A basic breakfast started our day before we wandered to the Amsterdam Dungeons, part of the franchise that runs the London Dungeons. Unfortunately, we miscalculated the opening time so had to kill an hour or so wandering around the streets, but that wasn't such a bad thing as we could do some window-shopping for souvenirs and stuff. The dungeons themselves were a little lame, but the actors were excellent and we heard a lot of gruesome and interesting stuff. One particular story stands out about the soul merchants that would get people drunk or drugged, then trick them into signing up to go away on ships to the colonies for the VOC. A Russian lady brought her two young kids, and they were scared a few times, but not as much as their mother. She was freaking out as she didn't speak much English and the actors quickly realised this and it was very entertaining. The tour ended with a fairly lame indoor rollercoaster, but it was funny.
Following the dungeons we did our last New Europe walking tour. We wandered through the Red Light District, saw a conveniently located church surrounded by prostitutes (so all the sailors could repent after their big night out), the biggest house in Amsterdam and the smallest (only 1.8m wide) – this was because there was a tax in Amsterdam for the street width of the buildings – and the old headquarters of the VOC (now Amsterdam University) which was the first real corporation in the business sense. Another highlight was the palace that was a town hall, built with an agreement between the church and the government that they would also build a huge spire on the church, which was never honoured. One interesting point that I had noticed but not understood was that every house here has a hook attached to the top that is used to hoist bulky items up the outside of the buildings to go in through the windows because all the staircases are too narrow and steep to fit them in. In the Dutch History Museum there is a famous painting that had a 10cm slash put in it by a stupid woman with an umbrella, and although repaired (at great expense) it is quite noticeable in the right light. We also heard about how the Jewish quarter of the city was destroyed in WWII not from the war, but to use as firewood to get the population through the longest, coldest winter in Amsterdam's history as the buildings were all empty (the Jews had been moved to concentration camps). Finally, we heard about the popular medieval entertainment double act of public execution followed by open medical examinations of the bodies for all to see. Apparently Rembrandt used this as one of the subjects of his famous paintings.
We had surprisingly good microwave pasta for dinner and are heading out on a pub-crawl tonight. Should be good.
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