Amsterdam, March 5, 2012

I arrived in Amsterdam late this morning at its "Centraal Station", royally impressive....

while also under a massive reconstruction to bring back much of the historical fabric, as in its main hall....

so as to look partly like this in (I don't know what year!)....

where the glass span in the center will in part be connected with a new entrance on the north side of the station, on the river known as the "ÏJ". This new "face"of a great European railroad station will add to the impression in the first picture above (since I believe 1888), where the front "ÿard" is very much one of constant heavy foot traffic and of trams galore...

all part of a bus, streetcar and subway system, known in short as the "GVB" (Gemeentevervoerbedrijf Municipality Transport Company of Amsterdam)) which I was eager to get on, but not before buying a four-day pass in its very nearby information and sales center, good for beginning to see some of the diversity of Amsterdam, the tourist demographics, including a boyfriend and girlfriend from Cornwall in England (underscoring a sense, as in a current Heineken commercial, that this is a HUGE magnet for the young) and, as always, cute kids, like this one who I'm guessing helped to make a GVB staffer's day as she and her Mom were assisted....

Once I got on the "1" tram to my hotel on a main street known as "Overtoom", southwest of Amsterdam's heart, I saw that very beating heart, and the joyous visual overload there reminded me again that there are just a few cities in the world which are spectacles at this level - sustained largely as international playgrounds, something to celebrate and to criticize when we think about the service workers who support them. Seeing a blind lady on the Leidsestraat was also a reminder of how lucky the rest of us are to see these incredible accretions of history and style, as here, at 68-72 Oudezijds Voorburgwal....

where the "Änno 1901"building on the right hints as with many others in Amsterdam of the rich store of Art Nouveau and other styles, well beyond the 17th-century row structures for which Amsterdam is known, and here, at one of the great canals of the city - the Keizersgracht (""gracht" meaning "canal" and "Keizers" meaning - I'll guess "rulers"), seen as the "1" tram crossed it on the Leidsestraat (not too far southwest of the Centraal Station....

The high style of Amsterdam is quite obvious here as well, with apologies for not knowing mroe about this show-stopping structure, now known as Magna Plaza and also on the Oudezijds Voorburgwal....

That's all for now from Satnam's Super Magic Wash, Overtoom 486, where, as on the front window, you can "wash and surf internetten", and it ain't free, but only 2 euros per hour (about $3.00), the music, so far at least, is gently Asian Indian and the bathroom is heavy with wholesale detergent....

DRAFT