Frets, canals and a dairy that held collars of Nazis - Euro Trip 10

we can view seven bridges from this viewpiont

On Friday R and I planned to visit Venice, but something came up at his work and we had to cancel the trip. Miss smiley asked me whether we could meet up for a city tour and I was more than happy to join her.

We took the boat cruise that went through beautiful canals of Amsterdam city. Schipol Airport of Amsterdam is 4 meters below sea level, so it’s not surprising to learn that the central station behind us is standing on 6000 stilts. Amsterdam name is derived from the Amstel dam, a dam in the river "Amstel".

The Nemo science center

This ship like building is called Nemo museum, its one of the big science center in The Netherlands for kids. The ship next to it is replica of historical ship “Amsterdam” that sunk in North Sea during 17th century.

The Dutch are the world experts on keeping up with back the water and flood, In fact after Katrina US turned to Dutch for help, to rebuilt New Orleans. Here people actually live in boats. These boats have address, gas, telephone and electric connection.

Dutch wall to wall buildings are iconic

Those days the city was densely populated and renting apartment was costly compared to living in boat, plus fishermen and businessmen went around with goods in their boats for trading. So they altered their boats and started living in it. Now you can rent a boat house to stay, ironically its way costlier than renting a hotel room.

Westerkerk church tower

TheWesterkerk ("western church") is a Protestant church from 16th century. It has the highest church tower in Amsterdam.

Dutch people are obsessed with cycles, I was told every Dutch man has at least 2 cycles (Kudos!), walk in the road you are sure to spot many (young and old) riding bicycles. Each road has a cycle line, and it’s advised not to walk on it.

cycles everywhere

Then we came across the world famous Anne Frank’s museum. Anne Frank is a 13 year old Jewish girl who went into hiding with her family, during Nazis occupation of Netherlands. They lived in small secret attic in her father’s office building from 1942-44(Anna museum). Her father’s friends and colleagues helped them with food and necessities.

Image courtesy google, the one I took wasnt good.

While in hiding she regularly wrote, about the political developments, about her life in confinement and her feelings as a growing girl (on the dairy which her father gifted on her 13th birthday just before they went into hiding). She wanted to become a journalist and be useful to many people, even to the ones she never met in her lifetime.

On August 1944 the family got arrested, separated and sent to concentration camps. After going through a great deal of suffering (some of her friends were gassed to death), Anne died of typhus, an epidemic that killed 17K prisoners. Among 107,000 Jews deported from Netherlands only 5,000 survived. Her father was the only survivor of her family.

Anna Frank, an innocence lost.Image courtesy google

He returned to Amsterdam after the war to find that her diary saved by his friend. Imagine the trauma he would have undergone reading the most intimate thoughts of her. He published her diary, which later got translated into many languages and it became one of the most widely read books. Anna frank became face of countless people who suffered just as she did in the Holocaust. Read here for the moving excerpt from her dairy.

After the boat trip, miss smiley and I had the delicious frets with Mayo sauce. Then we walked around doing funny poses until R joined me for shopping and dinner.

When she got them fed , I got them fled

When she held, I smelled

and when she just posed, I accidently licked!

After she left, I shopped!

I am wearing the red one today, they are actually cheaper than you think ;)

The next country is for next week, have a great weekend =)