2 days in Amsterdam

I flew to Amsterdam on Sunday afternoon for a few meetings, staying a couple of nights less than 100m from the Grand Central Station in a very cheap hotel that offers little to recommend to others... I was sent an on-line survey afterwards and will provide them with plenty of reasons to improve.



Whilst there I had some meetings with several people I've known now for a few years and attended the Made-By / Oragnic Exchange European launch on Monday and evening boat party. I was there with my colleague Tim and an old friend of ours who is also called Tim - his blog is listed below left. Tim and Tim did a double act at the conference and their combined speeches went down extremely well. Even given that they had the graveyard slot, I think they got the most applause of the day.

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If I get a chance to link to their presentations when they are published I will do so here. They were very informative on issues of brand transparency. (and now have)





After the conference we headed with Karin our Made-by colleague to the boat party they had set on for us all. Karin has a huge bicycle with flame moldings on the handle bars. Very cool I thought and much bigger than her! Sadly I was still feeling a bit delicate so didn't enjoy the evening as much as I would have normally done as we floated and wobbled around the waterways...



There were organic cocktails and tonnes of food. I managed a few cocktails and didn't feel like eating though the food looked and smelled fantastic. Including a massive Made-By/OE cake in the shape of a T-Shirt.



It being Amsterdam, smoking is still extremely common, and I guess about a quarter of the 100 or so people on the small boat were smoking. It was way too much smoke for me and I was glad when the doors opened to the freezing air at the end of the evening. It was also very loud in there as you will hear on the brief video clip above. I sound like I'm getting too old for all this, reading that back!



Next day after a better nights sleep, more meetings and a few sights. The building above I am sure appears in the Second Life version of Amsterdam.

The afternoon brought a very interesting meeting and a cider while Tim and I waited to say farewell to our friends Esther and Karin. We tried to get to the oldest bar in Amsterdam (1608 I think) but as the snow came down everyone had the same idea too, so we moved on down the street.

Our flight home was delayed and I finally got back to my house around 10pm, flopped into a hot bath and slept like a log.