Egnaro TV

Note: I know this is ummmm…a little late being posted but wanted to get it out of draft mode and online.

On Feb 21^st I arrived in Amsterdam for FITC 2009. Instead of flying alone this year I met up with the rest of the FITC crew at Toronto Pearson. This is the first time I've flown with such a large entourage and it was kind of fun to arrive all together. After landing we all took the train to Amsterdam Centraal and walked down to Die Port Van Cleve where we were staying. We got separated at the train station which ended up in my group getting right to the hotel while the others got lost and found us about thirty minutes later.

The flight was a red-eye so we figured no one would have rooms ready yet. As it turns out, everyone but Naomi and I got rooms right away. I left my bags at the hotel, grabbed my camera and headed out for a four hour photo tour. I re-walked familiar areas from last year and ventured farther into new areas as well. Around 3:30 I ended up back at the hotel, checked in and chilled for a bit before a planned meeting time of 5:30 in the lobby.

As the evening wore on – with me still running on no sleep – we made our way to an ok Italian dinner, then to a really crappy bar with a 40+ Chinese VJ playing random retro tracks, some of which none of us had ever heard before. From here we made our way to a better bar and were joined by Owen, Bert and a few other locals.  A splinter group made our way to Sugarland after the girls decided 20EU was too much for cover. The room was almost empty with an ok DJ and o VJ's. Eventually Dave and I got in touch with Owen – our local hero – who told us to meet  him in Melkweg, a club across the street were Speedy J and Adam Beyer were headlining in the main room and Montreal DJ Deadbeat was in the smaller room. Dave and I debated waiting in line but decided to stick it out after chatting with some guys behind us in line who happened to be Flash developers. A smart decision it turns out.

The place was insane and the vibe was something like we use to have back in Toronto. Everyone one was casual, there were no signs of bottle service tables and everyone was moving their bodies to every whim of Speedy J as you drove the crowd to heights of crazed dancing. From the balcony we spotted Owen up front beside the DJ booth and with some careful shimmy work and the occasional light shove we made our way there.  I haven't danced that hard in ages, but then I haven't heard such awesome DJ's  or been surrounded by such cool people in a long time either. At one point in the night I found my beard was being stroked by a guy dancing nearby who quickly invited two girls with him to do the same. They told me they loved me beard. I thought to myself E can make you love the strangest things. Dave had enough around 3:30, Owen stuck around until about 4am and I rolled out about 4:30am. I hadn't slept in about 30 hours.

Saturday got to a late start. Stopped at the Felix to see if I was needed then headed south. Ran into Shawn coming from the completely wrong direction. He was lost but headed the right way when I found him. Spent the afternoon in Vondelpark taking photos of plants, trees, people and animals. The main path through the park was like a bike highway. It was enjoyable to see so many local people out enjoying the sunny Saturday.

James had booked us a reservation at Sama Sebo, an Indonesian restaurant that he highly recommended. Most of the FITC crew ate together that night and were joined by two fellows James knew from Brazil who ran an academic conference about mobile devices there. After this we splintered again. Some went off to coffee houses while some grabbed some beers. We splintered again, leaving Shawn, Bram and I to talk about more of Shawn's interesting past. Eventually we joined Ralph, Grant, Mike Chambers and Scott at a finer beer establishment that Mike had picked from his beer guide. This group closed down another bar after this and then had Ralph lead us to greasy food. Frites with mayo and brown sauce was the weapon of choice. What they count as peanut sauce there is a think, almost gravy like version of what I'm more familiar with. Time for bed.

On Sunday our workshops began and I had some setup to do so I spent most of the afternoon at the Felix. Mid-afternoon Shawn and I did an interview with folks from the Adobe Edge newsletter. They wanted to discuss the current economies impact on our event and the interactive industry. Shawn did a good job handling the overview questions after Dave, he and I talked it through with them. Then I did my own interview with them to give a more first hand account of what I'm seeing right now. 

In usual Dutch fashion nothing was quite ready for me to work with yet so after wasting several hours I packed it in and went to eat and chill before the opening party. I was still pretty exhausted from the first night so I only spent an hour at the party at Max-a-lot Gallery and then went home to crash  knowing I'd definitely have to get up early to do the work I couldn't do that night at the Felix.

Monday morning is the big kick-off of FITC Amsterdam, starting with a keynote from Mike, Lee and Serge from Adobe. Checked in on them to make sure they were cool then went about setting up my gear. As per usual, nothing was quite right and I only got one room completely up and running. Spent the rest of the day trying to get everything as it needed to be. By the time the day was over everything was ready for day 2. Note to self: it seems the graphic drivers in most netbooks won't recognize when a VGA cable is hooked up while the machine is running. You have to do a cold reboot with the cable attached to get a projector or second monitor fired up.

