Leiden Relief

Ya I forgot to update this is a while! Leiden Relief was Oct 3 and it is now Nov 11. As you can see it was a merry time in the town.

It is the only day that people are allowed to drink in the streets in Leiden. In fact, Leiden is the only place in the Netherlands where normally, one is not allowed to drink in the streets. They have to make an exception for this party!

 The story goes that way back when the Spanish controlled Leiden and  finally there was a liberation. This day celebrates that. The streets are shut down all day but the real party happens at night. There are concerts ALL over the place; drinks a' flowin'.

The dutch love to party. There are so many rowdy people all over the place that they have to kettle people. That's a term from the hippy days when police on horses would funnel hippies into small areas to control them. The people roil like popcorn in a kettle.

It's impossible to coordinate anything when you leave your home. Once in the streets you just go with the flow.

Everyone is pretty docile though and there was no violence that I saw. I did see a lot of mischievous behaviour though.

I'm curious how they clean up so quick. One night there is three feet of plastic cups in the streets and the next morning it's gone as if no one was there. Likely lot's of volunteers.

Fireworks were a nice touch in the end.

The canals also receive a lot of litter, which I didn't like.

Dinner With My Research Group

We went out to an Indonesian restaurant where I'm sure we ordered more food than the average Indonesian village eats. We couldn't finish it all although it was the tastiest thing I've eaten in a long time!