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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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Hemaxima (Or: Eating a tompouce on King’s Day)

Posted on April 27, 2024 by Niki

As recently noted, today is King’s Day in the Netherlands, a holiday to mark the birthday of King Willem-Alexander. Every year the royal family (including King Willem-Alexander and Queen Máxima and their children) visits a Dutch city to celebrate King’s Day. This year they visited Emmen, a city in the province of Drenthe in the northeast of the Netherlands.

The local Hema had a great marketing trick. They added “xima” to their logo as shown in this tweet:

Of course the “xima” is in orange since it is King’s Day. It is also a nice word joke since “Hé” is a way to get someone’s attention, pronounced “Hey”. Therefore Hemaxima becomes “Hey Maxima!” The question above that is “What is your favorite way to eat (tompouce)?”, so it is asking the Queen how she eats the messy dessert that is known as tompouce.

Personally I eat the cream first with a dessert fork and then I eat the top and bottom layers in either order. Any other way results in a mess (for me). The kid in the photo above is eating it in the traditional manner, but then you risk the cream squirting out the other side.

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Preparing for King’s Day 2024 (Or: Flags and tompouce)

Posted on April 26, 2024 by Niki

Tomorrow the Netherlands will celebrate King’s Day to mark the birthday of King Willem-Alexander.

Tonight is the Life I Live festival, with free podiums set up at Lange Voorhout, Kerkplein, Grote Markt and the Hofvijver. Here is a look who is playing at each podium. Alternatively you can now download an app for iOS or Google Play (under the name “Woov”).

Here are some of the things you can do tomorrow:

  • Visit the King’s Day carnival at Maliveld (Saturday is the last day)
  • Visit the King’s Day carnival at “De Fred”, or Frederik Hendriklaan, which runs through 5 May
  • NMNH Kingsday Festival at Zuiderpark (paid event)
  • The Hague’s Vrijmarkten. If you’re from the US this is equivalent to a garage sale, but held on a national level. It’s the one day of the year you’re allowed to sell your stuff outside, although you have to do it in certain streets of The Hague. Check denhaag.com for a list of streets where you are allowed to sell your crap–err, precious memories.
  • Eat tompouce. indebuurt.nl has a nice list of places where you can buy it. Since it is for King’s Day the top layer is orange instead of pink. I had a “double decker” tompouce yesterday from Plasman.
  • Geraniummarkt at the Lange Voorhout. That translates to “Geranium market”. Yes, for some reason it is tradition to buy geraniums on King’s Day.
  • King’s Day at the Grote Markt, at the Zwarte Ruiter bar. denhaag.com has the list of bands and the times they will be playing.

Lots of places have put out Dutch flags to mark the holiday. This photo was taken near Dozo, an all-you-can-eat sushi restaurant (formerly known as Sumo, see also this blog post).

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Pickleball (Or: Are they watching you play?)

Posted on April 19, 2024 by Niki

Last month I visited my parents in the US. I had a blast of a time and really enjoyed visiting my old childhood town as well.

One of the places I came across while on my travels was a pickleball court. That sport is getting more and more popular. Don’t ask me how it is played though – I will just point you to the Wikipedia page (English|Dutch). But the court did have some very, very gorgeous graffiti in the area.

Are you a dog lover?

Perhaps you have two dogs at home…?

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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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King’s Day merch (Or: I hope you like the color orange?)

Posted on March 29, 2024 by Niki

King’s Day is a Dutch holiday on April 27. This year it falls on a Saturday. Annoying for those who don’t get the day off, as it isn’t standard practice in the Netherlands to give an adjacent day off if a holiday falls in the weekend. On the other hand, if the weathers good, you still have all day to party on Saturday.

Oh, and this means The Life I Live – a free music festival held the night before in The Hague’s city centre – falls on a Friday this year. The Hague government donated an extra €50,000 to the festival to keep it it around, on top of the already earmarked €400,000, as a one time (extra) donation. I can’t imagine The Hague or King’s Day without The Life I Live festival. Here are some photos I took back in 2022.

A lot of people dress up in orange for King’s Day (and some also dress up in orange for the festival the night before). Most Dutch stores take advantage of that by offering orange merchandise in the 4–6 weeks leading up to the event. Here is a look at the King’s Day offerings at Xenos:

I also saw some orange tompouce themed t-shirts being sold at Hema. Tompouce (English Wikipedia) is a pastry that is delicious, if extremely sweet and messy to eat. And of course it gets sold with orange frosting for King’s Day!

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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.

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Gummy noodles (Or: Interesting finds at Xenos)

Posted on March 6, 2024 by Niki

Here’s a look at some candy I found earlier in February at Xenos:

Unfortunately I am not a kid that craves high levels of sugar anymore. Maybe I can eat a few noodles a day?

I like shopping at Xenos, though. You never know what you are going to find as the selection is usually fairly random (stuff for the home, cooking, eating and drinking).

In other news:

Groningen egg balls to roll off production line into rest of NL from dutchnews.nl. I’m not a fan of eggs, so that is an easy pass for me.

Happy hardcore Europapa is this year’s Dutch Eurovision entry, also from dutchnews.nl. It definitely has a nice beat going. It’s in Dutch (and a bit of German!), although the news article does a good job of explaining what the themes are.

Categories: Everyday purchases | Tags: , | Leave a comment

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