A splendid evening at Scheveningen Beach leaves the best memories of having been there with friends. It was a cold and rainy Sunday and the Dutch weather was typically uncertain about itself, occasionally offering up glints of sunlight through the dark mist.
‘Dutchified’ as we are now, we had already planned to go there despite the annoying weather. I had seen this beach calm and crowded on a sunny afternoon, but this time it was different. There were high tides, strong winds and swiftly moving dark clouds, rendering the place virtually deserted. This snap was taken at the moment when the sunrays somehow managed to peek through the dense, dark blanket of thick moving clouds, creating an aura in the middle of the sea. Like poetry it was, bringing William Wordsworth’s beautiful lines to my mind:
‘Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty.’
Le Bourdon, the Delftsch Studenten Corps’ all-male choir (or ‘koor’), is named after the clock in the Oude Kerk’s tower. Tradition holds that when the season’s concert schedule ends, the choir takes a trip to Paris. “We always go in the spring,” says Thomas Massink, Le Bourdon’s president. “The entire choir, plus former members. We walk around Paris all weekend wearing tail-coats, with only a toothbrush in our pockets, and at various spots we stop and sing.”
Pins and ribbons hang from their tailcoat lapels, each pin signifying a past concert. Massink: “Some coat lapels are covered in pins and ribbons, like a Chinese general.” The number of mini-Eiffel tower pins on a coat’s lapel denotes the number of times the choir member has joined the weekend trip to Paris.
The choir’s street performances – at the Eiffel Tower, Sacre Coeur, Notre Dame and the Louvre – draw lots of attention, and when, according to the choir’s website, they sing old Dutch songs, like Piet Hein, in four-part harmony, the French ‘have bemused looks on their faces, but the hearts of the Dutch people present melt.’ The choir’s song-list varies from popular to classical. Massink: “Also some old-time songs. Actually, a bit of everything.”
A red and black wooden shoe (klomp), painted in the student association’s colors, is used to collect money for the trip. “We call this ‘afklompen’ (wooden-shoe fundraising). The money raised pays for the trip. We walk around Paris with a wheelbarrow full of ice and beer, sauntering along and singing all day. By 1 a.m. we’re exhausted, and then head back to our hostel.”
For anniversary years, the choir goes to Venice instead of Paris, there to surprise tourists with the resounding sounds of O sole mio.
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