New Year’s eve photo reportage for 2013: Dam Square

New Year’s Eve at exactly 2013 – Dam Square, Amsterdam, Netherlands.New Year Shot 2013 number ONE!

On New Year’s eve I went to Dam Square, the central square of Amsterdam to see the fireworks and gauge the atmosphere, to do some impressionistic journalism, within a one hour unprepared framework. My tool was a HTC-Vision camera phone in the rain!

It held really well. At one moment the indispensable keyboard started adding gibberish in a cartoon-like manner which looked like cursing cartoon bubbles, to what I wrote, spewing characters in-between my captions. The next morning, it had dried out and came back to normal usage. This happens to me more often with electronics, always asking the most of them, so I knew, more or less, that it would recover. A very strong phone it is! I had to dry it constantly with my sleeves during the whole photo-shoot, as it was raining.

It was a pleasant evening despite the soaked wet rain pouring, in drizzle at times strong and sometimes less.

Arrived at destination, the place was packed (not properly visible on the photos). The crowd present was a mixture of “new Dutch”, tourists and a couple of ethnic Dutch. The “new Dutch” comprising mainly of Moroccan youth and a couple of other ethnicities.

When I was younger it was mainly Dutch and tourists. Traditionally the Moroccan youth celebrate not so far from my place, on the West side of Amsterdam, for example at a public square called Mercatorplein. This year seems some have shifted more to the center and claim their part of Amsterdam more centrally as “new Dutch”.

Just as Queen’s Day, New Year’s eve in Amsterdam is nowhere near what it used to be due to government decreasing the events and implementing stricter laws and surveillance,  by discouraging the amount of fireworks used and by doing so decreasing the firework tradition on New Year’s eve in Amsterdam.

Laws do not allow anymore an uncontrolled New Year’s eve celebration and Queen’s Day. In a way really a pity. It contrasted well with the strict mentality of Protestants of before and both days were very anarchistic in happening.

Yes, they were more casualties before, on both days. Queen’s Day used to have quite a lot of food poisoning and sometimes riots. New Year’s eve was an unlimited fireworks' happening with many casualties. The fireworks could be heard long before New Year. About a complete month before the change of the year to be precise. Usually by New Year, one had no more firework left.

The square is not necessarily the place to be on New Year, although I think it is, when it is not reserved for some live televised event.

Other places are Leidseplein, Rembrandtplein and the many drugged out night clubs, all in the city center. So my choice for public places is much more fun and interesting. Mainly drunken people having a “Happy New Year Celebration”. Sometimes a fight. There was one yesterday just when I tried to get to The Red Light District. The police was there even before anything could really happen, and dispersed a couple of people fighting. No arrests were made. At least not when I was there.

Here’s my photo reportage (chronological) for New Year’s eve 2013:

Ceinturbaan/Ferdinand Bolstraat crossing. 1 hour and 1 minute to THE NEW YEAR 2013! "On your left, construction for the dreaded North/South metro line (Noord/Zuidlijn) which should join Amsterdam with the North side of Amsterdam. It’s the biggest fiscal and architectural disaster for the whole of the Netherlands ever. Not only has it exceeded its budget by billions (this is not a joke!), it also destroys buildings all under it, cracking them, and is already years behind in construction. It is totally useless. The connections are quite fine between the historically separated Amsterdam and the North side of Amsterdam, separated by a big waterway called Het IJ, which is the beginning of the North Sea Canal, directing all ships out of the Amsterdam harbor area. The tunnel has already been drilled out a long time ago. However, the problem getting the metro line finished is almost impossible, due to construction problems. The truth is nobody even knows if it will ever be finished"

Ferdinand Bolstraat/Gerard Doustraat/Albert Cuyp Market crossing.1 hour to THE NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: "Soaked wet New Year, Amsterdam, the Netherlands, on the way to the city center on bike.1 hour from New Year."

Heineken Brouwerij, Amsterdam. 50 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! ”Marie Heinekenplein, named after the family name of the world famous beer brewery (a museum now) around NEW YEAR 2013. A lonely Christmas Tree. It’s very busy. I can’t get a clear shot!”

Heineken Brouwerij, Amsterdam. 50 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! ”Marie Heinekenplein, named after the family name of the world famous beer brewery (a museum now) around NEW YEAR 2013. A lonely Christmas Tree. It’s very busy. I can’t get a clear shot!”

Heineken Brouwerij, Amsterdam. 50 minutes to The NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “Heineken Brouwerij. 50 minutes to NEW YEAR.”

Muntplein, Amsterdam. 45 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb ”Muntplein. 45 minutes to NEW YEAR.”

Rokin, Amsterdam. 40 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013!

Rokin, Amsterdam. 40 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “Rokin. 4O minutes to NEW YEAR.”

Dam Square. 32 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “Arrived place of destination: DAM SQUARE AMSTERDAM. Parked bike. 32 minutes to NEW YEAR 2013.”

Dam Square. 26 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! “”Officially this monument is called: “Nationaal Monument op de Dam.” It is where WW2 victims and the ones of subsequent wars are remembered every year on the 5th of May if I remember rightly. "Monument of the Fallen dead" is my fast translation for this strange and somewhat occult monument.””

