Frank Jansen Photography

Saturday is market day in Rotterdam and a great opportunity to get the freshest wares at a very reasonable price. The market sits on the Binnenrotte, which is the area between the Rotterdam Library, the Blaak Train Station and the Sint Laurens church, also known as the big church:

The market consists of at least 200 stands and provides a wide variety of goods; the most prevalent are the fruit and vegetables stands:

The vegetables offered are of excellent variety and quality:

The displays of fruits are well organized to best feature the wares:

There are a number of stands that offer specialties, such as Stroopwafels:

Stroopwafels are delicious and best eaten with a cup of tea or coffee. They consist of two thin waffles, which sandwich a layer of caramel-like syrup. Of course, in the Netherlands you will always find a good selection of fish at the market:

And, not to be forgotten, cheese:

No market is complete without food vendors, who will sell you french fries or other quick snacks to keep you fed during market day. The market is something to be enjoyed.

Friday we left at a reasonable hour and took the train to the Hague (Den Haag or ’s Gravenhage in dutch). The Hague is the seat of the Dutch Government, whereas Amsterdam is the Dutch capital.

Upon arrival in the Hague we first went to Madurodam, which advertises itself as “the smallest city in the Netherlands”. Madurodam houses scale models of a large variety of interesting places throughout the Netherlands. This also includes miniature traffic moving in certain areas, shipping activities, trains riding all around Madurodam and even a scale model of Schiphol, the Amsterdam airport. It is continually update with new and interesting architecture or innovations, such as the High Speed Line (HSL) train segment that has been constructed to run all the way to Amsterdam with speeds up to 300 kph (appr. 187 mph).

The models are excellent, as can be seen from this image of one of the Amsterdam canal scenes:

If you look very closely, you can see a non-scale human taking a picture in the background. Another great model that you can compare to its original is the Rotterdam Library, which was in episode 3:

Some of the scale models are truly massive, as the buildings they model are very tall, such as the Nationale Nederlanden building, the original version of which stands in Rotterdam:

A point of interest to a lot of children in the Netherlands is de Efteling, which has grown into a large amusement park. One of the original attractions of de Efteling is the Fairy Tale forest, where little forest dwellers come upon locations that have characters from some of their favorite fairy tales. Seen in this image is the long-necked servant of a prince who is trying to get the princess by answering all the questions put to him by the evil queen:

Dutch architectural highlights are a significant component of Madurodam, including this example of the works of Willem Marinus Dudok; Dudok built the Hilversum City Hall in 1931:

Dudok came out of the Amsterdam School from that time period, and also was influenced by Frank Lloyd Wright. His style had many followers and he was active until the 1960s.

After leaving Madurodam, it is always fun to get some life-size images of pieces seen in miniature, On the way to Scheveningen, we stopped at the Circus Theater to do just that:

We had lunch of pancakes (bacon pancakes are great!) on the Scheveningen Pier above the North Sea and then went to the government area of the Hague. We stopped by the Gevangenenpoort (Prisoners’ Gate), which dates back to 1375 and housed some key prisoners in its day:

The museum has a great selection of medieval torture devices and give a good idea of conditions during the ‘good old days’.

We walked over to the House of Parliament and de Ridderzaal (Knights’ Hall), which sits on de Binnenhof (Inner Square):

De Ridderzaal dates back to 1290 and is the original meeting place and administrative center of the provinces of Holland and Zeeland. It later became the location for the Staten Generaal (the General Assembly of the States of the Netherlands) and continues to be used for key government functions, such as the presentation of the policy for the next governmental year by the Queen on the third tuesday in September.

There is a lot more to do in the Hague, but our time ran out.

On Tuesday, we made a quick trip to Amsterdam, which really didn’t leave us nearly enough time to do it justice. Amsterdam has many outstanding museums, which will each be able to take a day of your time. The Van Gogh museum and the Rijksmuseum are some standouts among them.

Our visit to the Anne Frank Huis was memorable, as the exhibit is extremely well done and pulls you into the world of the 8 people hiding in very little space, while having to make sure that no noise was made while the office area below them was being used.

In front of the Anne Frank Huis, we found something that I had not seen before: a one-person car-like vehicle, which according to its side:

o you can drive without a license
o you can park on the sidewalk
o saves you having to pay parking fees

One thought that did come to mind is that it might also float in the canals, and not suffer the lot of so many other items that sink into the mud of the canals. Every year an enormous amount of items are removed from the canals, which includes a large number of bicycles, some cars, tree limbs and the occasional boat, as can be seen in this image:

Amsterdam has a lot of old architecture in it mixed in with the occasional piece of new architecture, such as a parking garage:

And even some of the old architecture is given some rejuvenation with the occasional off-beat mural:

One of the things that differs between the Netherlands and the United States is the shopping experience; even though supermarkets are now common in the Netherlands, there still are plenty of smaller stores around with exceptional quality and warm, human interaction as part of shopping:

When in the Netherlands, I suggest frequenting the smaller shops, as you will love the friendly treatment that you get!

If it was Monday, this must be Rotterdam. After a quick trip around Schiedam to find that most museums weren’t open on Monday (good to know), we took the preferred method of transportation to the center of Rotterdam, the train:

Rotterdam is a city with a different character from most other Dutch cities for a couple of reasons:

- Rotterdam is all about the harbor, which drives the economy
- Rotterdam has a very modern center

As a result, Rotterdam is very much a working man’s city with the attitude to match. That being said, its people are very friendly and certainly welcome visitors.

