Amsterdamage

The adventure begins hungover in Barry Carey's spare bedroom. A good night at Skittles did not put me in proper form for traveling. My main man Double C gave me a life to Bristol and I was early as usual. Besides being a little delayed (not as bad as my East Grinstead teammates) it was smooth and effective. From the Schiphol airport I hailed a cab to take me to the tournament. Here's a transcript of the exchange with the cab driver.

Brand Knew: I need to go to a place called "Sportlaan". Cab Driver: Is it in Amsterdam? BK: All I have is "Sportlaan"...sure. --CD fiddles with GPS/SatNav as we proceed into Amsterdam. No Sportlaan found.-- CD: Are you sure it's in Amsterdam? BK: All I was told was Sportlaan. --CD calls headquarters for direction. Turkish words fly like Pterodactyl's. CD: THAT'S IN AMSTELVEEN!!!! Now I have to turn around and go a different way.

So the first person I interact with has a go at me. Great start. I get to the grounds where we play around 4:30 Dutch time. I am introduced to the rest of the team and they instantly begin to harass me. Not only for the fact I am late, but mostly because of the "sleazy" handlebar moustache. We roll to the bar for my first of about six hundred Heinekens. We watch some lacrosse then make our way back to the hostel. I was expecting you typical Full Metal Jacket style open room dormitory with dirty hippies who have smelly feet. It was, in fact, a hotel style room with 2 sets of bunk beds, a toilet, and a shower. We were all sorted so we set off for the evening. The group decided to eat at the "New York Steakhouse" in the square near our hostel. It wasn't my choice but my idea of experiencing a foreign city has never been going to a restaurant named after your own state. After dinner we decided to hit up the party being thrown by the tournament. I was in the most odd bar I've ever been in. The entrance is completely unadvertised with set of stairs running up to a door. We walk in through a unfurnished undecorated corridor into the bar. This has to be the most bland bar I've ever been in. There isn't one piece of art or decoration in the whole place. The music was Euro and atmosphere was even worse. We then decided it was time to see the world famous Red Light District. I must admit which I did at the time that the red light mentioned was referring to the street lights. I assumed Roxanne would hit the walk button to change the traffic lights thus stopping cars to solicit. Well I was wrong, just like most of the women seen...that's the end of that chapter. We stopped at a bar that happened to be open on the way home and had a few laughs. The middle aged female bartender was really putting her young face on and it was met with loads of sarcasm from us. God know what time we got back to the hostel, but I hit the rock hard bed and passed out. The next morning we had a nice breakfast at the hostel...ham and cheese on white! Got a large cab to take us to the tournament. Once we arrived we watched a couple games that were already being played and began to get ready. Put in mind, these may have been the 2 worst pitches I've ever played on. One was just a hard sandy mud with no grass...and that was the nice one. Next to it was a grassier pitch but no where near the creases. It was basically sloppy mud for about 75% of it. The first team we played was Kiel from Germany. I thought we played great team defense. They wanted to start their offense from X but we never once let them get it back there. I think my man touched the ball about 3 times. I did though pull of a world famous Mike Brand head fake very effortlessly. Unfortunately our O had a tough time finishing shot although they were getting great opportunities. The final score was a 1-1 draw. I have probably played close to 1,000 lacrosse games in my life and never have I seen a 1-1 draw. So then we were officially out of contention for the championship. We watched the championship, which for some reason was the 3rd last game of the day, and Spencer from London easily took the championship. We then played Maastricht who we easily beat 4-0. They had one American kid who wasn't bad but he certainly was getting frustrated. We were leading 3-0 when our 37 year old Canadian attackman Nigel Tasko, who was on the ultimate bender the whole weekend, decided to take it all the way to the cage, knock a kid over, fall on him, get back up and score top corner with no time left. We made our way back to the club house for the trophy ceremony. We received our 5th place trophy and had a few more beers. Before we knew it we were the last team left in the clubhouse. Then came my first experience with fines. At the end of any tour the club designates fines for every person on the team. It's a way to raise funds for the clubs and a great laugh. Basically they write funny things that happened all weekend and announce them to the group and a payment into a cup is expected for each fine. I was fined for; coming late to the tournament, having a cheezie moustache, being an American, and being soft on ground balls (nothing new). The rest of the team took cabs to the airport to catch their flight and Nigel and I caught the bus back to the hostel. When the Dutch bus driver instructed us that it was our stop, we got off expecting to see our hostel and go in it. Unfortunately we were about a mile from the hostel. Lugging our kits around Amsterdam through a huge park was not fun. We finally got to the hostel and went to our room. I open the door and there sits a strange man with all our clothes, my MP3 player and all our extra lacrosse kit. His name was Francisco or something, but he was on his way to Nepal to go mountain hiking. Thank god he wasn't American or our stuff would have been history. I then grabbed a quick shower and made my way to the train to go and visit a friend. My friend Greg from South Buffalo's girlfriend Jackie told me once that an old friend of hers was visiting England and I should e-mail her. Although she was going to London and I couldn't meet her, I found out she lived in Holland and not to far from Amsterdam. We made some plans to meet in several different places and decided on Den Haag. I took the train to Den Haag and arrived about 10:30 pm. Katie, who went to Mt. Mercy in SB, and her Dutch boyfriend picked me up at the train station and we went back to his place. I really didn't get to hang out with them as long as I would like. We really had a great time catching up with what all the people in SB are doing, and Thomas would have been a great asset at the beginning of the trip as he knew all the best places to go and see. After a great homemade meal and conversation I decided to call it a night. The next morning Thomas was off to work, as they are both bureaucrat's, in a suit and tie...on an old bike. This found me strange but in a city like that I'm sure it's very common. Katie and I caught the tram to the central station and we said out goodbyes. She recommended I put all my kit in a locker in the train station and go see Den Haag. Unfortunately six foot lacrosse sticks don't fit in lockers. I took the train back to the airport and after going on a text message mission I tracked down the other two English guys on my team who stayed another day. We had lunch and walked around the airport. They took off and I waited for my flight. The flight was uneventful but the best part is as we were landing I asked the lady in front of me if she knew the best way to get from the Bristol Airport to the Bristol train station. I was telling her I needed to get to Trowbridge. A head pops up from the row in front of us and asks, "Trowbridge?" Basically I got a free ride right to my door...can't beat that. So there you go. Holland is pretty cool. I definitely didn't get enough time to spend there so I really couldn't enjoy it, but it was worth it.