September 5, 2012

Mayor of Maastricht does 180 on weed pass

Filed under: General by Orangemaster @ 9:04 pm

This April we announced the coming of the weed pass for NL residents only, supposed to deter cross border drug buying in the southern provinces of Limburg, Brabant and Zeeland. The weed pass will be introduced in the rest of the country as of January 2013, and Amsterdam is already gearing up for some sort of a fight.

The mayor of Maastricht, Onno Hoes, was a big fan of introducing the pass until this week. He now believes that coffeeshops shouldn’t be members only clubs, saying people are now avoiding coffeeshops.

You don’t say! Creating a database of weed smokers is not only awkward for the smokers, but it is a hassle and a half for coffeeshop owners. I know this for a fact, as I tried to buy a joint recently in the South to see how that went. Oh, and you don’t get a pass, what’s that all about, man.

First of all, besides meeting friendly all-female staff, they did need to see some ID and not any kind of letter stating where I actually lived. Second, besides telling me which parties I should vote for in the upcoming election with regard to the weed pass, they showed me their membership administration: a bunch of recipe cards in a box, nothing digital. They said if the cops come in, they need to be able to show their membership. I guess if it’s on a computer, you can’t produce it as quickly as with a rolodex, but that all sounds very shifty to me.

Someone else also said that forcing the south to follow the law, while other provinces don’t have to abide by that same law just yet isn’t really fair, either.

This story is far from over as it’s a matter of time before smart people from Amsterdam will figure out a way to buy weed for tourists and make a killing from it.

(Link: www.nu.nl)

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September 4, 2012

Netherlands scores poorly on list of stylish European countries

Filed under: Fashion by Orangemaster @ 4:02 pm

Some 12,262 respondents of Skyscanner.com, a European travel site, were asked to rate European countries on the basis of style, and the Netherlands wasn’t a big favourite. It landed second place in the top five least stylish countries just after Russia and just in front of Turkey.

Although I wouldn’t put too much stock into the survey, which reeks of summer filler, I myself wouldn’t think that the Dutch were doing that bad, but they are more practical casual than smart casual. Apparently, the Danes and Swedes dislike the Dutch style the most, which is interesting since the Danes are in fifth place of most stylish and the Swedes in fifth place of least stylish.

The easy to guess first three places with Italy, Spain and France sound plausible, considering all the fashion houses that come from those countries. Having Britain in fourth place, sure why not, although a British article seems to think that missing third place is a bit like not getting a bronze medal at the Olympics.

(Links: www.telegraaf.nl, , Photo of White leggings by Malingering, some rights reserved)

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September 3, 2012

Red heads break world record in Breda

Filed under: General by Branko Collin @ 1:03 pm

The biggest gathering of red heads in the world took place in Breda yesterday, netting the city on Noord-Brabant a fresh mention in the Guinness Book of Records.

Some 5,000 gingers from over 60 countries descended upon the city for its annual Red Head Day. To break the old record of most natural red heads gathered in a single enclosed space, Breda had to collect more than 892 of them. In the end 1,255 red haired people did the job. The old record was established in 2010.

Brabant’s cities seem to like these record attempts. In 2007 Tilburg set the world fire breathing record, and later that same Breda set the record for cola fountains.

RTL Nieuws has a couple of photos of the event.

(Link: De Stentor. Photo of last years visitors by Eddy Van 3000, some rights reserved)

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September 2, 2012

Dutch Rail abused privacy ‘anonymous’ transport card users, and more

Filed under: General by Branko Collin @ 2:27 pm

Dutch Rail is on a roll. Last Tuesday Webwereld reported that the state-owned monopolist has been sending spam to the users of the ‘anonymous’ version of the OV-chipkaart, the troubled Dutch transport card.

According to the tech news site, users of the anonymous card, with which you can pay for travel across modes and providers, had to give Dutch Rail their e-mail address in order to be able to travel with the company—presumably so that Dutch rail could differentiate between first and second class. Dutch Rail would then, however, abuse those addresses by inundating them with spam.

Earlier Dutch Rail was fined 125,000 euro by the Dutch privacy authority CBP for storing sensitive data about student travellers for too long.

It has not been a good week for Dutch Rail. Yesterday De Volkskrant reported that the company has been evading taxes by buying trains using a subsidiary in Ireland. The subsidiary would then leases those trains to the Dutch parent company. Train companies pay 9% in taxes in Ireland, but 25% in the Netherlands.

Par for the course for big business, you say? That may be true, but Dutch Rail is owned by the government. Basically, this is the example the Dutch state is setting to all tax payers. To make matters worse, Dutch Rail has a monopoly on all the juicy routes in the country. Other transport companies are allowed to run trains in the country, but only in areas that are not as profitable.

Suffice it to say that politicians were not happy, with for example PvdA (Labour) leader Diederik Samson calling Dutch Rails’ tactics ‘wrong’ and an example of ‘a lack of morals’. It is unclear to me whether politicians are upset because of Dutch Rails’ behaviour, or because their baby got caught red-handed.

