I am not a photographer. However, I find myself with a few photos of things in Amsterdam that I felt like photographing at that moment. They’re not all peculiarly Amsterdammish, but I think now is the time to share them. These pictures were mostly taken in winter, so with Spring nearing (it’s still too cold to say winter is over) I feel like I should say goodbye to this winter and all the misery it caused me.

First up is a picture of a bike in a peculiar position. In a city with more bicycles than people (yes, there really are more bicycles than people) bikes get up to all kinds of naughty things. In Afrikaans we have a saying “op die paal”, but that has nothing to do with poles or bicycles.

A bicycle “op die paal”

Next, bicycles covered in snow (mine is the one right in front). It snows in lots of places I know, but I come from a warm place with no snow. Snow and bicycles are an unhappy combination.

snow cycles

Some dirty brown snow. I have mentioned in a previous post that snow is rarely white and pretty for long. It becomes brown, dirty and trampled soon enough. I am not the only person who thinks snow is overrated. There is one other Dutch person who also thinks so. One person could be mistaken but two never are.

the dirty snow road

In Amsterdam there is graffiti everywhere. Not a single open space next to a train or metro track is unadorned. Here is some graffiti inside a metro which I found amusing. It’s so adorable the way they misspelt “rebel.”

adorable grafitti

A three-wheeled car like the one driven by Mr Bean’s enemy. Did you ever think you would see one of those in real life? I almost felt like doing something nasty to it. But then I thought, that would make me Mr Bean, so I just took a photo. (Actually I did not think any of this, but I did think it would sound cool if I said so).

three wheeled car

A dog in a chair at Waterlooplein. Amsterdammers love their dogs. It is a cute dog.

adorable dog in a chair