Dam Square. 26 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “Monument of the Fallen Dead. DAM SQUARE. One worry: that phone holds the soaked rain. 26 minutes to NEW YEAR.”

Dam Square. Royal Palace. 27 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013!

Dam Square. Royal Palace. 26 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “Christmas Leftover: Queen's Palace. DAM SQUARE. 23 minutes to NEW YEAR.”

Dam Square. Direction China Town and end tourist Red Light District. 20 minutes to THE GREGORIAN NEW YEAR 2013!

Dam Square. Direction China Town and end tourist Red Light District. 20 minutes to THE GREGORIAN NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “China Town/Tourist RED LIGHT DISTRICT. 20 minutes to NEW YEAR. Explosive are starting! Lookin' for a good spot for NEW YEAR shot 2013!”

Dam Square. Riot police guard the place at all entrances and stand firm in the middle of Dam Square. 11 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2000 and 13! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “Police guard DAM SQUARE as more and more serious explosives are being heard. some very loud explosions, shiver through me.11 minutes to NEW YEAR 2013.”

Dam Square. Security or Royals in the cupola of the Royal Palace? Not clear. 8 minutes to THE NEW YEAR 2013! Looks more like security.

Dam Square. Direction Central Station. 6 minutes and counting! Radio Silence. No more writing. I must find the perfect spot for my NEW YEAR SHOT 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “Crowd. 6 minutes to NEW YEAR. Radio Silence. No more writing.”

Here they are: New Year Shot 1 and 2!

New Year’s Eve at exactly 2013 – Dam Square, Amsterdam, Netherlands. New Year Shot 2013 number ONE!

Zoomed in and got the shot hereunder! Shot 2. Also interesting with the riot police van next to the fireworks. It must have been 2 seconds past 2013! Couldn’t see if my first shot was good due to the chaos and smoke. Uploaded this one with prepared text. Copy and paste under these conditions is not so easy. Soaked wet and smoke, explosions and noise all around!

It was uploaded and visible a few seconds after NEW YEAR on Fb. Fb screwed up afterwards and got confused due to the new dates with 2013 in them, registered it as 2012 later. Strange. Some 2013 Y2K bug in Fb’s programming. Very unusual. These picture are registered in Fb as if they were taken on the 1st of  January 2012. New Year Shot 2013 number TWO!

LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “"NEW YEAR SHOT 2013"

DAM SQUARE, AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS. SMOKE AND MORE SMOKE, EXPLOSIVES AND SOME DECORATIONAL FIREWORKS UNDER SOAKED WET CONDITIONS. SHOT TAKEN AT EXACTLY NEW YEAR.

(Prepared) Wishing you a 'HAPPY GREGORIAN NEW YEAR!!!!!' from Amsterdam, the Netherlands at 00:hours, 00:minutes, 00:seconds on 01.01.2013 Greenwich Mean Time +1 as I hit the «SHARE» button of my Facebook mobile application. 2013 should be a reasonably positive year for many according to my humble scholarship.

2012 was the Year in which Whitney Houston (48), Etta James (74) and Norman Schwarzkopf (78) died. My heart is grieved. The death of Whitney Houston was particularly tragic. Bless her soul. She was a Goddess upon Planet Earth and cannot be replaced.

Other celebrities who died this year: Donna Summer (63), Rodney King (47), Davy Jones (66), Gore Vidal (86), Gerrit Komrij (68), Neil Armstrong (82), Hendrik Jan Marsman ((J. Bernlef (75)), Ravi Shankar (92) and Dave Brubeck (91).

In about a month from now the ‘Chinese New Year’ will bring us to the ‘Year of the Snake’. Famous snakes are: Muhammad Ali, Bob Dylan, Art Garfunkel, Kim Basinger, Henry Fonda, Indira Gandhi, John F. Kennedy, Frank Sinatra, Grace Kelly, Feodor Dostoyevsky, Tracy Chapman, Jacques Brel, Pablo Picasso and Nick Nolte.”

Dam Square. 12 minutes after THE NEW YEAR 2013!

Dam Square. 13 minutes after THE NEW YEAR 2013!

Dam Square. 15 minutes after THE NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “Quite a crowd present. Broken glass sound rinkeling and endless fireworks still heard 15 minutes after NEW YEAR.”

Dam Square. 20 minutes after THE NEW YEAR 2013!

Dam Square. 20 minutes after THE NEW YEAR 2013! LIVE caption delivered to Fb: “20 minutes after NEW YEAR.”

Spui, Amsterdam. 50 minutes after THE NEW YEAR 2013!

Spui, Amsterdam. 50 minutes after THE NEW YEAR 2013!

Direction Leidseplein, Amsterdam. Camera phone batteries finished! ONE hour after THE NEW YEAR 2013! 

ONE hour after THE NEW YEAR 2013! One more shot! Idyllic Amsterdam as I remember it in the 80’s.

_-_-_-_-End of Facebook of the day-_-_-_-_

That’s it for today folks. God Bless. Thank you for this Blessed day!