It Never Rains, But...

Hi there!
This is a joint message from both Viggo and myself.

The readers-between-the-lines (you, in other words) have discovered that I have recently discovered that all was not well in marriage land. Again in other words: I have been dumped. Jilted. Betrayed. Found wanting. Found lacking. Found to be approaching sixty-thus-sexlessly-age. Take your pick. Take them all, I have.
I prefer to use: we have drifted apart so far, that land was totally out of sight.

Don't worry. I'll survive. My blog will survive. My posts will survive, and I will try not to turn maudlin on you.
But it is essential that you, my readers, will come to realize that the Renée Koopman that you know has seamlessly morphed into the Renée Grashoff she was unto 1990.
That means there is suddenly another name on top of this blog. It also means that I cannot change my email address simply because of the enormous logistics involved, but that I will have to change it in due course. I will let you know.

To the ones that have taken the trouble to send me sweet and uplifting messages: thank you. You have no idea (no idea!) how much this has meant to me.

Talk to you soon!

Renée

Life's So Heavy...

My macho cat Viggo has been doing the honors for the last couple of posts about little very old boring me, so I thought it prudent to tell the ones of you who are interested in person how I am getting on in the quagmire  of broken marriage vows.
Well...sinking fast, I must admit.
Thank Frith for those colleagues and friends who are doing their best to throw me a lifeline in the form of practical, philosophical and social aid!
Ever the one who is searching for that Ray of Light, the cliché silver lining, I am...
Sometimes I get a glimpse...

I always turn to music. The one constant in my life. So I've looked up an oldie, but goodie.
There's a link: The Beatles
Do not make the (understandable) mistake of thinking that it's about departed hubby, 'cause it isn't!
But I love it. Love it. Love it. Viggo lets it be known that he still isn't that impressed.

Viggo's Blog - The Wednesday Evening Blues

A link to Together - by Selah Sue

Hi fans, Viggo here.
Since the school year has started in The Wetlands, and my woman is rushing around like a demented hamster to get everything in order for her new classes, I have taken it upon myself to give you an update on our situation.

You know that line from the CD by Carlos Santana, where he has all those friends contributing? No, of course you don't, sorry. So. Anyway, there's this guy singing about pain, and he says (and I quote) "Pain never makes me cry, but happiness does".
I'd like to paraphrase this and turn it into: pain never makes her cry, but anger does.
Still. It's extremely fruitful in one aspect, and that's the writing angle. She's turning out the blues like a maniac.
Now, it's a public secret that people who are into music are avid listeners to other people's music (what a strange mechanism that is - as if I would go and watch that poxy Maine Coon when he's trying to catch a mole. I'd rather catch it myself. I'm better at it than him anyway!)
And my woman is listening to all sorts of stuff, mostly blues, but also Dutch artists like Jodymoon and Marike Jager. And that Belgian cutie called Selah Sue.

I've provided a link on top, for your perusal.
Meanwhile, as there's a huge thunderstorm blowing in, I'm going to love you and leave you. My belly is rumbling almost as hard as that thunder and lightning.
Cheerio!

Montmartre-Sur-Haringvliet...Well, Sort Of.

When you are a teacher, there are always pupils who have a special place in your heart. It's not done to let this show in class, but as soon as they've left school it's all right to casually mention that you've always thought they had it in them.
David Slob of Fantastix Entertainment & Productions falls into this category. Winner of Best Living Statue 2012 of The Netherlands, he has been organizing fun projects in Hellevoetsluis. And Montmartre aan het Haringvliet (a strange but eclectic mix of living statues, live music, flea market stalls and do-it-yourself art) was his latest.

My home town is kinda famous for its maritime summer festival called "Vestingdagen", this month the free pop festival Wallenpop made a triumphant comeback and we enjoyed the Fokveedag, but there is always room for one more festival in my opinion. Everything that makes its 40.000 or so citizens happy is a win-win situation.

See this? This is one of the entrances to the old naval port, called the 'vesting'. A vesting is a fortified piece of land, surrounded by a moat and grassed up walls and fortifications. Hellevoetsluis is an old naval vesting. When I first visited it as an 8 year old girl, it was boring as hell. The navy had just left, and the (by now substantial) suburbs had not been built yet. Hellevoetsluis was a dying port full of old fogies. I would not want to be seen dead here, even then.

Circumstances beyond my control forced me to rent a flat here in 1986, swearing I would get out as soon as possible, but here I still am, almost 30 years on.

And it has grown on me. Yes, it can still be boring. But quite often it is charming.

