Foto’s

Supporting local businesses (Or: Takeout? Delivery?)

Posted on April 16, 2020 by Niki

Okay, I’ll admit I’m not a big fan of delivery. I would gladly do takeover over delivery any day. I think I am in the minority, though!

Check out the sign by the local Momiji Sushi and Momiji Ramen. They are special enough to have two websites and two entrances (normally) – even though they are run by the same company and you can walk from one part to the other.

A sign saying they are open for both takeout and delivery, and giving their opening times.

I am definitely a fan of the color work on that sign. I think maybe I’ll suggest we get some sushi… or ramen… this weekend. Yum!

Fun side note: “Ramen” means “windows” in Dutch. Let me tell you, Marco loves to make jokes about their windows every time we walk past. (I love that. Usually…)

Support your local business and stay safe, everyone.

Categories: Food, The Hague | Leave a comment

Protect the art (Or: Jantje statue with face mask)

Posted on April 13, 2020 by Niki

Last night Marco and I went for a walk, a bit later in the evening around 20:00. While the weather was turning cooler it was still a nice walk through a fairly peaceful city centre. Actually, when we walked through the (deserted) Binnenhof what I noticed the most was the silence – not even the birds were chirping.

One thing we noticed was a face mask on the statue of “Jantje” or “Little John”:

Jantje was a boy who died at the age of 15… in the year 1299. He’s part of a Dutch children’s song about The Hague. If you ask him where his father lives, he’ll point with his finger to the Binnenhof, as his father’s estate used to reside in the space where the Binnenhof now stands.

Marco remarked on the dislocation of the finger – most likely a lot of people touch it due to the song.

And here is a bonus picture taken by Marco:

That’s a great angle, if I say so myself.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Binnenhof/Buitenhof, Flowers, Statues, Tourist attraction | Leave a comment

Good Friday (Or: A bit of sun and relaxation)

Posted on April 10, 2020 by Niki

Happy Friday everyone! ☀️ We made it to the weekend.

I would also like to give a shout to my mother who has an irregular job which is not only Monday-Friday – hope you’re getting some time off here and there!

It has now become routine to check the numbers from RIVM (National Institute for Public Health and the Environment) in the afternoon, as they release statistics about the coronavirus deaths and hospitalizations around 14:00 every day. They seem to have increased their server load in the last week or so as the site doesn’t freeze around that time anymore.

RIVM Statistics in English

Note: The Netherlands has increased testing capacity in the last week, so the number of confirmed cases is going up due to that. They are now able to test healthcare workers outside of hospitals, including workers who work in home healthcare.

The statistics regarding ICU beds can be found at NICE (National Intensive Care Evaluation) although that page is not available in English. Daily numbers are released sometime after 16:00 each day. Also note the time stamp at the top of the page is whatever the time was when you visited the site, not the last time that it was updated. But keeping an eye on the ICU beds is important is this country as we needed to quickly increase our numbers to be able to handle the expected strain in the ICU.

In either case, the numbers aren’t complete yet as some hospitals send in their reports a day or two later. For example our country generally has a higher number of deaths on Tuesdays as they include deaths over the weekend and on Monday.

Here’s a photo from The Hague Centraal train station earlier this morning:

*Care for each other, keep 1.5 meters distance*

ProRail is responsible for the infrastructure and capacity of the rail transport lines, while NS (which I mention sometimes in this blog) is responsible for most, but not all, of the passenger transport in The Netherlands.

And a look at the current tram schedule at the train station:

At the moment, trams operate every 20 minutes during the day on a weekday and every half hour in the weekend.

Stay safe!

Categories: The Hague, Transportation | Tags: Coronavirus, COVID-19 | Leave a comment

An empty Malieveld (Or: Coronavirus trumps good weather)

Posted on April 9, 2020 by Niki

Ahh, weekend! It’s an early one, but we’re getting four days off. My work gives both Good Friday and Easter Monday as paid holidays, and Marco took tomorrow off and gets Easter Monday as a paid holiday. This has been a long work week. It’s not the work itself, just the constant working from home situation, I think.

This is the end of week #5 for working at home, and my expectation is that we’ll also be working from home in May as well. Or at least partially working from home so that the social distancing and 1.5 meters rule can be enforced on the work floor. For instance by saying only half the workforce can go into work each day, and alternating who goes in each day.

