July 26, 2017

Russian submarine in Amsterdam has to go

Filed under: General,History by Orangemaster @ 12:21 pm

B-80

Even back in 2008 the Russian Foxtrot B-80 submarine that watches over Amsterdam North’s NDSM harbour was scheduled to be removed, but that never happened. The 90-meter-long submarine built in Riga in 1956 and brought to Amsterdam from Den Helder in 2002 for 56,000 euro by a local architect has been in the harbour since and now belongs to a Belgian company that has been served an ‘enforcement action’ to remove it.

Today, the submarine is considered to be a real risk because it is in poor condition. They were big plans for the B-80, from being a place for fashion shows, being turned into a presentation space and even becoming part of a ship museum, all ideas that fell in the water.

In 2009 the submarine was owned by a Turkish firm that wanted to tow it away in order to have it destroyed, but they were asked by the Dutch government to pay a hefty ‘deposit’ to guarantee that everything would go according to European regulations. The Turks didn’t want to pay the amount, something the Belgians tried to appeal in court as well, but lost. Now the Belgians have to tow it away, but we wonder how this is all going to be enforced.

And yes, the B-80 is a cool thing to look when you take the free ferry from Amsterdam Central Station and arrive 10 minutes later at the NDSM harbour.

(Link: parool.nl, Photo of Russian Foxtrot B-80 submarine by FaceMePLS, some rights reserved)

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July 12, 2016

Hospital fends off Pokémon gamers

Filed under: Gaming by Orangemaster @ 8:37 am

A few days ago when Pokémon Go launched, some Dutch fans took to a police station in Amsterdam North to try and catch some Pokémons where the cops were not amused in the slightest. Apparently in Australia and the United States, police stations have been ‘overrun’ by gamers trying to catch whatever it is that is hiding at the cop shops. A possible reason why it’s not that bad here yet is because the game is only available to people with an American Apple ID and not yet officially in the Netherlands, which should be in a few days.

If that wasn’t inconvenient enough for the police, the AMC hospital in Amsterdam is said to have a sick Pokémon in their basement, where groups of people have been spotted even though they have no authorisation to be there. The situation is bad enough that security has been alerted in case gamers show up in sick people’s rooms. The hospital said, “if we find the sick Pokémon, we’ll take good care of it”, which is doctor speak for ‘please piss off and let us do our job’ on behalf of the hospital.

Back in 2009 one of our most popular stories ever was about a gamer in a hospital basement playing Silent Hill and shutting down all the electricity in the building.

(Link: www.at5.nl, Photo of the old building of the Sophia hospital (1884) by Wikimedia user Arminiuzz, some rights reserved)

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August 22, 2013

Creative camping in fancy design objects

Filed under: Design,Nature by Orangemaster @ 10:47 am

From 16 August to 30 September visitors can stay in one of the ‘creative shelters’ created by contemporary industrial designers. Each of the 15 mobile units on the campground are equipped with a comfortable bed and some of them have a bit more space that doubles as a small living space. The accommodation shown here is ‘Polaris’ designed by Boris Duijnevel of MUD projects.

Prices range from 20 to 80 euro a night, depending on the accommodation, and in the Story Caravan designed by Nancy Wiltink, she’ll throw in a bedtime story for an extra 55 euro between 10-11 pm that is either romantic or filled with horror so you will ‘sleep poor’, most probably no pun intended, just bad English (it should be ‘poorly’, Dutch adjectives and adverbs are often written the same way).

In addition, urban campsite offers guests a zone for campfires, hammocks to relax, a wood-fired sauna, and a picnic spot in front of each installation. the site also provides the visitors with general amenities — a restaurant, a well-stocked shop, laundry and a shower. the creative expression stop stop at the art objects: temporary photo exhibitions will be shown on the grounds, one of the fields will be arranged as a sculpture garden, and the terrain’s decoration will be changed regularly.