This afternoon I sat on one of the many terraces and just watched the Hellevoetsluis world go by.

Lots of older men and even older women (Dutch women outlive their spouses by years and years) in the wrong shorts happily listened to The Amazing Stroopwafels, who have been performing in these streets since the fall of Rome, gawked at the living statues and rummaged through the junk, or had a beer. And it was so...pleasant. Innocent, almost.

In Brussels some lunatic tried to mow down Thalys passengers with a Kalashnikov, and here an artist drew butterflies on the pregnant belly of a young woman.

Let's hope it will stay that way, and we won't have to polish those canons!

So, I sat there, with my own beer, contemplating what makes the town I live in and the people I share it with so special.

I think that it has come of age. From a dying but-once-great-naval-port it has taken those 30 years and transformed itself into a laid-back melting-pot of quite a few nationalities. We had a refugee camp over here, and many of the people who lived there have stayed in this town. The troubles we had in the early nineties with people from the Dutch Antilles have evaporated when some of those people were relocated (literally) to another town that was better equipped to handle them. The ones who remained have adapted.

We have our share of troubled youngsters and also of troubled middle-aged. But on the whole this is a friendly town, especially in Summer when the water on our doorstep shows its best sparkly face.

For the life of me I could not find any resemblance with Montmartre. But who cares, it was a fun afternoon! Do it again, David, by all means! You've made your old teach proud.

For those of you who are interested in The Amazing Stroopwafels (they are quite famous in The Netherlands you know) I'll provide a link right....here: Oude Maasweg (live)

All photos ©RenéeKoopman

Viggo's Blog - The Joy Of Pooping In Someone Else's Garden.

Hi fans, Viggo here.

Alright, okay, calm down, don't worry yourselves, we're still here and still alive and kicking. 
Jeez, you'd think we were in a war zone or something, it's not THAT bad!
I've told my woman to stay strong, and for Frith's sake to jog to the supermarket and get me
 a load of those expensive nibbles before her assets are frozen. And she seems fine, honestly, 
she'll live.

Meanwhile I sat in one of my customized bags. This is one of my special ones; it only took

 me 2 seconds to get it just so.

But what I really wanted to talk to you about, is something I've discovered a while ago.

You know we have quite a large garden, right? Large enough for me to have some secret

 secluded spaces for my...well, let's call them my special needs.

I am a stickler for privacy. I do not like to be watched when I do my business. Would you? 

(No, don't answer that! It was a rhetorical question, you stupid human! As if I care.)

I also told you that we have a new Maine Coon on the block. And his humans have a poor 

excuse for a garden, almost all paving with a tiny tiny piece of earth with some pitiful plants in.

Now, I have discovered that it really pisses him off when I poop in this plot of dirt. So I do.

It takes quite a bit of planning, because fun as it may be, I still like my privacy.

This afternoon his woman shouted at me, so perhaps she's sussed me out... Still. It was worth 

it. And I don't need to be afraid that he will try to do his business in my garden, 'cause Gina

 will bark as soon as he shows his ugly hairy face.

Right. Wanted to share this with you. Tarah!

Southern Limburg - Un-Dutch Corner of The Netherlands

Travel is one of the joys of (my) life. Fortunately I am nearly always able to find travel companions; and this time I took my ancient (87,5...you should be so lucky!) mother along. 
Our journey took us to Zuid-Limburg (Southern Limburg), in the farthest of farthest tip of The Netherlands; a land that is so untypical of my flat homeland that it feels like another country.

The locals speak a lingo that is a cross between German and something entirely different, which enhances the 'abroad!' feeling. With my natural feel for languages, I could make out approximately 1 in 3 words. And it is hilly! And it has marl caves and quarries and narrow rivers which actually have (tiny) rapids.

We stayed in a small village called Hulsberg, in a nice country hotel called the Hof van Hulsberg, situated in a traditional Southern Limburg farmhouse. These farms are built in a carré, with a large courtyard in the middle.

From my front door to Hulsberg is a 3-and-a-bit hour drive, a skip and a jump for you Americans-and-other-large-countries-dwellers, but to me quite a trip, which necessitated a break in the middle for coffee and lunch.

Hulsberg is tiny, but like many villages in Southern Limburg it is built around a huge Catholic church, visible from the hotel terrace.

The next day we opted for one of the most touristy towns in Limburg, namely Valkenburg.

Valkenburg was built around a keep, and later a large castle and keep, dating from the 10th century but a ruin since William the IIIrd decided to blow it up to keep it from falling into the hands of Napoleon. Tourist trap though it may be, it is a charming town, with a nice car-free centre chock-a-block with bars and restaurants, and boasting 'the best beer terrace of The Netherlands 2015' right along the river Geul.

