I had been told that the weather could change quickly in Amsterdam – and I sure got to experience that during the course of the afternoon I spent checking out the typical tourist attractions.
It had been pretty cloudy in the morning when I walked with Alison (the family friend who I was staying with) to the Rijksmuseum, but during my last hour in the museum I had glimpsed clear blue skies through the rare windows in the galleries. However, as soon as I got out of the museum, heavy grey clouds started rolling in and I thought: How will this go? Luckily, though, it never really rained. Just a couple of drops now and then, but otherwise they just hung there, like heavy grey threats of what might come.
Walking through the streets toward the old center of Amsterdam, I realized two things: The houses here are really narrow (four meters wide, Alison told me later that evening), and generally very cute. And most people bike. Everywhere. In my opinion, that makes for a very agreeable city indeed.
And just like that, the sun was out again. The doves and the tourists outside the Royal Palace got along splendidly.
On my way toward the main public library, I just happened to walk by the Sex Museum. Since it didn’t cost that much to go in, I thought I might as well check it out. To be honest, I wouldn’t really call it a museum. There are so many interesting things you can do on the subject of sex, but here they just had a couple of life size dioramas, some odd stuff of an erotic nature and then just heaps and heaps of porn photographs, running from the dawn of photography, with women in big skirts and lacey petticoats and men in hats and cravats, to modern S/M stuff. It felt like an exhibition showing off stuff, just because it could (being in liberal Amsterdam and all), but completely lacked the analysis and historical and cultural background to the stuff. In fact, the most interesting part of the museum was all the young girls walking around in groups, giggling.
Next, my tour took me through the Red Light District. And here, I was actually chocked. For real. I just turned around a corner into a pretty narrow street, and there in windows were half naked women standing, waiting to be chosen. Prostitutes in window displays, dressed in lace and fake diamonds. And then, on the next street, bars and shops selling souvenirs, tourists walking with their kids by the canal. For example, there was one extremely voluptous Carribean woman standing in a window, facing Oude Kerk, the old church of Amsterdam. The contrasts!
Of course I had read that the women stood in windows in the Red Light District, and the heavy smell of marijuana in the air didn’t surprice me at all. But actually seeing the women standing there. Like pieces of meat on display. No. I know that there are arguments for legalizing prostitution, these Amsterdam prostitutes get payed well and the risk of them being mistreated is small, since they have panic buttons in their rooms. They’re protected by the police and they pay taxes. But these young, eastern European women, standing in windows – I just can’t. It is not okay. Sex is not a human right. It is something that two people share, and it should not be bought. If you can’t be a decent enough human to get someone else to want to have sex with you, you shouldn’t have sex at all. That is my opinion.
But as suddenly as the women in windows had appeared in the narrow streets, just as suddenly they were left behind me and I could walk along the quaint little canals without getting mad again.
But Amsterdam does not only have the old and quaint to woo visitors with. They do have some really cool modern architecture in too. Close to the train station, just by the big Amsel, the huge science museum NEMO looms like an enormous turqoise upside down horse hoof. And the brand new main public library is amazing too – but that deserves a post all to itself.
The modern art museum, looking pretty much like a huge bath tub, creates a pretty interesting mix among the old 19th century architecture as well.
So, walking back to Oude West along the canals in the evening sun, I felt that this is a city that I really like. Except for the Red Light District (which, to be honest, is a pretty big negative thing, but still), I liked everything. I didn’t even mind the throngs of tourists. It is a very walkable city, relaxed but not slow, and it is so easy to just wander around and end up by some new, quaint canal where people have filled their balconies with flowers. Beautiful, absolutely beautiful.
Katja Malmborg 