Amsterdam - Windmills!

While Amsterdam is really messy and smelly with the weed and smoke at every street, the outskirts are about the nicest places I've been to. 

And how can you miss the windmills when in Holland?

So I headed to a place called Zaanse Schans to catch the windmills :)

Cheese factory

My lunch - bread, milk and Dutch strawberries. Dutch strawberries were actually sweet! It was the first time I didn't have to add sugar or honey to them. Just pop the whole thing in your mouth and spit out the leaves heh.

Really antique cashier which they still use

Dutch art is really one of the prettiest art forms I've seen around. Yeah, partly because it's blue and white, a very pretty colour combi.

Had this for dinner, it was pretty solid stuff. Though I would think that going to Burger Bar and ordering fries with Jopee sauce would have been had the same satisfaction.

You see the little yellow sign in the background? That was the hostel that I had stayed in, 'Shelter'. The foreground is a typical 'window' in the Red Light District (hence the red lamps). My hostel was right in the middle of the RLD. To get back to my hostel I would have to walk past a few windows, and further up the street were a few coffeeshops that sold weed. 'Thai Massage' might even have extra service Idk.

BUT the hostel was a really lovely place to stay in. It was really clean and safe, and the staff were very helpful too! On the last night, they had an 'Open Mic' session and some Dutch snacks like stroopwaffles. People were singing and telling jokes. I met a 'missionary backpacker', and he basically backpacks around the world to bring a Christian influence. I don't remember what he does exactly in detail, but he looked like he was in his late 40s, and had been doing this for a really really long time.

Also managed to play the piano for the first time on that night, and jammed a little with the hotel staff, singing christian songs that we all knew... Pretty cool stuff, and it was completely unexpected from a city of so much vice.

I want this painted in my house. And for it to be the spirit in my home.

And this too.

On the day I left I went to a market nearby to grab food for my long journey back. I think anything from a market tastes good haha. Should have discovered this sooner. But I did enjoy strawberries and croissants and chicken at decent prices anyway.

:)