Home Sweet Home

There isn't much quite like it...the feeling you get after being away, especially internationally, for some time and then touching down back in the good 'ol US of A.  Thankfully, an uneventful - even great - flight got into Philadelphia an hour ahead of schedule and I'm now on I-95 heading home.    I will say this - Amsterdam definately lived up to all the hype, anticipation, and stories that people tell of the city.  I really didn't think that a major city, let alone one of the top 5 travelled cities in Europe, could be as seedy as the stories told.  Boy, was I wrong.   

I arrived this past Sunday at 8:30AM after a typical overnight flight to Europe.  Of course the major challenge is staying awake the entire day, and trying to get your body over to the local timezone so you can be productive the following day.  So after checking in to a very nice, upscale hotel (kudos to the guy from HQ who booked it), I decided to talk a walk.  Bells are tolling off in the distance, but not too far so I decide to see what the deal is.  A few blocks away is a church that is starting mass - and it's one of the older churches in the city, dating back over 750 years!  Now that's impressive, but was even more impressive was the ring, and I mean RING, of red curtained, red light windows around the church, half of them sporting women in Victoria Secret's finest.    It turns out the hotel was on the very edge of the Wallen red light district - the most famous one in the entire world!  So after some more walking, needless to say I wish I had my wife along.  Next time for sure!

Then there's the perpetual haze that is over the city - at least the area we were in.  You couldn't walk a city block without hitting 3 "coffee shops", 2 sex stores, a burlesque show front, and some of the forementioned windows-o-pleasure.  Everytime I walked by one of the coffee shops, I had to smirk.  The sheer opportunity for someone - say like me - to cut their teeth on the ganja was funny.  Now I waited until later in the week with a group of colleagues to finally give it a go - to no effect (but I've since been told that is normal for a n00bie - so be it).  Was for the best anyways, because both my Greek and Russian counterparts needed a bit of help getting back to the hotel afterwards. 

So, all in all, definately the most "interesting" business trip I've taken in my career.  Madrid and Beijing next month will have a hard time matching it, that is for sure.