Little Bernie - Amsterdam

The Biggest Little Village

New Yorkers call their city The Big Apple. Have a bite and enjoy it, they say. In The City of Lights, Paris, it never gets dark since people work, shop, eat and drink at any hour of the day. London is nicknamed The Big Smoke because its traffic creates a thick cloud over the city.

One of the great charms of Amsterdam is its smallness. You can walk or bike to any destination – and you’re likely to pass through colourful districts with buildings from another era. If you live here, you have a chance of bumping into a friend everytime you go out, which makes the place feel like a friendly village. And then there’s the happy and open mood of the people – which causes outsiders to fall in love with the place.

People living in Amsterdam say they are like water: they can not be controlled. Kings and lords have never had a lot of power in Amsterdam and the Netherlands, nor did the church. It was the burgers (citizens) who ruled.

That freedom made Amsterdam a centre of trade in the 17th century and a beautiful place to live in and visit nowadays.

A former mayor of Amsterdam once said his biggest little village was above all ‘a sweet place where people respected each other and each other’s way of doing things’.

Hannah always says, Amsterdam is not big but it’s great!

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