Foto’s

BlowUp Art The Hague (Or: 2024 edition)

Posted on May 7, 2024 by Niki

The 2024 edition of BlowUp art has arrived in The Hague and is available through 2 June. This time the focus is around the Hofvijver area. Here is a look at some of the artwork currently on display:

The yellow pot is from the theme “larger than life”. The pink tower is a play on the Torentje or “little tower” that the Dutch Prime minister would sit at, just out of view behind the tree above. There’s even a Dutch Wikipedia page about it.

Here is a close up:

The floating garden near the pink tower is also part of the temporary art exhibition and was designed by second year students in the “Urban Green Development” program.

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Dutch flags in the sun (Or: At the Hofvijver)

Posted on May 5, 2024 by Niki

This weekend is Remembrance Day (May 4) and Liberation Day (May 5). The first day is a somber event where all war victims with ties to the Netherlands are remembered, and the second day is a celebration of freedom. For instance there is a festival going on at the Malieveld this afternoon and later tonight.

While in the city centre I took a picture of the Dutch flags on display at the Hofvijver:

May has been just as rainy as April, with only a few exceptions. Therefore, any bit of sun deserves a trip outside, even if you still need to wear a jacket.

The Netherlands still has two more holidays to go before we enter June – December drought. This Thursday is Ascension day and Monday, May 20 is Pentecost. After that the next holiday is Christmas… eek! However, we do get more days off than the US does. If you work full-time in the Netherlands you are entitled to 20 days off at a minimum. I get 25 days off, although when I started at this job we only got 20 days. Some lucrative companies even give 40 days off, although that is not the norm.

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Party time (Or: Photos from the Life I Live festival, 2024)

Posted on May 1, 2024 by Niki

First: today is the first jacket-less day of the year! Bring on summer!

Second: we had an awesome thunderstorm in the middle of the night last night. Both Marco and I woke up to the loud crash of nearby thunder and then stayed awake for a while listening to the storm. This is newsworthy because proper thunderstorms are quite rare in this part of Europe.

Back to the blog post: The Hague was host to the Life I Live festival last Friday, held on the night before King’s Day (and back in the day, Queen’s Day) every year. Here are some of the photos Marco graciously took for this blog. He’s tall so he usually can get the camera over everyone’s heads. Thank you Marco!

First up was the Dutch band Droom dit (Dream this). See also Dutch Wikipedia. The podium was at Lange Voorhout.

Here is the band Chibi Ichigo. See also Dutch Wikipedia. This podium was also at Lange Voothout, but at the other end. Kind of a funny moment to take a picture if you ask me.

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Palace garden (Or: The first signs of spring)

Posted on April 14, 2024 by Niki

A few weeks ago I visited the Paleistuin (Palace Garden), not far from the city centre. See also Google Maps.

The sky was a lovely shade of blue:

It’s hard to imagine that this was taken in the Palace Garden, since there isn’t much open space without flowers in it. But if you take a picture at the right angle, it makes the garden look even larger.

There wasn’t too much color yet when I visited (see the photo below) but it was, as always, a peaceful place to walk around.

I did find some nice purple flowers though.

Maybe I will go back next week to see if even more flowers have started blooming. We have since had a few days of really good weather (including yesterday which was the first “no jacket” day of the year for me).

Did you know there is also a secret entrance to the Palace Garden? You ring the doorbell to get let in. During the day, at least. See also this news article in Dutch from indebuurt.nl.

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Pink camellias (Or: Randomly spotted)

Posted on April 10, 2024 by Niki

Last week I was walking back from Albert Heijn when I spotted some beautiful flowers. If Google Images reverse lookup is to be believed, it is a camellia flower.

And of course it wouldn’t be a picture in the Netherlands if there wasn’t a bike in it. Ha!

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Hrmmm (Or: A man and a bear walk down the street…)

Posted on April 8, 2024 by Niki

Imagine my confusion this weekend when I snapped this picture, taken on the street which connects The Hague’s Central Station with the city centre:

Either he is about to be eaten alive from behind or that is one big bear. Roger offered a good explanation though: the Kingsfair is now open at the nearby Malieveld. Kingsfair is the carnival to celebrate the upcoming King’s Day holiday on Saturday, April 27.

