Tuesday, September 25, 2007

Amsterdam at Midnight

Amsterdam has at least two, often three entirely different cities sharing each place on any given day. Some places that are full of hardware stores and elementary schools suddenly spring restaurants in the evening. Bars dominate some of these same areas at night. The never-empty streets are later occupied by people you'd never want near your neighbourhood school. Until the light of morning when the last of the misanthropes move out and giggling children again return to school.

And midnight is the most dramatic of all the shifts. The trams and buses take their last rides to the edges of town as the (respectable) night clubs are opening their doors. (Sure some might have been open at 10pm. But no one shows up until 1:00.) Restaurants close their kitchens by 10:30 and by 11:30 the well fed customers are grabbing their aforementioned last bus. So midnight is a brief, brilliant mix of two portions of the city. A moment of chaos transitioning from the respectable to the unspoken.

There isn't a specific time in the morning when the last partier goes home. There is no time such as 5:15pm when the all the office workers become cafe sitters. The various stages of the city transition slowly. But at midnight... ah midnight in Amsterdam.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Midnight anywhere and I'm asleep. I am a dull one.

Anonymous said...

crap -- sorry Morgan. This having two identities requires an attention span.

I Dive At Night said...

Quilly, normally you'd be there at the school when the kids are... so it's a bit hard for you to stay up late enough to get out of the club in time for work.

Rest easy, others have the clubbing covered for you. And I'm not claiming to be one of them. I like to be in bed by... well what ever it was 20 minutes ago.

Minka said...

Nice title :)

I liked some sentences in that post very much... I always live to see midnight...I think I haven't been found asleep around this time for years. I guess teh German part is all out of me...on the other hand I hardly ever have to get up early, well...except tomorrow morning when 7 is my magic number :)

I Dive At Night said...

Was one of the sentences "A moment of chaos transitioning from the respectable to the unspoken"? I actually thought of Saturday night in Iceland when I wrote that.

And is liking "some" sentences more or less than average??? Feedback!

Minka said...

well, you write differently when you write about a complex concept, rather than when you write about your every day life...
hey, i am not a writer...I just see sparks in your writings whenever you tackle concepts and ideas, rather than describing your...say...toaster :)

I love both varients, for different reasons :)

I Dive At Night said...

;-) <-- Genuine tears