Queen's Day and Joe's Visit

So for the duration of my time in Amsterdam, I have been hearing of this holiday known as Queen's Day. According to the hype and legends, it is a day unlike any other. It is a national holiday, honoring the queen and celebrated by the entire city of Amsterdam and country of Holland. Last year, DJ Tiesto (http://www.tiesto.com/) performed, for free, so we knew that it was going to be a big party.

Here's a little background:

Queen's day, or Koninginnedag as we call it, is a national holiday in the Netherlands. On this day we celebrate the birthday of the Queen of the Netherlands. Although it's original the birthday of Queen Juliana (the mother of Queen Beatrix), not of Queen Beatrix, we celebrate her birthday on 30 April. Our Queen Beatrix birthday is really on the 31th January, but the winter isn't the time to party outside. Because of this Queen Beatrix officially celebrates her birthday on 30 April, so we can party with (hopefully) better weather! Isn't our Queen lovely?

Queen's Day is also a typical occasion for the world-famous Orange Craze. On this day most of the people wear orange clothing and creative orange accessories. The colour orange is a ubiquitous sight, referring to the name of our royal family, the House of Orange. Everywhere in the city you'll see orange banners, orange coloered foods and drinks. So don't forget your orange t-shirt when you join us in the Orange Craze!!!

Because Queen's Day and Queen's Night (the night before Queen's Day) are such a big deal, almost everyone in my Residence had friends visiting from all over Europe. My friend Joe Craig is currently on exchange in Madrid, so after some flight mishaps, he made it to Amsterdam Friday afternoon to observe the national holiday.

Joe and I on Queen's Night

After hearing all of the hype, I thought that it was just too good to be true. There was no way this celebration could live up to all my expectations. Somehow, the night and day surpassed my expectations. 

We began Queen's Night, like so many other nights, with a gathering in our building's Common Room. After socializing with the people in our building and introducing Joe to all of my friends, we set out to check out the city. Somehow, our group managed to stick together and about 70 of us boarded the metro all together. Wanting to keep the party going, some of the boys began leading our group in song and running between cars at every stop. This created quite the stir in the metro, but most of the people loved it and either laughed and joined in. Yes, it was true, almost all Amsterdammers were in good spirits celebrating the Queen. 

Making our way downtown, we ended at Leidseplien, where there was a band set up in the middle of the square! People were everywhere and we spent our night hearing live music in the street and inside some of the bars and restaurants. What a night!

The next morning was Queen's Day! After having a Queen's Day breakfast together, we all set out for downtown to see the sights the city had to offer. On Queen's Day, any person living in Amsterdam is given the opportunity to sell whatever they may want to sell in the streets. This means that the streets are lined with people selling everything from books, antiques, & usual yard sale fares to head massages, orange nail polish manicures, and other orange accessories. Vondel Park is reserved exclusively for children looking to capitalize on the opportunity and sell some old toys or other fares. We even saw one little boy playing his guitar-adorable!

We spent the day hearing music from Dutch Djs at a stage called Loveland, walking around the city and seeing sights, and finally making our way to Museumplein to hear Dutch Djs Afrojack (http://www.afrojack.com/) and Armin Van Buuren (http://www.arminvanbuuren.com/). These are really famous Djs and we got to see them for free!!!

Museumplein on Queen's Day-I was in there!!!

It was a truly amazing day and I am happy to say it lived up to my expectations. Everyone is out and about and in good spirits! I did not see anyone acting unruly or getting in trouble from the police. In fact, I did not see any police. Some would compare Queen's Day to July 4, Mardi Gras in New Orleans, or St. Patty's Day in Ireland. I don't think that Queen's Day is comparable to any of these! July 4 tends to be celebrated more individually than collectively and Queen's Day is a family affair-definitely tamer than Mardi Gras. I have just never seen so many people take over an entire city, but do so in such an orderly fashion. Either way, it's a wonderful, fun day and I am happy to have experienced it here and happy that Joe got to be here as well.

Canals and streets filled with people in orange!

For the final day of Joe's visit, Sunday, we went out sight-seeing a bit. We saw the Red Light District, Dam Square, rode the giant swings at the Dam Square Carnival for aerial views of the city, and Joe did the Heineken Experience. I had to return home early from our day for my big interview for my next adventure in Montreal! Stay tuned to hear more about that!

View of Dam Square from the swings!