Author Archives: Niki

Unknown's avatar

About Niki

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

Mall of the Netherlands (Or: Like an inexpensive trip to America?)

Posted on August 30, 2021 by Niki

The Mall of the Netherlands opened earlier this year. It is definitely an American style mall, complete with kiosks in the middle of the walkways. The owner is Westfield (the company that owns a lot of American malls) so it does make sense.

First, the cutest photo ever, of the Nijntje store! Nijntje is a cartoon rabbit. She goes by Miffy in English translations.

And then Hema – I love the facade and touch of green. And as noted, there’s a kiosk in the middle of the walkway.

What mall isn’t complete without a peanut butter store (below)? pindakaas = peanut butter.

The joke on the bag is Pindakaas, in geval van noot or Peanut butter, in case of emergency. Normally it is “in geval van nood”, but they switched out nood (emergency) for noot (nut in English).

(It’s a lot cooler if you don’t have to explain it, I swear.)

And finally, a huge cart artwork which doubles as a slide for kids (the front paws are the slide).

So we can finally say that the Netherlands has a proper mall. American style, at least.

Categories: Shopping | Tags: , | Leave a comment

August (Or: Did you know it is already time for Sinterklaas?)

Posted on August 27, 2021 by Niki

Marco and I visited Action today. Action (English Wikipedia) is a cheap store, kind of like Dollar General in the US without saying everything is a dollar.

Imagine my surprise (okay, not really) when we saw that Action was selling kruidnoten (English Wikipedia) already. Although I know Roger already saw some at the beginning of this month. Kruidnoten is a hard cookie-like confectionery sold in the time leading up to the Sinterklaas holiday on 5 December. These days it starts appearing in August, and 2021 was no exception.

They also had other Sinterklaas items for sale:

Continue reading →
Categories: Everyday purchases, Holidays, Shopping | Tags: , , | 2 Comments

Through the centre of The Hague (Or: Tourist tram)

Posted on August 22, 2021 by Niki

Side note: it is getting way too easy to use the British spelling for some phrases, like “centre” instead of “center”. Hmmm.

Below is a photo of the tourist tram riding through the centre (!) of the city. The Grote Kerk (literally “Big Church”) is off to the left, just out of the photo. I’ve posted a picture of this area a few times after its renovation a few years back. It looks a lot better with the greenery and stone walkways than it used to look.

Here is a photo of the church from the air (pre-renovation), from monumentenzorgdenhaag.nl. And here is information on the tourist tram, from denhaag.nl in English. Unfortunately it is a bit overpriced, but for tourists it could be nice.

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

5 years later (Or: End of an era)

Posted on August 19, 2021 by Niki

In 2016 the Eat Company café hired Sophia den Breems (official website) to add murals to the side of their restaurant.

Here is a link to the image I took of the first mural, winter 2015-16. I think it was my favorite.

Here is the second mural, summer 2016.

Here is the third mural, fall 2016. That photo was taken in October 2016, almost 5 years ago. But no new mural ever came after that. We were perpetually stuck in fall for years.

Imagine my surprise when I rounded the corner this week:

An end of an era, I guess. And it doesn’t look like anything new will be coming in its place, considering the worker was covering up more than just the mural itself. Who knows…

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

Almost as tall as a front door (Or: Sunflower on Vondelstraat)

Posted on August 17, 2021 by Niki

Here is a photo of a very tall sunflower. It’s hard to pass by without noticing it!

Maybe I should start taking a photo every month to see how tall it grows… I suspect it will soon be taller than the front door behind it.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: | Leave a comment

Friday’s press conference (Or: Possible dates for lifting corona measures)

Posted on August 14, 2021 by Niki

There was a press conference yesterday evening, as always with the Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte and the Health minister Hugo de Jonge. This press conference was to discuss the next (hopeful) steps.

Set in stone:

  • Higher education will be open from 30 August, with no social distancing
  • Lectures are limited to 75 students maximum (to prevent large outbreaks)
  • Testing is encouraged but not required

Possible, if all goes well, from 20 September:

  • Social distancing is no longer required anywhere (but can be practiced if desired)
  • Face masks are no longer required on public transportation (which means they are not required anywhere, although hospitals and corona test centers would probably still want to keep the rule in place for some time)
  • Businesses that want to have more than 75 guests can use the Coronacheck app. This app generates a QR code which displays a green check mark if the user is vaccinated, has a recent negative test result or has had corona in the last 6 months.
  • The strong advice to work from home where possible will be removed (they removed it for a few weeks in late June but it quickly came back during the last wave)

This will be decided and announced during a press conference on 17 September.

Possible, if all goes well, from 1 November:

  • Night clubs / dance clubs will be allowed to open again
  • The CoronaCheck app will no longer be needed for domestic use
  • All Covid-related measures will be dropped except for the base rules (hand washing, staying home if you have corona-like symptoms, coughing and sneezing into your elbow, etc.).

