Author Archives: Niki

Unknown's avatar

About Niki

I run the blog http://www.lifeinthehague.com

Playing around (Or: This cat likes dirt)

Posted on August 27, 2025 by Niki

Recently I went to Kelly’s Expat Shopping. Mainly for some more Cheerios and sour cream pretzels. Yum yum yum.

On the way back, I spotted a cat playing in the dirt on the same street, Zoutmanstraat. Unfortunately it was a bit too distracted to look my way, as it was acting like a dog and rolling around in the dirt. It looked like it was having the time of its life! (Maybe it just had an itch it wanted to scratch, who knows.)

In other news… it is quite touristy, but in September you can ride a swan boat in the Hofvijver (indebuurt.nl, in Dutch).

Or, on Tuesday, September 16 you can visit The Hague to watch the ceremonies around Prinsjesdag. Here’s a description from DenHaag.com: “Prince’s Day (Prinsjesdag) is the traditional start of the parliamentary year for the Senate and House of Representatives in The Hague. On the third Tuesday in September, King Willem-Alexander will deliver the Speech from the Throne in which the government announces its most important plans for the coming year. Prior to the reading of the Speech from the Throne, King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima will travel in the Glass Carriage, followed by other important members, with a driving tour from Noordeinde Palace via Lange Voorhout to the place where this year’s speech from the throne will take place.”

Of course, most of the plans are always leaked a few days in advance, so…

Categories: The Hague | Tags: | Leave a comment

Handybrew tea maker (Or: It is actually quite handy)

Posted on August 20, 2025 by Niki

Last weekend we went to Umami, an Asian fusion restaurant. Check out some of the food:

Admittedly there was definitely a bit too much creme fraiche on the bao bun at the front of the photo, but it was otherwise delicious. My favorite was probably the veggie dumplings in the back, or the bread with anise dip (not pictured).

On a whim I ordered tea, and it came in a quite handy contraption I had never seen before, a Handybrew. I thought it was so cool I went to a local tea shop, Simon Levelt, the next day and bought my own.

You steep the tea leaves in this plastic container. The trick is that when you put it on top of a glass, it magically pours out, and stops as soon as you lift up the container again (so the opening is controlled by pressure). See also this YouTube video:

Another selling point is that the tea stays pretty warm in the Handybrew container, so even the second glass is warm. I appreciate that. Of course, it’s a bit messy to clean out the tea leaves after the fact, but you can’t have everything!

Categories: Everyday purchases, Food | Leave a comment

From above (Or: View of the Grote Marktstraat)

Posted on August 12, 2025 by Niki

Here’s a view of the Grote Marktstraat from the second floor of Uniqlo:

Interestingly, if I held my camera just a bit higher, everything got a brownish tint to it. It looks cool, even if it wasn’t the true colors at the time.

The building on the right side of the photo is Bijenkorf (literally: Beehive). If you’re ever there, take the stairs! That way you can see the impressive stained glass windows – see also this Reddit post.

It’s hard to imagine this street used to be a normal street with buses and trams running down it! See also this post in Dutch from indebuurt.nl.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

Marco’s ramen menu (Or: いただきます)

Posted on August 2, 2025 by Niki

Last week was Marco’s birthday. He took a few days off to slave away in the kitchen making a ramen dish. Here was the menu he made:

Here is the translation:

Ramen shop

Marco (マルコ)

🍜 Miso Ramen
・Udon ・Chashu (braised pork) ・Ajitama (seasoned egg)

・Gyoza (dumplings)

🍰 Cake with caramel miso sauce

🍶 Drinks: Sake ・Beer ・Mineral water ・Calpis ・Soju

“Itadakimasu” (いただきます) is said before eating, meaning “I humbly receive” or “I gratefully partake”. It’s a way of expressing gratitude for the meal, acknowledging everyone involved in its preparation, from the ingredients to the cooks. 

It was, as expected, delicious!

Categories: Food, Friends&Family, Marco&Niki | Tags: | Leave a comment

Restaurant guardians (Or: Five K Comfort Food)

Posted on July 24, 2025 by Niki

Yesterday, Marco, Roger and I went to see Fantastic Four at Pathé, a large movie chain here in the Netherlands. After that, we went to Five K Comfort Food, a Korean restaurant. I had katsu chicken tenders, Marco had a katsu chicken burger and Roger had garlic chicken wings. It was all very tasty (although we were definitely stuffed after).

After we were done eating and Marco went up to pay, I noticed some Gundam statues throughout the restaurant:

Here’s another one. In the background you can see even more hanging on the wall…

Definitely a colorful and cool end to the evening!

Categories: Food | Tags: | Leave a comment

Off to Amsterdam (Or: Hadestown in Carré)

Posted on July 16, 2025 by Niki

Last week Marco, Roger and I went to Amsterdam to see the play Hadestown at Royal Theatre Carré.

We had front row balcony seats (thanks Roger!).

Here’s a closer look at the stage before the play started:

Here’s the description from Carré’s website:

“Two ancient love stories are woven into one bold and modern retelling: that of the young dreamers Orpheus and Eurydice, and that of King Hades and his wife Persephone. When Eurydice makes an irreversible choice, Orpheus sets out to save not only her, but the entire world—with a song that brings spring back to life and a stirring dose of hope.”

