Amsterdam Hotels
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Amsterdam
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Off the train at Amsterdam Centraal, down the Damrak and into the 420 Café, where I shuffle through my bags at my stash in the second-floor storage space above the café, pack up my dirty clothes to take to the laundro-world the next day, and meet Adam Brook to catch up on things. He shows me his TravelPod site and convinces me to try it myself. You can find more details of our activities around town at Adam's TravelPod site: http://www.travelpod.com/cgi-bin/guest_login.pl?u=adambrook&t=amsterdam_3-06&p=tpod.
Still no lodgings available for me, so I catch up with Jim Epstein and wangle another invitation to spend the night in his bed at the Hotel Golden Bear. That'll be my home the next night too, and then Jim leaves Saturday morning to return to San Francisco, so something is gonna have to be done fast!
It's hell being loose in a foreign land with no housing budget, but on the other hand it's not that bad at all-at least one is not in the dread United Snakes scuffling for pennies and a room. I always say that if a poet has to starve, it's better to starve against a more pleasant backdrop and in a locale where the people are not so relentlessly idiotic. I might not always know where I'm sleeping over here, but I know I can count on my friends and co-conspirators to take care of me as best they can, and what more can a man ask for? I've been put up by a bunch pf people here in the Netherlands-Mark Ritsema, Donald & Beatrice McSorley in 's-Graveland, Ms. Sandra in Hilversum, Clay Windham in Amsterdam-Zuid, Rod Gillies on his houseboat pad, Dave the computer music man, Wild Billy, Rev. Ferre's apartment west of the Jordaan, Sara's House in Breukelen, the old school building in Bos en Lommer where I stayed in Anthony Murrell's studio for a month in 2005, Dwayne's apartment above Amsterdam Dreams on the 3rd canal east, Arkansas Sam's squat off the Limburg van Stirumplein, and probably some others I can't think of right now.
But right now I'm sitting in the Dolphins coffeeshop with Jim Epstein waiting for our coffees and getting ready to have our Saturday morning joint. He's just checked out of the Golden Bear and I'm wondering where the fuck am I going to sleep tonight when the Dolphins' proprietor, a very hip young man of Moroccan descent called Rado 1, sits down with us to talk. He and Jim have spoken earlier of the availability of a room on the 3rd floor above the coffeeshop for 375 euros a month, but my housing budget is still on zero and that's way above my head. I confess this sad fact to Rado and he smiles and says, I think we can work something out. Do you want to see the room? Yes!
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