Amsterdam, it's cool but it's not all that

Our Amsterdam hostel was really good and not so great at the same time. The main downside was found while I was off getting money: black mold. While it's not good for anyone it's particularly not good for Constantina. For some reason the hostel people didn't offer to move us, or to clean it, so Alex ended up taking a mask and some bleach spray stuff and killing it off. Seems like an unpleasant job to me but he enjoyed it. After that we walked around for a while, hungry and indecisive, until eventually settling on a tasty Italian place with very nice wait staff. Having food in us perked us up enough to walk around. They have lots of interesting shops there.

We'd enjoyed walking tours in other cities so we decided to try to find a free one there in Amsterdam. None of us knew much about the city, so it seemed like a good way to get an introduction and learn about some cool places. Sadly we never found it. We waited for a while in the rain, but eventually had to give up and make our own walking tour. Touring the Red Light District by day and then by night was a fun time. We had some tasty foods and saw some interesting shops. By night the whole area was lit up with neon lights and signs. Windows that had been mostly vacant by day were then occupied by prostitutes. We decided to check out a club in the area, which was an interesting time.

For our second full day Constantina and I split a cake and we headed off to the zoo. It wasn't quite what we'd expected, but it was still fun. I think that part of the problem was that we were all pretty tired, and kind of malnourished that day. The zoo was fun and kind of chill, which was nice, but we also kind of forgot to eat. Dinner that night was Indonesian food--yay! I'd really wanted to make sure I had some Indonesian while we were in the Netherlands, and it didn't disappoint.

That night we hung out with our hostelmates. Well, some of them. We made friends with three out of the four people in the room. The fourth we named Sleeping Guy, because it seemed that all he did was sleep. Come in at night, he's sleeping, the next afternoon-sleeping, later that evening-still sleeping. Strange. But anyway, our little group went out for tasty tasy gelato, then off to a cafe. It wasn't quite what I'd expected but I did really enjoy the experience. Very relaxing.

That was pretty much the end of our time in Amsterdam. Our last morning and afternoon was spent getting ready to go and then hanging out around the train station. It was a fun city, and I wouldn't not recommend it, it's just that there are so many other places which are just, well, more awesome.