January 5, 2018

Free classical music all year round in Rotterdam

Filed under: Music by Orangemaster @ 11:22 am

To celebrate its 100 year anniversary, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra is letting it rain free concert tickets in Rotterdam.

Tonight they kick off a series of free concerts that thousands of Rotterdam residents were able to get free tickets for via a website. For every concert, 54 are reserved for residents of specific neighbourhoods, for a total of 5,400 tickets. The RPO will be playing free concerts all year for the entire city, the last of which will be on 23 December for downtown Rotterdam residents.

The concerts will take place in concert hall De Doelen, the second busiest hall in the country after Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw.

(Link: rijnmond.nl, Photo of Carlo Antonio Testore violin, Milan, 1738 by Jason Hollinger, some rights reserved)

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January 3, 2018

Football goal and basketball shot at the same time

Filed under: Sports,Weird by Orangemaster @ 5:11 pm

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The film of a penalty kick at football club DOVO in Veenendaal, Utrecht during a indoor football tournament is going viral. Not only did Rafael Mamba score a goal, but one of his shoes landed right into the basketball hoop on the wall at the same time.

That’s two goals at once and it will make your day if you watch it. Keep your eyes on the shoe first and then watch it again to make sure the ball goes into the goal.

(Link: gelderlander.nl, Photo of Football by Bramus, some rights reserved)

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January 2, 2018

Worst slogan of 2017 about sausage rolls

Filed under: Animals,Food & Drink by Orangemaster @ 4:08 pm

Slogan-cat

The winner of the worst business slogan of 2017 is De Korenbloem in Mill with ‘Van kop tot kont, worst in de mond’ (roughly, literally and figuratively, ‘From top [head] to bottom [arse], sausage in the mouth’, as in from beginning to end, sausage in your mouth. You get the idea and it sounds gross in Dutch as well.

Second place goes to ‘Voor iedere gleuf een doos’ (Moniss packing materials, Lelystad), which is ‘For every slit (possibly, tab), there’s a box’; ‘gleuf’ is slang for female genitalia and so is ‘box’. Third place is ‘Alles om uw poes mee te verwennen. Ook als u een kater heeft (‘Everything to pamper your pussy, even if you have a (male) cat.’) from 4 Cats. Yes, the image I snapped from the Amsterdam shop is Dunglish and there should be a space between ‘cat’ and ‘food’.

This was the sixth edition of the Dutch Bad Slogans Awards and if they are not disgusting, they are usually sexist or really bad puns, from head to arse.

(Link: www.sloganverkiezing.nl)

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January 1, 2018

KLM scraps pilot caps from uniform

Filed under: Aviation by Orangemaster @ 2:21 pm

Happy New Year!

As of today, KLM pilots will no longer be required to wear caps, claiming that in today’s world, they have no added value. As well, not wearing a cap makes pilots more modern and easier to talk to as people. Many other airlines have either scrapped the caps or never introduced them at all.

There’s also talk of donating all the fun caps to a foundation for sick and handicapped children who are fans of pilots and aviation.

(Link: parool.nl, Photo of KLM A330-200 by caribb, some rights reserved)

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December 23, 2017

Christmas break time at 24oranges HQ

Filed under: General by Orangemaster @ 10:58 am

Xmas-tree-2017

24oranges is going to take a breather for a few days to catch up on some much needed sleep, finally make that video we promised in March (it’s bad juju if we don’t get it done in 2017), eat, drink and watch comedy on the telly.

Branko will again have a Top 10 list of this year’s favourite stories before the end of the year.

Happy Holidays to all you and thanks for your continued support!

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December 22, 2017

Looking back at Dutch cycling in 2017

Filed under: Bicycles by Orangemaster @ 3:29 pm

Here are some cycling stories for starters, then you can watch a proper main course of Dutch cycling ups and down through the Netherlands and beyond from Bicycle Dutch here below.

This fall saw the opening of the world’s first printed bike bridge, made by the Dutch. Next, we had the success story of Amsterdam Central Station’s shared space, also mentioned in the video below.

And there’s a great one shot video with no editing whatsoever on a Canon Powershot (before mobiles had cameras) of my co-blogger and me getting ready to ride through Amsterdam with Christmas lights on our bike 11 years ago!

