Amsterdam was the most interesting, weird, sophisticated, and amazing place that I have ever been. The amount of freedom in this city is amazing, it’s like nothing I have ever experienced before. This place is like an absolutely different version of America, and it actually reminds me a lot of the Denver/Boulder, Colorado area for a lot of different reasons. Everyone in Amsterdam speaks really good English, American things are everywhere, people are active, they are super friendly and intelligent, and specifically why it reminds me of Colorado is because of how much people use bicycles for transportation and because of legal pot. For anyone who has been to Colorado you have probably seen how active the state is with bicycling, bicycling in Colorado is really a pretty common mode of transportation. Now imagine a city of roughly 800,000 inhabitants, and imagine how much car traffic would be in a city of this size. Now imagine that 8 out those 10 cars are bikes; that is the city of Amsterdam for you. It’s really odd being in a city when the bike lane has so much more traffic than the regular car lanes. A funny saying that our tour guide said on our first day there was that "if you hear the bell, run like hell" and this saying could not have more truth to it. You absolutely must be aware of your surroundings at all times in this city because you never know when a bicycle will appear out of nowhere and nearly knock you down.
There is so much history in the city of Amsterdam, and this history greatly impacts on why Amsterdam is so different than anywhere else in the world. Amsterdam is a city that is hundreds and hundreds of years old, and has played a major role in world trade throughout history, and was even the headquarters for arguably the most powerful and influential company ever, the East Dutch India Company. Now because of how important global commerce has been to the Netherlands, and Amsterdam in particular, the people that live here have always been very tolerant of other people, no matter how different. They respect all people regardless of who they are, and as an American I thought that our country did a spectacular job with this, but simply put we don't even come close to comparing to the Dutch with how tolerant and accepting of a society that they are. Its honestly really quite mind blowing how incredible Dutch society is. However, there are some dark sides to Dutch society. Prostitution is legal in the city of Amsterdam, as well as shrooms, and while other hardcore drugs are technically illegal, they can be very easily found. No other place allows as much as Amsterdam does, and while the vast majority of people around the world would view this as wrong, the Dutch actually have what I think is a pretty valid reason for why they allow so much.
During WWII the Nazis occupied the Netherlands, and with it came their oppressive laws towards everyone, but especially towards the Jews, homosexuals, political enemies, as well as some other targeted groups. Amsterdam was one of the only places occupied by the Nazis in the entirety of the war where the citizens of the city peacefully rose up to protest what was being done to the Jews and the other targeted groups. While their efforts actually resulted in much harsher laws and treatment in the area, I think that this is a great example to show that the Dutch really do care about everyone in their society. Now after the war, the Dutch had to rebuild their government, and with it they decided that they thought it was better to error on the side of having too much freedom than not enough, and they really have the mindset that as long as you are not harming anyone else than you can do what you want to do. While personally I do question some of the more extreme results of their very liberal policies, I do very much so respect the fact that put such a high value on freedom. Also, there is currently a huge momentum to end prostitution and to work on curbing back the hardcore drug scene in the city, and we were told that these things could very well be a thing of the past in the next 5-10 years.
The last place we visited over our spring break was Berlin, the capital city of Germany. Berlin was the most historically rich place that we have visited yet. I really think that Berlin could be the most historically important place in the world when looking at recent history. We saw so much history relating to World War II and the Cold War. We saw places such as the Berlin Wall and Checkpoint Charlie, as well as the place of the bunker that Hitler and his wife committed suicide in. We also saw the Holocaust memorial and other monuments that have been important throughout history. We also met a lot of really cool people in our hostel that we ended up hanging out with quite a bit while we were there. One other thing I liked about our Berlin was that there was a restaurant in our hostel that served THE BEST American food that had free ketchup and free water! And by free ketchup I mean like there was a bottle of ketchup on every table... you can bet that I took full advantage of it! It was almost just like eating a good meal back home at like an Applebee's, it was so good!
These last 17 days of backpacking Europe have without a doubt been some of the best days of my life. I really hope that someday I will be able to come back here and travel to even more amazing places. I truly hope that my trip will inspire other students to study abroad, as it is truly a completely life changing experience. Adventure is out there, go and find it.
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