So hopefully that explains the long walk Marco and I took in the afternoon yesterday – sometimes you just need to get out and stretch. Here is a look at Malieveld – unbelievably empty on a day when temperatures reached 71F / 22C. It was the first time I took off my jacket in many months, I must admit. And the first time in a while that I wondered if I should have put sunblock on…

There were a few people in the grass in the distance, but not many. You can also see that the grass still hasn’t completely recovered from the farmer protests back in October of last year. Check out this aerial photo: Reddit link.

Looking forward to sleeping in a bit tomorrow. And maybe stretching my legs and going for a socially distant walk at some point.

Categories: The Hague, Working & Volunteering | Tags: Coronavirus, COVID-19, Malieveld | Leave a comment

A hotel for bees and insects (Or: Provinciehuis in The Hague)

Posted on April 8, 2020 by Niki

It’s a bit too small for you and me, but I found the perfect hotel for bees and insects here in The Hague:

Marco and I took a walk in the afternoon to get some fresh air. We walked along the Malieveld, a large grass field not far from The Hague Centraal train station. It’s perfect for hosting concerts, carnivals and other events. Oh and farmer protests, too.

The bee and insect hotel was on the property of the Provincial house of South Holland (The Netherlands is split up into provinces, and this is the main contact address for the province).

Good news of the day: for the first time since the corona crisis began, more patients have left the ICU than entered it. In total there are 16 fewer occupied beds (1424 beds yesterday versus 1408 today), including the ICU beds in Germany housing Dutch patients (52).

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Coronavirus, COVID-19, Malieveld | 2 Comments

Warmth and sun (Or: Cautious wanderings)

Posted on April 7, 2020 by Niki

Oh, sunny days! (which makes me think of the song “Oh Happy Day” from Sister Act 2 – obligatory YouTube link).

But today’s temperature was about 66F / 19C. Spring is coming. I took a break from work to take a short walk, finding bits of sun while practicing my social distancing responsibly…

I took a photo of the old city hall, where Marco and I were married in September 2013. See the stairs in the lower right? We took some wedding pictures there. I was reminded again of how much taller Marco is than I am, as I had to stand a few stairs above him in the pictures.

Blast from the past (blog post from September 19, 2014 to be exact): Holding hands (Or: A year ago today)

There was another press conference this evening with Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Healthcare Minister Hugo de Jonge. For the most part the message was Hou vol! Or “Keep going! You’re doing great!” With a few exceptions, we managed to use our common sense and stay home over the weekend, only going outside if needed and going out alone, etc.

There was also a reminder that Easter was coming and we needed to celebrate it at home responsibly and not travel throughout the country to visit family. With a similar amount of “You’re doing great! Don’t stop now!” and a reminder that the only way the country can consider relaxing the measures (piece by piece, slowly) is if we all individually and collectively make smart decisions in the near future. You get the idea.

Minister de Jonge also mentioned that the government was looking into two apps to help in the fight against the coronavirus: one app to let you know if you have been in contact with someone who had later been diagnosed with the virus, and another app to help potential patients stay in touch with their doctors. They don’t know if the apps will be compulsory (my guess is no, as people tend to be stubborn around here) and how they will work with regards to privacy and user data.

Musical graffiti (Or: Spotted by the Spui)

Posted on April 2, 2020 by Niki

A few weeks back I snapped some photos of musical graffiti by the Spui here in The Hague. Someone was definitely feeling creative:

This area is just outside the city hall. In the background (on the other side of the construction walls) you have what used to be the Dr. Anton Philipszaal (Dutch Wikipedia link) which was torn down in late 2015. The building housed both concert and theatre events.

A larger cultural building is currently being constructed in this spot and will hopefully be finished in 2021. Earlier it was announced that the name would be “Amare”, which is Italian for “to love” or “by the sea”. Even if I never step foot inside, I’ll still be glad to get the area in front of it back – the construction site takes up a huge chunk of the plaza (see also the photo I posted back in 2012 of the Spuiplein).

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Centrum, Graffiti, Music | Leave a comment

Time to be patient (Or: All coronavirus measures extended)

Posted on March 31, 2020 by Niki

The Dutch prime minister announced today in an evening press conference that all measures relating to stopping the coronavirus would be extended from 6 April to 28 April (at least). That includes working from home where possible, restaurants only allowed to be open for take out, the social distancing measures, and more. In addition, schools would be closed until the end of May vacation (3 May).

