Amsterdam tourist cannabis ban rejected by mayor

[Poll_Blind]

10. I am amazed you left out the Australian tourists!

I was there in the late 90's and when I arrived I got the lowdown from one of the proprietors of the Hotel Hortus, where I was staying. He was Australian, interestingly enough, but he warned me that of all the tourists I might run into who could cause big trouble, groups of male Australian tourists were the ones most likely to actually get into physical confrontations and attack people, especially when drunk.

I was there for only a few weeks but I was out and about almost every hour of the day, with special attention to the Red Light district and the sort of Chinatown between where my hostel was and the Red Light. He was right. The Americans didn't seem to cause many problems but the British and Australians- you could hear them coming from a mile away- like a horde of mongols.

I was also amazed to see how the Dutch police, especially these little teeny blonde Dutch policewomen, would run into a melee and just start laying the smack down on guys who looked like they should have been in a Street Fighter videogame.

Amazing place.

PB