In May 2006 I returned to the Netherlands to update the Dutch chapters I’d previously written for the Europe On A Shoestring and Western Europe guidebooks. This time, I was also co-author of the Netherlands country guide with Neal Bedford: I wrote the Amsterdam, Zuid Holland & Zeeland, Overijssel & Gelderland, and Utrecht chapters. This meant loads more work (67,000 words) and a longer stay in the land of the Dutch. But it was fun. I also condensed the work I did for the Netherlands book into the Dutch chapters for the Western Europe (Feb 2007) Europe On A Shoestring (Mar 2007) guides.

Selected material from the Amsterdam chapter, by Simon Sellars, published in Netherlands 3, Lonely Planet Publications, March 2007.

AMSTERDAM (intro)
Amsterdam’s always been a liberal place, ever since the Golden Age, when it led European art and trade. Centuries later, in the 1960s, it again led the pack – this time in the principles of tolerance, with broad-minded views on drugs and same-sex relationships taking centre stage. Today the cannabis coffeeshops and the Red Light district are still the city’s top drawcards, even if that can sometimes wear thin for the locals. But Amsterdam’s more than just an X-rated theme park for Weekend Warriors and Hooray Henrys.

Quite simply, it’s among the most distinctive of all European cities (it’s certainly one of the most eccentric). And it may well be the most beautiful, with its breathtakingly scenic, heritage-protected 17th-century housing and ubiquitous canals. Other cities in Europe’s Premier League are nothing if not monumental, but Amsterdam by contrast is irreverent, intimate and accessible: you can walk across the city centre in around 30 minutes, less by bike, and it has enough sensory delights to keep the shortest attention spans occupied. All of the major sights are found in or near the city centre: some of the continent’s best museums and galleries nestle among attractions that are just plain quirky, silly or dumb – but always fun.

Walk or bike around the canal grid, down the historic lanes of the Jordaan district, or through the Plantage and bask in the many worlds-within-worlds that make the ‘Dam so thoroughly addictive.

Box Text: Window Shopping
You’re not fooling anyone; you know you’ll end up here. Everyone does at some stage, even if they think they’re too hip, too moral, too conscientious, too prudish, too impotent, too old…the curiosity value is just too strong. But it’s not just rubberneckers and pleasure seekers who flock to the Red Light District: Amsterdam’s approach to prostitution has generated reams of socio-economic analysis, along with a raft of facts and figures – and some contradictions.

Prostitution was legalised in the Netherlands in 1815 (although brothels were only legalised in 2000). Unsurprisingly, less than 5% of Dutch prostitutes work illegally in the Netherlands. Dutch ‘working girls’ pay taxes and they have their own union. Pimping is technically against the law, but the girls are not on their own: their quarters are fitted with panic buttons in case of trouble. Should the button be pressed, it won’t be the cops who come running.

An estimated 5% of Amsterdam prostitutes are born in the Netherlands, and there’s around 1000 to 1200 working approximately 380 windows daily, in day, evening and night shifts. The girls must rent their window at a cost of between euro40 and euro100 per day, depending on location. Do the maths: the typical base cost for ‘oral favours’ or a ‘quickie’ is euro30; the average base cost for both is euro50. ‘Encounters’ typically last 15 minutes.

Dutch customers are most likely to visit on a Monday morning – that’s when many businesses and most shops are closed. Of the international clientele, almost half are British – we don’t dare speculate why.

A few years back, three chaps installed themselves behind windows as prostitutes, a sociological experiment – and maybe a little bit of performance art – that generated frothing mass debate in the media. In the end, the guys were warned not to give up their day job: no women took the bait (we’re not sure if any blokes did). Rubbing salt into the wound, one female prostitutes dismissed the whole incident as ‘filthy’.

Box text: An Insider’s Guide to Amsterdam: Steve Korver

Steve Korver is the editor of the super periodical, Amsterdam Weekly, and the irreverent and informative Time Out Amsterdam. Who could be better qualified, then, to give me the inside dirt on this wonderful city?

What’s your favourite part of Amsterdam?
It varies and stretches further afield day by day as the inner city gets more and more ‘organised’. I like those funky bits that were always easy to find in De Pijp, Jordaan and along the waterfront but are now getting scrubbed cleaner than clean. But the stereotypes are still nice: the canal girdle remains one of the planet’s most painfully scenic places, especially when the water glows purple just before dawn.

Speaking of stereotypes, what’s the least applicable?
The whole sex, drugs and rock’n'roll thang – it’s there but mostly for the tourists.

Has Theo van Gogh’s assassination changed the disposition of Amsterdam and its people as much as we’ve been led to believe?
It was our ‘September 11th’ – it only took that one death in this tiny country to have a similar effect. But after the initial hysteria flamed by populist politicians, things have mellowed and people are doing what they’ve done here forever: gathered as many parties around a table to talk, talk, talk…and hopefully hash out solutions.

Do you have a favourite ‘Amsterdam experience’?
Shooting the shit with friends on a terrace on one of those first sunny days of spring.

