April 30, 2010
Rail traffic around Amsterdam was halted this afternoon because party-goers were walking on the tracks, presumably because authorities decided to vacate Amsterdam Sloterdijk station for unclear reasons. Today is the Netherlands’ national holiday, Queen’s Day.
More Queen’s Day reporting tomorrow.
Tags: Queen's Day, trains
April 29, 2010
Back in November 2008 famous comic book store Lambiek in Amsterdam celebrated its 40 year anniversary, a milestone even famous Dutch comic strip artists like Hanco Kolk and Jean-Marc van Tol probably did not expect the store to reach, considering their rightful laments on this tough business.
Unfortunately, today marks the passing of Kees Kousemaker, founder of Lambiek, who was just 68 years of age. According to the Dutch association of comic strip artists, “Kees Kousemaker meant a lot to the comic strip world and helped many an artist.” He was the driving force behind the Comicopledia, the largest online source on comics, an author, organisator and owner of what could easily be called the most important and influential comic book store in the Netherlands, and possibly the oldest still standing in the world. RIP.
(Links: stripmakers, Zone5300, Photo courtesy of Zone5300)
Tags: Amsterdam, Hanco Kolk, Jean Marc van Tol, Lambiek, Zone 5300
April 28, 2010
Last year, the Netherlands Supreme Court ruled that the mentally challenged who had a legal guardian are legally allowed to vote. However, in a report published by the Dutch association for care to the handicapped, the secretarial offices of residential homes rip up or throw out the voting passes. The association’s assumption is that employees do not know what to do with the passes because the actual voting is problematic. People with a physical disability are legally allowed to get help in the voting booth, but not the mentally challenged. An older man determined to vote explains that his voting pass goes to the headquarters of the residential home and not to his address. He has had to fight to make sure his pass is not thrown out to be able to vote.
Oh and electronic voting got scrapped back in 2007 for all kinds of security reasons, which probably doesn’t help, either.
(Link: trouw.nl)
April 27, 2010
Lodewijk Westerbeek van Eerten invented an anti-pirate system called ‘P-Trap’. Two booms are attached to the flank of large ships that have invisible electric ropes that hang in the water. The idea is that the pirate ships cannot board the bigger ships as their motor gets caught and shocked in the ropes. Then get dragged to wherever the boat is going unless they jump ship, which is highly unlikely.
Westerbeek van Eerten, who calls himself an inventive businessman and not an inventor in all Dutch modesty, says “this anti-piracy system dissuades pirates from boarding sea going vessels.” The Royal Dutch marine has tested the P-Trap, calling it an excellent invention. Hiring armed guards is very pricy as compared to installing the P-Trap. And since we always want to know the price of things in the Netherlands, it is 50,000 to 75,000 euro for a P-Trap as compared to 120,000 euro for armed guards. The latter doesn’t guarantee pirates won’t board you, either.
(Link: depers.nl)
Tags: piracy
April 26, 2010
File sharing in the Netherlands shares a strange dichotomy with selling marijuana: acquiring the stuff is completely above board, but distributing it is illegal.
The collecting society for composers and performing artists, Buma/Stemra, has therefore come up with a plan to make uploading music legal, for a small fee paid through Internet providers of course. The society told Telegraaf that research shows users are willing to pay a fee of between 5 and 10 euro a month.
Response to Buma/Stemra’s plans has been varied according to an article by Webwereld. Access providers and representative organisations of consumers and record companies all saw positive sides to the proposal. The only group that has reservations (based on my reading visitor comments at the Webwereld and Telegraaf websites) are listeners themselves.
See also:
Tags: brein, BUMA, file sharing, providers
April 25, 2010
The coin to the left was issued in 1681 by the states of Holland and Friesland, of the Dutch Republic. It was a silver guilder design sporting the lion from the coat of arms of Holland. The coin to the right was issued by the Netherlands in 1973, and was I believe the penultimate design.
The last design had a 1980-ish look with grids and layers. It was replaced in 2002 by the euro.
