Amsterdam (Rough Guide) - Martin Dunford [0]
This tenth edition first published January 2010 by
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© Martin Dunford, Phil Lee and Karoline Thomas
ISBN: 978-1-84836-515-5
Maps © Rough Guides
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This Digital Edition published 2010. ISBN: 9781405382663
The publishers and authors have done their best to ensure the accuracy and currency of all the information in The Rough Guide to Amsterdam, however, they can accept no responsibility for any loss, injury, or inconvenience sustained by any traveller as a result of information or advice contained in the guide.
Introduction
Introduction to Amsterdam
Where to go
When to go
20 things not to miss
Introduction to Amsterdam
Amsterdam gables
Oudeschans canal
Amsterdam has grown up in the past decade or so. It is a slicker, more cosmopolitan place than it once was, more business-minded, less eccentric, and overall more integrated into the European mainstream. Yet it still enjoys a reputation as one of Europe’s most relaxed cities – and with some justification. There’s a laid-back feel to the streets and canals (and its people) that you just don’t get in any other European city. Of course, it remains a place for Sixties throwbacks who just want to get stoned, and for well-oiled gangs of blokes on the prowl in the still notorious Red Light District. But it also has a small-city feel: it doesn’t take long to get from place to place, and – thanks to its canals – many parts of the centre are uncongested and peaceful.
Amsterdam’s welcoming attitude towards visitors has been shaped by the liberal counterculture of the last four decades, but it’s emphatically no longer the hippy haven it once was. In fact, in the last few years the city has been more or less absorbed into the rest of Europe, with not only high-end bars and clubs muscling in on its more traditional haunts, but also with the emergence of crime and drug problems that for decades seemed to have passed Amsterdam by. However, some things haven’t changed, and it’s hard not to feel drawn by its vibrant, open-air summer events, by the cheery intimacy of its cafés, and by the Dutch facility with languages; just about everyone you meet in Amsterdam will be able to speak good-to-fluent English, and often more than a smattering of French and German too.
Amsterdam is still far from being as diverse a city as, say, London or Paris; despite the huge numbers of immigrants from the former colonies in Surinam and Indonesia, as well as from Morocco and Turkey, to name but a few, almost all live and work outside the centre and can seem almost invisible to the casual visitor. Indeed, there is an ethnic and social homogeneity in the city centre that seems to counter everything you may have heard about Dutch integration. It’s a contradiction that is typical of Amsterdam. The city is world-famous as a place where the possession and sale of cannabis are effectively legal – or at least decriminalized – and yet for the most part Amsterdammers themselves don’t really partake in the stuff. And while Amsterdam is renowned for its tolerance towards all styles of behaviour, a primmer, more conventional big city, with a more mainstream dress sense, would be hard to find. Indeed, these days the city is trying to reinvent itself, geared towards a more up-market kind of tourist who is a little less fixated on smoking and drinking. In recent years, a string of hardline city mayors have had some success