Monday, September 04, 2006

Holland trumps Italy in tasteless Snowstorm contest


Now there's a sentence you thought you'd never read! There are lots more where that came from. For those beyond the magical world of QISS (don't even try to work out what it stands for!) there is an ongoing competition in the office for who can bring back the naffest snowstorm souvenir from their hols. The only rule is that they must cost no more than £2 / 3 Euros. Even if I say so myself, my Dutch boy and girl on a see-saw with a windmill in the background edged it over m'colleague's valiant two-sided submission of Vesuvius in its dormant and erupting states. The 4 days in the land of liquorice and bicycles was delightful. I devised a game for anyone visiting the country with a friend or partner. It involves spotting the most outrageous or unusual item being carried on a bike. Just to start you off, mine was a three piece suite, with a pair of crutches as a runner-up. Please do comment if you can offer any interesting sightings.
One of the high / lowlights of my stay was a visit to the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam; low, because it had been relocated (albeit temporarily) from its former site close to the Rijksmuseum and Van Gogh Museum to a building site round the back of the station,and all the fine impressionist and other modern masterpieces I remember from previous visits were no longer on display; high because one of the exhibitions there was unexpectedly splendid. I could not do it justice by trying to describe it. I'd urge anyone reading this to go and see it, or if this is not possible, at least look at the trailer and downloads on the website
http://www.stedelijk.nl/ . The exhibition is called "The Falling Eye" by Saskia Olde Wolbers, and for anyyone who likes vivid images and intriguing and captivating tales, it is a sheer delight. The image above is a still from one of the videos.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I find it impossible to believe that a Dutch see-saw can be thought to trump the sheer majesty of an erupting volcano. Y'colleague has been cheated of his/her rightful place in the grand schem of things