Amsterdam, Netherlands

The picture may not seem very special, and it’s remarkably similar to previous pictures I’ve posted about my living room, but there’s still a bit of a twist to it. Some years ago it suddenly became fashionable to create HDR (High Dynamic Range) pictures, that were basically a merger of several pictures, taken from the same standpoint but with different exposures. By merging them together you create a surreal scene where the contrast between different parts of the picture becomes much less than usual.

Take the above picture. It was shot indoors and the interior of the flat is properly visible: the exposure was correct for the interior. Yet, typically with such a setting, anything outside would become completely over exposed, and therefore just white. From the fact that in the above picture the buildings outside are visible, you can see that I worked on it a bit. I wanted to try an HDR picture myself, but not with using some of the free applications available on the net but just Photoshop Elements. It didn’t quite work, which is best seen from the dark and unnatural window frames. Ah well, I will have to give this another shot when I am willing to spend more time one this. Speaking of pictures, with the availability of a new picture format on Flickr (800 pixels wide or high) I’ve switched to this format on this blog as well, making the pictures bigger… but maybe a bit too big on a screen that is only 1024 pixels wide. I’ll have to see if I like it… Maybe I’ll switch back to 640 pixels pictures.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

On Monday evening, the evening after Queen’s Night and Queen’s Day, the city was an absolute mess. I can imagine that, if you are a tourist arriving in Amsterdam in the evening of 30 April and not knowing what went on during the day, the city must seem like an absolute shock. I wouldn’t be surprised if, in that case, you’d feel the urge to immediately return to the airport and fly as far away from the Low Countries as possible.

But, the city cleaners start doing their work as soon as most party-goers are on their way to their home towns again, and they clean throughout the night. Yesterday, the day after, there was still a lot of rubbish left in some streets, but today, as I cycled to the pool in the early morning, the streets were cleaner still and the city started to look like its old self again. Even the rubbish that floats in the canals gets removed when the canals are flushed out every night. There was one exception to that though, because the canal in front of my place is blocked because of reconstruction work. That means that, even though the rest of the canals get flushed through, the one close to me, Oudezijds Achterburgwal doesn’t. And the rubbish in it is going nowhere fast. As you can see in the picture above, which I took as I was nearly home after work. The canal, by the way, is much older than the date on this wall. It’s Amsterdam’s second oldest canal and was constructed in 1367.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

So, the day after Queen’s Day turned out to be a rather normal day again. Gone was the orange everywhere, gone was most of the rubbish in the streets (most, though definitely not all) and back was office life. Most European countries have a public holiday today (Labour Day) but not so the Netherlands. We were back at work…

The most exciting part of the day turned out to be the evening when Hanno and I went to a theatre very close-by. The theater is called Engelenbak (roughly translated as box of angels) and every Tuesday they organise an Open Bak (yes, open box) evening. The purpose of Open Bak is to give performers a chance to show their material to a small audience (about 50 people), to try the effect of jokes, to see if their songs are understood properly, to check the engagement of the audience with whatever is performed on stage.

Each Open Bak has about 6 segments of about 10 minutes each, and the performers of each segment are introduced by a more or less well known artist (tonight it was a well-known Dutch stand-up comedian called Lebbis) who also does an introduction and an after-talk. Because you never know what you’re going to get, and because of the variation in the performances (tonight included a French chanson-team, an acrobatic team, a singer and a stand-up comedian for example), attending the Open Bak really is a lot of fun. Hanno and I did this regularly ages ago, but this was the first time in years we were back at Open Bak. I think it’s a tradition we should be starting again!

The other exciting this was what you see in the picture above: asparagus! White asparagus to be more accurate. I love them, and this is the season for them, plus they are low-carb as well. So many reason to enjoy them with my dinner tonight!

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Unlike me, God must be a fan of the House of Orange, the Dutch Royal Family. We’ve had some pretty lousy weather recently and the outlook for the rest of the week is not good either, but today, on Queen’s Day 2012, Amsterdam experienced its first real spring day. It was absolutely wonderful. The sun shone all day and the temperature was just great. I walked around town without a jacket or a coat all day.

I left the house in the morning, at around 10, and via Nieuwmarkt and Utrechtsestraat I made my way to Stadhouderskade and on to Museumplein, walking almost in the opposite direction from when I used to go into town for Queen’s Day in previous years (when I still lived south of the city centre) where it all seemed remarkably quiet. The city did not give a permit to Radio 538, who used to organise a huge party on Museumplein, because there were fears for security of the 150,000 people who would normally visit that concert, so Museumplein this year was an oasis of peace and quiet – definitely compared to previous years.

