Compound Cats

There are signs all over the compound warning that, if you keep a cat, you must put a collar on him so the authorities can distinguish between those with a home, and the many strays they say live around here.

I don't know where all these strays were during the winter months - they're probably smart enough to charm some human into keeping them inside until April.  In the last few months, they've emerged, however.  And I've been able to get my kitty fix.

Most of them are pretty shy, so I can only sometimes get in a pet.  But, it's still fun to see them chasing bees in the sun and keeping court on the lawn.

Some cat owners, who live in the second floor apartments, have constructed cat-ladders. 

Golden Hour at the Compound

I live in a concrete residence on the outskirts of Aarhus along with 1,000 other international students, young families, and Danish students.  We've started referring to it as The Compound.

When we arrived in January, the grey concrete of the residence buildings and white, snow-covered lawns blended with the white-grey of the Danish sky.  Suddenly, Shakespeare's description of Hamlet's homeland became all too real.

As the seasons have changed, however, patches of green and glimpses of blue sky have pushed me outside to capture Denmark's version of the transformation.  Golden hour - that time of late afternoon/early evening when the sun's angle makes everything glow - lasts a long time in this Nordic country.  For that, I and my camera lens, are thankful.

Haunts.

One of the things I love most about moving to a new place is the process of locating beloved haunts.

You know that dive bar with great live music on Thursday nights, or the post-night-out-fast-food joint with a local specialty to be enjoyed at all hours of the night.  Or a cafe where the staff is friendly and coffee is well-brewed.

Lucky for me, and my fellow journalism students, Utrecht's Journalism and Communications Faculty has its own bar...in the building.  Many Friday afternoons turned to evenings in this fine establishment.

After a particularly good night of dancing, a friend asked if I wanted to sample the best cheeseburger of my life.  I couldn't help but feel intrigued as I'm a pretty big fan of the cheeseburger, as it is.  Well, he was right and the establishment (conveniently located on the way home from downtown) became a frequent midnight stop.

A few weeks after my introduction to the best cheeseburger of life, I shared my experience with some new friends after a Tragically Hip concert.  They agreed about its superiority.  If you're ever in Utrecht, search out Neude 32 on Voorstraat off the Neude Square.

And lastly, my studying safehaven had free wireless access and a resident orange cat.  What more do you need for hours of student time spent clickety clacking away at my keyboard?

Climate Summits and Danish Cops

My friend and I decided, on a whim, to go to the Copenhagen Climate Summit in December.  We wanted to witness a historical moment...this banding together of governments in the interest of people all over the world.  They were supposed to have our best interests and heart - to put aside their differences and come out with a plan.  Something that would change the way the world is run.   We're still waiting to see the final outcome of the meeting - from the ground, it looked like another expensively run summit with little to show at the closing ceremonies save a little pomp and circumstance. 

As journalism students without any press credentials, we had no chance of actually entering the building.  The conference organizers had distributed press cards months earlier without, apparently, thinking of how many people could actually fit inside Copenhagen's Bella Conference Centre.  So, by the end of the two week summit, no one who wasn't directly involved in negotiations was even allowed near the building. 

The people outside the building spoke of a lack of fairness.  Their sense was that the organizers and the world leaders had lost sight of finding solutions and had fallen to bickering and posturing.  They  figured there must be something fishy going on inside if there wasn't any information getting out.

That feeling of hopelessness culminated at a protest outside the Bella Centre on the third-to-last day of the summit.  We originally came as spectators, but got caught up in the spirit and figured that, since we were young lefties anyway, we may as well join in.  Something like "Participatory Journalism."  This isn't to say that we agreed with everything that was being said, or that we had lost hope entirely in the process of a democratic solution to the world's biggest challenges.  It's just that, without being allowed near the decision makers, the protest was our story.

 

We made it to the front of the battle lines.  The stark contrast between the colourfully-dressed protesters and the black-booted Danish police was striking.  Signs vaguely demanding 'Climate Justice' or 'Women's Rights' were reflected in the mirrored helmets of the lines of officers protecting the gated entrance behind which conference delegates negotiated.

There was a point at which people were yelling and screaming at the cops.  Their outrage at these seemingly immune and faceless guards was palpable.  The guards seemed unable or unwilling to grasp what the crowd saw as the importance of getting inside.  And then, suddenly, it calmed down.  The protesters walked away a little and there was a sense of stalemate. 

We spoke to some of the Danish cops about the crowd.  I asked them questions they wouldn't answer, but apparently we developed a rapport...because one of the older ones leaned over to me and said "You better get out of here now if you don't want to get arrested."  And I said "What?"  And my friend in blue said "In a few minutes, this protest (which had been entirely peaceful) is going to be declared illegal and we'll have to start arresting people."