(Photo by Mike Porcenaluk, some rights reserved)

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December 21, 2017

Watch a documentary on the Ice Man

Filed under: Science,Weird by Orangemaster @ 2:51 pm

Ice Man Wim Hof is the definition of cool. He is able to control some of his body’s systems, which is not usually possible. He also claims he can teach his methods to anybody and lets scientists poke and prod him on the regular.

Can everybody do what Ice Man does following his method or is that wishful thinking? Watch the video, in English, with some English subtitles.

(Link: video.vice.com)

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December 19, 2017

How does Rudolph’s nose glow? Find out

Filed under: Animals,Science by Orangemaster @ 9:11 pm

reindeer

An article in the Dutch biology research journal Deinsea, an annual publication of the Natural History Museum of Rotterdam, based on a study published in 2012 in the same journal, discusses the physiology of ‘Why Rudolph’s Nose is Red’.

The new study, entitled ‘Rudolph the red nosed reindeer had a very bioluminescent nose. A reply to Van der Hoven et al. 2012’ by Neil Crooks, Claire E. Marriott, Hannah R. Clifforth, Zain A. Ahmed, Arnold Xhikola, Samuel G. Penny, and Angelo P. Pernetta at the University of Brighton, UK, explain:

“Research published in Deinsea by Van der Hoven et al. (2012) identifies the cause of Rudolph’s infamous red nose to be the consequence of hyperemia of the nasal mucosa induced by the exertion of pulling a heavy load […] due to the excessive stresses endured whilst flying with Santa Claus and the sleigh in tow resulted in cerebral and bodily hyperthermia, overworking the nasal cooling system, causing the nose to glow. Whilst we recognise van der Hoven et al.’s (2012) central tenet of highly vascularized nasal mucosa in reindeer (Rangifer tarandus) helping regulate nasal heat exchange, we concluded that this is unlikely to be the causal factor of Rudolph’s particularly iridescent appendage for multiple reasons (PDF).”

(Link: improbable.com, Photo of reindeer by Dave Taylor, some rights reserved)

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December 18, 2017

Rotterdam launches app to report harassment

Filed under: Technology by Orangemaster @ 12:26 pm

Thanks to a new Dutch app called ‘Stop-App’, people will be able to report cat-calling, whistling, hissing (it’s a thing here) and threats of many kinds on the streets of Rotterdam. As of 1 January 2018, this kind of behaviour will be punishable by law with fines starting at 190 euro and running up to 4100 euro or three months in jail.

Like me, you’re probably wondering if this will work or have any effect – who knows. The city claims that it can effectively combat this bad behaviour if people report it. As well, Rotterdam will have special agents on the streets talking to offenders, with action only if warranted. It’s the Netherlands, everybody talks things out first.

The app will also need people who make reports to let it use their phone location, but if the situation is dangerous, calling emergency number 112 is still the right thing to do. According to research in Rotterdam, some 84% of women between 18 and 45 have been sexually intimidated, half of which is afraid to go to certain places at night. Only 5% of women report the harassment, and the goal of the app is to make it easier and increase this percentage.

(Link: rijnmond.nl, Photo by William Hook, some rights reserved)

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December 15, 2017

Queen Wilhelmina featured in Civilization VI

Filed under: Gaming by Orangemaster @ 3:45 pm
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Set to be released on 8 February 2018, computer game Sid Meier’s Civilization VI: Rise and Fall will feature Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands, the country’s longest-reigning Dutch monarch from 1890 to 1948 as well as the world’s first female billionaire in American dollars. In the game, the Netherlands’ particularities includes ‘grote rivieren’ (‘big rivers’), polders and ‘scheepsbouw’ (‘shipbuilding’). It is nice to see a game that left William of Orange aside for a change.

Although game creator Sid Meier is Canadian (actually, Canadian-American as well as Swiss by birth), he also inherited Dutch roots from his parents, which may or may not have played a roll in designing this part of the game. And the Dutch press loves playing a quick game of ‘Zoek de Nederlands’ (‘Find the Dutch person’) any chance they get, especially when it’s a talented person.

24oranges HQ has staff still playing Civilization III that was not designed by Meier, but rather by Americans Jeff Briggs and Soren Johnson, but hey, it’s still ‘Civ’ to us.

(Link: bright.nl)

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