I walked on to Willemsparkweg where Sean had told me that him and Mike would be selling some of their stuff (a Queen’s Day tradition), only to find out that they weren’t there. I returned into town and via many canals made my way back home where I had a delicious lunch. Windows open, many people outside, nice lunch – the sheer joy of living in the midst of it all! I continued my exploration of the orange city an hour later and via Singel, Herenstraat, Prinsenstraat made my way to the Jordaan area, well known for its authentic Amsterdam atmosphere.

It was there that I bumped into a group of my friends (of the Gay Expats group on Facebook) which is quite an achievement given that Amsterdam had about 700,000 people celebrating Queen’s Day today. The picture shows Valentin, one of the expats (absolutely the cutest and nicest of them all – and there are many cute and nice ones) with his baret (he’s French) in appropriate orange colours. It was a great coincidence that I bumped into them. Together we made our way south through the city centre. I ended up in Spijker and then lost most of the group, but that was OK. After three drinks there, I had seen enough orange for the rest of the year, and I returned home at around 7:30pm, after a wonderful, sunny, great Queen’s Day.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

This is quite an extraordinary picture. It shows the studio in which I live but that’s not the extraordinary part. What is exceptional here is that, for the first time this year, I have a view again! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, all five windows, all 158 little window panes if you like, are clear of scaffolding again, all of them offering a view to the outside world. And believe me, in this part of the city there is a lot of outside world to be viewed (and heard) so you can imagine my relief that there’s light again.

What else today? Just a lazy Sunday afternoon in town where I visited some shops (actually looking for new polo shirts because my old ones are getting a bit big) and then a swim in Zuiderbad. In the evening, after yet another delicious low carb dinner, I went to… Spijker! It was the first time that I went in a long time, in fact only the second time this year, but at least it seems to be a sign that I am slowly coming out of hibernation. I didn’t really go there for any reason, other than possibly the fact that it’s Queen’s Day tomorrow and the evening before Queen’s Day (‘Queen’s Night’) can be quite busy and quite nice. It was neither, really, but it still was good to be back in Spijker. It is, after all, the place that I used to call my living room for a long time. 

Amsterdam, Netherlands

It was a fairly typical Saturday, at least for those Saturdays that I spend in Amsterdam (most of them, these days.) That meant that I had breakfast (muffin and a large vanilla latte with skimmed milk) in the Coffee Company store in the morning.

In the afternoon I went to Huis Marseille where there was a beautiful exposition by photographer Guy Tillim. All photos on display were large prints (which unfortunately meant that this time the visit to Huis Marseille was rather short) so that a lot of details in Tillim’s landscape pictures could be seen very clearly. About two thirds of the exposition dealt with pictures that Tillim had shot in French Polynesia, so there was a lot to be seen of places like Tahiti and surrounding islands. Given that I am unlikely to ever go to Tahiti (though I have been to Hawaii so you never know) it was great to see a still of the island’s landscape in such great detail and with such overwhelming colours.

Another set of pictures was shot in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and with a similar landscape photography approach. Some of the pictures made me wonder ‘why?’ in the sense that I questioned why they had been picked by the photographer (or by the gallery) to hang in the museum. Some of the Sao Paulo pics especially just seemed like ordinary street pics to me. As I walked out, I took a picture of Keizersgracht where it intersects with Leidsegracht. It’s a mystery to me why Tillim’s pictures of Sao Paulo hang in Marseille and mine doesn’t (not that I think it should hang there, mind you) but that’s the way it is. The rest of the Saturday was just some relaxing in Deco and then some wine at home. Quiet.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

The last workday before a three day weekend! Monday is Queen’s Day here in the Netherlands and for Amsterdam that means that the city will be coloured orange (the national colour) and that the days before Monday will already be busy with people preparing for a party. A big party. The weather today was completely not promising yet. In fact, it was grey and the skies looked threatening. It didn’t stop me from me from going for a swim in the morning of course.

At work I typically have an Internet Browser window with Facebook open. It’s not like I spend entire days on Facebook, but in between tasks I always enjoy checking some new updates. Well, I almost always enjoy that. Today, both my upstairs neighbours posted pictures on their profiles showing that on the lion statues on top of our building was painted pink. This is the statue that was initially painted white (until the city disapproved of that colour) and that will soon need to get repainted in a very soft yellow. The upstairs neighbours had decided to paint the statue pink until the moment it would get repainted. According to their Facebook statuses they figured it would be fun to tease the city a bit and they also thought it was appropriate for the Queen’s Day weekend. Me? I was furious when I noticed it on Facebook. It’s exactly what’s wrong in this building. The upstairs neighbours thing they own the entire building, and didn’t even bother to discuss this with any of the other floors. This might have been a funny prank if they had bothered to share this with everyone, but right now it makes a building that had already been turned ugly into an even uglier one. Naturally this will not be the end of it. That list of questions I mentioned in yesterday’s post? That will have one or two questions added.

