We turned to giggle at what our friend had just said to break the silence as we sat on the plane. Not just Amsterdam, but the Netherlands as a whole, is quite a unique place. So many unique things that are hard to come by anywhere else are packed into such a little country. A country so small that it only takes 3 hours to drive through.
Let’s start off with when we landed Thursday night. Alissa’s best friend from high school picked us up at the Dusseldorf, Germany airport. She was born in the Netherlands, moved to the United States in 6th grade, and moved back after graduation. After their reunion, 2 ½ years in the making, we ventured to her friend’s house. It was strange not going through an intensive customs procedure to get into one country from another. It was even weirder not having to stop at an intense border crossing area as well. For a second, it made us feel almost apprehensive about traveling in and out of European countries. It’s simply because it’s something we’re not used to. America doesn’t trust in their citizens as much.
The friend resides about an hour away from Dusseldorf and just 20 minutes from the Germany border in a little town called Meerlo. Meerlo gives “farm town” a whole new meaning. As we pulled off the highway we immediately encountered miles of farms covering the characteristically flat Dutch land. Most of the roads in this town run right through the farms. At this particular moment, there was a section of corn on our right and carrots on our left. Her friend’s house is a renovated barn. The living room is where the pigs used to feed, her loft is where the farmers would stack their hay, and when you look out the kitchen window her horse stands 20 yards away. Her horse shares a pen with the biggest rooster we had ever seen and a goat. The goat, as was shared with us, shares a strange affectionate attachment to the horse.
The next morning it was time to travel to Amsterdam. Yet again, we found a train station and a set of tracks in the middle of flat farmland. Amsterdam was no different- a small location filled with contrasting locations juxtaposed next to each other. Anne Frank’s house sits adjacent to a canal tour where people can freely explore the same city the Frank’s unfortunately could not. Businesses and homes now fill the houses painted black from the residents who used to live there that were infected with the black plague. Some of these houses have rotten structures from the rising water levels. Compared to the stable houses next to them, these houses look like something out of a Dr. Seuss story.