January 7, 2012

Welcoming the new year with a cannon

Filed under: Weird by Branko Collin @ 4:36 pm

Carbidschieten (igniting calcium carbide in a milk churn) is a popular New Year’s eve tradition in the rural areas of the Netherlands.

It seems that these days milk churns are considered too small for a decent bang, and bigger and better cannons are built. Not always with the desired effect. The following video’s were shot in Triemen in Friesland on December 31.

(Video: Youtube / Vancha112)

(Video: Youtube / Uko van der Meulen)

Both videographers have more vids of ‘carbide shooting’ on their Youtube accounts.

Kids should not try this at home.

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January 6, 2012

Women, children and gay men first at football match

Filed under: Sports,Weird by Orangemaster @ 4:52 pm

Back in September 2011, Turkish football club Fenerbahçe made an international, historical statement against supporter violence by only allowing women and children into the stadium for a match, for free I might add.

Upcoming Dutch cup competition AZ (Alkmaar) against Ajax (Amsterdam) has to be replayed due to a violent incident in December 2011 involving a supporter. With Ajax leading 1-0, an Ajax supporter ran onto the field and attacked the AZ goalkeeper. Yes, his team was winning. Problem is, the goalkeeper defended himself by hitting the supporter, which sounds like a normal response to being attacked. The goalkeeper was then dealt a red card and the whole thing led to the AZ players leaving the field in protest and the game being abandoned.

True, players are not supposed to hit supporters, but then supporters are not supposed to attack players on the field. This wonderful display of what pathetic looks like is still a good conversation starter at the local Dutch cafe.

According to Editor-in-chief Kristiaan Schimmel of Gay.nl, gay men should also be able to enjoy a day at the stadium. The obvious objection to this is that straight men will do their utmost to get into the game and will succeed. It just takes one fake gay guy to ruin the whole idea of punishing what is predominately if not exclusively male supporters’ bad behaviour.

How’s this for an idea: if supporters stopped acting like cocks this wouldn’t be an issue in the first place.

(Link: www.rtvnh.nl, Photo by Wikimedia user Carolus Ludovicus, some rights reserved)

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January 5, 2012

Verstappen pulls a pit stop and runs down ex

Filed under: Automobiles,Sports by Orangemaster @ 12:19 pm

What sounded like an ‘Oh dear, Jos Verstappen got mad again flair up, has now turned into running down his ex girlfriend with a car.

Once the pride of Limburg in Formula 1 racing ‘Jos the Boss’ has now become just another abusive partner and criminal in many people’s eyes. According to the woman’s story, she jumped out of his car at a filling station and he drove after her, hitting her with his car on her side. She only had scraped and bruises, which even scares me as a I write this. He then drove her home and made the textbook profuse apologies, begging her not to call the police. Once she was home, she eventually called the police, and he’s been arrested.

Having compared Limburg to Québec where I come from in a PechaKucha presentation in Maastricht, I can tell you that Gilles Villeneuve (here above), Québec’s first F1 race car driver did some really weird and dangerous stuff on the track, but not to his loved ones.

Epic and pathetic fail, Jos.

(Link: limburger.nl)

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January 4, 2012

41 design pianos from Tilburg up for grabs

Filed under: Art,Music by Orangemaster @ 10:12 pm

Back in September 2011, a project entitled ”Play Me, I’m Yours” by English artist Luke Jerram at Tilburg’s annual Incubate Festival featured 101 pianos
all over the city that people could play, painted in all kinds of colours and styles.

The pianos have been through all kinds of weather and are not functional anymore, but they make great conversations pieces and you can bid on them online. The proceeds will go to the foundation No Guts No Glory, which raises money for cancer treatment.

(Link: Incubate.org, Photo of piano keyboard by Adam Henning, some rights reserved)

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January 3, 2012

Musician buys old violin at flea market worth thousands

Filed under: Music by Orangemaster @ 1:12 pm

Gypsy musician Tata Mirando from Arnhem, aka Djangela Mirando (you may all know his family, the Mirando gypsy family), recently bought a violin for 50 euro at flea market in Den Bosch worth about 100,000 euro.

An elderly woman sold the violin, which was part of the collection of her departed husband. For his money Mirando also got a bag full of sheet music which contained a certificate of authenticity of the violin, stating that it was a Giuseppe Guadagnini from 1801. Mirando thinks the violin is worth less and says it does need to be fixed up.