What film or book set in Amsterdam would you recommend for first-timers?
Books: Time Out Amsterdam (heh heh), the Diary of Anne Frank, Porn by Irvine Welsh and Blue Mondays by Arnon Grunberg. Films: Diamonds Are Forever, plus Bastards and Bridesmaids and Simon, both by Eddy Terstall.

Your favourite nightspot?
I’m not telling. Everyone’s got to find their own. But do try to go local rather than endlessly circling around the Red Light District’s inner pit. The Melkweg and Paradiso still rule, but there are a lot of new, smaller venues like Sugar Factory, Bitterzoet and New Anita that are pumping both live music and good ol’ fashioned cosiness back into the mix. As for coffeeshops: remember, you can do takeaway, kids!

Any ‘foodie’ tips?
Fish stalls, for deep-throating herring – the poor, working-person’s sushi. Perfect for people on the move.

Can you tell me Amsterdam’s best-kept secret?
Nope.

What are your favourite local slang or swear words?
Too many to list: just pick a disease, any disease. It’s ever evolving, here: today’s curse is tomorrow’s Ajax football chant.

‘Amsterdam equals bicycles’ – so says the tourist board. What’s the downside?
Tourists on bikes thinking they are in Disneyland, totally oblivious to the fact that basic traffic rules and precautions are just as relevant here as in any other city. Just because it all looks so cute, it doesn’t mean you can’t become road pizza. The same goes for pedestrians. And it’s not just stoned backpackers – visitors just forget to look both ways before crossing a street. Theories abound as to why, but I haven’t figured it out yet.

How has living in Amsterdam changed you?
It’s probably slowed me down to enjoy the smaller, more social things in life – doing business over a coffee and a beer instead of over a desk.

Describe Amsterdam Weekly for someone new to it.
We seek to be attached to the city and not detached. Our prime directive is to provide a paper for culturally savvy Amsterdammers to help plan their weekend and to go deeper into the cultural workings of this very special city. Oh, and we like to kick city hall’s ass on occasion whenever they think they can change things from above and not from the ground up. We are the voice of the grassroots, the subcultures that are always busy bubbling up towards the foreground. We are Amsterdam and not just a city marketing ploy.

Box Text: Bicycles: The Man-Machine Rules
Pedal power rules in the Netherlands: that’s a Dutch truism, simply a fact of life. Bicycles, known in Dutch as fiets, are everywhere, and especially in Amsterdam, where they seemingly outnumber cars. But visitors are often surprised at the nature of Dutch bikes: it’s rare to find fancy mountain bikes in the city’s dedicated bike lanes – virtually everyone rides sturdy, heavy two- or three-gear (often no gear) granny rattlers (Gazelle or Sparta brands). There’s no need for the fancy stuff in a land that’s as flat as a pancake. Also, a 21-speed racer will probably be stolen within an hour of being parked: 150,000 bikes are nicked in Amsterdam per year.

When researching this book, here are some of the sights we saw on Amsterdam streets:

• A man with one leg in plaster pedalling his bike with the other leg, with crutches strapped to his back
• A man riding a bike with a blow-up sex doll strapped to his back
• Four drunks riding one bike
• A woman riding a bike while wearing stilettos and with her G-string showing
• A girl riding side saddle while kissing the boy piloting the bike
• A customised bicycle modelled after Dennis Hopper’s hog in Easy Rider
• A man riding with one hand while holding a plate-glass window with the other, seemingly oblivious to the threat of severed arteries in the event of emergency braking
• A man who must have been over 100 years old riding a bicycle at about 2km/h
• A woman riding a bicycle weaving and wobbling all over the place, her vision almost totally obscured by a massive bunch of flowers
• A group of kids playing football while riding bicycles
• Numerous mothers riding three-wheelers with toddlers in a barrow attached to the front, or in a box towed from behind
• A bicycle barrelling down a side street with no one on it
• An abandoned bicycle that looked as though it had been twisted into a figure 8
• A bicycle up a tree
• Bicycles in canals
• Dutch police riding the same crappy bicycles as everyone else
• Almost everyone steering their bikes with one hand, while talking on a mobile phone or eating a sandwich with the other, while perilously weaving in and out of trams, trucks and cars

Tips
• When on foot, don’t play the dumb tourist, standing in the city’s dedicated bike lanes, staring at the sights: you’ll be knocked over by a speeding bike before you can say ‘moederneuker’, because here you give way to them.
• When riding, watch for cars. Cyclists have the right of way, except when vehicles are entering from the right, although not all motorists respect this. Also watch for dumb tourists (see above).
• Watch out for tram tracks – if you wheel gets get caught in one, you will break your bones.
• By law, after dusk you need to use lights on your bike (front and rear) and have reflectors on both wheels.
• Always lock your bike securely. Bike theft is rampant (see above).

Fast Facts
• Amsterdam has 400km of bike paths, identified by signage and their reddish colour.
• There are an estimated 600,000 bicycles in Amsterdam at any given time
• The bike parking garage at Centraal station has space for 2500 bicycles