The prime minister was also quite clear that this could be extended further, and also said that measures would only be removed gradually once the country was ready for it. Considering we had our highest number of deaths today that is probably for the best. There were 175 deaths, although some of them were from previous days but only registered today.

For now there is no complete lockdown. Whether or not we get one is based on whether people follow the measures and make wise decisions. Only time will tell.

Information board in English near The Hague Centraal. The same information was also displayed in Arabic, which I find interesting.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Coronavirus, COVID-19 | Leave a comment

Closed, closed, closed (Or: Signs of corona in The Hague)

Posted on March 30, 2020 by Niki

These pictures are from 20-21 March, after the first week of working from home. The first is from Lebkov, a local café:

Unfortunately I think they will need to update their sign… At the moment schools and restaurants are closed until 6 April 2020, however there will be a press conference tomorrow. The expectation is that both measures will be extended until the end of April or the beginning of May. The National Institute for Public Health and Environment is currently conducting research on 100 families with school-age children to see how how the disease develops and how it affects family members of a COVID-19 patient. However that research only began about a week ago and they expect it to last 6 weeks before results are official. And until that time the government will likely keep schools closed. And there’s a good chance restaurants will also be kept closed. Right now they can only be open for take away.

Unimportant side note: The Netherlands has a very cool term – “horeca” which is shorthand for hotels, restaurants and cafés.

A closed sign for TK Maxx. ‘We’re sorry, but unforunately our school is currently closed for business. We hope to be back soon. For current information, visit www.tkmaxx.nl.’

Unimportant side note: In case you’re wondering, TK Maxx is the same company as TJ Maxx in the United States.

Not quite a closed sign, but some information about how to order at the local Smoothie Company.

Unimportant side note: I just noticed that Google Maps now provides adjusted store hours in red (or it says ‘Temporarily closed’ in red), so it’s a bit easier to see if hours have been adjusted due to corona or not. If the font color is still in black, they probably haven’t been updated. See more at 9to5google.com and also the Google support page.

Stay safe, everyone.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Coronavirus, COVID-19, Lebkov | Leave a comment

Wandering through The Hague (Or: Noticing the little things)

Posted on March 29, 2020 by Niki

Here are more photos from the last time I went outside – you can see how deserted the Binnenhof is:

Although there was a small press conference going on further ahead, it wasn’t in this part of the area. The only people I saw outside of that were a few cyclists traveling through.

One of the other places that I visited was the Haagse Bluf, where I took a few pictures:

And a picture of a metal sculpture that looked odd enough that I just knew I had to photograph it:

Otherwise people seemed to be following the rules of staying home if possible, and not flocking to the beaches or parks like they did last week. Perhaps they realized doing so would probably mean yet more rules imposed next week…

Check out the webcam of the Scheveningen boulevard, which is as good as empty. Usually I only see one or two people walking past, with the occasional car.

Good news of the day: the Dutch company Philips delivered 100 respirators to the Dutch government yesterday (article in Dutch) to increase the overall amount of ICU beds in the country. One thing I hadn’t realized before this crisis was how few ICU beds The Netherlands had. Normally there are about 1150 beds in the entire country, with half designated for corona patients and half for non-corona patients. The minister of Health, Welfare and Sport expects there to be just over 1,000 beds on 1 April for corona patients – but keep in mind we are close to that capacity already. Currently the goal is to increase the number to 1,500.

Whether or not Philips could deliver anything on The Netherlands was in doubt – while they are a Dutch company, the factory is in the United States. Recently president Trump was considering invoking the Defense Production Act from 1950, which would jeopardize Phillips exporting to the Netherlands (or any country for that matter). Part of the issue is that a lot of the components for the ventilators are sourced globally, so it is not as if everything could be created in the U.S. alone. But it hasn’t come to that yet.

In similar news, I read this morning that Germany has 28,000 beds and 25,000 respirators… that is a crazy difference compared to the Netherlands, and not just because of the differences in populations (17 million versus 82 million). That explains why two Dutch ICU patients were moved to Münster, Germany today (article in Dutch). Germany has also been taking patients from Italy and France.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Coronavirus, COVID-19, Haagsche Bluf | Leave a comment