(Photo by Flickr user UggBoy hearts UggGirl, some rights reserved)

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September 1, 2012

Money bra wins HEMA design award

Filed under: Design by Branko Collin @ 11:17 am

A student at the Delft University of Technology has won the audience award of a design competition held every year by Dutch department chain store HEMA.

Hiske Elferink designed a brassiere that contains a small wallet which can hold some change, a bank card and perhaps a key. She told Radio Netherlands (see the interview below) that she got the idea because when she goes clubbing, she puts her bank notes in her bra. The problem arises when you get change, because coins will slide down and jangle.

A quick Google taught me that this is not the first money bra.

The professional jury did not award a first prize this year. The winners and runners-up will be on display at the public library of Amsterdam (OBA) until October 31.

HEMA organises a yearly design competition for students. In the past, several of the winners and runners-up have made it into the store’s inventory, such as the 103% Vase, a vase that had a little side vase for the inevitable broken flower.

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August 31, 2012

Dutch nail world record longest hearse procession

Filed under: Automobiles,Dutch first by Orangemaster @ 11:28 am

The Dutch city of Baarn, Utrecht has bumped off Hell, Michigan (what’s in a name) as record holder of the longest hearse parade on Thursday, 30 August 2012. The American Just Hearse’N Around group had 51 hearses on 17 September 2011, while the Dutch managed to rally 107 hearses and easily set a Guinness World Record.

Nuvema, the group who held the attempt yesterday, was enthusiastic about the turnout and also the media attention paid to hearses, which is good for business. Check out the pictures of all the hearses that participated).

(Link: perssupport.nl, Photo of Hearse by Jason L. Parks, some rights reserved).

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August 30, 2012

Mural in Amsterdam honours Dutch paralympians

Filed under: Sports by Branko Collin @ 7:32 pm

This mural by the brothers Stein and Wessel Koning honours the Dutch athletes currently participating in the Paralympic Games in London.

It depicts archer Johan Wildeboer, runner and long jumper Suzan Verduijn, runner Marlou van Rhijn, football player Dennis Straatman and tennis player Jiske Griffioen. The mural is an initiative of Marc de Hond, himself a disabled basketball player who failed to qualify for the games.

Originally this wall, just off the Amsterdamse Bos, contained a mural by the De Koning brothers depicting athletes from the regular Olympics, but it was defaced by vandals.

(Link: dichtbij.nl)

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August 29, 2012

Passing off Thai coins for euro coins

Filed under: General by Orangemaster @ 4:02 pm

Canadian quarters in washers and dryers at the laundromat in the US and in Canada, old 20 French frank coins, if I remember correctly, for the parking meters, which probably works in the US as well: every country has their slugs (see definition No. 3).

Since the introduction of the euro, it has been easy to pass off certain lesser coins for euro, at the least the one and two euro coins. Pictured here is a 1 bolívar fuerte from Venezuela that was passed off to me as a 1 euro coin.

According to Amsterdam newspaper Het Parool, people who have been to Thailand are freely using Thai 10 bath coins, which are worth about 24 euro cents. Although there’s a king and a temple on the 10 bath, the similar colour scheme confuse folks who don’t check these things, especially in a bar or taxi. Well, that’s how I landed the fuerte.

“We estimate that lately at least 10,000 of these coins are circulating in the Netherlands, says Sander van Golberdinge, Deputy Director for Detailhandel Nederland — the umbrella organisation for all retail trade in the Netherlands.”

(Link: www.dutchamsterdam.nl)

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August 28, 2012

Verstappen gets away with running down his ex

Filed under: Automobiles,Sports by Orangemaster @ 5:01 pm

Back in January, former F1 driver Jos Verstappen pulled a pit stop and ran down his ex, and got arrested. Lucky him, he got away with yet another act of violence on a technicality.

A judge in Roermond, Limburg said that he should have been given a fine of 132 euro for destruction of property, namely two cell phones, jewelry and a handbag of the ex he tried to run down. Since that didn’t happen, his 40 day detention was enough ‘punishment’ and he’s free to fly off the handle again soon because he has anger issues that aren’t going anywhere.

(Link: www.limburger.nl, Photo of Jos Verstappen by Mike Philippens, some rights reserved)

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August 27, 2012

Rijksmuseum purposely misspells name in new logo

Filed under: Design by Branko Collin @ 11:32 am

The new logo and the old logo.

Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, the home of many a Dutch master, has presented its new logo.

Oddly enough, the name is spelled “Rijks museum”, which is not correct according to the official Dutch spelling. As one commenter at Bright asked, who is Rijk and why does he have his own museum?

The designer, Irma Boom, explains that the space is on purpose: “Everybody is already using Rijks as a pet name for the museum”—her spelling merely codifies and pays homage to that practice.

Bright also links to a profile about Boom which is a must-watch for its opening sentence alone, “I hate hand-made books”, which runs completely counter to today’s idolization of all things artisanal.

Meldpunt Spatiegebruik, which collects examples of the misuse of spaces in compound words, writes: “Never have I received so many reports about a single space within half a day. But the Rijksmuseum belongs to all of us, so you can’t touch it.”

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