April 24, 2010
Toni Bienemann from Arnhem is an avid collector of vintage cars, but having acquired about 40 automobiles he decided it was time for a change. And so he bought an old rail bridge in Germany—only to find out that this particular bridge is a symbol of German reunification. The Germans would get very upset, for instance, if he were to strip the thing for scrap metal.
Bienneman told Duitslandweb:
I had expected perhaps a small article in a local news paper, but not this much attention. Spiegel, ORF, Berliner Zeiting, they all called me to ask me why I bought the bridge. So I told them a story which I had made up afterwards. Originally, the bridge just seemed a nice symbol for my company, Dutchi Motors.
The Dömitz rail bridge (1873) used to be one of the longest bridges in Germany. It spanned the river Elbe, and was bombed by the alies in World War II. Afterwards, one side of the bridge became East German territory and was scrapped.
Wendland-net faithfully reproduces some of Bienneman’s spin:
“It would have been a pity if such a symbolic bridge had fallen into the wrongs hands.” This is the fear that drove Toni Bienemann […] to buy the historic construction for 305,000 euro from Deutsche Bahn in an auction.
Bienemann has now proposed the Germans come up with suggestions on how he could use the bridge in such a way that its symbolic value won’t get lost. He doesn’t need to make much profit right away, according to Duitslandweb, but if running the bridge is going to take him too much time, he will sell or lease it. Some of his own suggestions are to turn it into a bicycle bridge and run an ice-cream stand from it.
(Link: Sargasso. Photo by R. Kirchner, some rights reserved.)
April 23, 2010
What started way back in 2002 has finally been approved by The Hague’s city council: world-renowned architect Rem Koolhaas plans to build a 93-metre high building in front of the city’s central station as a new city landmark. The plans include three tapered towers, two with a total of 179 apartments and one for offices that meet and merge at the top, encompassing Koningen Julianaplein (big town square) on two sides. And it looks like a big M.
The Dutch press always likes to inform their audiences how much things cost. In this case, NRC tells us the ‘wowie’ building (that gives me a Grande Arche at La Défense in Paris feeling, but then a Dutch version) is estimated to cost 300 million euro and expected to be finished in 2015.
(Links: dutchnews.nl, oma.eu, nrc.nl)
Tags: Rem Koolhaas, The Hague
April 22, 2010
The Vegan Vampire, directed by Suzi Terror, won the first ever Imagine Time Capsule 2010 during the Amsterdam Fantastic Film Festival this week. Many of the YouTube send-ins were very good, but the jury was “very impressed with the skilled production as well as with actress Mirte Eggenkamp who mimics and moves like a tragic vampire.”
Watch more films from the festival here.
(Link: imaginefilmfestival.nl)
April 21, 2010
A taxi driver at the busy Amsterdam taxi stand Leidseplein was sentenced to two years in jail instead of the usual four for murder for beating a client, leading to his death (manslaughter). Last year, the taxi driver beat the man to death over the price of a cab ride. He dealt a deadly blow by going all amateur Jean Claude Van Damme on the man with his kickboxing. The court had asked for three years, but it turned into two and public opinion knows that if he’s nice he’ll get out even sooner, hence the commotion. This violent man has been in court before for threatening and assaulting three girls in 2007.
To give you some background, the taxi market in Amsterdam was liberalised a few years ago, out of town taxis were allowed to come and work in Amsterdam with little or no knowledge of the city and the situation is a general mess for honest taxi drivers and clients like me who need a cab at 3 am because I am carrying DJ equipment that won’t fit on my bicycle. There are many incidents, but this is really bad. The city of Amsterdam should really do something, but we don’t currently have a mayor and politics aren’t touching difficult issues until June.
As well, there is a constant claim that judges are too soft on sentencing in general, but I can’t judge (pardon the pun) if that is the case.
Back in October 2008 in Nijmegen, Gelderland, a 31-year-old taxi driver ran over a 29-year-old man because he refused to pay his taxi driver colleague.
(Link: spitsnieuws.nl)
Tags: taxi drivers
