4/30/2008

Hollands strangest holiday

You might want to read before checking out the pictures, they'll make a whole lot more sense then.
Business of a town core during the day.
The garage sales... this x 98723498. On every square inch of sidewalk space in the city.
The orange getup's are freakin sweet.

Queensday.

Alright, so Holland celebrates their Queen Beatrix, that's cool, but the way they go about this, is just so wierd to us. Today is Queensday, meaning that everyone is pretty much required to wear some sort of orange, most dutchies own a bunch of random orange stuff like massive clown hats, rediculous glasses, and very very very flashy orange pants and shirts.

If we we're to head 5 minutes away to downtown Rotterdam, we would see the equivallent to the biggest garage sale in the history of mankind. Queensday is the only day of the year dutchies can sell anything on the streets without needing a permit. This means that many many families stuff their little cars full of their 2nd hand crap, drive it to the city, claim a spot on the sideway, and park all their stuff on the curb. I remember walking around downtown last year the evening after this massive garage sale took place, and downtown was a freaking mess, crap everywhere. Bums here and there rummagging for whatever they can (probably their favorite day of the year). I think it's a good idea, the only shitty part about this for the sellers, buyers and bums, is that it's raining today.

Another characteristic of today is that everyone gets hammerred, and early. Shorty and I have both been warned by fellow teammates to stay out of the core of the city tonight, because the soccer hooligans, drunk college people, and just plain smashed people come out. This isn't the first time we have been around a situation like this though. We went to University together in the St. Patricks day capital of southern USA in Savannah, ga. We experienced the whole downtown core being closed and it being legal to roam the streets with a beer or two in hand, as long as you're wearing green.

Needless to say, we're chilling at the apartment today. The plan is to do some running at the field this afternoon, throw a bit with one another, then rent a movie or two, and spend the night listening to the crazy drunk people walking down our street outside. Should be relaxing.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

weird it may be to us, but merely an expression of their country's pride,.. and of course a good reason to party.
Never seen or heard of orange getup's
what are they?