Maybe a little premature, since I don’t leave till Friday a.m., but barring disaster (cue ominous music), here’s a handy summary:

Number of days in Amsterdam: 30
Number of days riding bicycle: 30
Number of times I encountered a car blocking the bike path: 3 (in NYC, it’s at least 3X/day)
Number of times I clumsily got on or off my omafiets (granny bike) and then looked around to see if anyone was watching: 876
Number of days when I felt like I’d gotten the hang of getting on my omafiets: 1 (today)
Number of days when I felt like gotten the hang of getting off it: 0
Number of frites stands visited: 5
Number of culinary epiphanies: 6

1) Basil ice cream is good (I’m a little behind the times on this one).
2) Pom–a food I never even knew existed until this trip, but see explanation here.
3) Van Dobben, the famous old-fashioned vendor of kroketten (croquettes), is heartbreakingly wonderful. All this time I thought it was just for drunk people.
4) Bitterballen (basically, little round croquettes) signify a great cultural gap between me and Dutch people. I mean, sure, I like them, but it’s just not the same.
5) Intestines can be good. After my tragic andouillette incident in Lyon, I’ve been leery of the chitlins. But Tjon’s food stand at Kwakoe, the Surinamese fest, did me right.
6) Most important: Frites should be done at 150 C/302 F, then 170 C/338 F. I can’t believe all the American cookbooks I’ve read that say to fry everything at 365 F. (For the record, I was told by the master that croquettes are perfect at 180 F/356 F.)

Number of times I thought, “This place is so beautiful!”: 30–basically, every evening as the sun fades away, my heart just plops out on the street. (By contrast, I’ve had that thought in Queens only about 5 times in 10 years, and 2 of those times were provoked by the steam from the power-plant towers, which hardly counts.)

Essay Section:

High point: Talking to all the people I did “Local Voices” interviews with: a rad tour guide in the red-light district, a cool girl who knows a lot about the theater scene here and had a lot to say on post-Theo van Gogh Amsterdam, a smart woman who taught me a lot about Dutch food and some inspiring bike freaks. Anyone who read my earlier post about this trip knows that I hate talking to strangers. But part of my assignment is to find people with an interesting POV on the city and interview them. When I had to do this for the Cairo job, it caused me no end of stress–and then turned out to be fun. But could I remember that lesson this time around? Of course not. It’s just like how, while I’m drinking, I can never remember that drinking too much is bad for me–but with a positive twist.

Secondary, literally high point: Late Sunday night, I was walking along a street in the center. I was a bit stoned–I’d been doing my coffeeshop research, and entertaining a visiting friend of a friend (if you can call staring at the wallpaper in the coffeeshop and smiling thoughtfully “entertaining”). I’d just dropped him off at the train station, and the air was balmy, and I was enjoying walking in the beautiful night. Until some dude next me said, “Beautiful night, isn’t it?” “Grumble” replied my defensive brain. I smiled wanly and nodded. Dude kept talking, and, whaddya know, he turned out to be nice. He just genuinely wanted to share what a nice night it was with someone. We got to the end of the pedestrian zone and biked our separate ways, and I was smiling thoughtfully again. (The fact that the guy was Moroccan somehow makes sense–I have never gotten that “let’s just share the joy of being on this earth!” kind of human contact in the First World, except from people on drugs, and sometimes at home in Astoria.)

Maybe high/maybe low point: I tried to get frites at the Eiburgh Snackbar, allegedly the best in the city, but people probably say that because it’s in the middle of nowhere by a gas station. Sour grapes? Maybe. Just as I rolled up, a crowd of Dutch rockabilly rednecks swarmed out of their beat-up muscle car, all tattoos, sleeveless shirts and mullets and yelling, “Stop, Elvis!” at their jumpy dog. They ordered about 80 fried snacks each. The counter woman, who was wearing a T-shirt that said “Fuck You!” on it, had to stack all the frozen bricks of kroketten, kaassouffle and frikandel (creepy sausage) on the counter to keep track of them. And the rednecks all kept saying, “…met mayo!” (with mayo) at the end of their orders. I turned around and left because I saw the grease would go cold before my frites got in. I would’ve been grumpier, if it hadn’t been such a culture/food train wreck.

Low point, pretty literally: the day when, due to poor planning and lack of food, I slumped down so far in my cafe seat that the end of my braid fell in my coffee. Sadder still: I didn’t even realize this until hours later, when I noticed my hair was hard and globbed together with milk foam and sugar.

Which, all things considered, is not bad at all.

Erm–now I just have to write the book…