to capture it all, I knew he'd have felt it, the way life felt like a movie just then.

It was an easy ride, we had a stop in Paris where we got off and scarfed down some cheap sandwiches. We also stopped in Lille and Antwerp, but the majority of the time I was seated, reading on my kindle. I used to be kind of anti-kindle, and I still prefer having physical copies of books, but now that I travel a lot more often my kindle is my favorite bus/train/plane buddy.

We arrived in Amsterdam around 9pm, an hour and a half ahead of schedule, so naturally we sought out greasy food. Amsterdam has a ton of places where they serve you fries in a cone with your choice of mayo or other various sauces. Not what my stomach needed but DEFINITELY what my soul needed.

the hostel is a dream come true

Not only is it in the center of the redlight district, close to a lot of attractions, provides free breakfast and sells postcards, it also HAS A CAT. Her name is Oliver and I love her. She lives in a pink velvet armchair in the little lounge space. Don't worry, I'll attach a pic.

We've met a lot of really cool people here too, last night we talked to a woman from Palm Springs, California who is on a journey through Europe "until she's ready to go home" and she was asking us about social media and places we've been, she was awesome. We had breakfast this morning with a boy who was born in India and moved to Australia when he was in his teens, and talked to him about study abroad experiences and what university life is like, and then right before we left we met a boy from TOLEDO OHIO (UT, BOOOOOO), how wild is that? A fellow Ohioan who's also studying abroad in France and who also happened to plan a break in Amsterdam. The world gets smaller everyday folks.

I really like Amsterdam so far though. We went to the Van Gogh Museum this morning, they had a version of his painting of the Sunflowers and I was NOT emotionally prepared for that. We also had stroopwafel this morning, mine had chocolate and speculoos on it and I died right there and went to a Christmas flavored heaven. We're leaving soon to go to the Anne Frank house, I read her diary on the bus ride here so I'm hoping for a pretty profound experience. I'm really excited to spend the rest of the week here.

(P.S. Here's Oliver!)

more amsterdam adventures to come!