In the early evening I went to see Intouchables. Finally! After two failed attempts last week, I managed to get a ticket with my Cineville pass in the Cinecenter cinema close to Leidseplein. And I must say, it was worth the wait! I loved it! It’s a funny film, and also a very touching one, that never gets slapsticky, or silly, but just stays very endearing. I can definitely recommend it to anyone! Well, except to my upstairs neighbours. Not them.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

The picture shows my savings. Actually, it shows the scaffolding that’s in front of the house on the street side, but to call it my savings would be more accurate than you’d think. The builder who is usually on this scaffolding all day and all week told me on Tuesday that the work on the street side of the building was close to completion, so the scaffolding would soon disappear. That’s good news and bad news. It’s good news because that means that I will soon get my view back, and I particularly enjoy the view on that side of the building (it’s one of the main reasons I bought this place) but the bad news seems to be that the work is far from over. Why they are thinking of taking the scaffolding now already is beyond me but it gives me one more question to add to my list of questions about what all went wrong with the repointing. This is not over yet.

I spent the evening watching TV and that is quite an exceptional thing to do for me. The reason is that last weekend the Dutch government fell because the three right wing parties involved in that coalition could not decide on a set of austerity measures so that the government could make the 2013 budget targets as set by the European Union (and strongly supported by, yes, the Dutch government itself.) Then, three opposition parties and two of the government parties sat together and in two days came up with a comprehensive set of measures to indeed reach that target. The debate in Parliament tonight was fascinating to watch. Suddenly government parties had turned into opposition parties and vice versa, while some parties remained in opposition because they’d been sidetracked. For me, the news that the government had fallen was most welcome news. I despised the troika of parties and their cold and harsh austerity measures (while at the same time of course making the super rich comfortably super richer) so the fact that we’ll have news elections in September and hopefully a more social government thereafter is definitely a good thing in my book.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

With me, a typical cold is fairly predictable. Day one is when I can feel the cold coming up, with my throat getting sore and my nose starting to itch. Day two is the worst, with perpetual sneezing and sniffing and feeling miserable pretty much for most of the day. Day three (today) is a slightly improved version of day two. Still not feeling great but at least feeling that recovery is on the way. The next couple of days will see improvement still, with the number of sneezes down to manageable proportions, while feeling better day by day. Then it will take another week or so for all symptoms to disappear altogether and my sinuses return to normal.

Because I was still sneezing quite a bit in the morning (and I had not had a good night either) I decided to skip the morning swim and stay in bed for an hour and a half longer and just be in the office at nine. I also cancelled meeting up with Günter because I didn’t want to infect him with my germs, and because I didn’t quite feel up to it. Throughout the afternoon I started feeling better though, so as I was on my way home after work, I decided that I would stop at Zuiderbad for a swim after all. The pool was busier than in the morning but it wasn’t too bad, and afterwards I was actually very happy that I had gone for a swim anyway. I continued sniffing all evening but at least there is some clear improvement. The picture is of the statue of Mary that’s on my cupboard, with the light from a lamp shining rather unflatteringly up from underneath.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

And yes… bingo… what I suspected last night, that I felt a cold developing, turned out to be true overnight. And all day today I felt rather miserable, having to sneeze very often and with a running nose. I wasn’t the most pleasant sight for my colleagues, I’m sure, but fortunately the two colleagues that normally sit closest to me, were not at their desks today, so that at least allowed me to suffer in relative privacy. I did actually go swimming in the morning (and weirdly enough that did seem to clear my nose) but if tomorrow morning I feel like I feel today, then you won’t find me in the pool before work. 

In the evening, feeling quite exhausted, I just sat at my computer desk. Until I remembered that I had recently downloaded a video podcast on charcoal drawing. I looked it up on my iPod and found it soon enough, and also found the charcoal and drawing paper that I had bought in London years ago. I am certain that I do not have any drawing talent but I would love to know more about drawing (charcoal, pencil, pen or otherwise) so tonight I gave it my first, rather unlucky shot. The result is in the picture above. It’s supposed to be a daffodil and it clearly didn’t look quite like the original. Never mind, I will blame it on the cold (and on my lack of talent) and will try again soon. At least I’ve done my first charcoal drawing.