A few weeks before the conference, Danish Parliament pushed through a bunch of laws upping the power of the police, particularly when it came to crowd control.  He'd gotten a message on his ear piece that they were going to start exercising those new powers.  And, he wanted to warn me.  Thanks, I guess.

So, we got outta there.  It was cold and our feet were wet.  Our spirits had been dampened.  Until we saw the news a few days later, we wouldn't know that Obama had rushed in to save the day - to come out with a deal to make a deal...later.  At that point though, with the memory of the dogged faces of the frustrated protesters fresh in our minds, it seemed like no one inside was listening. 

Hank.

 

This is Hank.  Well...Hank's work.  Well...at least I think his name is Hank.

Utrecht has a resident graffitti artist whose work can be seen all over the city.  I first noticed him about three days into my trip but, rather than a simple tag - which I kind of hate because who cares about your name and why do they want it on their property - he instead paints fun little cartoon guys.  And who doesn't love a fun little cartoon guy?

 

 

They all have the same characteristics - like the portfolio of an artist in a museum or a book, but he uses walls, overpasses and basically any flat surface to express himself.

Big head, small ears, hands (if there are any) are attached by curly cue arms, a heart painted on the figure's chest.  I feel like you can understand the mood Hank was in when he painted each one. 

And some seem unfinished, so I always imagine he was interrupted mid-work.

I would have liked to find him, but my friend from Utrecht said he hadn't seen any *new* pieces for about five years.  So, I guessed he'd probably moved on.  

Utrecht was already saturated with his work - he needed a new canvas.

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

Bloemen Markt

No account of time spent in Holland would be complete without a mention of flower markets.

I don't have any social commentary for this one, but the pictures might make the bloemen-lovers among you hop on a plane come spring.

** A word to the wise, however.  If you want to share some of the beauty with your friends and family back in North America, perhaps pictures are best.  I sent tulip bulbs to my Mom and sisters - two in British Columbia and one in California.  The bulbs bound for BC were confiscated by Canada Customs despite the gold seal the flower-seller assured me was proof of their safety for North American soil.  Fortunately, the "Princess Irene" bulbs sent to California made it safely through the postal system and my sister tells me that her Dutch Tulips are already sprouting.  Hopefully the Canada Customs agent who stole my bulbs will appreciate their beauty as much as my family would have.

Sky

The Netherlands is flat.

Like. There are no slopes.  No summits.  Few ditches...it's rare that getting anywhere by bike requires effort.  F.L.A.T.

And, as I would know if I were from Saskatchewan or Manitoba, flat land makes for incredible skies.

What I love about the Dutch skies, however, are their intermingling with the densely placed buildings.  Fast moving clouds, pink underbellies from city light, calm-before-storm kind of clouds - they're all painted above and overtop silhouettes of Dutch architecture.

This foreigner spent a lot of time looking up.

Jacques Brel - a Belgian folk singer from the 1960s wrote about the winds that change the skies in Belgium.


He sang in both French and Dutch - and the Dutch have adopted his version as a sort of anthem for their own wind and skies. 

 Jacques Brel's "Le plat pays qui est le mien" - in French

And the lyrics - which will break the heart if they can be understood

 

View over red rooftops - from my room.

  

Centre of Utrecht - Golden Hour

 

From up on high, you can see for ages

               The calf - Mascot of the Netherlands Film Festival - with sky.

Life on Water

The space on earth that The Netherlands occupies wasn't always land.  The Dutch created their country through a complex system of dykes and canals so that, when the rest of Europe was fighting over the seemingly insufficient land provided by mother earth, the inventive (opportunistic?) Dutch came up with a revolutionary idea:  If we're not strong enough to take it by force...we'll just expand what's available and take our share.

The unforeseen byproduct of living in a country dredged from the ocean floor is that living at (and sometimes below) sea level becomes commonplace.  The Climate Change debate exists in the Netherlands but there's not much talk of capitalizing on their water-control know-how - something that, to me, would seem like a natural.

On an aesthetic level, the waterways in the Netherlands are beautiful, even if they were created for utility.  Utrecht is called the Venice of The Netherlands because of its many canals running through the city centre.  These people live on, around, over and next to water all the time. 

In the old(er) part of the city, you can still see the no-longer-used doors that were originally drop-off and pick-up points for goods transported on the canals.  I like to imagine Dutch hobbits going out for a morning dip - opening their personal portal onto the water and splashing in.