Got Roo?: Dutch Design - Day 3 - Neighbourhood Scout "We saw the Prince!"

We had a late start today as we all took some time to re-group from the previous intense touring days. My neighbourhood team is the De Pijp/Oosterpark area with Vivian H., Kenneth, and Élan. We started our day off just doing a walkthrough of the neighbourhoods to get a feel for what they are.

Entrance to Albert Cuypmarkt

We visited one of the busiest street markets in Europe, the Albert Cuyp Market or Albert Cuypmarkt, in De Pijp, which is on Albert Cuyp street between Ferdinand Bolstraat and Van Woustraat in the Oud-Zuid district. There were a variety of products on sale ranging from food products such as cheese, meats, fish, snacks to clothing, bedclothes, pans, plants, SO MANY THINGS!

Our first stop was a dried fruit and nuts stand. Vivian and Elan got some dried mangoes and I got a pack of the dried kiwi. They were a bit sweet but SO GOOD.

We were getting a bit overwhelmed with the crowds so we went into a cafe, De Koffie Salon to do a short de-brief. I got an iced latte (icekoffie verkeerd) and a black current cake (zwarte besson koek). Elan got a nice slice of cinnamon-y apple pie (applespicecake).

We came up with a strategy for our narrative and decided to continue our neighbourhood walkthrough by checking out the Oosterpark area. Of course, being in De Pijp in the market, we had to stop and get some fresh stroopwaffel. Elan got a plain stroopwaffel and Vivian got a half hazelnut stroopwaffel. As we were heading down there via Sarphatistraat, we saw a bunch of guards at the InterContinental Hotel Amstel. We joined the small crowd gathering at the front entrance and shortly after a motorcade came in and got to see Prince Charles and Camilla.

Hazelnut Stroopwaffel

Walking through Oosterpark, something bad kinda happened and we stopped to take a look. We definitely noticed a difference in the diversity of culture in the area as most of the people were of African, middle-Eastern, and Asian descent. The pace of life in the Indische district was definitely more slow, or at least different than the rest of Amsterdam. There was a weird incident where I saw a bottle flying through the air thrown down at the sidewalk across the street from one of the apartments. I'm not sure if this was intentional but it was definitely jarring.