Saturday, February 17, 2007

Alaaf!!!

picture by Axel Schoevers, NKB zeekamp vlieland, September 2006

As a born Brabander I must pay a tribute tot this tradition: the catholic part of the Netherlands is celebrating Carnival now. Everybody is dressed up in weird outfits. Friends know what a "party beast" I am.... Not really, but I enjoy my kids dressing up for the carnival-party at school. With a jellyfish costume, you will steal the show at every Carnival-party. The kids were not ready for this suggestion though. Jelle and his girlfriends dressed up as giant crisp-bags, Lieke as a dolphin.


9 comments:

bonnie said...

omg...is that jellyfish real?

What kind is it? Doesn't it sting? YIKES!

Anonymous said...

As the maker of the picture I can surely warn people: "Do NOT try this at home!" Louis had eye-burn for at least an hour. It DID sting, although he thought it was dead. I was just in time to take the picture, because he gave no warning he would be doing this with it. But it is understandable that he wanted to impress Marieke ;-)) With my knowledge of all living creatures I can tell you it is a "stinging kind".

bonnie said...

Sometimes just knowing that it is the "stinging kind" is enough!

And oh, yes, they can still sting when they're dead. We had Portugeuse man o' wars in Hawaii - they had pretty little blue floats that looked like bubbles - the tentacles were a yard (oh wait, I'm talking to someone from the 95% of the planet that's gone metric - make that a metre) long or more, and if you saw one washed up on the beach, you had to make sure that you didn't step on the business end.

The folk remedy of choice when I was a kid was meat tenderizer - but it was better to just keep your eyes open & avoid 'em in the first place -

actually just found interesting article by my favorite Hawaiian marine biologist on another, yuckier folk remedy...

http://www.susanscott.net/OceanWatch1999/mar22-99.html

Anonymous said...

Bonnie, I just cannot resist to comment on the metric thing...
You have "yard sales", we do NOT have "metric sales". But referencing feet makes it a lot easier. 3 feet is a yard, 6 feet is a fathom (or easier to remember is that a fathom is the water depth in which one just cannot keep breathing while standing...) But I believe the whole world should unite on the Nautical Mile (a beautifully derived number)

bonnie said...

One mile, one degree of latitude...yes, so sane!

bonnie said...

oooh, I better have gotten that right!
...O
:D/>
O

Hans Heupink said...

Hi Bonnie!
Must puzzle on your last post!
Better ask Axel?
greetings,
Hans

bonnie said...

welcome back from whitewater fun, Hans! That course looks like a blast.

Thanks for the Bronx beaver news - I'm trying to send all my NY friends over here now!

Anonymous said...

A princely crown.

=TomBrooklyn