And so it begins...

OK, let's go back to the beginning.  My parents dropped me off at JFK on Monday evening, in time for my 8:00 flight.  I met up with Aubree and Eric, two other undergrads headed to Mpala for internships, and Colleen and Kate, two recent alums headed to work on education stuff.  The flight to Amsterdam was fine.  I got to watch Divergent! Which I really wanted to see when it came out, but never had the time.

It took us a while once we got to Schiphol Airport to take care of our boarding passes for the flight that evening, freshen up, and store our bags for the day.  But once we did, we went and found Renee, one of my best friends from high school who currently attends Amsterdam University College (which is located just outside of the city).  She pointed the others in the right direction to go see the city, and she and I boarded a bus to go to Museum Square.  This is where the World Cup games were being shown in the city, with tens of thousands of people in attendance.  You could still see the remnants of Sunday's match, in which Holland beat Mexico after coming from behind.  We went to the Rijksmuseum, which was recently renovated (2013--see this awesome video here).  The building is gorgeous, and right outside there's a garden which was full of bright and colorful flowers.  Inside, we saw arguably the two best known works there, Vermeer's The Milkmaid and Rembrandt's The Night Watch.  Both of which were really cool to see, but probably not my favorite.  There were a few Monets there, including La Corniche Near Monaco (probably my favorite), and some works by Van Gogh, including his famous self portrait.  Also, there were some of the still life portraits that Dutch painters are famous for, and some works by artists from the Hague School (Wikipedia article here), which were many depictions of everyday life in Holland.

After the museum, we made our way over to Leidseplein square for lunch.  We went to a restaurant/bar called the Pancake Corner, where I had, you guessed it, a pancake! It was so good--with apple and cinnamon, and then you put syrup and powdered sugar on it.  Nom nom nom.  After some more walking around, we took a tram over to Renee's dorm, so I got to see that.  And then she showed me one of the academic buildings at her school.  It has an eco friendly roof with moss on it, Harry Potter staircases inside, and a moat.  It was pretty awesome.  I had just enough time for a snack before Renee put me on a train back to the airport, where I met up again with the rest of my group, and we made our way to the gate for our flight to Nairobi.

One of the gardens outside the Rijksmuseum

The Night Watch.  With security guard for size reference. 

La Corniche Near Monaco

Renee and me in front of one of the "I Amsterdam" signs by the museum

My pancake.  Note the syrup, powdered sugar, and Renee's beer just behind.  It was a delicious Dutch lunch. 

So good

The canals are so pretty. 

                   

                                The AUC academic building.  You can kind of see the moss on the roof  and the moat.

                                            

                                                        The "changing" staircases inside.