March 14, 2013

24oranges celebrates Russia -The Netherlands 2013

Filed under: History by Orangemaster @ 12:42 pm

In addition to a year chocked full of serious cultural activities that feature the Russian-Dutch connection, 24oranges proudly presents some articles you might have missed that have a bit of the Russian soul in them as well:

1. ’50 years of human space flight’ out now

Dutch-Canadian writer Steve Korver has this obssession with Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gargarin that will suck you in as well.

2. Russian goes free thanks to Google translation error

It reads like a bad Russian joke and it reminds us all that a real translator beats a human being any day of the week.

3. Dutch Eurovision entry: cultural suicide

Dutch Eurovision’s entry in 2010 was a flop from the get-go and mentioned Leningrad, which was the name of the Russian city of Saint-Petersburg between 1924 and 1991.

4. Hiddink not happy with vodka named after him

We have lots of vodka-related stories, but this one was a good one. Hiddink’s spokesperson said that he never wanted to be associated with tobacco, alcohol or sex, so I guess that means vodka as well.

5. Maybe the Dutch king should have a beard

Once you get past the actual story, there’s a nice educational bit about Peter The Great taxing men with beards and his historical role in changing the Russian alphabet.

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March 13, 2013

The perfume that had everything

Filed under: Art by Branko Collin @ 8:17 pm

Amsterdam-based artists Lernert & Sander write:

Everything is a perfume by Lernert & Sander consisting of all fragrances launched in 2012. Over the last year Lernert & Sander collected almost 1400 samples of newly launched fragrances. By mixing the content of all of these bottles, they created 1.5 litre of Everything. This unique perfume comes in a specially designed and hand blown bottle, an enlargement of a classic sample bottle.

The result? Eric Wilson of the New York Times wrote:

It smelled, at first whiff, of strawberries mixed with salt, along with hints of baseball mitt and hair spray. And tuberose, yes. And licorice and fresh paint. And musk and rotten peaches and honeysuckle and basil and soap.

It was awful.

Apparently a bottle of 1400 free samplers goes for 30,000 euro these days.

The Huffington Post quotes the artists themselves:

“When Lernert tried it on in our studio yesterday and took the tram, the unbelievably handsome man that came to sit next to him instantly got up and found another seat after smelling Everything,” said Lernert and Sander via email. “But, hey, Everything is not for everyone.”

(Video: Vimeo / Lernert & Sander. Photo: video still)

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March 11, 2013

Dutch youths take extra driving lessons to lower insurance

Filed under: Automobiles by Branko Collin @ 10:19 am

Young men from the countryside are the worst drivers, according to Spitsnieuws.

This is why they have been taking supplementary driving lessons in droves, according to the online paper. Last year 12,000 Dutch youths participated in a program called ‘Trials’ in which they were taught how to perform emergency stops, how to control a skid and how to drive trucks. This is up from 10,000 in 2011. The program is run by several insurers who give successful participants a no claim discount.

Participation in the one-day programme costs 60 euro and is open for 18-28 year-olds from the provinces of Groningen, Friesland, Drenthe, Overijssel, Zeeland and Flevoland.

The Verbond van Verzekeraars (Association of Insurers) claims that the number of accidents with damage was 25% lower for participants than it was for people who did not participate.

Some figures:

  • At age 18 one can get a drivers license in the Netherlands.
  • 510,000 Dutch people of age 27 or under drive a car.
  • The risk for people aged 18-24 to be in a car accident is 4 times that of people aged 30-59.
  • People under the age of 27 are involved in 76,000 car accidents each year.

(Note that those numbers do not neatly fit together. The number of 31,000 accidents where at least one party was not insured for liability might not have involved a single youth and the lack of insurance might not have been on the side of the guilty party. This story was basically copy written by an insurance company for the main stream media, so take these things with healthy doses of salt.)

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March 10, 2013

Table with rubber legs by Wout Wessemius

Filed under: Design by Branko Collin @ 12:27 pm

Wout Wessemius likes to use rubber in structures. His website showcases tables, chairs, sofas and even a log cabin made of rubber, or least covered with the stuff.

This table, called the Chapli, has two twisted rubber legs with a frame of steel and a wooden top. It is also available as a smaller model with a round top and one leg. Pricing seems to be unavailable, dimensions can be altered on demand.

According to House of Design, Wessemius sources a lot of his materials at the junk yard.

(Link: Trendhunter. Photo: Wout Wessemius)

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March 9, 2013

Lack of women in top management roles in the Netherlands

Filed under: Weird by Branko Collin @ 2:55 pm

In the Netherlands 11% of all senior management positions are occupied by women.

Trouw likens the Netherlands to an emirate when it comes to the number of women in top management positions. (I believe they intend that to be an insult, which would be interesting in itself.) For comparison, the United Arab Emirates also sits at 11%. Since this year corporations and government agencies in the UAE are required to have women on their boards.

