Amsterdam-France - day 1

16-17 Sep 2014

Every year, Viv goes on work to Amsterdam. This year, we decided that after he wrapped up his work, we would have a family holiday in Amsterdam and some parts of France. Of course, this meant that I'd have to fly all the way from Singapore to Amsterdam with Xena, without Viv, which was very daunting. I am still not sure how I even agreed to it.

So he went off first, while I tried to get ahead on my projects by a month. It was crazy, but with a lot of babysitting help from the sis-in-law, I did it. And then Xena fell sick. Other than the usual runny nose, cough and low blood oxygen levels, this time she had fever and rashes too. She started getting better, and then the haze hit Singapore again. On one hand, it would be good to get out of the island, but on the other hand, the haze was delaying her recovery process. To be honest, till the very last minute, I really wasn't sure the trip would happen. In fact, on the morning of the flight, a friend messaged to ask me when we were flying off, and I responded, "11:55 pm. If at all we go."

But go we did. Thankfully. I had Xena take a later nap; 4 pm instead of 2 pm, so she wouldn't be too sleepy and cranky during the check-in and immigration processes. It worked well for me and she was chirpy as a bird.

Xena waiting outside the gate, eating some candy that the immigration guy gave her

After a while, she insisted she was cold and that she wanted to wear my jacket, not hers! Ok, fine!

I thought she'd fall asleep as soon as the plane took off because it was midnight. But she was up till 2 am! I wasn't sure what to do with her, but the TV (thank you, Singapore Airlines!) helped to keep her in her seat. She doesn't watch TV at home so it was a novelty for her. I didn't give her the headphones though, so I'm not sure she knew what was going on, but she recognised Elmo and Mickey and that was enough for her.

At 2 am, she finally slumped against my shoulder and went to sleep. I lay her down in her seat, with her head on my lap and she slept comfortably. I stayed awake so I could monitor her breathing and oxygen levels, and watched movies to pass the time. The flight was about 13 hours long, and I'd hoped that she'd sleep for at at least 10 of those. But she only slept 6 hours and then woke up, fresh as a daisy, eager to have a conversation with sleepy fellow passengers. A lady asked her name and she responded with a random, "You can call me Annie Apple." For the uninitiated, Annie Apple is a character in the Letterland song, which her teachers use at school to teach the alphabet. Every time the pilot said, "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking..." she'd respond with a "AGAINNNN???" sending everyone around her into peals of laughter.

She didn't eat much in the flight, so she got a bit irritable towards the last two hours of the flight, but somehow I managed it without losing my cool. In the hope that in a few hours I'd toss her towards her daddy and go off on my own for some hash brownies. Okay, I'm kidding. About the hash brownies part, not the 'toss her towards her daddy' part. I did intend to do the latter. And I did.

Soon, we were out ofthe airport and on the way to our apartment, which we had booked on airbnb.com. Our hostess was overseas, but her friend received us and showed us around the apartment. It was a nice cosy place, and there was even a cat called Tiger! Xena was fascinated by it. Our hostess' son was supposed to drop by every evening to feed the cat.

Tiger naps on a chair.

I was exhausted, and so was Xena so we took a 3-hour nap before heading out for lunch. I'd taken a jacket along, thinking that it would be cold, but it was very warm. Not wanting to carry any dead weight around, Viv went to keep my jacket back in the apartment. No wonder he was dressed in just a T-shirt and pants, while I was regretting wearing a full-sleeved top.  

We had lunch at Peper Wortel, where,  to our utter surprise, Xena ate some tortellini! 

Witness the miracle!

We walked a loooong way to Prinsengracht, the outermost of the three main canals that run through Amsterdam. On the way, we encountered what tripadvisor.com had warned me of - cyclists. Fast and furious cyclists. Millions of them that appear out of nowhere and go zooming along the sidewalks with nary a care for petrified pedestrians. I honestly think there were more cyclists than motorists. And they were very fast and sudden. Viv had to keep reminding me to look out for them. 

What really amazed me was that among all these cyclists, not once did I see one that looked like he/she was doing it for exercise. They were all dressed nicely, and they were all going somewhere. I saw some very nicely dressed up people in really nice un-bikey outfits too. It was amazing. Of course, some were typing on their phones and taking selfies while cycling, which was really scary.

I even spotted a policewoman on a bicycle, fining a scooter rider for using the zebra crossing. Speaking of zebra crossings, there are separate lights for the zebra crossing on each side of the road divider so one needs to wait midway, and watch for the cyclists. Sometimes I felt like I was missing out on the pretty sights because I was busy trying not to go under a bicycle!  

