Saturdays in the Rot

rotterdam's working docks, romantic view. from West 8 office.

Wandering around saturdays in rotterdam is always a show to see. It may not be paris or amsterdam, where you can breathe the magic in the street from centuries of city building (and the coffeshop next door). No. The magic of this city, decimated in WWII, is found in the jostling and movement of its people — and all the weird shit that they do.

This is a working city, where movement is an industry. Borne out of centuries of ports, docks, logistics, Rotterdam is the essential link in the supply chain of a functioning europe. From 1962 to 1986 it was the biggest port in the world. (It’s supposed to reclaim the title when the Maasvlakte 2 port area is finished in 2011.) You feel it at 6 in the morning. The one time I was so proud to run that early, I thought the streets would be mine! I merely joined the chorus of headlights, street crews and bikes already in motion. As if it were rush hour on Friday afternoon. On the same order, the weeknights are early (save some crazy students and architects). The singels are solitary. The docklands quiet and low.

The Maas gives moving a whole new meaning

But Saturdays. Saturdays are when it all comes out. The Saturdays I spend here, I’m taken by the assemblage of randomness let loose on everyone’s day out and off.

First, running in kralingen park – the city’s jewel (can i get a Merritt?) and lung, if not located somewhere in the right clavicle. The other day, not only did I see every species of dog and a majestically sunken bike, I was also overtaken by a thundering BRIGHT yellow corvette. Dude. Don’t those belong to balding, American ex-stock brokers in 1987? And blasting the Macgyver theme song? Alas! I had no camera to prove it.

kralingseplas, our jewel. a rare frozen moment.

Not to worry. There was no hiding that car in this city. 2 weeks later…I spotted it just off Middelandstraat – my local commercial corridor, the mission street of rotterdam, full of turkish retail, scary cofffeeshops and …. rice cooker stores?

the rot has midlife crises too! bellies not included.

typical middelandstraat rice cooker store

Okay, so maybe I have no life. (“corvettes?! who cares?”) But in a place with tiny euro cars, drab colors, and some uninspiring vernacular architecture – that picture of american midlife crisis struck a nerve. Perhaps an arterial nerve. I’ve got a thing or two to say about arterials. Actually the whole american car in rotterdam phenom strikes me funny. They’re just so out of context. And bigger than most apartments.

My neighborhood 70s Chevelle.

And they DO qualify for the dutch road tax credit. Which, if you recall from our discussion of Felix’s mercedes, confounded me in this nation of pragmatic peoples. Why on earth would any dutchman subsidize a bad ass american muscle car from the 70s? Who are these people in orange anyway?

Up next for dutch road tax: Them Duke Boys!!

Well, the logic has been explained to me. Who knows if its right or true. But like most laws dutch, there’s a logic to it. The road tax for 25-yr old cars is designed to keep all the materials and embodied energy of a vehicle in use for as long as possible – minimizing the energy, steel and pollution that go into producing new cars. And while I was previously aghast at the subsidizing of 70s gas guzzlers, the truth is that with fuel prices so high in Europe most of these are on liquified petroleum gas already. LPG is not just leisure sport for women.

suburban ..rotterdam?

And they’re fun to photograph! This will be the first of many American car photo entries earning dutch road tax credits that you probably don’t care about.

More exciting sights are yet to come… Like this uplifting character on the 2-stroke higgly piggly pipe organ. Nice gams.

nice gams!