Amsterdam - you'll never guess who I ran into!

On Saturday, August 4th (or something like that - I've never really been sure about dates all summer...) I headed off to Cape Town, via Amsterdam. Due to the way I booked my flights, trying to optimise the use of my frequent flyer miles, I ended up with a 24 hour layover in Amsterdam. I might not have saved much money that way - but hey, Amsterdam is fun, and it made the trip a lot nicer. It was great having a break to get used to the jet lag before getting to work, too.

I had a great start to my day in Amsterdam - I arrived at 10am (after an overnight flight) and went to the exercise room to do my personalized yoga-based workout. It felt great to move and stretch. Then I decided to take a little nap before showing and hitting the town. Much to my dismay, I slept 3 hours!!! I rushed to get ready so I didn't miss the museums. I have this crazy short haircut right now, and bless it - it is so easy to take care of.

So here is the funny side story about my hair. My bangs were just below my eyebrows and I didn't want to fuss with them while in Cape Town, so I went to the hairdresser for a quick bang trim before the trip. She BUTCHERED them! I now have pixie bangs and they are cute, but not so much. I always wandered if pixie bangs would look cute on me - now I know. At least there is that. And I also now have a haircut that only needs to be towel dried - not even brushed. It's that easy. I do look a bit silly, though. One thing is for sure, I will NOT need a trim while in Cape Town!!!

So I got into the city in time to go to the Van Gogh museum and the Anne Frank house before they closed (fortunately the Anne Frank house is open until 9pm on Sundays in the summer). Then I was wondering back toward the train station looking for a place to have dinner. Much to my surprise, who did I see walking down the street toward me but my good friend Emel!! What a shock! I knew she was in Germany for a conference, and she knew I was heading for Cape Town - but she did not know about my layover. Apparently she got bored in Munich and decided to make a side trip just the previous day. How random that was. I wasn't even on a busy street - just a random side street not near any tourist attractions. She was with a friend, so I joined the two of them, or rather they joined me for dinner. Then we walked around before heading back to our respective hotels. I was enjoying my travels alone, but having company for dinner was nice. I think the trill of that, though, was how random it was. It reminds me what a small world it really can be sometimes.

Amsterdam, by the way, is lovely. I would enjoy living in Europe again... I loved the variety of people, how fit they were, the lovely food, hearing the different languages, the old architecture...

Behind me in line for the Anne Frank house was a really funny guy - a gay flight attendant. It was gay pride weekend in Amsterdam. There were happy male couples all over town. I happened by one club with a fancy drag queen outside in a great leopard print, too - but I think most of the festivities had been Saturday. Anyway, this guy was with a female flight attendant he seemed to work with. He was fussy with her to not stand too close, while he flirted with men passing by on the sidewalk. We got mooned - big time. It was the fullest moon I've ever seen :) This guy was hopelessly unaware of Anne Frank's story - bless him for going to the museum. He was also aware of how much he sounded like a dumb american. He made friends with the man working the line and got the inside scoop on the museum, then offered information to all sorts of people who came up to check out the line. It was great seeing someone so comfortable with himself, and so outgoing.

The only thing I didn't like about Amsterdam was the totally geeky or old looking people who were obviously just there for the drugs - do you have to walk around the city in rasta hats and shirts with the leaf print on them???