We got up early this morning so that we could beat the rush to the Anne Frank house. We made a friend at breakfast from the states who was also heading there so we all went together. When we arrived at 9 there was already a small line but it moved relatively fast. To be honest the house was not at all what I had pictures when reading the book. For one it was a lot bigger then I pictured, this does not take away from the struggle or difficulty it must have been to be in hiding like that but there we're many rooms and the ceiling was at a comfortable level. There was also no furniture in it. After they were found and sent to the concentration camp all the furniture was removed and when the house was made into a museum Otto Frank, the father requested that it remain empty. I also loved how at the museum they had quotes from the diary on the walls, I got a few good ones for my book.

After the museum we headed back to shelter city and went on a free walking tour. The girls running the tour, and also working at the hostel are volunteers that work with prostitutes working in the red light district who want to get out. They were quite well educated on the topic and were happy to answer our questions. Apparently while prostitution is legal, and the women do get regular check-ups and health care it's not as "clean" as it sounds. There are a lot of women who are "imported" to work as a prostitute and often can't get out because they owe money as they have to rent their space. Also they don't have "pimps" but they will have people who are in charge of the brothels, and those people will have a kid (13-15) watching in the street to make sure the girls don't try and funny business. Also there are red lights and blue light, the blue lights signify that it's a transvestite. It was called the red-light district because it began because sailors would port in Amsterdam, and having not seen women for a while would go get a prostitute, and the prostitutes would have red lights shining up their skirts because it would make them look more attractive.

Anyways after our tour we went to the sex museam. This was Kaylena's must do in Amsterdam, he thought it would be hilarious. However this was not the case it was disgusting, it was like walking through a personal porn collection, we got out of there pretty fast. It was a rather crappy day so we got lunch at this amazing falafel place and then just went to a cafe ate pastries and played cards. Good cousin bonding. We then had to find somewhere for dinner and it was pouring rain, not an enjoyable experience but we finally found a pub to eat at. It's really unfortunate we couldn't drink at shelter city because we could have had a real fun time with a few bottles of wine that night. I now know what the first years feel like when they can't drink in rez, it really is a pain in the butt.

Fun fact: Anne actually wrote the diary with the intention of having it published, she took her old diary and re wrote it adding in more details about their living conditions and the war when she heard on the radio that records of the war will be important and there will be a desire to publish writing from the time when the war was over.