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The next day I was supposedly traveling to Amsterdam for my free weekend, however for whatever reason, my flight got booked the day after. I went all the way to the airport (14 euro train ride one way to get there) only to find out that I was booked for a friday flight, not thursday. I was so upset I couldn't even think about it without wanting to punch a wall. It was the most upsetting thing I've ever had to deal with only because I had spend so much money on this trip and now it wasn't even worth it because i would spend 1 day there and two nights. However, I was still going so it didn't make it completely awful.
I traveled back to my apartment alone and then went out to dinner with the rest of the people who stayed in Rome for the weekend which was fun. The next day I traveled BACK to the airport, and after three long hours of waiting at the airport I finally got on the plane. It was definitely weird travelling all by myself in Europe but I felt super independent haha.
The second I got there I couldn't wait to meet up with everyone and go exploring. I got to the airport and then bought a train ticket to the central train station and then from there had directions to my hostel. I was proud of myself for finding it all by myself! I got to the hostel and unfortunately everyone was napping so I waited for a bit and then Mario wasn't sleeping so we decided to leave them and go walk around. The first thing I noticed was the red light district because we LIVED in it. I couldn't believe that this actually existed. Women in bra and underwear literally stood in a doorway/window and men go up to it and then go in with them. It was crazy...I couldn't help but stare at this as I had never seen it before. After we got out of the red light district I had to go to H&M to buy a sweatshirt because unfortunately I didn't realize it was going to be freezing and raining and I only brought tank tops with me haha. The weather and atmosphere is completely different from Rome. I was happy in the end to see a different kind of living. After getting some food we walked back and met up with everyone once they woke up and ended up going to a club later on. House music was founded in Amsterdam so we wanted to check that out and we went to this one club that was pretty insane.
The next day we woke up and went to get breakfast. We took the tram a little bit farther out of town and found this quiet restaurant and I got a pretty amazing omelete. I liked this side of town better because it wasn't as crazy busy as it was closer to the train station and it wasn't as touristy. After breakfast we went to the Van Gogh museum. It was 14 euro to enter but it was totally worth it. The museum was soooo cool let alone all the paintings that were there. We saw so much art! The van gogh paintings they have are the bedroom, the sunflower and a couple other ones that I can't remember the names of. They also had many of his earlier works and sketches. His style of art is so different from others that I think that's why he is so famous. I could look at his paintings for so long and see so many different things worked within the art.
After a long time at the museum we stopped for some lunch and found this random place that had huuuuuuge burgers. They were amazing and it was so different tasting than normal american burgers so it was really interesting. After that we walked around for a long time because we just wanted to explore. The buildings are so interesting and I really liked the break from the typical red shingled roofs of Italy. The other major difference from Amsterdam to Italy was the fact that it was so clean! I loved it! Everyone rode bikes too. On the streets there is actually a side street right next to the main one for bikers only. You actually have to look both ways before you cross because you will get hit by a biker if you don't wait for them to pass. I think that's so cool that biking is so big there. The only thing I didn't like was that everything was super expensive. Northern europe in general has such a higher standard of living and everything is more expensive. I was mad I had to spend so much money on food. Back on track, we eventually ended up at this huge park where this guy decided to make a huge sign saying "IAMSTERDAM" the "I" was white and the rest was red and it's on the ground so everyone could take pictures with it. It was a cool idea and a good way to attract toursits to this part of the city. We waited to meet up with other people who didn't go to the museum and walked back to our hostel. We got back took a nap and then went out again for some fries . They have these random fries stands all over and their really good and come in a paper cone. That night we all just ended walking around again and met some people that were pretty cool. Mostly everyone in Amsterdam speaks English because it's so touristy. It was weird being able to speak Englsih again. So many times I caught myself saying Italian phrases realizing I wasn't in Italy anymore haha.
The next morning we had to wake up super early because our flight was at 11:30 a.m. I was very sad to leave and decided I wanted to visit this part of Europe again. I really liked how clean it was and how efficient it was. Sooooooo different from Italy and I'm so glad I got to go.
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