Here’s what the Mirando clan sounds like in a restaurant in Epe, Gelderland

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

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January 2, 2012

The man who sells church interiors

Filed under: Architecture,History,Religion by Branko Collin @ 3:39 pm

Two weeks ago Der Spiegel published an interview in English with Marc de Beyer, a man who sells pews and other items for churches that are closing their doors:

Marc de Beyer is an art historian in Utrecht, located about a half an hour by train from Amsterdam, but one could also call him a liquidator. He’s a man who shuts down churches. When a parish is dissolved, when a church is shuttered, de Beyer is there. And he has a lot to do.

Some 4,400 church buildings remain in the Netherlands. But each week, around two close their doors forever. This mainly affects the Catholics, who will be forced to offload half of their churches in the coming years.

See also:

(Photo: the Dominican church in Venlo was turned into a ‘cultural podium […] when the priests left the city in 2005‘. This statue of a blackfriar still reminds passers-by of the building’s original purpose.)

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January 1, 2012

Stock market gorilla fails for the first time in 11 years

Filed under: General by Branko Collin @ 3:16 pm

In 2000, gorilla Jacko picked a banana with a basket of shares attached to it, and those shares have since then outperformed the AEX (Amsterdam) index handsomely.

Z24 now reports that last year the gorilla’s random pick fared worse than the AEX for the first time. In 2011 AEX only dropped by 13%, whereas Jackos stocks decreased 45%.

Measured over 11 years the gorilla is still doing much better than the market. Jacko’s basket rose more than 30%, whereas AEX dropped by 55%.

See also: Dolphins outperform market analysts

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December 31, 2011

Crowd sourcing a bridge in Rotterdam

Filed under: Architecture by Branko Collin @ 12:53 pm

The Pop-up City writes:

The International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam (IABR) and Rotterdam-based architecture firm ZUS have launched the project I Make Rotterdam, a spectacular temporary pedestrian bridge between the city’s Central and the North districts that will be financed through crowd-funding.

The bridge, which should be completed during the 5th International Architecture Biennale in Rotterdam this Spring, has to help pedestrians to get from Rotterdam’s Central Station to some of the biennale’s locations. But how long this new pedestrian bridge is going to be depends completely on the amount of money that crowd wants to spend on it.

A plank will set you back 30 euro, an element (5 planks) 150 euro, and a part (9 elements?) 1500 euro. The Pop-Up City has some good advice for the organizers: “translate the website to English in order to open up the project for foreign money. Isn’t this an International Architecture Biennale?” I would like to add that listing prices to consumers without including sales tax is punishable with a fine of the third category.

See also: How to improve Rotterdam in 100 steps.

(Source illustration: I Make Rotterdam)

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December 30, 2011

Dutch astronaut André Kuipers wears Heerlen space watch

Filed under: Design,Dutch first,General by Orangemaster @ 6:06 pm

The watch Dutch astronaut André Kuipers is currently wearing in space was specially designed and made for him by watchmaker Roland Oostwegel from Heerlen, which is positive news from a city that has had to tear down an entire shopping mall right before Christmas for fear of collapse.

The watch bears the name R.O.1 SPACE Special Edition (pics) and will stay five months in space at the ISS on Kuipers’ wrist. It is the first-ever Dutch watch to go into space. I love how the second watch has a number four that looks like the capital Russian letter ‘d’ (Д).

When Kuipers met Oostwegel he told him about how astronauts lose their sense of time. Oostwegel then decided to create a watch for astronauts to solve this problem, with a mission counter that displays the elapsed mission time in days and weeks, and an extra sub dial for when the space ship has made one full lap around planet Earth in 91 minutes and 59 seconds.

Price for the stainless steel limited edition starts at 4900 euro.

(Link: limburger.nl, www.fratellowatches.com, Photo of a telescope at the Brunssummerheide (‘Brunssum heather’) in Heerlen)

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December 29, 2011

New Dutch cars ready to tear up the road

Filed under: Automobiles by Orangemaster @ 8:21 pm

First, there’s the Savage Rivale Roadyacht GTS, a four-door convertible supercar, which is a car segment that not many cars fit into, according to all the car blogs. It’s being built by a Dutch start-up company, it’s not yet available, but it almost is, February they say, and you can watch the car zoom along the corniche with Monaco in the background.

For now Savage Rivale is continuing work on the Roadyacht GTS’ convertible roof system but order books for the car are already open, with three customers having placed firm orders thus far. One of these orders is for a special version, the track-only ‘GTR’. It will come with a stripped out body, more powerful drivetrain, and plenty of carbon fiber to keep weight down.

Next, there’s a car that is ready to roll from a Dutch company in the province of Flevoland that has been around for ages, the Donkervoort D8 GTO. Bright.nl had good reason to write about it, as one of their former interns, Jordi Wiersma, designed the car. The first 25 cars will cost way more than 100,000 euro and the first 12 or so have already been sold.”

(Links: www.motorauthority.com, www.bright.nl)

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