The party that night was a big one. We'd rented the Supper Club boat which was suppose to take us for two trips out in the channel but due to a failure in coatcheck we didn't make it out the second time. Didn't matter, the drinks were flowing from the bar thanks to Influxis and Sam Aglesias had the dancefloor pounding.  Sadly the Red Bull and faux Red Bull ran out early, but I still managed to drink about 6 or 7 screwdrivers all with double shots. It was a good night. Again though, I packed it in after that while others went off looking or another party.

Tuesday went super smooth. Saw Ralph, Keith and Balasz? Present. Also took some time to shoot a couple timelapse sequences around the venue. Next year I think I'm going to do a whole short movie about the event like this.  Grabbed my gear at the end of the day and then headed over to the Odeon Theatre to get ready for the closing party. Jackie was doing a VJ set that night and I was running a live photo show. Basically I shoot photos of people at the party that were sent from my camera via wifi – using an Eye Fi card – to a laptop which then uploaded them to Flickr. On screen I was running Anavision, an app from Mario Klingemann that grabs the most recent Flickr photos from our account and blends them into a continuous video of sorts. Sorry I ran it on such a shitty computer Mario! Everyone still thought it was awesome. Again, headed back to the hotel and crashed after this. Another smart decision as the group wandered around all night, got lost and found no where to go.

Wednesday was sleep in day. Walked around for a few hours in the afternoon and then went to the hotel lobby where I'd agreed to meet Shawn before headed out for dinner. I thought we were simply going to do a cheap dinner somewhere and talk about the RMI. Boy was I wrong. Shawn had made reservations at the Supper Club and managed to invite 14 people to join. We still talked about RMI for a bit beforehand over at the house R had rented for the week.

Supper Club. Interesting place. It's part dinner, part performance, part other. The main room is almost entirely white and is lined on either side by what is essentially a giant bed. The hostess instructs you to remove your shoes before climbing in. Along the bed are small tables to put drinks on. There is also a balcony with matching giant beds. The balcony is empty the night we are there but I'm told that when it is used, servers get the food upstairs via an acrobat who hangs from the railings. It's a 5 course prix-fix menu delivered over several hours. The general idea here is to chill our and relax. A live jazz band entertained us for awhile and I was one of the last few to get an awesome massage from a masseuse who worked her way around the room. When I was done everyone said I looked different. I felt different. Deeply relaxed and content. Something about a massage between courses while listening to a great band in the background. I saw the changed look though after Jackie and Lisa had their massages. The food itself was average high-end fair. Nothing outstanding or innovative and generally luke warm by the time to arrived bedside. However the experience of this place more than made up for it. Really a perfect ending to a crazy week.

Thursday morning I got up, packed and made my way to the train station. I took the train down to Rotterdam where I was going to spend the next two nights. I was really wiped out when I checked into the Golden Tulip so I surfed the web for a bit and caught up on RSS and emails. Grabbed the camera and headed out after dark. Took some interesting night shots, including the requisite shots of the Erasmusberg at night. Had rice table for one at an Indonesian resto to fill my belly. Walked some more, took more photos and looked for a place to buy snacks and drinks with no luck. Back at the hotel I decided to make use of the luxurious bathtub I had and took a two hour hot bath while I watched Shortbus on my netbook.

Friday I slept in a bit again. Apparently I still needed some recovery from the previous week. It was raining pretty hard and foggy all day, putting a damper on my plans to photograph the harbour or anything else.  Went to the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen instead and had a great time. Saw samples from nearly every major art movement including a few Dali's that I hadn't seen in person before. Was a bit sad they didn't have more of Bosch's stuff out as they claim to have many of his works. I was also pretty impressed with the ceramics collection they had. Downstairs was small but packed with the stuff. Overall this was a good art fix.

The rain had slowed a bit so I spent a few ours walking around again, along the harbour, through some parks. Found a store for snacks. Back at the hotel decided to get room service – burger and bitterballs – and had an early night.

Of course Saturday was a much nicer day but I still decided to head back to Amsterdam as soon as I checked out. Was a bit confused by the train at first because it wasn't headed in the direction that I had originally come from. Eventually I realized that the trains are setup to run a loop from Amsterdam to Rotterdam, stopping in other cities like Den Haag along the way. It's an hour between the two cities whichever way you go.

Checked into the Golden Tulip in Amsterdam. Not quite as nice as the one in Rotterdam but still the nicest place I've stayed in Amsterdam so far. Grabbed a map and made a plan of attack for the afternoon. Decided to walk west, stopping at the cat boat, a small skate pool, a wind mill and a cemetery along the way.  I wanted to go check out the Gasworks, a place we are considering for next year's FITC. It's an old industrial area turned into an arts and cultural hotspot, much like the Distillery District in Toronto. Seems pretty decent, we'll have to see if this works out.

