You tend to get to know a place decently well in one week. Certainly a walking city such as Amsterdam where everything is at your feet. In the recent days i have had some big ups and downs. I came here with one night booked as i had only planned on being here, one, night. It was a Wednesday and the city was cold and dreary. i felt in good spirits until i waited for 45 minutes to be told i couldn't leave Amsterdam not without flying. I then went out into the city in search of a place to stay for the next few days. It was going to be Thursday night and the price to stay at my Hostel went from 19.95 to 42.95 so i needed a cheaper option i found a broker, no rooms were available but he told me to try between 9-11am tomorrow for cancellations. I was there at 8:45 and scored a great price for the whole weekend, three nights. My new hostel was just fine, i had a top bunk next to the window just like i like. we had private shower and bathroom facilities, even though there was a large hole in the bathroom wall that opens onto a terrace now partly covered by a mirror it was great. 18 of us spent the night in what was once a fantastic living room with a huge marble fireplace and intricate ceiling moldings that had long since been neglected. but the good thing was i was set with a good place with free breakfast. That night i slept well and woke up early as not to miss a free meal, made myself some PB&J sandwiches to go and bounced. i felt a lot better about everything, i visited Rembrandt's house. You know its wild, this dude, whos works are now priceless, had to foreclose on his house because he couldn't pay the bills. he must be rolling over in his grave. I spent the day walking around and ran into a flea market where i bought a pretty nice used Swiss army knife for 5 euro. I then ran into a Hells Angles support shop with a dude sitting out front of the joint. I walk into the shop looked around. When i came out i asked if i could sit with him a minute, i figure he has to have some good stories right? He says sure, this lady shows up wearing a support T shirt and offers to buy us all coffee. So after talking for a bit with our nice warm coffees i find out this is the president of the Hells Angles Amsterdam chapter, a member of the mighty red and white, the big red machine. Unu was a great guy and i couldn't help but smile at the places one can find ones self in. Sitting, having coffee with the president of the Hells Angles Amsterdam Chapter, head of 50 full patch members, on a sidewalk in the Netherlands outside a flea market. He took me on a tour of his place complete with all the magazines he had been in, all kinds of biker mags and PLAYBOY, his favorite, and mine, but he wouldn't let me keep it. I came across a "hangaround" patch, wearing it signifies that you have taken the first step in becoming an Angel. He wouldn't let me keep that either. it was crazy though, a one percenter. After about an hour i had to go, my bags were about to be spat out of the lockers at Amsterdam central station. i said my goodbyes and i made it back in time, grabbed my bags and headed for my hostel. When i got there, they had moved my bed. they moved it two floors down, one of which happened to be underground. The room they tried to put me in was a box with no windows and a strong to very strong odor of urine. So there i was, the choice i had to decide, stay in the worst room i would have ever stayed in (i was in India!) or head into the city Friday night around 4 with nowhere to go i also would lose my reservation for Saturday night as well. i took one more breath and i knew i had to go. I walked for what felt like a year and found a place. Its a Coffeeshop Hostel, I'm not kidding. After settling in i made my way to the Internet cafe and started researching hitchhiking in Europe. If there were no trains or buses, i had to get there somewhere. Now flying for 200 euros was on the table of options that were growing smaller by the moment. The issue was, would either the Netherlands authorities or the Spanish authorities notice my expired Visa. if they did notice what would they do about it? The missing answers to these questions and being unsure of the exact fine involved with such an infraction, made me decide not to proceed in that direction. As a read on about hitchhiking i find a website for ride shares. So on this website i find a number of people headed to Spain from the Netherlands but to increase my chances i decided to respond to those leaving from Belgium also. Well, i emailed about 10 people and i only got one response from a Belgium guy and he is willing to take me to the Spanish coast for free. He said he found my blog and wanted to help, how neat huh? Yeah, the kindness of strangers really, awesome. with that settled the next issue at hand was that i needed to find a place to hang my head till my ride 6 days away. i had only anticapated staying in Amsrterdam for 1 night and here i fould it would be 7. i decided to take refuge from the city and headed to a lake near by where there is a really neat Hostel. Almost all of the living quarters are little caravans and its about a stones throw from a really great lake by which i have spent two days swimming to cool off only to get to hot again and eager for another dip, you know the routine. So i head into the city again to get my train to Belgium to meet my ride to spain who might be a serial killer posing as a kind member of society with nothing but killing tools in his trunk. Its a risk but at the moment i have no other options, viable options. Stealing a car was considered. Here i go.
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