Of the developed countries (for want of a better word) only Japan fares worse. It has 7% women in management roles. The most emancipated country in the world is China with 51% of all big bosses being women. In fact the top ten of countries has seven nations in it that either are or used to be communist. (The word ‘socialist’ and ‘communist’ are oddly lacking from the Grant Thornton report (PDF) that Trouw bases its article on.)

Dutch women do not seem to be very interested in having careers, although they do like having the opportunity of having careers. In 2010 the United Nations voted the Netherlands the most gender equal country in the world.

(Illustration: public domain version of the symbol of feminism, via Wikimedia Commons)

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March 8, 2013

Privacy issues could make Royal awards awkward

Filed under: General,History by Orangemaster @ 3:23 pm
oranjenassau1.jpg

Every year, municipalities hold a ceremony to hand out decorations of the Order of Orange-Nassau. However, this year municipalities won’t receive any personal information about the recipients due to privacy issues, which could lead to embarrassing situations, according to the city of Venlo, Limburg.

What if someone has died? City officials won’t know and still have to send a letter to find out the hard way. What if a person has moved? Officials won’t know either and the recipients won’t get their decoration. The mayor of Venlo, Antoin Scholten, has a point.

(Link: www.limburger.nl)

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March 7, 2013

Trendy Ghanaian bikes, Dutch business savvy

Filed under: Bicycles,Design,Sustainability by Orangemaster @ 10:31 am

The BlackStarBike has a unique bamboo frame that is ecologically sound and ‘as solid as steel’. The company has two secret weapons: bamboo from the West of Ghana and cactus fibres from the North, processed in an innovative way, giving the bikes their unique, woodsy look. As well, a large part of the profits from the sales of BlackStarBikes goes to craftspeople in Ghana.

During the years we lived and worked in Africa, one of the issues that kept us thinking is the lack of export of manufactured goods. Africa provides enormous amounts of raw materials, from crude oil to tea, cocoa and coffee, but what does Africa manufacture? Africa’s raw materials are shipped to western countries and to China, to be processed there. In other words, African countries are unable to enjoy the maximum of profits from their natural resources. The profits made by a Ghanaian farmer on a bag of cocoa beans are low, but the profits made by household chocolate brands, which contain those very same beans, are very high.

(Link: blackstarbikes.nl, Photo of BlackStarBike by Zapdelight, some rights reserved)

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March 6, 2013

Taking the guesswork out of expiration dates

Filed under: Food & Drink,Science,Technology by Orangemaster @ 6:34 pm

Expiration dates on food are just a guideline. Sometimes, things like milk are bad from the get-go, while tinned products seem to last for years. However, we don’t really know, as most of us make sure nothing green is growing on our food or sniff it to make sure it smells alright.

But wouldn’t it be great to have the guesswork taken out of the equation? The Eindhoven University of Technology is working on doing just that using a plastic analogue-digital converter, or plastic chip. The cost of having these chips on food are less than a euro cent and could also be used for other expiration date sensitive goods such as medicine.

One of the researchers on this project says food can be monitored already using standard silicon chips, but that is too expensive, about 10 euro cent, which is too much for a one euro item. That is why they are using plastic, as the chips can be applied directly to packaging. And apparently, the chips use some very complex mathematics to make sure they work properly.

(Link: opmerkelijk.nieuws.nl, Photo of Orange juice – expiration date by viZZZual.com, some rights reserved)

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March 5, 2013

Need extra gangster bling? Score a stolen alpaca

Filed under: Animals by Orangemaster @ 1:03 pm

After owning a Ferrari, a Rolex and other gangster shizzle, the new thing to own if you’re an Eastern European gangster according to Dutch telly is an alpaca.

Stolen in the Netherlands and surely elsewhere by gangs of Eastern European criminals, alpacas go for anywhere between 200 and 20,000 euro. The caretaker of the alpacas in this Dutch video watches the nocturnal theft from his homes, afraid of being shot by armed gangs. “We just want them back,” says the elderly lady in the video who misses the animals.

Criminals or whatever, I do take offense to Dutch journalists use of the word ‘Oostblok’ (East Block) because in addition to it being a thing of the past, it stigmatises Eastern Europeans, many of which are EU citizens.

Get Microsoft Silverlight
Bekijk de video in andere formaten.

(Link: www.hpdetijd.nl, Photo of Alpaca by James Preston, some rights reserved)

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March 4, 2013

Bruce Springsteen covered in Dutch dialect

Filed under: Music by Branko Collin @ 8:09 am

Frans Pollux from Venlo translated 12 Bruce Springsteen songs to the Venloish dialect.

Are the Boss’ songs uniquely tied to New Jersey or can they also be about the roads of Blerick in Limburg (just across The River, the Meuse that is, from Venlo)? The 12 track CD Pollux Duit Springsteen tries to answer the question, or at least to entertain you. The title means Pollux Does Springsteen.

Mefite Martin Wisse thinks: “Perhaps surprisingly, it works.”

The CD cover was designed by Fred Honig, also from Venlo.

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