EuroX Trip: Day 12

Here from Amsterdam, and am I glad to be back to keyboards that look more normal, and don't have buttons changed around. I am glad I don't have to relearn the keyboard after getting used to and trying to lose the influence of the dreaded French keyboard.

We took the train from Gare du Nord to Rotterdam this morning. Since we got to the train station early, Henry and I went to Quick, the French fast food chain comparable to McDonalds. We had seen these ads for 'Extreme Cheesebuerger' all around Paris and Rheims while we were in France, and Henry decided he wanted to try one. Unfortunately, the burgers didn't start being served until 8am, and we were there at 7:40am. So I ended up, with much difficulty, trying to explain to the girl at the counter in my limited French, that we would order the burgers and pay for them now and wait for them.
Not interested in eating so much grease in the morning, I decided to leave my things with Henry and go exploring around the station for a bakery which served pate chaud, which is a kind of meat pasty. Unfortunately, I looked high and low (for about 15 minutes) and couldn't find one. Grease for breakfast!
We got our burgers and hurried to the station, passing a campout of bums in front of the station on the way. Soon enough, we were riding to Rotterdam, passing through Brussels and Antwerp on the way there.

Once we got there, we had to stash our stuff. One thing I've noticed about the Dutch language is their vocabularic predilection for hard-sounding consonants and double vowels. It makes for interesting listening to a Dutch conversation, sounding something like German.
We met up with my friend Razor, who took us around Rotterdam, and was even kind enough to pay for us too! I will have to do the same if he ever comes to Adelaide. We went and saw several 'interesting' statues, including something that absolutely made my day.
They had a statue of the V2 Gundam in Rotterdam! I don't know of any place outside Japan that has a statue of a Gundam. It was absolutely awesome to see, and I just fangasmed over seeing it. We wandered Rotterdam, chatting about lots of things for several hours, before camping out at a bar and chatting about stuff.

One train ride, and sad farewell later, we were in Amsterdam! City of sin and all that jazz. I am looking forward to tonight's visit to the Red Light District.