Amsterdam

Meg and I spent a short break in the city of Amsterdam in Holland.  It's a lively, bustling energetic city full of interesting sites and historical associations.  We stayed at a hotel just outside the city in the Old South area, an area considerable prosperity.
As anybody who knows Holland will tell you, the best and easiest way of getting around is by bike.  The city has over half a million in all!  Nearly everyone, young and old, and rich and poor,  uses the bike for all short and medium distance journeys. In fact, you are more likely to be knocked down by a bike than a car here!  Everyone seems so slim and energetic, though  piles of chips (fries) dipped in mayonnaise are very popular! 
Outside our hotel is a rank of bikes and my wife is trying to understand the two sorts of locks used in Holland.

I don't think you will see anywhere else a groom ferrying his bride to the  town hall to be married - no posh car but a bike. The photo was taken in the main square in the nearby town of Harlem.

Near the hotel is the famous Vondel Park, the biggest and most popular in Amsterdam.  It's a favourite place for joggers and all those, like ourselves, who just meander through on our bikes and enjoy a stop at one of the riverside cafes.  In Amsterdam you are never far from a canal or a river.

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Below is a typical scene in the city.  Some young people sit by the edge of a canal, chilling out in the sunshine and enjoying a snack, surrounded by cycles of course!

This is a typical scene taken from one of the many bridges over a major canal

One day we took a train to the famous town of Haarlem.  The photo below is the famous jewellers owned by the Ten Boom family, that was used in the war to hide Jews from the Gestapo.  The Hiding Place, a film and a book, describes the amazing life of Corrie Ten Boom.  The whole of her family were betrayed and perished in Ravensbruck, except Corrie, who was released for some unknown reason.  She spent the rest of her life wandering from country to country telling the Gospel wherever she went.

The picture below is a shot of the magnicent Great Square of the historic city of Haarlem.

One of the most visited areas of Amsterdam is the Red Light district.  In it everything goes - drug taking, lots of sex shops, live sex shows and strings of shop fronts where scantily clad girls sit in front of windows offering themselves to anyone passing by. For years the town elders have been happy to sponsor this display of tolerance and so-called sophistication.   But things have started to change.  They became aware that nearly all the sex workers were from Eastern Europe or Africa.  It was obvious that people traffickers and foreign pimps were using psychological and physical force to run the area and to keep the girls in virtual slavery..  They are trying to deal with the problem, but it is very difficult to get witness evidence that will stand up in court.  

There is a Christian group known as the Scarlet Cord trying to befriend and help the girls involved.