In the last EU Off Duty, I wrote about Amfora, an ambitious proposal to create a vast underground leisure and parking zone. It’s a project that, effectively, would sweep much of the traffic that chokes the city’s narrow street under the canals. As clean-up jobs go, it’s massive. But no one seems really sure if it’s going to happen or not. The city is, nonetheless, changing. And it’s been happening in the red light district.

All with good reason. Organised crime is a problem in this part of town, known locally as Walletjes as it’s where the old city walls once stood. So is the unsavoury presence of pushers and junkies. Well, this year, plans are underway to try and deal with these issues, while also softening the area’s image. One initiative, along with the closing down of several coffee-bar pot shops, is called the Redlight concept. This has led to former brothels, with their floor-to-ceiling display windows, being transformed into artists’ studios, exhibition spaces and even, in one case, a public library.
All this hasn’t wiped out prostitution, though. The city’s leaders know full well that it’s a draw for tourists and there’s the simple business of workers’ rights, supported by a prostitutes’ union. “It will still be a place with 200 windows for prostitutes and 30 coffee shops which you can’t find anywhere else in the world,” a local councillor recently told the Dutch news site NRC Handelsblad. “And you won’t have to be embarrassed to say you came.” www.redlightartamsterdam.nl

A second home for Russia’s treasures
If you feel the need for some higher culture, it’s worth taking a 20-minute walk south of the red light district towards Amstel to visit Hermitage Amsterdam, twinned with the vast State Hermitage museum in St Petersburg. In fact, if you show up at 10am on Saturday June 20, you’ll be on time for the grand re-opening of its restored and expanded 17th Century home and the inaugural exhibition, At the Russian Court: Palace and Protocol in the 19th Century. This will be a vivid recreation of Russian high life spanning the reign of six tsars, with over 1,800 pieces on loan from St Petersburg. Items on display will include the masquerade costume of Duchess Ksenia Alexandrovna-‘Boyarina’, court paintings, Fabergé jewelry and even the last tsarina’s grand piano. All this opulence and privilege had a brutal end, and it’s a story that adds compelling emotional resonance to the exhibition. Nicholas II, his wife Alexandra, their five children, doctor and three servants were shot dead by Bolshevik revolutionaries in July, 1918. www.hermitage.nl/en/

Let the bed bugs bite
Amsterdam. Can’t get away from it. This time I’m going to tell you about a budget hotel. According to its advertising, a bad one – very bad indeed. Check out the eco position: ‘Change is happening. And it’s hitting like a hurricane. Ice caps are melting. Sea levels are rising. Our planet’s climate, battered and bulllied is taking its revenge.

Welcome to the 21st Century. A world that will never be the same again. This was our wake up call. We’re a 650-bed budget hotel in the heart of Amsterdam. We have a voice. And we have a responsibility. It’s time to tell the world of a very convenient truth. The Hans Brinker budget hotel has been helping the planet, unintentionally, since 1970. Yes, here is a hotel where the elevator stays out of order for days. And whose vacuum cleaners’ buttons are rarely switched on. We have towels that need washing on a much higher heat. But this is a hotel that had the foresight to think: why waste the energy? ...

It goes on like that. They’ve even published a book to drive home exactly what kind of a fleapit doss-house this really (allegedly) is. It’s billed thus: “As hard as the Brinker pillows and as heavy as a Brinker breakfast, THE WORST HOTEL IN THE WORLD will tell you everything you wanted to know, and many things you didn’t, about the hotel described as ‘similar to hell, but without proper heating’.”

It’s not that bad, apparently. This is all just clever messaging with a great viral hook (although anything viral in this context has me squirming right now) created by their ad agency Kesselskramer. Go to www.hans-brinker.com – it’s funny, particularly the book.

Something a tad more salubrious
I won’t sign off this month with a place like the Hans Brinker. Instead, here’s a tip for the business traveller on a mean budget – the newly opened citizenM Amsterdam City. It follows the same compact-hip concept seen in the award-winning citizenM at Schiphol airport, featuring boutique touches such as power rain showers, free wi-fi, cut-price VoiP calls, Charles & Ray Eames lounge chairs and groovy touch-screen mood pads that allow central control of everything in your room, from the telly to the coloured lighting. And yes, by all accounts, the towels are clean. www.citizenmamsterdamcity.com

See you next time.