amsterdam/milano/bergamo/excitement

this past week has been crazy-full of traveling, sightseeing, fashioning nonsense.

AMSTERDAM
Bikes
there are bikes everywhere. seriously. every one out two people in amsterdam owns a bicycle. walking down the street you see rows of bike racks filled and every road has a large bike lane. also if you hear a bike bell ring you better effing move out of the way.

Canals
before my trip, i honestly had no idea that amsterdam was built around a canal system. i was pleasantly surprised by the canals and the bridges of the city and found them to be very charming. every view from a canal bridge was a great one.

Red Light District:
everywhere you turn is a sex shop with every kind of toy you could conceive of staring you in the face. red lights cover every window where a half-naked girl stands shaking her hips and tapping her ring on the glass at you. horny, drunk men from all over the world mill up and down the streets oogling the girls and sometimes entering their red rooms.
"15 minutes of fun" costs between $50-$70 euro. everytime you ask them to do something extra (aka take their shirt off, let you touch their breasts, etc) costs extra. needless to say the tab can get really high really fast.

van Gogh Museum
interesting experience...not just because of the art.

Anne Frank House
this was one of my favorite parts of the trip. the museum itself was really nice and just the experience of being in the tiny house where the Frank family lived for so long was very moving.

the culture was a little bit of a shock, it being so liberal (not that i minded) and coming from such a conservative country like the US. but, overall i found it to be a really great city and would love to visit there again.

MILANO
my studio travelled to milan to attend the moda in fashion fair. one can obviously tell that fashion is important to this city from the countless designer stores and showrooms that appear on every corner. the people here are immaculately dressed and way too good looking.
no really. everyone here is VERY good looking.

Moda In
the fashion fair showed all the upcoming trends for the spring/summer 2009 collections. the fair was divided into four areas: color, fashion, innovation, and decoration. in these sections we saw the color palettes, materials, accessories and more of season to come.

1) metallics are out, pearlized fabrics are in
2) four main color trends:
color techno
low frequency
high definition
eco allure
3) accessories: mother of pearl accents

Duomo
very large cathedral in the center of milan. ehh...gothic cathedrals all begin to look the same after a while.

Basilica of Sant'Ambrogio
this was an ancient church we visited in milan. i liked it because it wasn't yet another gothic cathedral with insane detail everywhere. it was simple and simple is nice.

Monumental Cemetary
this was my favorite part of the milan trip. this was the most amazing, ornate, over the top cemetary i have ever seen. we all wander around in it for an hour or so. it was a great place to think and observe. the graves all had amazing sculptures on them, some graves were actually huge monuments that families of the deceased could go into to pray, etc.

to be honest i didn't really like milan that much. as a city i felt that it lacked character and it just seemed very commercial.

BERGAMO
bergamo is a small city near milan. we came here for the day because it's a pretty. i enjoyed bergamo more than milan. it was more like how i imagined an italian city to be.

this has been a really long, but fun week. lots of exposure, lots of excitement. i'm actually looking forward to a break from planes and traveling.

EXCITING/AMAZING/MIND BLOWING NEWS
radiohead may 9th. if anyone is interested in going with me just let me know
oh, and jonny greenwood is going to father my children :)