On Thursday we went on a architecture tour of a part of town that used to be the harbor, before the harbor moved farther out to make room for more people. And don't let this picture fool you. It was cold and rainy for most of the time we were there.
They want to keep the feel of the land in this area so they use a lot of the existing structures and materials to make housing and buildings. These are student apartments made out of shipping containers. (although technically they are pre-fab)
This is an office building that was built on top of the structure of a crane that used to unload cargo from ships.
There is even a guy who lives in an old tram.
There are tons of artists in the area (including the headquarters of MTV Europe). One of the old warehouses was divided up into artists studios and offices.
The designers of the space built these metal skeleton structures that they would then sell to the artists. Then the artists could build anything they want in their space.
This resulted in a little town inside a warehouse of all these cool little structures filled with artists.
And of course, since they are artists, some of the structures get really interesting.
I also saw my first PBR since coming to Europe. Apparently it is hard to get here so the hipsters drink Corona instead.
All around these buildings are amazing outdoor sculptures and art.
This one is made of tons of pint glasses.
There is even a pancake boat that gives you unlimited pancakes on an hour and half boat ride.
And an old submarine. Needless to say if I moved to Amsterdam I would want to live in this area.
On Friday we went to Leiden which is about an hour south of Amsterdam. It is an old town (big surprise) that is famous for being under siege for almost a year in the 16th century. During the siege almost half of the town's inhabitants died from either hunger or the plague.
We went to a museum which unfortunately doesn't allow photographs. Luckily there were some amazing public art around town.
After we returned to Amsterdam we went to this amazingly tacky floating Chinese restaurant called the Sea Palace. Then we looked at the menu and decided it was way to expensive so we left.
Instead we went to this Italian place inside the library that was delicious and super cheap (a good combo). The only table with enough seating for us had a huge tree in the middle. So my professor decided to make random jungle noises all through dinner.
Here we celebrated Katy's birthday (she's the one covering her face with embarrassment as we sing happy birthday in English and Dutch to her).
We decided walking home would be a good idea since I had a lot of wine. (2 euro 50 for a HUGE glass!) We took a strange route but got to see tons of amazing little houses and decorations along the way.
That night we all gathered in one of our rooms for a little drinking. (Its like we are college students or something.) Anna (the girl in this photo) brought a bottle of wine that only cost her about 1 euro 50. (That is about $1.85 in America.) Then she made us all try it. As you can see from Mario's reaction it tasted like cleaning solution. We later found out that it was probably cooking wine. After that it was time for me to sleep of the alcohol and look forward to the weekend.
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