Amsterdam is the strangest place ever...2

So, Jantzen says "Great, now this guy is going to go outside and tell all his bum friends to take our stuff." Now I'm on-guard. Im clutching my bags, looking over my shoulder, and generally being paranoid. I know, you're thinking "Its Amsterdam, he's paranoid...stupid stoner..." but I swear, we hadn't even made it to the hotel, not to mention a coffee shop. This is pure paranoia, and not unfounded.

After 20 minutes of walking around the station, we finally got our tickets (a 10 Euro 48-hour tram pass) and catch the 1, 2, or 5 south towards Leidesplein. We get there, and find the Marnix Hotel. I dont know what it is about europe, maybe its a lack of space, but every set of stairs I went up/down in Amsterdam was like 4 inches wide. Its bizzare. i was excited at the Atlanta Airport when i could fit my entire foot on the stair!

We get to the desk, and sure enough, the credit card machine is broken, and that means we cant pay for our room, and we have to get E246 (roughly$343) in cash. We tell them we will take care of it in the next day or two, but we need to put our stuff in our room and get lunch, etc. They give us a room key (#100) and we head down the hall to the room. Much to our suprise when we open the door, there are two asian people in there making the beds. No big deal, cleaning crew, I get it. The thing that was confusing was that some guys bags were still in there. That was weird.

So we had to put our luggage in the closet next to the desk until the room was empty, and set off to get lunch.

Jantzen and I headed across the street to "Crush" the coffeeshop closest to our hotel. The weird thing about the people in Amsterdam is that either they speak perfect english (enough to convince you they are American) or they dont speak it all (because they are Moroccan) but will pretend to understand every word you said, and give you rude, abrupt answers.

The "bartender" at the Crush was the second.

He sat, and nodded along while we talked to him, said yes and no when appropriate, and then was clearly lost when we asked an open-ended question like "how much is it to use the internet." It was his answer to this question that set me off. "Three Euro per hour." Okay, thats fine, I don't care...BUT WAIT, there is a sign behind his head that says "Internet, 2 Euro per hour." That Moraccan Bastard! Why is everyone trying to screw me here? Whats the deal!

To make things worse, The worst thing that could possibly be on TV was on...Clueless, the Series. That is just uncool. So Janzten goes to the weird Moraccan and says "Would you mind changing the channel" and the guy doesnt' get it. Jantzen points at the TV, and the guy picks up the remote. Jantzen reached for it, and the guy is like "No, I use remote" and put on Football (soccer). Thats alright with me. Then he mutes it and puts on Bob Marley. I couldn't belive it. I know, I know, we're American, and we're in Amsterdam, and we're at the Coffeeshop, but I mean, that doesn't really mean I want to listen to Marley. I'd have prefered to listen to the damn match...

Then it just got bizzare...

This woman was kind of stalking around the cafe, and went into the bathroom. She looked American, dressed like us, etc. She came out of the bathroom and came right to us. Started asking us all these questions about where we were from, staying, what we were doing, etc. I tried my best not to give her information, but for some weird reason, every time I opened my mouth, some critical piece of information about our trip would fall out of my mouth. It was embarassing. She could have said "what time is it?" and I'd have said "We're staying at the Marnix Hotel Room 100." I couldn't believe it. The other thing is that she wasn't even an American. She tried to convince us she was, but then when we tried to have a conversation about some specifics, she got weird. The Dutch love to pretend to be American, its like they enjoy fucking with us...

Jantzen and I were both very uncomfortable in Amsterdam at this point, and decide to leave the Crush and go get food.

We step outside, and begin to walk back towards Leidsplien (the square near our house) where all the restruants are located. We are walking about 200 yards down the road, and come to the first canal we have to cross. As we are crossing the bridge, there are literally hundreds of pidgeons flying around above my head. I looked at Jantzen and I said "I'm going to get shit on" he thought it was funny. I said again "No, seriously, the way today has gone. I'm going to get shit on by a bird." he laughs again, "no you wont, lets go." Again, I say "I'm going to get shit on by a damn bird!" We both laugh, and keep walking. We get about halfway down the next block, and I look down...

SURE ENOUGH, I GOT SHIT ON BY A BIRD!

Thats what our trip to Amsterdam was like...

I got shit on by a bird

It got better.

Much better.

But that first half-day was insane.

Stay Tuned...