A strange night

Well for starters yesterday had a bit of everything,
In the afternoon I played chess with a dutch guy in the park (who later offered me a place to stay whenever I need), in the evening we wandered aimlessly through the red light district watching scenes of animalistic fluid exchange spill out on to the street, the whole time trying to get a grasp of a world that was so vivid and colorful it didn't seem real.

The early afternoon was filled with chess and a unxepected tour through a side of amsterdam we couldn't have expected to see. I had played a few games with Ron (the dutch chess guy) when I had previously visited Amsterdam. We sat down to play again and to my surprise he actualy remembered me and what was even stranger was the fact that both of us remebered some of the games we had played a year before. I played reasonably well for not playing much lately and one a couple of games, though he was a bit stronger. After a few games he asked Tyler and I if we wanted to go for a walk and get something to eat. We of course said yes and headed off to a small store and then sat in a park and talked. Ron ended up being a really cool guy who said that we could stay at his place with him and his girlfriend if we ever visited Amsterdam again. After talking for a bit longer we headed off to see a farmers market he had told us about. The market ended up being cool but just the fact that we were walking around with someone who actually lives here made it more interesting.

Eventually we met back up with my friend Corry and sorted out what we would be doing for the rest of the evening. Around 17:45 is when the night started to get interesting, we had eaten a very small amount of mushrooms around 17:00 (only 1 dose split 3 ways, not wanting to over do it), at first we felt that we hadn't eaten enough and were going to have to go and get more if we even wanted to feel anything. So we decided to rest for a couple minutes on a bench and plan what we were going to do next. After a few minutes on the bench we started to realize that something had changed and were filled with the giddy laughter of children as the world slowly switched over to high definition. We watched cyclists seem to float by, Watched peoples faces and mixed emotions pour out of them. We saw love, fear, frustration and almost every emotion you can imagine in these faces. It's amazing to sit in one place very still and just notice the little stories that play out in front of you as strangers walk by. At this point (needless to say) the mushrooms had begun to work so we decided to head off to the more hetic and colorful scenes of the hookers, bars and wispering drug dealers. The drug dealers in the red light district have perfected the art of wispering, it's so subtle that when they walk by and wisper into your ear your mind is tricked for a second into thinking it just thought "cocaine, extasy" instead of hearing it. In the beautiful and crowded red light district we saw so many different stories unfold, the Spanish guy who stared at a hooker like a heavy weight boxer at the beging of a prize fight, focused and intense while his friend spoke quickly and without pause into his ear as if perparing him to slay an apponent across the ring. We also saw the quick hurried walks of shame as men would leave the stalls and try to escape while the girl they just fucked would put a smile back on and try to lure another one in for a quick € 50. Even in the faces of the hookers I saw a range of emotions, in some total despair, you could tell by the way a cigarette was smoked or the way they stared blankly into the crowd of lud druged beasts, but in others there was what looked like actual excitemet and happiness. All in all it was a bit like going to the zoo. I could go on and on but I think you've got the picture.

We eventually got home and in one piece, so for that we can be thankful. I've got to run, I think we're off to Antwerp today. Hope all is well, Zak


I'm also going to upload more pics as soon as I find a computer I can do it on.

and again only Dutch spell checker sorry