Newbie question

[bram]

Hi all

I've just installed freebsd AMD64 and have come to the (maybe wrong) 
conclusion that you cannot run 32 bit software on it.
whenever I try to compile for i386 freebsd something it says I do not 
have i386 and therefor cannot he cannot compile.
A programmer that I know says that c code is not processor specific and 
also that the amd64 support 32 bit applications.
So I ask you, what is the problem here and how can I solve it.
programs wich are a problem here are MySQL and hotline for unix.
can't I just say something like: compile 32 bit ?

sorry for my english and my maybe stupid question

bram