Furmanator's Blog

First days of classes

Today and yesterday were our first day of classes here in NL. Monday was lectures on the history of Amsterdam (very interesting for me only pretty much because it was a lot about the architecture and urban design of the city), the drug policy, gays in Amsterdam, prositution in Amsterdam, and euthanasia in NL. The drug policy one had a good lecturer who explained how coffeeshops work even though cannabis is illegal, etc. It's a very delicate network that somehow works. The most interesting thing is that only 17% of Dutch have ever tried marijuana, whereas in America it's 35%. The euthanasia lecture was very dull - done by powerpoint in a dark room with a monotone with no new information. The gay lecture was interesting, but some stupid questions by members of the class made us seem ignorant and homophobic. The prositution lecture was probably the most of an eye-opener, for our lecturer was a prostitute herself, who had worked in Canada as a sex worker and a teacher simultaneously, then came to the Netherlands to get her Ph.D. and be a prostitute. Very interesting, if you can imagine. The lectures were all at the Vrije Universiteit.

Today we went to Rotterdam for the day. First we went to a lispunt, a youth center in Rotterdam Noord district. We had a few lectures in the lispunt about programs like Communities that Care (also exsists in the US). The Dutch have a very good approach to social work for children. They look not only at the risk factors present in a community, but also at it's strengths, and work with the two to develop programs to prevent deviant behavior, drug use, and other issues among children. That approach could work in Schenectady, I believe, and if I ever get a chance, I'd like to go back to the Youth Board, and tell them about it. Then we toured the lispunt. Then we went to Paulus Kerk, which is St. Paul's Church. The church used to be Catholic but is no longer because they have opened their doors to drug users and refugees. The drug users (hard drugs like heroin) are given shelter, a small meal, and are allowed 3 times a day to take their drugs in special drug consumption rooms. Strange that it's in a church, but it's helped with letting older addicts live a better life, because they are never going to get off the drug, they are too old. There is needle exchanges, etc. there. We saw plenty of junkies and a few refugees too. Some members of the class were able to actually go in the consumption rooms and see them shoot up with heroin, but I did not. After visiting the Paulus kerk, we went to the IVO, which is a drug research center. We heard a quick presentation from a worker there, and then debated a bit about American v. Dutch drug policy. Then back to Amsterdam.

For meals, we ate a wonderful resturant last night in central Amsterdam, called Humphrey's. 3 course meal for 20 euro - great deal! I had a beef appetizer, duck for the entree, and these amazing dutch pancakes with cinnamon apples. Really really good. Other nights we've gone to this local mediterranean resturant that has a really good menu (panini, bruschetta, etc) for good prices with good atmosphere.

Because class is all day long, we aren't going to have much time for sightseeing in the evenings. We are planning a busy Saturday, though, and are going to go shopping Thursday night most likely.

Time for bed!