The typical view of Europe’s larger cities is that of medieval through 19th century architecture, giving the feel of very old cities. The reason for Rotterdam’s modern center lies in its history; at the beginning of World War II, Rotterdam’s center was bombed by the Germans to both take out the infrastructure that kept the Netherlands running and force the Dutch to surrender against an overpowering enemy. As part of these bombing raids, most of the center of the city was flattened and with it the historic structures that stood there. The statue by Ossip Zadkine symbolizes the city missing its heart:

We walked through most of the center of the city to see some of the interesting architecture, such as the Rotterdam Library:

The library is a recent design and sits just about next to another eye-catching piece of architecture:

These apartment cubes (Plan C is their collective name) are indeed different, as there are no upright walls to hang your pictures on. I took a tour of one of the units a number of years ago and can tell you that they do present a comfortable living space, but are not overly large.

Rotterdam also has some more conventional modern architecture, such as the Trade Center:

and of course, it has its share of bridges across the Maas river, such as the recent Erasmus bridge:

Some other notes:

Rotterdam is also the birthplace of Marten Toonder, who created the most enduring Dutch comic strip of all time, The Adventures of Tom Poes. These comics are known for their interesting, animal-based characters with a mild social commentary mixed in. The detail from the status erected in his honor shows the character of Professor Sikbok, a supreme technocrat:

Most restaurants in the Netherlands still allow smoking, although there is a European tide that will sweep the Netherlands along over time. The warning labels on Dutch tobacco products are not nearly as subtle as we have seen in the United States; the message attached to the Marlboro sign reads “Smoking Kills”:

Certain things you will find all over the world; sea gulls (aka Beach Rats) are one of these:

Another of those things are what you find in big cities world-wide: trash (this newspaper was actually frozen in water surrounding a station entrance).

After sleeping away a good portion of the day on Saturday (long days and jetlag will get everyone eventually), we went off to Hilversum to catch up with my brother and his family. It was wonderful to spend some time with them and we had fantastic brick-oven flatbread pizza from de Houtoven pizzeria in Hilversum.

On sunday morning, we didn’t have a lot of time to go sight-seeing, but did get a chance to at least sneak a peek at the Beeld en Geluid (Sound and Vision) museum in Hilversum.

The outside glass wall gives a very fuzzy impression in any image, as that is how it is finished. When viewed from the inside, this wall gives a very different vantage point:

The wall provides stunning light onto the Dutch Radio and Television Wall of Fame in the right part of the image.

This museum chronicles Dutch radio and television from its inception to current day programming and is unique in allowing the visitor to create their own experience. Not only can one customize the experience, but it is also possible to have this experience e-mailed to yourself and relive it.

The building extends a number of levels underground as can be seen here:

This provides a very different look and feel that you certainly won’t find in too many places. The Netherlands has a significant number of examples of interesting architecture that you will not find in the United States. There will be more examples of this when we direct our attention to Rotterdam.

After the whirlwind view of Beeld en Geluid, we made it to the Amsterdam Stadsschouwburg to watch an excellent performance of Handel’s Guilio Cesare.

That was it for the weekend.

As promised, here is the first update from my trip to the Netherlands, even though I’m still bleary-eyed from lack of sleep. The weather upon arrival at Schiphol airport outside Amsterdam was sunny with temperatures just above freezing; what we would call a great day in New England.

One of the first trips was to hook up with my father at the Central Train Station in The Hague, where I took this shot of bicycles parked in front of the station.

This is very typical of what you see in Holland, as people of all ages and stations in life use the bicycle to commute.

After a great lunch of poffertjes (a batch of small Dutch pancakes, which are about 2 inches in diameter), we went off to Schiedam, where my father lives. After settling in, I took a couple of images of the street that give some of the flavor of the Dutch city.

The first image gives some perspective on the parking situation that is prevalent in most cities, as they were not designed for vehicular traffic (when these cities were planned, only rich people had horses).

This second image gives a view of the rooftops of the traditional style of row housing that is still very much in place in the larger Dutch cities.

Enjoy…more to come during the trip.

The proofs from this past weekend’s American Bullmastiff Association AKC Agility trial held at American K-9 Country in Amherst, NH, are on-line. They can be found by following this link:

ABA February Proofs

Please keep in mind that due to in-door lighting there will be color correction required for any photo before it goes to print; the lighting at American K-9 Country tends to produce a pinkish cast, which will be removed during this process, so that the end results will be a more natural looking image. Due to the very high film speed required for this in-door action, prints can be ordered in wallet, 4×6 and 5×7 sizes only; from my experience, glossy prints will look better for this venue, as opposed to well-lit outdoor action, which will look best in a matte finish.

As always, your satisfaction with the prints is guaranteed 100%.

On February 9, I will be at the American Bullmastiff Association 1-day trial held at American K-9 Country in Amherst, NH. I look forward to seeing all of you there!

I thought I’d share another of my images from the ‘Conceptual Photography’ class that I’m taking. Part of last week’s assignment was to further enhance the emotion or idea used in the previous image; this was the solitude expressed by the fork bent over in its long journey.

While I worked on refining the original image, I want to share a reshoot of the same concept with a slightly different approach. I call the image above, ‘A Tree Grows’; the ‘tree’ is the only living thing in the sterile landscape that is presented in the background. I photographed the ‘tree’ in a hanging position with a pure white background and did the rest of the work after the capture; I created a layer from the cut-out of the white background and overlayed that layer with a woven pattern. Sizing this correctly and selecting a position that works finished the image.

I hope you enjoy the image and welcome any comments or questions you may have.

Even during the off-season, one might be drawn to the ballpark!

Earlier this month, I attended a company kick-off meeting at historic Fenway park in Boston. The outing was wonderful, but something was missing: the fans! Even on a snowy day, the park looks for its fans to bring the warm atmosphere to life inside its hallowed walls. Let’s hope the snow is gone by opening day!