Michael and I went to Amsterdam for the World Stevia Organization conference. It was a wonderful trip! We left on Tuesday, October 22. We flew on Delta and the flights were pretty good. We changed planes in Minneapolis. I did have a hard time sleeping on the flight from Minneapolis to Amsterdam, but we got through customs and got our bags easily. At the customs desk, the guy didn’t really ask us any questions, he just
made a bunch of sexist jokes about how I must be the boss and would be spending
all of Michael’s money. By the time we got to the baggage carousel, our bags
were already there. We took an Uber to the hotel, and thankfully they had our
room ready when we arrived. Sai had traveled with us, and he had to wait an hour
for his room. They upgraded us to executive room, which is nice except for the
fact that the bed is the hardest bed I’ve ever slept in before. Even Michael
said it was too hard for him. We took a nap and then got up and got ready to go
to dinner with Marvin. After dinner we came up to our room and relaxed for a
while. I called dad for a few minutes and checked my emails. I went downstairs to
get some change and see if we could get a softer bed, and they sent someone up
with a bed topper that makes it a little bit better.
Here are some pictures I took on the ride from the airport to the hotel. I thought the architecture was very cool, and there were bikes everywhere!
Our hotel, Movenpick
Our room
The view from our room was amazing!
I never did find out the story about this yacht, but it was docked outside our room the whole time. I think it's available to rent because there is a website listed on the side.
Thursday, October 24,
2019
Well, it really doesn’t
feel like a Thursday. I was confused about what day of the week it was all day
long. This morning Michael and I got up and got ready and went to breakfast.
Since we are in an executive room, we get to sit in an exclusive dining area.
They even have a small buffet set up in there. Michael and I went to the big
buffet to get our food and then brought it back to the fancy executive dining
room to eat. The waiter was super attentive to us. After breakfast, we went to check in for the conference.
We said “hi” to a couple of people, and then I left. I came back up to the room
to get my stuff situated and brush my teeth and then I left. I wasn’t really
sure where I should go, so I decided to go on the Amsterdam City Walk that’s in
my Rick Steves book. He has some audio tours and I downloaded them to my phone
before I left the hotel. While I was in my room, at 9:04am I tried to get
tickets to go to the Anne Frank house. That was a mistake, because by then
there was a queue for 800 people to get the tickets and they said if it’s over
200 not to even bother. I kind of didn’t want to go there by myself anyway so
I’ll try again on Saturday and this time I’ll get on a few minutes before 9am
and see if I can make it work. There is a shuttle from our hotel to central
station, but I missed that by just a few minutes so I just walked to Central Station. It wasn’t too far. It was a little
tough to figure out exactly where I needed to go so that I could avoid the bike
paths, but I just followed the crowd and it worked out fine.
Central Station
From Central
Station, I walked down the Damrak past the stock exchange to Dam Square.
I thought this bike was so funny. I think this wooden shoe-shaped attachment is for a child.
They
had a really cool statue in the middle of Dam Square and there weren’t that
many people.
I was able to see the Royal Palace, which is really the former
City Hall, and the new church. Apparently, the new church is only 100 years
newer than the old church. The sundial above the entrance was once the city’s
official time piece.
I took a seat on a bench for a few minutes and watched the
people. It had started sprinkling, but not too badly. From there I walked down
Kalverstraat, which the tour said was a pedestrian-only shopping street.
However, there were tons of delivery trucks that had no qualms about running
you over if you were in the way. Some of them were nice enough to honk loudly
at you to get you out of the way.
There is a hidden Catholic church along the
street. Apparently, for a very long time Catholicism was outlawed so they had
this secret hidden church.
I also walked into the Amsterdam Museum for a bit. I
didn’t see the whole thing, just a very long hall with a very cool carpet that
had art on it, some pictures on the wall, and a huge statue of Goliath and a
small one of David.
Amsterdam Museum entrance
Very cool carpet
Statues of David and Goliath
After that I went to the Begijnhof, which is a little
housing area with a beautiful courtyard in the middle. People actually still
live there. It’s all for women who are in need in some way. It has been a
shelter for women since 1346. The Beguines were women who weren’t nuns, but
they kind of lived like them because they were unpretentious and simple and
Christlike in serving others.
Next, I passed Spui Square, which is a popular
nightlife spot. After that I saw the Mint Tower and then walked to the flower
market.
Mint Tower
Flower market
After the flower market was Koningsplein, where they have a little
stand that sells raw herring. Yuck. Then I walked down Leidsestraat, past the
canals and shops. There was a little pottery shop that I stopped at and bought
some Delftware, which is the blue-and-white design ceramics which are famous in
Holland.
Here is another view of the shop from our canal boat that Saturday
My tour ended at Leidseplein, which is a cool open square. By then I needed to use the bathroom
and there was a public bathroom building on the street, but you had to use a
credit card to pay for it so I went to the Burger King instead. I still had to
pay .70 Euros, but I was able to use coins. Then I figured out how to use the
tram and took that back to Central Square. It was fun to ride the tram and look
at all the sights again and see all the people. Dam Square was super crowded
this time. There was a crowd gathered to watch a performer and tons of
kids in groups and lots and lots of people. I’m not sure why it had been so
empty at 9am and so busy at noon. I got back to the hotel and freshened up and
changed my clothes and went down to the conference to have lunch. Then we listened to the speakers.
Michael was the chair for the session so that’s why I wanted to be there.
