You aren’t allowed to take pictures in the Anne Frank house so I have no evidence that I was there (besides the ticket stub I threw away) but it was such a great experience. This was the 2nd time I’ve been to the house but it was still emotional and humbling. I’m really glad Kelly and Stu got the opportunity to see it and experience a small part of history.
When the Germans found the hiding place, they cleaned everything out. When Anne’s Dad, Otto, came back after surviving Auschwitz he said that all the rooms should remain empty as a memorial to his family who all died in the concentration camps. There is a glass building built up and around the house so you can’t see it from the outside which is disappointing, but at least it has been preserved. The tour takes you through all of the rooms and artifacts left behind such as the actual diary and other hand written letters. It’s amazing the insight that she had at such a young age and going through such difficult things in life. Compared to what those people had to go through, our society has become a bunch of “sissies.”
Well, being the sissies that we are, we were hungry after the Anne Frank house. We were walking back to Dam Square to catch the tram over to the Heineken Brewery when we came upon a Dutch pancake house. Well, we are on a mission to make sure Stu gets to experience all things Dutch, so we decided this was a great lunch place. I love the simple Dutch pancakes with cheese and ham but I thought I’d get a bit crazy and order the Mexican Pancake. It wasn’t bad, I don’t think I’d order it again, but it had a nice kick and lots of veggies.
We finally made it to Dam Square where I’m walking with a map in my hand looking at it when we see a giant crowd of people standing around. Well, I decide to walk around the crowd towards the tram stop that we need and I get yelled at by some clown looking man. “YUP! YOU FOUND ME. I’M RIGHT HERE. THE SEARCH IS OVER!” I was, to say the least, a bit embarrassed and confused. I just got yelled at by a clownish man in front of a crowd of people for wondering around slightly lost.
Anyways, we get on the right tram and head off to the Heineken factory. This was our first time using the trams because usually we just walk (and get a workout in). The weather was cold though and the factory was pretty far away from everything so we figured we better suck it up and figure this out. It wasn’t too bad. You can get a day pass for unlimited rides for €7 or for €7.60 you can get a strip that has 15 “slots” on it. Each ride, though, uses 2 “slots” per person. We had 30, that’s good enough for what we needed to do. We even have some left over for the next person. They don’t expire in the calendar year. Each tram you get on, the driver stamps them and away you go. We arrive at the brewery with little issue to start taking some pictures of the outside. You can see my excitement.
They have recently re-done their “museum” so that now it is the Heineken Experience. And boy was it! When you walk in the first thing is a digital bar and bartender giving you the rundown of the history of the company and its founders. It is still to this day run by a Heineken family member, and a woman! We had to take advantage of the photo op that was available:
The next room had all of the huge copper vats where they used to heat up the hops and malt and all sorts of other stuff. They had a great idea and you could look into the vats and on some of them they had little projections on the dark insides showing what would have been going on. I thought it was such a neat idea! There was also a station where you could help out the brew master by grinding the barley and helping stir them. I couldn’t go without putting in a bit of hard labor:
Now, we thought it smelled like horses in there but we figured it must have been the barley oats that give it the horse-ish smell. Nope, there were really horses in the next room. It is where their stable was for the real Heineken horses. Apparently, they will still pull the wagons around town and deliver kegs. Another great marketing/promotional scheme. The horses were so pretty! You could only see them through the glass partition so I couldn’t get a good picture but thankfully Stu was along who happens to be in the 6’3” range and could hold the camera above the glass to get a picture. During my photo op Charly decided to scratch and Freddy thought it looked like a good idea so he wanted to copy. They are such pretty animals!
After the horses we got bottled. Yup, we as humans got bottled. Well, via the 4D experience. It was a lot of fun that people of all ages could enjoy. You walk into a little room where you stand on a little platform that moves and shakes as you go along the bottling process. The moving platform is complimented with spray, heat, and wind. I now know how beer feels while being bottled.
After being bottled we got to go have a little taster. They had neat star shaped bars where we all stood around and answered questions and got some more beer drinking tips and lessons. Since I paid attention another exibit I learned that the foam head on beer serves to keep the beer carbonated and fresh by keeping the carbon dioxide in and the oxygen out of the beer. It is also the lightest part of the beer, primarily made from hops which is why it tastes bitter. American and England aren’t big on serving beer with the head but I learned it is better; you just have to take bigger drinks to get below the foam head. I figured that wouldn’t be too difficult. So because of all of my great new knowledge, and not being afraid to speak in public I answered the questions right and got an extra sampler of beer. I knew paying attention would pay off someday!
The next stop is where we got to bottle our own beer. Well, I’m sure it wasn’t the exact beer, but we got to create a label that has our name on it. I now own a beer that says “Brewed in Amsterdam by Amelia Christensen.”
After that there was more interactive areas where you could create your own music video and send video messages. What a fun idea! There were also crazy chairs that you could sit in and watch commercials from the past 50 years. Such simple things, but so neat. They also had a bit of a museum set up that displayed all of their old beer bottles and labels. At one point Heineken wanted to make recyclable bottles so they created the WOBO, or the wall bottle. They are square bottles that basically interlock with one another so that poor people could use their empties to build a house! Now, if that isn’t helping out the world, I don’t know what is. I am standing in front of a small WOBO wall.
What makes Heineken beer so special is that “A” yeast that is used to create it. It was one of the first beers to come out with standard yeast so that no matter where it is made, it will have the same taste. A student of Louis Pasteur developed it. Those smart people seem to hang out together!
After the tour we got to enjoy 2 free beers. That’s worth half the admission cost right there! They have a great atmosphere created for the bar area and throughout the entire Experience. I wanted to post a picture of Kelly and I drinking, but I forgot and it’s so hard to do after the fact. Kelly’s blog has plenty of great pictures! After the Experience we wanted to take a canal cruise. I also needed to get my train tickets for my trip to Halle, Germany so that I could still get the cheap price. I told Kelly and Stu to go try the food in the wall (to continue Stu’s Dutch food experience) and I’d get the ticket. Well the ticket took forever and I ended up missing the canal cruise, but Kelly and Stu went and I take it they had a good time. I will have to go one of these days! I took the train back home, bought some groceries, and settled in to call my German host parents and tell them I am coming.
After a while into my call to Germany my cell phone rings and it is Kelly. I have no idea why she would call, but I figured it was important so I answer. She needs me to go pick her and Stu up from the other train station/stop in Haarlem. There is 2??? Apparently, there is. It’s by IKEA. Do I know where IKEA is? Nope. So I get in the car and pull out of the garage and try to find it on TomTom. TomTom can’t find it. I start to worry and the thought of driving towards the giant IKEA sign sounds slightly promising but I’m still worried Kelly and Stu might freeze to death. I have the bright idea to Google the address! Sure enough, Google has it and it gives me the proper address I enter it into TomTom and head on my way. I pull into the giant black, empty parking lot and wonder where in the world they are hiding. I call Kelly and she starts shouting that she can see my headlights and gives me turn by turn directions to their side of the parking lot/bus stop. I could hardly see 2 silhouettes’s jumping up and down in the darkness. I found them! They thoroughly enjoyed the warm car and we headed home. They grabbed their bags out of the car and I see a blue Doritos bag. Now, Kelly has been on the search for “Cool Ranch” Doritos since we’ve been here but she hasn’t had any luck. She finally found a bag of “Cool American” which is the Dutch version of “Cool Ranch.” There is some minor debate around the apartment whether they are made with real “American” or not.
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