The government has also launched a website, prikkenzonderafspraak.com (vaccination without appointment) for anyone who has not made an appointment yet. The website lists the sites that are open without appointment so that people can walk in at a time convenient for them and get vaccinated. You then book an appointment for the second dose.

I think there is a good chance that 20 September goes ahead, but it remains to be seen if all measures can be lifted on 1 November or not. The government’s reasoning is that everyone 12 years and up has had a chance to make an appointment, and that at some point we need to go back to “normal”. The main worry is that the 1.8 millions adults who don’t yet have a vaccination would all end up in the hospital in the fall, putting too much strain on the hospitals. We will have to wait and see. I do expect the numbers to start going up again–there is no way around it as measures are being lifted. However, hopefully the numbers will keep decreasing until 30 August when higher education opens up again so that the numbers are lower in mid-September.

Categories: News | Tags: , | Leave a comment

Across the water (Or: Traveling from Rotterdam to Amsterdam by boat)

Posted on August 12, 2021 by Niki

I saw a cool video posted on TheNetherlands subreddit:

Raising the many bridges on the way from Rotterdam to Amsterdam from thenetherlands

The video is about 2 and a half minutes, or there is a 10 minute 4K version on YouTube (link). If you keep an eye on the map in the lower right you can see where the boat currently is.

And how is the camera so high up? It is not a drone. The tugboat you see in the image is pulling a large structure, and the camera was placed on the structure. See also this image (thetimewriters.com).

Finally, if you watch the shorter video above (Reddit), you’ll see a retractable bridge at 1:56. Kind of cool.

Categories: Uncategorized | Tags: | Leave a comment

Architecture in the city centre (Or: Peek & Cloppenburg)

Posted on August 10, 2021 by Niki

I took this photo recently of the building facade by the clothing store Peek & Cloppenburg (official website in Dutch).

This is quite typical of buildings in the Netherlands – and usually the architecture is from long ago, predating the current store at the location by decades. However, in this case the architecture was indeed designed for the Peek & Cloppenburg building (monumentenzorgdenhaag.nl, in Dutch). That article mentions that it was designed to be a counterweight to the architecture of Bijenkorf across the street (denhaag.nl, in English).

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

Shortcuts (Or: Through a small alleyway)

Posted on August 7, 2021 by Niki

I’ve posted a few times about the small “alleyway” street that goes by the name Bagijnestraat, not far from the Tweede Kamer. My favorite post was about the art on a garage door last May. Actually, if you click on that blog post link you will see just how many bikes are cluttering up the alleyway… which is the subject of today’s post.

A few months ago Marco, Roger and I cut through this alleyway and we noticed the “no bikes here” signs for the first time. Each sign is in a different language. For example, here is Spanish (no bicicletas aquí):

But – kind of funny, here is the German sign (wo ist der bahnhof?):

That doesn’t say “no bikes here” in German. It actually says “Where is the train station?”. That is a reference to a 1985 short, satirical Dutch film by the same name (the actual skit is only 2 minutes). Read more at this vpro.nl link (in Dutch). It is a common joke between Marco, Roger and I: “wo ist der bahnhof? …do is der bahnhof.”(Where is the train station? There is the train station!) See also the 2 minute skit at YouTube in Dutch.

As you can see, there are also plaques with a poem in the alleyway. Here is the start:

If walls had ears / and streets could cry / then resonating in the Bagijntje [street] / is an endless story. Of course it sounds better in Dutch!

Categories: The Hague | Tags: , | 1 Comment

Let’s go racing! (Or: Formula 1 preparations in Zandvoort)

Posted on August 4, 2021 by Niki

Formula 1 is coming back to the Netherlands this year, the first time since 1985. It will be held in the dunes of Zandvoort. The race should have happened last year, however due to Covid-19 the Dutch Grand Prix organizers decided to pull out of the racing schedule rather than have a race without fans. Fast forward to this month, where the organizers are (cautiously) planning for 105,000 visitors a day on 2, 3 and 4 September.

My favorite part to read about is the preparations the national Dutch train company has put in place for this event. At the moment 2 to 6 trains arrive in Zandvoort (a beach town) every hour. During the F1 event, 12 trains will arrive every hour, one every 5 minutes. In that way 10,000 people can be transported to the race every hour. That infrastructure did not exist before the F1 deal was signed; it was built in the last few years. During the race weekend the area will all but be inaccessible by car – you would need a special pass to reach it, even if you are just trying to visit the beach. So, the train is definitely the way to go.

Zandvoort preparing for Grand Prix despite Covid restrictions from nltimes.nl. There is of course a bit of uncertainty in the air, since last minute Covid restrictions could put a stop to the plans to be at full capacity. Since the Grand Prix is categorized as a sporting event and everyone has assigned seating, being at full capacity is currently allowed. That might change between now and the beginning of September, depending on how the Covid situation develops in the Netherlands. At the moment cases are decreasing at an average of 40-45% per week, so that is very good news. But you never know.

Categories: News, Sports | Tags: , | 5 Comments

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.