We walked along the Prinsengracht canal, enjoying the pretty sights. We stopped by a souvenir shop for a drink as the walk had made us thirsty. Xena wanted a lollipop, so we got her one. I expressed my shock at the price of the lollipop - 1 Euro! Then Viv explained it, "Souvenir shop. Run by an Indian. In a touristy area in Amsterdam. What do you expect?" 

We knew we would have to do a lot of walking in Amsterdam and we didn't want to take a stroller along for Xena. So I borrowed a baby carrier from a friend. After about 10 minutes of sitting in it, Xena refused and wriggled out. Well, one of the upsides of her hatred for food is that she only weighs about 10 kg so it was not too hard for us to carry her around. Viv did most of the carrying, and I helped out once in a while.

A pic with her poppy at Prinsengracht

Bikes... canals... tourists... classic Amsterdam!

Just when you thought bicycles were the only things you needed to watch out for, a tram would appear out of nowhere! "Watch out!" was Viv's most repeated statement throughout our Amsterdam stay. 

I believe this castle-like building is a restaurant!

Next, we walked to Dam Square, the historical centre of Amsterdam, housing the royal palace and the Nieuwe Kerk church. We didn't see a lot of the pigeons Dam Square is famous for, but we did see lots of police vans and policemen. They looked ready to spring in action, though we couldn't tell what for exactly.   

Dam Square

A few pigeons marking their attendance

Next, we took a walk to Amsterdam's famous red light district. I'd read that it's safe to go there just as a tourist, and taking babies and children was quite common. I did want to go there during the day and just look around out of curiosity. I did not desire to go there at night when the action begins. 

Though we did spot some extremely skimpily dressed ladies in the windows, thankfully Xena was distracted. Otherwise, we'd have to answer a thousand times to "Why was the aunty in the window not wearing anything?" We even heard some men trying to 'bargain' with one of the ladies. One of them actually said, "I should be the one getting paid!" 

We stopped at a cafe and bought a brownie (regular, not hash). From there, we walked to the Waterloopein flea market, a large outdoor bazaar full of second-hand clothes and other knick-knacks. 

Near the Waterloopein flea market

Though the walk was a very long one, it was punctuated with beautiful sights like this. 

Out last stop for the day was Vondelpark - a huge and beautiful public park that gets 10 million visitors a year. 

Ducks swimming in a lake at Vondelpark

We bought some gelato ice-cream from a vendor. Viv tried hard to convince Xena to take a bite, but she was persistent. Which 3-year-old hates ice-cream???!!!

We had walked a total of about 10 km, and were very very tired. Xena and I were jet-lagged too so we decided to call it an early day. Viv packed some Mexican dinner for us with some fruit beer he wanted me to try. I'm a beer-hater so I was surprised that he got it for me but I tried it anyway. The fruit beer was yikes but the quesadillas were nice. 

We fell asleep by 9 pm, feeling tired but happy that the vacation was actually happening. 

Click here for Amsterdam-France - Day 2!

Amsterdam-France - day 2

18 September

I slept quite well, but I think Xena's jet lag was pretty bad because she woke up at 3 am and declared that she was hungry! Her being hungry and even better, declaring it, is such a rarity for us that we instantly woke up and gave her a banana. She ate about a fourth of it, went back to sleep but woke up at 6:30 am, raring to go. I was still sleepy so Viv entertained her while I slept for 2 more hours.

We had a late start to the day but I was feeling refreshed and had synced with the local time. We decided to go a supermarket nearby and pick up some basic food items. The supermarket was just like any other, but we were amazed at how cheap some of the things were compared to Singapore. A pack of spinach tortellinis, which is about $11.90 in Singapore, was selling for €1.90! It did strike us as odd that the cashier asked us to take out the things from our basket and put them on the counter. She also didn't give us a bag to put everything in, until we asked. She just kept everything on the other side of the counter after scanning them. How on earth were we supposed to take everything home? Really weird. I wondered if they were super environmentally-friendly and everyone took their own bags to buy groceries, or whether it was just the cashier having a bad day.

We got back and had breakfast of sandwiches and juice. Xena ate a slice of cheese and a small tub of yogurt. We took a walk to KinderKookKafe, a concept cafe where kids cook the food they eat. You won't generally find it listed under Amsterdam attractions unless you're a parent who starts her travel googling with terms such as 'kid-friendly places in Amsterdam' which is what I'd done.  The place was just a few minutes on foot from where we stayed.

Xena poses outside KinderKookKafe. 

They had a few options for Xena to cook - muffins, pizza, etc. but we chose pizza because we thought she might actually take a bite after making it. We were given the ingredients and a guy who didn't speak much English, explained to us what we needed to do. 

Xena greases the pan...

...rolls the dough...

