Last updated on Sunday, December 16, 2007
Amsterdam
Amsterdam makes an impression with its canals, bridges, row houses and monuments. Along with the trams, bicycles, and thousands of people walking down the Damrak, you will be lead along this main street from the Central Station into its commercial heart. Apart from the diversity of restaurants, shops, people, and products, and the constant activity that first envelopes you, you will notice a familiar feeling as the city welcomes you into its fold.
Amsterdam is many things to many people. It is a city that is flexible to your needs and desires. It can be trendy, hippie, cozy, conservative, commercial, busy, innovative, aristocratic, historic, trashy, accessible, tolerant and inviting. All kinds of opportunities are available here. You can find traditional museums with historic and world renowned collections, but you can also find a myriad of smaller, more particular museums. The list of places to visit seems endless. Amsterdam is also full of other cultural activities from festivals to films, to musical, theatrical, or dance performances. These events also take place in a range of venues from the large and prestigious to the small and experimental. Even the architecture deviates from its downtown stereotype with its well know gables to examples from the turn of the century Amsterdam School to the most modern forms that have just been developed in the last few years. It is a blend of residential, commercial, public and private, old, less old, new and very new.
This multitude of options and opportunities is not just limited to sights, tastes, and sounds but also is carried by a spirit that is embodied in the alternative views and lifestyles that can be encountered here. From one end of the spectrum to the other Amsterdam has it all, and can be experienced passively or actively. You can merge in and out of the different faces of the city, and take your choice of what appeals most to you. It is quite an individual society, so you can independently decide. It is the place where "alles kan."