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Haarlem

By now you (& I) are accustomed to the cold-rainy-windy environment here in Amsterdam. With the majority of last week spent at Hoofddorp office, it was time to move out of the city to either Rotterdam or Haarlem. The weather forecast for both places for the weekend was…… cold-rainy-windy, so I decided to take it easy and visit Haarlem. Haarlem is about 30 minutes away from Hoofddorp as compared to more than an hour and half for Rotterdam.

As a result, slept late on Friday night and woke up just in time before the McDonald’s breakfast menu stops being on offer at 11 AM. Caught the Zuidtangent# 300 from De Hoek (pronounced as Dohook, spelling classes for my non-Dutch friends) and reached Haarlem station at 11:30. Reached the city center, precisely 5 minutes from the station. The way Haarlem is ‘structured’ is that there is a big church in the middle (hence the term, city center, duh) and there is an open market for cheese, flowers, vegetables, fruits etc (old fashioned stuff) and then is there are the modern stores for clothing, jewelry, accessories and the works. Surrounding that are multiple canals and some good looking buildings. Quite a mix of the old and new. I asked a local vendor selling his food right outside the church, for the name of the church and unwittingly he answered, ‘big building’. I sympathized with him as I am sure I don’t know crap about all the buildings in Bombay. Sigh.

One interesting scenario today though. As I was walking, I saw a group of men wearing “Hell’s Angels” jackets and proudly window shopping as many of us were. A lot of looks went their way and they were least bothered about it. I dare not think these were the ‘actual’ Hell’s Angels. I read somewhere these guys are the ‘protectors’ of the prostitutes from the RDA, but surely they won’t be roaming around the city of Haarlem shopping for turtle neck T-shirts or Longines watches for their ladies, right?

Not much of a picture-spree day today. Just a couple of the “big building” and canals here and there.

On Thursday, a Dutch colleague and I went to an Indian restaurant in Amsterdam called Gandhi. My colleague was actually feeling sorry for me as I told him the McD outside my hotel was my dinner den. The food was delicious and it didn’t pinch my pocket at all. The friend paid for it :)

Comments

Beautifully explored. You must have enjoyed it.Amsterdam is a great place to be. Whether you are planning to tour,you need strong financial planning for it.

lela

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