...with a little help from her Poppy.

All rolled out!

Now it's time to cut the veggies...

Some toppings go on the pizza...

...while some go directly into her mouth (yeayyy!!)

Say 'cheese'!

Xena is all set to hand her pizza to the 'oven uncle' for baking. 

They told us it would take 15 minutes for the pizza to bake, so Xena spent that time in the adjoining playground, which had swings, a slide, a sand pit and many many toys that the kids could choose and play with. 

Xena dragging a toy along

Down the slide she goes!

At the swings

At the sand pit

As she played and the pizza baked, Viv and I sat at one of the tables and shared a coke. Viv remarked that it had been quite long, and whether our pizza was burnt. Suddenly, one of the guys in the kitchen violently jumped up and ran towards the oven and took our pizza out. We were sure it would be a mass of charcoal. Surprise surprise! They handed it to us and it was perfectly baked!

Our pizza!

Xena shows off her creation. 

Xena ate a bit of it and ran to play. But Viv was determined. Not only did he manage to feed her the pizza, one micro bite at a time, he even got the toppings in - olives, mushrooms and red peppers!

Mommy and Xena pose for a picture before leaving KinderKookKafe. 

It was close to her nap time, and though we had planned to take her to the children's playground in Vondelpark, we decided to get back and let her nap and go in the evening instead. 

We went to a pizza place to pack lunch and asked the owner if he had anything vegetarian. He immediately asked Viv where we were from. "India", Viv said, and the guy said, "I thought so. Only desis carry their kids like that." I suppose he was referring to me carrying Xena on my hip. I was pretty sure that he was not Indian, but Pakistani. (Since my awesome trip to Pakistan, I have a radar). So I asked him where he was from and he confirmed that it was indeed Pakistan. 

After our food was ready, he picked up Xena and asked her to pick a drink. "My mummy already bought me one." She said, making Viv and me soooooo proud. But the guy insisted and had her pick a small juice carton and refused to let us pay for it. The desi connection. :)

We got home, finished our pizza and within 5 minutes, both Viv and Xena were fast asleep, while I wrote out this account. Tiger was lying on the table in the patio, sunning himself. 

In the evening, we decided to go for a canal cruise. We chose the Blue boat canal cruise, which was not too far from our place. It was really nice and scenic and they had earphones with audio commentary on what we were looking at. 

Xena insisted on a pair of earphone, but realised soon enough that it was super boring for her. 

So she decided to just sit and relax, and enjoy the view.

The view was enjoyable indeed. 

We saw houseboats along the canal, and at one point, we even saw this guy row past us!

Xena and me enjoying the cruise

Our boat was moving along peacefully when suddenly, another boat bumped into ours. The passengers panicked for a second, but then our co-captain coolly announced, "Don't worry, this is Amsterdam. We have bikes and we have boats. And sometimes these things happen." Of course, I immediately thought of the DDLJ line, "Bade bade deshon mein aisi chhoti chhoti baatein hoti rehti hain."

The audio commentary was in the form of a couple reminiscing about all the things they had seen when they were young. It was actually quite lame I though. 

After the cruise, we took a stroll around Leidseplein Square, which had lots of bars, pubs and shops. We went to the Apple store but they didn't have the iPhone6 yet. Not that we were going to buy it, but Viv wanted to take a look. 

We walked back towards our apartment as we'd been eyeing an Ethiopian restaurant called Abyssinia for dinner. 

Abyssinia restaurant

On the way, we saw this tiny two-seater car. We saw a lot of these during our trip. Very cute!

At Abyssinia restaurant. They had coke in a glass bottle! I love coke in a glass bottle!

Viv had the St. George beer. 

And this was our main course + sides. The base is a bread called injera and the meat, vegetables and sauces are served on top of it. It was slightly sour and totally yum!

Click here for Amsterdam-France - day 3. 

Amsterdam-France - day 3

19 September 2014

Today was going to be a jam-packed day! Our first stop was the tiny village of Zaanse Schans, a popular tourist spot on the banks of the Zaan river. It was literally a stone's throw away from Amsterdam. We took the Connexxion bus 391 from Amsterdam Central Station and got to Zaanse Schans in about 40 minutes. The drive was very scenic and our bus driver was very friendly and talkative.

A chirpy Xena in the bus

Xena with her Poppy

Zaanse Schans is most popular for its windmills from a bygone era, which are still functional, by the way. But it's also a charming place to walk around, and scattered all over it are tiny museum-factories for things such as clocks, clogs and chocolate.

As soon as we got off the bus, we were greeted by the sight of windmills everywhere. I'd read that these windmills were major contributors to the Dutch economy in the 17th and 18th century. There were literally thousands of them -- sawmills, dye mills, oil mills, etc. We literally felt like we had travelled back in time -- the village really does give a feel of what it must have been like in those days.

