Amsterdam Politie

today we got a first hand experience about how the Amsterdam police services work.  wow, i bet you are thinking about all kinds of different reasons why we could be involved with the police.
nope, not espionage, drug trafficking, public intoxication, urinating in public, etc.

our experience was something much less dramatic.

we have rented bikes through our friend Jente’s transit card because the rate is much better than the tourist bikes.  yesterday we had a great day biking through the waterlands just north of amsterdam.  we saw different types of birds and small dutch farming villages.

we went out for dinner last night at a turkish restaurant just down the street from Jente’s place (where we’re staying).  my bike lock was pretty finicky, so robO locked both of our bikes up together.  we sat at a patio table about 10 feet from where they were.  sometime during the course of our dinner someone came along and stole the key which was still in my bike lock.  taking the key out activates the wheel lock for the back tire, thus making the bike un-rideable.  (we have learned since that bike thiefs hope that you’ll abandon the bike, then they come along with the key and steal it.)   so we carried the 40 pound bike home and locked it to rob’s for the night.

in the morning we obviously had to take the bike back to the shop (which is about a 20 minute bike ride away).  we had the great idea that rob would ride his bike in, while i would take the un-rideable bike on the tram.  what we didn’t know is that bikes are not allowed on trams.  of course this was learned AFTER we had already split up.
i carried the f#&king bike about a third of the way, then realized that we would be in more trouble if we also ended up losing eachother (as it was taking me a ridiculous amount of time to get to the meeting point and i had no communication options i.e.cell phone).  so i abandoned the bike in a busy area and took the tram to meet rob.
of course the klootzaks (Jente taught us the dutch word for a$$holes) at the bike shop made me feel like the stupidest person on earth to abandon the bike to which some stranger has the key (even though it was in a different area of town) and told us that we would likely have to pay for a WHOLE NEW bike (400 euros).  robO doubled me back to rescue the bike and we went to the police station to make a report for the missing key (as directed by the klootzaks).

we took turns carrying that MoFo bike back to the shop, where they told us we have to mail in our police report to determine our fate.  (note: on they actually sell new locks at this shop for a total of 80 euro.)  so we will post an update when we get the damages.  funny thing is that when Jente called she spoke with a different guy who said “don’t worry about it – people lose their keys all the time.  just bring it in and we’ll deal with it”.

anyway, we salvaged our day by going on a hop-on, hop-off tour around amsterdam’s beautiful canals.  of course, we were so tired from carrying the bike that we actually never “hopped off”, but saw many of the highlights.

on tap for the next couple of days: Anne Frank House and a trip to a few neighbouring towns.

the offending bike

heron

robO’s ride

imagine if you forgot where you parked…

robO thought they were saying “kennel”and was looking for dogs.  ha ha canal!

south church

my favorite row of houses (interesting facts: they still build them with a beam at the top that can be used to hoist large furniture items up to the top; they are built angled slightly forward at the top so there is less damage when hoisting your pianos, etc. to the top.