benwatts.ca

Yes! It is true, I am back in the land of Maple Syrup and Beavers! The flight was long and very bright, but I amused myself with pathetically attempting to sleep and watching (in order): Mars Attacks!, Caddyshack, Kung-Fu Panda, and then miscellaneous portions of other shows. 

It was definitely exciting to come back to land at the Ottawa airport and know exactly where I would be sleeping that night. Nothing beats knowing precisely where and how you are going to get to the place you will be sleeping later that night. Bliss. 

Anyway, here are some of my favourite photos/moments from across the pond:

Yeah, there’s lots. I think I uploaded over 1,250 photos to flickr. Bwhaha.

Having been in Europe for a month I have come across a bizarre thing that I haven’t seen anywhere else: toilets with a two button flush mechanism. I couldn’t figure it out! One button tends to be smaller than the other button, and both buttons are typically side by side. I frankly assumed one button was for #1′s and the other for #2′s. It never seemed that simple, though.

Honestly, in my Paris hostel I saw the two button system again and genuinely thought that there must be some pretty blatant design flaw with the idea of a two button flush system. After the deed is done, which do you press? Presented with such confusion I always went for the bigger of the two buttons (occasionally trying out the smaller one). However, I noticed that when I pressed the smaller one, generally both buttons depressed (that’s the case in this London hostel). In such a case it seems like an aesthetic choice to split the buttons up — so clearly there’s a design issue!

I figured that in my last two days outside of Canada I’d google the matter and was quite surprised to learn that the button size corresponds to the amount of water used with the flush. Big problem with that logic: given the potential inconsistencies between flush mechanism designs, do you press the large button because it’s bigger (thus more important) or because it symbolizes more water? It’s ambiguous!

Both buses and trams cost 1 Euro for one transfer within 74 minutes. That’s about 50% cheaper than OC transpo when you pay by cash. It gets even better though, since for that 1 euro, you can go all the way to Monaco. That’s right. Tomorrow I’m going to spend a whole 3 euros to go to a place called Cap d’Ail and  then Monaco (one euro for each location, and then another euro to get back). Nicccceee (eh! Nice! nice!). 

Wrote this a couple days ago because our hostel in Amsterdam had no wifi! What a shame … really behind on uploading photos now. There’s still most of Brussels that has yet to go up. Eep!

What can you say about Amsterdam that is SFW?

I went on a nice free tour of the city today. The group of about 20 of us walked through the city, learning about the history and tolerance and whatnot. Very fascinating stuff. For example, did you know that there’s a kindergarten school in the red light district? Yes, neither did I. The window ladies were also there in all their glory. Our tour went by in the afternoon so there were quite a few empty windows. Not that I’m complaining. It’s all so very different, that’s for sure!

Oh, then there’s the abundant coffeeshops and smartshops, which are pretty much everywhere. Interestingly a scene from Oceans 11 or 12 (the remake) was shot in one of them and the alley outside it. Cool beans, for sure.

Peeing in the streets has also been a problem it seems, so some corners contain ‘urine deflectors’. At some point there was apparently an electrified fence in one corner. There’s also open-air urinals (our tour group stopped in front of one of them as there was a guy inside one. Ahaha. The city apparently also puts up porta-pottys every Friday for people to use over the weekend.

The buildings are extremely fascinating since most are slanting left/right and some of them are intentionally designed to lean forward. The idea of making a building lean forward seemed strange until it was pointed out that there were hooks on the front of pretty much every house in the city. The idea is to use some rope, put it around the hook (probably with some kind of pulley) and then hoist the item in question into your house. This has more to do with how steep and narrow stairs are here than anything else. It’s RIDICULOUS how steep the stairs to get to the first floor of our hostel are.

Maybe it’s just the time of year, but the weather is insane!! It will rain for 5 minutes, go sunny and hot, go cloudy and chilly. Then there’s the strong wind that appears to be omnipresent. Makes holding a map quite challenging, but frankly so far Amsterdam has been the easiest city to get around. The one thing I am slowly getting used to is paying far more attention while crossing streets. Compared to Ottawa, there’s certainly a lot more going on and there’s a lot less space on sidewalks/streets. Most streets are one way, but it’s still a good idea to check both ways for cyclists, otherwise there’s mopeds/scooters, not to mention cars and the trams. Agh. Sidewalks tend to be pretty nondescript and blend in with the street and bicycle paths. It’s madness!

I had to buy a new belt today. My other one became all frayed and has been doing a very poor job of keeping my pants up. That’s neither here nor there, though.

C’YA.