There was a museum at the entrance with interactive videos about the history of the village.

Viv and Xena enjoy the sight of these old-styled houses. 

The tourist buses had started arriving so the place was getting crowded.

Xena and me against the backdrop of the windmills

More windmills!

The weather was beautiful -- not too sunny and cool enough for us to do without jackets, but of course Xena wouldn't go of her favourite dragon jacket. 

We decided to take a tour of the windmill called 'De Zoekar', which means 'the seeker'.  The only working oil mill in the area, it has an incredible amount of history. It was built in 1672 in Zaandijk and was literally moved in 1968 to Zaanse Schans as it came under threat from urban development. The upper section of the windmill, which weighs a whopping 18 tonnes, was moved in its entirety. It took a day and a night to transport and install the windmill in its new home. During transportation, the mill was even lifted above the overhead lines of a railway!

Viv and Xena pose in front of De Zoekar.

Me too!

We entered the windmill and on the ground floor were the huge grindstones crushing the peanuts. These would be then roasted and prressed to extract the oil. The windmill drives both the grinding and pressing processes.

Can you spot the peanuts?

We had to climb this very narrow ladder to get to the top and view the upper section, including the cogs and the sails. 

Small doors lead out to the outer section where you can literally see the sails of the windmill go past you. There were signs marking areas that were out of bounds, unless you were in for a serious knock on the head by the strong sails. 

Viv and Xena admiring the sails

The roof of the windmill looked like it was made of something fine and relatively soft... 

...but closer inspection revealed them to be hollow cylinders made of dry stems. 

The outer area also provided a lovely view of the surroundings, including the other windmills. 

On our way out, we stopped to admire this tiny wooden replica of the windmill. 

A sample of the windmill's product - a bottle of peanut oil

Next, we went to the chocolate factory, where you could make your own chocolate milk. The ingredients and recipes were clearly laid out. 

Samples of different chocolates. I was blown away by the chocolates called 'rusty tools' because they really did look like rusty tools!

We took a break on the pier and admired the view. 

Xena is curious about the sudden appearance of this sheep. 

Next up was the clog museum. I was amazed at the different kinds of clogs. 

There were even wedding clogs!

And a diamond clog!

We watched the clog-making show. The guy literally took 5 minutes to produce a pair of beautiful clogs from a log of wood. 

Outside the museum was this giant clog and I just couldn't help popping Xena inside it for a photograph. 

There were more! I gave her a pumpkin and asked her to stand in the giant clog, holding it. She absolutely insisted that I do the same. When you're 3-something and you do this, you look cool. When you're 30-something and you do this, you look like a fool.

Soon, we were back in the bus, where Xena took her much-needed nap. 

We had lunch at 'Hasta La Pasta' around Centraal. It was a tiny place with two cooks, one of which was obviously a total newbie. He took our order, but the other cook came over to ask us which dish was for Xena so he could tone down the chilli. How cute. 

Viv tries to feed Xena, while she tries to dodge the spoon.

Xena needed to go to the toilet, but the restaurant didn't have one. The cook told us that the Japanese restaurant next door allowed non-customers to use their toilet for a fee. I found it hilarious, but took Xena there anyway. 

After the yummy lunch, we took a bus and went to Zandvoort beach. One of the ice-cream cafes there had Redbull gelato! It was superb!

A sand-sculpting competition was on at the beach. 

Xena mimicking the sculpture

Xena and her Poppy chilling on one of the brightly painted benches

It was still bright and sunny as we walked towards the beach. 

The beach and clean and the sky was a beautiful blue. Seagulls were everywhere.

Xena and I pose at the beach. 

It was quite warm, so off came the jackets!

Xena picking shells

This Food Express van with lots of snacks was going up and down the beach. 

We found a chair to sit on and relax.

Xena is all set to go back after playing at the beach.

And off we go!

We passed by an Indian restaurant on the way home and decided to have a snack there. We were horrified to see the price of one dosa listed as €14! We ordered a few snacks, but the manager (very obviously Indian) retorted rather rudely, "That's all? What's your other order? This is dinner time already." We were so put off by his attitude, we got up and left. These people are in customer service and they don't even know how to talk to people!

So we dodged more cyclists (I was amazed that not a single cyclist wore a helmet!) and made our way home. We saw two cyclists collide, but thankfully there was no finger-showing or showdown. No abuses, but also no apologies. I suppose in a city of cyclists, these must be so common they're not worth fighting over. 

Another tiny car! Love the red!

Xena gets ready for bed!

Click here for Amsterdam-France - day 4.