Days 47-53

This past weekend has been lovely, exciting, and relaxing all at once. It started off Thursday night after my Dutch language class when I got to skype with Zoe and LT! A great way to start my weekend. Thursday and Friday nights consisted of frolicking through Leidseplein and Rembrandtplein, meeting new people, dancing, and other miscellaneous merriment. Friday afternoon a bunch of us went down to the more southern part of the city (about 20-ish minutes away) to the Albery Cuypmarkt. It is like a huge outdoor flea market, except that it is at least two blocks worth of different stands with clothing, bike supplies, food, produce, bedding, shoes, and anything else you could possibly imagine.
A view of Albert Cuypstraat.

At Albert Cuypmarkt they also have a home-made stroopwafel stand. So, naturally, we each got some. so yummy!
It was fun walking around, looking at all of the different stands of absolutely anything and everything. We then walked toward Museumplein, where the Van Gogh, Stedlijk, Rijks, and other museums are.
FUN FACT: many of the streets in this area are named after artists (eg. Johannes Vermeerstraat).
We happened to walk past the American Embassy there as well. We knew that it was the American Embassy because it was the only building around that was surrounded by security guards, cameras, and huge gates. A real welcoming place. This was the first time that any of us had seen an area so restricted. Very few other areas in Amsterdam were like this.
so out of place. Makes Americans look like idiots here. yet again.

On Saturday Becca and I frolicked through the Eastern side of the city, toward Plantage Muidergracht and the Artis Zoo. Right outside of Prins Hendrikkade (where I live) there was a big rowing competition going on. Becca and I meandered over there, where they had live music and so many different people in different rowing colors. We then continued to wander the streets and we eventually made it to Oosterpark. It is a small park, but it was very beautiful. We saw so many blue herons and other lovely creatures. Unfortunately, we went around 6:00pm, so it was still light out but it seemed as though the homeless people and sketchies had come out as well. There were hoards of homeless men (some presumably druggies) just lounging on the grass, most of the time minding their own business. It was such a gorgeous day- the perfect sort of day to go exploring.

Sunday and Monday were fairly uneventful, full of homework, classes, more homework, etc etc. However, YESTERDAY (tuesday) was quite exciting. I got to go to the qualifying match for the European Cup 2012- Netherlands vs. Sweden. It was SUCH a cool experience! It was a group of about fifteen or twenty of us from the program all decked out in orange, surrounded by thousands more decked out in orange. All day on Tuesday all you could see were people on the streets wearing their team colors- blue and yellow for Sweden; Orange, red, white, and blue for Netherlands. The metro station was packed with crazed and rambunctious soccer fans. Even though we had the highest seats up in the stadium, we had an awesome view of the field. The Dutch annihilated the Swedes, 4-1, with some amazing goals by the Dutch (and one nice one from Sweden...) It was such a fun night. The only professional sports games I've been to were baseball, so this was such a new thing for me.



Funny Dutch words:
Snoepen (pronounced SNOOP-en)=to eat sweets
koffie verkeerd = café latte, literally: false/wrong coffee
voetballen=to football (ie play football/soccer)