Well, too good to resist, right, especially since the weather was great?!

 I had an Emperor Charles V blonde beer, and it was absolutely wonderful. But in case you were wondering what other beers they had, here is only a third of their stock:

Valkenburg was charming, and Mum loved it, although the hilly streets proved too much for her and we had to forgo the planned trip to one of the marl caves.

The next day promised to become a scorcher - up to 29 degrees C, which for us Dutchies is like walking in a desert. Maastricht was quickly abandoned as a destination, and we opted for a day in the zoo instead, as it is laid out in woodland.

Gaia Zoo in Kerkrade is only a 15 minute drive from Hulsberg and in 2015 has won the prize for the best Dutch Zoo four years running.

We loved it!

The architect has made very clever use of the hills and woodlands, and has created a beautiful parkland with plenty of space for the animals. It is subdivided into Taiga, Savanna, Rainforest and Limburg (with indigenous species). Yes, sure, they are in cages...but the cages are large and with greenery, shade and natural bathing water for all of them.

For instance, where in Rotterdam Blijdorp Zoo the huge infamous silverback gorilla Bokito* is banned behind inches thick plate glass and electrified fences and always makes a thoroughly depressed impression on me, in Gaia the 25 yr old silverback Makula sat in the sunshine on his large green island, surrounded by his family with several females and frolicking youngsters and looked sort of peaceful.

(*Bokito escaped some years ago by jumping the moat surrounding his pen and mauled a woman who had been harassing him for months, created havoc in the nearby restaurant by throwing chairs around and caused families to flee in panic. Mind you, he only taught that woman a lesson, in my opinion, as he did not kill her, and he did not harm anyone else. But he has paid his price)

We enjoyed ourselves tremendously and I had a righteous feeling because I walked off the nice lunch in the zoo restaurant by pushing Mum in her loan wheelchair up and down those hills all day in the blazing heat.

This gorgeous Ibis sat down next to us, close enough to touch. But I resisted.

So. Southern Limburg. Whenever you are in the neighbourhood, go check it out!

Fokveedag - Where Rural Meets Suburban.

Growing up amongst cows, horses, goats, pigs and sheep was fun - for awhile. My stepfather was an optician who wanted to live the life of a country gent; so there we were in a converted farmhouse with all the mod-cons, in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by farmers (livestock or otherwise) who viewed his efforts to keep some goats, chickens and a horse with curiosity, disdain and sometimes outright animosity.
I fled towards Amsterdam at 17. Need I say more?

But.
Somehow this rural life has crept into my blood. I take a walk or bicycle ride around the countryside near to my suburb most days, and always stop to watch the cows and the horses, and I note with interest that the wheat is harvested right now, and that the onions show a good crop.
Going to the local Fokveedag (Livestock Fair) therefor, is a tradition I will probably stick to till the cows come home.

Around Hellevoetsluis, on the island of Voorne, we have a mixed bunch of country folk. There are the dairy farmers (both cow and goat), the crop farmers and the fruit and veg people. 
Fokveedag used to be all about the livestock, but a need for funds urged the organization board to branch out, so last Saturday I saw a farmer's market, huge shiny combines, traditional crafts and plenty of activities for kiddies. The animals, to me, are the pull, though.

I sat and watched the heifer competition for an hour or so. Being a dummy in Heiferland, they all looked fine to me, albeit a bit stressed. But a farmer on the bench next to me explained what I had to look for. He talked with great enthusiasm and at length about udder suspension, dry legs, gait and backbone. Right. They all looked fine to me!

A new part of this Fokveedag were the dray horses. These huge horses are being bred by quite a few stables on Voorne, and they are impressive. They were being groomed with coloured wool and straw, and they... stood there and took it.  

I used to ride, so am not a novice around a horse, but this was a totally different ballgame. Their owners and groomers had thrown themselves into it and wore pristine white. All of them. I don't know what impressed me more; the fact that the horses were so patient or that the people managed to keep their clothes from being soiled.

It was a fun day, especially for the Hellevoetsluis kids who not often get a chance to get up close and personal with, for instance, a gaggle of geese.
And those rural folk? They used the Fokveedag to show off their livelihood and to compete, but mostly to socialize with other rural folk. 

The same day I went to the local free pop festival, Wallenpop, where I socialized with suburban folk. More, even more, my kind of thing. Still, you can take this girl out of the polder, but you cannot get the polder out of this old girl...

All photos © RenéeKoopman