Hopefully the gentleman didn’t actually drop it on the way home. That thing looks like a dirt magnet!

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Tulips by the Spuiplein (Or: Beauty on a rainy day)

Posted on April 6, 2024 by Niki

Recently Marco took some pictures of the tulips by the Spuiplein. The tulips just appeared one day – before that the area was barren all winter!

It’s an appropriate topic considering we had one day of really, really good weather today. It was about 24C/75F. The winds shifted and came from Africa today. But only for one day.

And a look at the area in general:

Orange, pink and just a bit of yellow!

And a look at the raindrops stuck to the flowers:

In case you are interested, Spuiplein is in the middle of a renovation. The next stage will begin this fall. You can read more about it at projecten.denhaag.nl. The article is in Dutch but there are pictures and a Google translate option available.

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On horseback (Or: Statue of Willem the Silent)

Posted on April 2, 2024 by Niki

During the holiday weekend (a four day weekend!) I decided to take a picture of the equestrian statue of Willem the Silent outside of the Paleis Noordeinde. I was drawn by the color of the statue against the gray-white of the building behind it. Unfortunately the sun decided to mostly disappear at that moment.

Here is a Google Maps link on where to find the statue.

In other news:

New species of tiny geckos found in India named after Vincent van Gogh from nltimes.nl

King’s Day in The Hague from denhaag.com in English. This includes the King’s Fair (= carnival) at the Malieveld, opening this Friday and running through Saturday, April 27. There’s even a geranium market on Lange Voorhout on King’s Day!

Route of Tour de France Femmes announced from denhaag.com. The Tour de France femmes will be cycling through The Hague (and Rotterdam) on August 12 this year.

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Dutch flowers in St Peter’s Square (Or: A decades old tradition)

Posted on March 31, 2024 by Niki

Since 1985, the Netherlands has been sending thousands of flowers to the Vatican for Easter Mass. This year they will be sending over 20,000 flowers. Here’s a tweet of how it looks, although I am not sure if this is an arrangement from 2024 or from an earlier year.

The tradition in 1985 for Titus Brandsma’s beatification. See also: Dutch Flowers Back in St. Peter’s Square in Rome At Easter at seedworld.com. In case you’re wondering, no flowers were sent in 2020 due to the corona crisis. In 2021, even though there were no major gatherings allowed in Italy, roses were sent. That year they decorated the inside of St. Peter’s square with some roses also being sent to retirement homes in Italy. See also: Italy – An Avalanche of Roses to Celebrate Easter. Amusingly that comes from a Dutch government website which publishes agriculture news happening outside of the Netherlands (agroberichtenbuitenland.nl). How specific!

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Random internet activities (Or: The fish doorbell)

Posted on March 23, 2024 by Niki

Have you heard of the fish doorbell? (I think I posted about it at some point.)

There’s a canal in the Dutch city of Utrecht in the middle of the Netherlands. The canal is shared by boats and fish, with a boat lock that opens and closes as needed. But this is also the time of the year that the fish move upstream searching for places to spawn.

What do the fish do if the boat lock is closed? They wait.

What do they wait for? For you to press the doorbell of course!

If you see a fish on the live stream waiting at the door, you can push the doorbell. The page is at: https://visdeurbel.nl/en/the-fish-doorbell/. A bit further down on the page you see a live stream, probably full of murky water and no fish. On the right side there’s a doorbell. If you see a fish, you press the doorbell. This lets a human know they should check and open up the boat lock so the fish can pass through. (Note: if there are more than 950-999 viewers, you’ll see a YouTube stream instead with no doorbell, due to capacity issues.)

The fish doorbell news report – a YouTube channel with weekly news about what fish they saw in the last week and predictions for next week, with subtitles in English.

Nicest photos – a look at some of the nicest photos taken this year.

Categories: Culture, Utrecht | Tags: | Leave a comment

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