The
talks were all very scientific so I really had no idea what they were talking
about. After Michael’s session was done, he stayed and I went
up to the room. I wanted to lay down and rest for a little bit and ended up
sleeping for two hours. We got ready for dinner and went down to meet everyone
in the lobby.
Ready for dinner
Friday, October 25,
2019
After breakfast, we came
up to the room to get our stuff and then Michael went to the conference. I
relaxed in the room for a bit then I went downstairs at about 10am. I heard a few of the talks
and then it was time to have a break for taste testing.
Here is our table for the taste-testing
Our Better
Than Sugar was a big hit, as well as our English Toffee Sweet Drops. Next, we
went back in the room to listen to Sai’s talk and then we had lunch. We found out once we got back that we wont the top two taste awards!
After
lunch, there was a question-and-answer period and then the awards were given
out. We gave out the Father of Stevia awards that we sponsored in honor of Jim. Then
Marvin and Gerd made their final comments and they closed the session. I took
a little nap but woke myself up by 4pm so I could call the boys while they were
getting ready for school this morning. That’s the only way I can talk to them
with this nine-hour time difference. That evening, we walked over to Central Station.
We didn’t have much luck finding a canal cruise so we walked down the Damrak.
We stopped for some frites with mayonnaise and ketchup and walked around for a
bit.
When I was there yesterday, I didn’t realize that there were little
alleyways between the shops because I was walking on the other side of the
street. Michael and I found a really cool alley with beautiful artwork.
We
walked through that and then walked past the shops toward the Royal Palace. It
got really windy.
We headed back towards Central
Station and stopped at a little restaurant for some schnitzel. After we ate, we walked back to the
hotel and relaxed for a little while before going to bed.
Saturday, October 26,
2019
Today was the one full
day Michael and I could go sightseeing together. I got online a few minutes before 9am because I knew
that the tickets for Anne Frank go on sale then. I was very disappointed to
find out that people were already in the queue long before 9am because they
were already over 600 people in front of me. I was really angry about that
because that was very unclear in the instructions, and if I had known I
would’ve gotten on sooner. That means that I have no chance of seeing the Anne
Frank Museum while I’m here. I really wanted to take a canal boat cruise, so we
went to the dock right by the hotel to catch the hop on/hop off boat. We were
able to buy the tickets from the concierge. We didn’t have to wait very long
for the boat. I really enjoyed riding around in the boat. You
really do get a good view of everything.
They made a stop at a place called
Gassan Diamonds. I hadn’t planned on touring that place, but the stop was there
and they said it was free so we went for it. They told us the guide would be by
in a minute and we stood there for a while waiting. We almost gave up and left,
but then the guide finally showed up. There were so many groups that went in
before us, and it was really loud while she was trying to talk to us. She took
us into a small showroom where we all sat around the table and looked at the
jewelry. At that point it sounded a bit like a sales pitch and she showed us
what we could buy. The Gassan diamonds with 121 faces were very cool.
We took a
quick peek at the Rolex show room, which is supposedly the biggest in the
world, and then we went back to the boat.
Here are some cool views from the boat
We rode it all the way to the stop
near the Rijksmuseum. I found that museum to be pretty confusing.
Self Portrait by Vincent van Gogh
I don't remember who painted this, but I thought it was pretty
This Rembrandt paining, Night Watch, is being preserved
After the museum, we walked just a
short distance to De Vier Pilaren for some poffertjes. It was recommended to me
by some friends. I had
actually given up on going there, because I thought it was a lot further south
and I’ve been having poffertjes every morning for breakfast. However, when I
realized how close it was to the museum, we ended up going and I’m glad we did.
We sat right on the water and the poffertjes were way better than what we get
at the hotel. I had mine with strawberries and cream. Michael ordered a Dutch
pancake with lemon curd, and it was kind of like a crepe.
After a very late
lunch (by then it was about 3:30pm), we went back to get on the canal boat. We
rode it for only one stop and then got off near the Anne Frank Museum. The
museum really did look like a museum, and nothing like the attic she would’ve
been in. We took a few pictures then went
back to wait for the next boat.
This is the view from the canal boat stop. Can you see the crooked buildings?
While we were on the dock waiting, Nathaniel
contacted us on Hangouts. He was allowed to call us today so we had a video
call with him while we were on the boat. The call used up Michael’s data so he
had to buy more but then it ran out again. We told Nathaniel that we would get
back on once we got to the hotel on the Wi-Fi. Nathaniel had a long time online,
so I talked with him for a while and then I let Michael talk with him. We had dinner at the hotel (again!) because we were too tired to walk anywhere.
Sunday, October 27,
2019
Last night was daylight
savings in Europe, so we got an extra hour of sleep. We needed it, because the lines at the airport were crazy and it took us forever to check our bags and get through security and customs. We sat near the back
of the plane and it was a very long 10 hour flight. Actually, we arrived almost
an hour early so it was more like nine hours. I spotted Louis Van Amstel from
Dancing with the Stars. He was seated behind us and across the aisle. I didn’t say anything about recognizing him
because I didn’t want to be weird, but when his son asked for a pencil and the
stewardess said she only had pens I did offer him a pencil and they were
grateful. I guess he needed the pencil do his homework. The flight was pretty good. We stopped in Salt Lake City to change planes and made it to Phoenix around 6pm. The kids were so happy to see us. Our babysitter did a wonderful job and the house was nice and clean and the kids were great so that was comforting to come home to!
I am so glad I got to go on this trip! It was amazing!
