July 21st
Today was our first official “free day” in Am-dam, and we had a lot planned! Canal cruise, museums…so much to do! So you can imagine my surprise when I walked out of the room to buy tickets at the handy kiosk in the hostel lobby…and dig for my wallet…and dig…and dig…and PANIC. It’s not there. So I proceed to tear my room apart looking for it (semi-hysterical at this point) and feel the sudden urge to vomit. This is the point when I find out just how great girlfriends (new & old) can be. These girls just took control (Jenny in the lead…of course) and completely took care of me. We walked into town, determined to go to each place that we went last night and find the wallet. So…we were thoroughly disappointed when every one of them were still closed. So…we wait. And got ice cream at McDonalds. Really sweet Jenny moment: I got back from using the WC at Mickey D’s and saw that everyone had bought ice cream cones…and Jenny had one in each hand. What a gal. If that’s not a true friend I don’t know what is. So after a quick lunch, we headed over to jump on a canal cruise. The only problem with this is that it was around 2 in the afternoon…which means 8 sleepy girls. I think we all dozed off at some point during the ride. But it was really neat to see all of the houses that Jenny mentioned earler.
Insert from Jenny here. I was determined to stay awake for the cruise considering we paid good money to see the city via water, but 4 weeks traveling really takes a toll on ones ability to stay awake when drifting slowly around canals. So the boat makes several stops along the way to pick up more people, and I decided that would be the best possible timing to cat nap and not miss anything. So I lay my head down and doze off and feeling pretty good about the back of my eyelids when I suddenly felt something cold and wet on my leg. Holy moly. I sat up and said “did it start raining?”… Uhhh no I had just drooled on my leg.
So after the canal cruise…Jenny and I headed back to the hotel for a siesta. Well…she siesta’d and I fretted. I still had a phone call to make…and I was feeling it in the pit of my stomach. So I decided not to waste any more time and call my parents. Needless to say…they were great. I was borderline hysterical again after hearing my mom’s voice…but everything worked out thanks to a great company called Western Union. (Funny fact… Before the trip my dad and I were at the wal mart money center…and we had this conversation:
Me: Dad why would anyone ever need to send a money transfer?
Dad: Well Lauren that’s what you would do if you ever lost all of your money and cards and you were overseas without anything at all.
Me: Man that would really suck. I wonder how often that happens.
Dad: Let’s not find out, ok?
Oh the irony…. Hopefully Mark can laugh about this now. He didn’t really think it was humorous the day after it happened. Love you dad.)
So once I knew everything was ok on the home front…I could actually enjoy myself again. I promised them that I would go back to the places again and make sure no one had turned in a pink wallet, but neither of us had high hopes. And our assumptions turned out to be right. No pink wallet was found.
~Moment of silence~
But we did have an amazing dinner that night…Jenny and I split lasagna gorgonzola and tiramisu…and I drowned my sorrows in yummy Italian food in Amsterdam. After dinner, we all went to check out the red light district. I had expectations for this…but nothing could prepare me for what I saw. It was sad really. Enough about that. Tomorrow’s yet another free day here…some people just can’t get enough of this place. As for me….I’m kind of over it. Oh well…there are still museums to see tomorrow.
L&J