After dark I went to the Torture Museum. It's small but also cheap. If you are into tis sort of thing it's worth going in. I was familiar with most of the devices, but one wooden device in the shape of a pyramid and used on those accused of homosexuality, was completely new to me. Went to Wok to Walk for a quick dinner. I still think this is best fast food anywhere in central Amsterdam. Went for a walk around the Red Light District and was thinking about catching the show at Casa Rosso for kicks, but the lineup was pretty long and full of drunk British boys so I decided to pass. The RLD was pretty crazy that night, I think it was the busiest I'd seen it. 

Headed back to the hotel for my last night. Did a bit of work and caught up on emails as Shawn was bombarding me as he caught up on his end. Talked to Dora and then crashed for the night.

Woke up around 9:30am Sunday morning, showered, dressed and headed to the train station. Took the train to Schipol and proceeded to wait for my flight. Schipol airport is a bit strange. Or at least the international flights are. Security is done at the individual gate with a queue outside the gate for security and then the largest waiting area is beyond security. But they don't do the security checks until less than an hour before boarding. I thought the delay to get through this was an anomaly the first time I flew home from AMS, but it happened again this time. What do they expect when trying to cram so many people through a small, slow checkpoint at once.

James found me and shared some Portuguese tarts direct from Lisbon with me. We chatted about his iPhone workshop and then got in line to board. Finally on the plane, we are late starting up because of the security lineup. We pull away from the gate, ready to go when the pilot tells us there will be a delay because the aft cargo air conditioning is malfunctioning and there are dogs down there that need the air-con. We head back to the gate, shut down and wait for maintenance to check it out. After a substantial delay they get things going and we are on our way. Despite the delay, I'll take this over not going at all or having to change aircraft.

Right now I'm in the plane somewhere over northern Quebec, an hour away from Toronto and a half hour late arriving. Hopefully Dora checked the flight status. Can't wait to see her!

See you again next year Amsterdam! You now feel like a home away from home for me.

Complete set of Amsterdam and Rotterdam photos.

When North American cyclists go looking for a place to call mecca, they often turn to Amsterdam. It's easy to see why. On the train from Schiphol airport to Amsterdam Centraal you already see the signs of cycling. Bike lanes on every road, people of all ages and genders on their old bikes zooming around everywhere. One of the first sights you see when exiting the train station is the multi-level bike parking facilities with what must be thousands of bikes on it. Those bikes spill out of the official parking and onto every railing and post in sight.

Walking away from the station you quickly find yourself crossing roadways consisting of car, tram and bike lanes, each usually separated by it's own median. Intersections have bike signals in addition to the usual lights. Deeper into the downtown core the cars come alone the roadways at pretty spares intervals and instead you spend most of your time dodging bikes instead.

As a Toronto bike commuter I felt like I'd discovered heaven my first time in Amsterdam. While I'd like to think this would all be possible in Toronto some day, I really doubt it will ever happen. Amsterdam is what it is because of it's old foundations, the canals and narrow streets have made it an easily sell to promote cycling as the best way to get around. The mild winter weather definitely helps too.

If you really want to look somewhere for a cycling infrastructure that Toronto could truly model itself after, I'd say go to Rotterdam. It's an hour train ride southwest of Amsterdam and is really a completely different city. Having been almost completely destroyed during the war, Rotterdam is a now a very modern city, full of new, stunning architecture and intelligent urban planning.  It's common here to find six lane roads, much like those in suburban Toronto, but down the center often runs a light rail line and on the outsides are wide bike lanes separated from the rest of the road.

Rotterdam is obviously a city that clearly thought about the bike as an important part of urban transport and as incorporated the necessary infrastructure where ever possible. I could see Toronto being this way. In many ways Rotterdam feels like Toronto with it's modern shopping malls, diverse population and mix of industrial past and modern financial centres.

 

 

This photo shows the clear separation of a major bike line next to a major roadway. Even cooler is the way the median has been re-purposed here. A huge skate park sits on it, keeping the skaters away from anyone who might be annoyed by them. And underneath this is a nightclub, where the ground muffles the beats late into the night. Such great usage of this space.

I never really saw it before, but the more I consider how Toronto could be transformed into a hub of cycling activity the more I realize just how much our weather will always make this nearly impossible. At least until global warming heats things up enough that we no longer get snow. Trying to imagine a snow plow clear the streets of Rotterdam is scary. You'd need different machines to clear each type of lane, all working together to move the snow all the way to the sidewalk. It would be painful at best. Or even, as much as I love the old (and new) cobblestone sidewalks and roadways, can you imagine trying to clear these with a sand shovel?

Maybe turning the Gardiner Expressway into an enclosed bike and pedestrian route isn't such a crazy idea afterall.