I thought it was a pretty good musical. It’s not at the top of the list of musicals I’ve seen, but it is always fun to go to the Carré. The musical was also in English. Certain shows had English subtitles for Dutch speakers (if you look at the first photo, you’ll see black boxes to the left and right of the stage where the subtitles show up). And it was definitely a fun night out with the boys!

Categories: Culture | Leave a comment

Bee bold, write (Or: Designs at P.W. Akkerman)

Posted on July 9, 2025 by Niki

There is a fountain pen store in De Passage, a covered shopping area called P.W. Akkerman. Their latest campaign is “Bee bold. Write.”, complete with eye-catching bee and beehive designs.

I took it looked cute, and it worked well with the yellow color underneath (I can’t remember if it is usually yellow or not. I’ll have to check again the display is removed.)

I personally have not been inside but I know it is a great store. Two of my coworkers were gifted fountain fens when they left the company, and I only heard praise for P.W. Akkerman when they opened the gifts.

Random news article from dutchnews.nl: Beautiful addiction: art meets taxidermy in new Amsterdam museum. The museum is called Art Zo and is about a 20 minute walk from Amsterdam Central Station. Have a look at the website if you will be visiting Amsterdam.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: | Leave a comment

Colorful graffiti (And: Sizzling temperatures)

Posted on July 1, 2025 by Niki

Last week Marco and I had Friday off so we were exploring Binkhorst, an industrial part of The Hague a bit more to the south of the city centre. I managed to find some graffiti. First, some frogs!

I also found graffiti of a woman’s face. It was quite striking, although my preference goes to the frogs since it was so unexpected.

The woman looks like she could be an evil villain, like Harley Quinn or a younger version of Cruella De Vil.

At some point we had to cross the canal. The best way to do that was over a very steep bridge. Steep because each step was quite narrow, too narrow to fit my (already tiny) feet on without hanging over the edge. Here’s a link to the Google Maps image but you won’t be able to see well how steep each step is. Like most Dutch bridges, it comes with a groove on each side for you to more easily transport your bike across. It did the job, though. We got across. And Marco was a gentleman and went before me to catch me if I fell! (Or at least we would fall together. Haha.)

In other news, the Netherlands sizzled like a pair of eggs in an overcooked frying pan today. The Hague got to around 35C (95F) at the worst point. To be fair, we only had a few days of really high temperatures. Things are already supposed to cool off tomorrow as the wind changes and a storm rolls in. Hopefully with some thunder and lightning…

Here’s an article from regio15.nl in Dutch about how the weather was so hot today, the tram rails started shooting upwards (!). There were also a lot of issues with bridges getting stuck and not opening due to the heat. There’s also a live blog about the weather over at NOS, one of the public broadcasters in the Netherlands.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

Construction in the city centre (Or: Different road signs)

Posted on June 25, 2025 by Niki

You know you are in The Hague’s Chinatown when even the road signs are translated into Chinese:

I’m assuming it says what the sign in Dutch says – that the street is closed off. Technically The Hague’s Chinatown is the biggest in the country but it is still effectively one long street, or maybe two at most. Nothing like the Chinatowns in other countries.

In other news, the two day NATO summit has just ended in The Hague. The most important thing I have learned while being required to work from home is that eventually, the sounds of the helicopters flying overhead start to sound like background noise. Mostly…

But it was a much larger event than the 2014 nuclear summit (when we also had to work from home). This time there were a lot more road closures, including of highways between Schiphol Airport and The Hague. The main road next to the World Forum, where the event took place, has been closed for more than two months because they needed to build temporary buildings on top of the road to house all of the delegations and journalists. The government recommended that anyone in the Randstad area (The Hague, Amsterdam, Utrecht and Rotterdam) work from home this entire week. Extinction Rebellion took advantage and decided to demonstrate again. You get the idea…

But somehow, nothing crazy happened and everyone is on the way back home. So that’s good.

Hopefully tomorrow is a return to normalcy! (Mostly.)

Categories: The Hague | Tags: | Leave a comment

A moment of quiet (Or: Just off the main road)

Posted on June 18, 2025 by Niki

Here’s a look a photo I took earlier this week:

Don’t you just wonder how it looks around the corner?

Please note that I took this photo from the public sidewalk. The gate is usually open but it is still private property after all!

Interestingly enough I first thought it was a hofje until I did a bit of research. Marco joked that I thought that because there really are so many of them in The Hague (see also Dutch Wikipedia). A hofje is a small, enclosed courtyard surrounded by houses. These areas were originally built to provide housing for elderly women and often funded by wealthy benefactors as a charitable act. They date back to the Middle Ages and can still be found in many Dutch cities, especially Haarlem and Leiden.

The Gilde Den Haag offers tours of hofjes every Tuesday and Thursday morning, although those are in Dutch. You can also see some hofjes on Open Monument day in September (also known as Heritage Days in English). In fact, there’s a lot of places that open their doors to visitors on that day.

Categories: The Hague | Leave a comment

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.