(Link: www.designboom.com, Photo of Polaris by MUD projects)

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July 23, 2013

Amsterdam North’s famous crane is being dismantled today

Filed under: Architecture by Orangemaster @ 8:48 am

One of the symbols of Amsterdam North’s NDSM dock area is a towering, 50-metre crane (‘Crane 13’) that is said to weigh about 300 metric tons. Today marks the beginning of the crane being dismantled and brought to the province of Friesland to be renovated.

Currently, a design hotel that will be 45 metres high and a small television studio is being built right next to the crane (or where the crane was). The crane will eventually be put back, a good excuse for a party maybe, who knows.

(Link: www.amsterdamfm.nl)

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May 28, 2010

Dustbins open with any magnetic strip card

Filed under: General,Weird by Orangemaster @ 10:08 am

After posting a video a on how a public transport chip card opens dustbins in Eindhoven, now there’s a sequel and prequel of dustbins in Amsterdam North that can be opened with a selection of cards.

In the video, the dustbin in question can be opened with any card that has a magnetic strip, even without a chip in it.

Big hairy deal? Well, if you lose your dustbin pass, you have to pay some 20-30 euro to get a new one, one of the guys in the video explains. You also need to pay money to actually get extra ones for your household. The point is to pay to put out your trash, as some municipalities let people pay this way instead of collecting taxes for rubbish. In Nijmegen we used to have to buy special bags at one guilder (pre-euro currency) a pop to use for rubbish, otherwise we could have been fined.

And the fun doesn’t stop there. A few days before this video, Amsterdam telly station AT5 also shot a nice video of a five-year-old working some dustbin pass magic, using a discarded public transport chip card. The whole point of the Amsterdam North district installing these dustbins was so that the locals could dump their trash in it and not just anybody. In this video, which was more about the privacy issues surrounding the public transport chip card, you’ll see that someone managed to order a legit card using a foto of Osama Ben Laden.

The little boy sums it up well: ‘It just crazy that it can be opened that way.”

(Link: at5.nl, Photo by Franklin Heijnen, some rights reserved)

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May 24, 2009

First edition of Ascension Day festival was smashing

Filed under: Dutch first,Music by Orangemaster @ 1:34 pm

The kids just loved watching all that old junk get totally trashed! For the very first edition of the Hemeltjelief Ascension Day festival in Amsterdam North, hosted by Cafe Noorderlicht, all kinds of crazy stuff was going on. I was a DJ at the event during the day, so I watched all that smashing from the newly built wooden stage they set up outdoors.

On a sunny day, albeit it with too much wind to actually play vinyl without the needle skipping, all kinds of cool stuff was happening outdoors. They had freshly baked pizza, fresh oysters and bright coloured ice cream for the kids. There were several stages with bands, some strange artist making a human-sized spider web with huge amounts of transparent tape between some trees and a workshop where kids could make their own musical instruments. I missed the evening activities, but they included some seriously bassy reggae, bonfires, car bashing and alcohol.

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October 26, 2008

Blog08: ‘Build something you love’

Filed under: General,Online by Orangemaster @ 1:40 pm
Gabe Mac and Pete Cashmore

Just like a real rock show, there was a spontaneous afterparty at Blog08 which consisted of a bunch of speakers and attendees taking a ferry boat to Amsterdam North and knocking back some bottled Heineken out of crates in a bunker. Here you have Pete Cashmore of Mashable (I said he was American, but he’s Scottish) being vlogged by Gabe Mac of Mobuzz.tv in the perfect grunge setting.

I had a great time, met tons of people from the Netherlands, England, Estonia, Slovenia and what have you and have enough tips to keep me and 24oranges busy for a while (see photo below). I very much enjoyed the casually dressed atmosphere and my first time using a Twitter back channel (constantly updated micro-blogging comments on screen), which was a real source of ‘infotainment’.

Blog08, the one-day extravagaza dedicated to blogging, vlogging and the blogosphere organised by Einstein generation hopefuls Ernst-Jan Pfauth and his mate Edial Dekker was a success that needs an encore in 2009.

Check out more photos here on Flickr.

Rocking blog

(Photos: Natasha)

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