Latest news with #Koningsdag
Hindustan Times
01-05-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
New Delhi glows orange for Dutch King's day celebrations
Thursday evening in New Delhi shimmered in shades of orange, as guests gathered to celebrate Koningsdag, King's Day, which marks the birthday of King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands. From socks and bags to marigold garlands, everyone embraced the signature Dutch hue, capturing the cheerful spirit of the occasion. The evening was a blend of festivity and flavour, with a delightful spread of traditional Dutch treats like Poffertjes, Bitterballen, and Hutspot. Laughter, music, and stories of both nations echoed through the air, creating a sense of connection and shared joy. But amidst the cheer, there was also a moment of solemn reflection. The celebrations honoured the memory of those lost in the horrific terrorist attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir. Marisa Gerards, Ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands to India, opened her address with a tribute: 'For the first time in five years, we're celebrating in New Delhi, marking the birthday of the King. We are all shocked and deeply saddened by the horrific terrorist attack in Kashmir, and we offer our heartfelt condolences. Our thoughts are with the loved ones of the victims.' She went on to paint a vivid picture of how King's Day unfolds across the Netherlands: 'Across our cities, towns, and communities, this day serves as a reflection on our heritage, our values, and the unity that binds us as a nation. It's a day full of joy, the only day when you don't need any special permission to sell things. Everyone's clearing out attics and garages, selling second-hand items, baking, cooking, and, of course, my favourite, apple pie on the streets. There's lots of music and games being played. That's how we celebrate in Amsterdam, and, of course, there's lots and lots of orange!' Chief guest of the evening, Tanmaya Lal, Secretary (West), Ministry of External Affairs, said, "India–Netherlands ties are intensifying. If you look at the areas of collaboration, they range from water management to agriculture, health, education, and more. There are also strong sporting links especially in field hockey. We have Dutch coaches training our teams, and Indian players who have competed in the Dutch league. Dutch football enjoys a strong following in India as well. And now, it's wonderful to see you're playing cricket and even Kho Kho!' A special moment came when Saskia Rao-de Haas, a renowned cellist and composer from the Netherlands now based in New Delhi, was conferred the Ridder in de Orde van Oranje-Nassau—a Dutch royal honour awarded for exceptional service to society.
Time of India
23-04-2025
- Sport
- Time of India
Lando Norris gives up partying and alcohol to focus on F1 title fight: 'If I make even the slightest mistake, I have to pay for it immediately'
Image credit: Instagram Lando Norris had a wonderful start to the 2025 Formula 1 season with a win at the Australian Grand Prix, which changed the fate of many amid the rain. He followed it up with podium finishes in all the races, except the latest one in Jeddah—the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. However, the McLaren driver has been increasingly dissatisfied with the results and has now revealed that he has given up alcohol and hasn't had a single drink in months, just like Lewis Hamilton. Lando Norris says no to partying and drinking amid title pursuit Lando Norris' frustration also stems from the fact that he is gradually falling behind his teammate Oscar Piastri in the driver standings. Piastri has won three of the five races this season. Norris recently told Planet F1 about his decision to quit alcohol. Last year, Norris hurt his nose after falling on broken glass while partying with his friends during the Koningsdag (King's Day) celebrations in the Netherlands. He sported a bandaged nose when he returned for the Miami Grand Prix, where he registered his first F1 victory. When asked if he was visiting the Netherlands again for the same celebration this year, he said: 'I would have loved to go again because it was one of the best days of my life. And last time, I won in Miami straight afterwards. I miss all my friends. I had a good week in Amsterdam with Martin [Garrix, DJ], but I'm fighting for the World Championship now." "I can't afford to do that now. I have to go back home and train. The [Jeddah] race was physically demanding and I'd like to have a drink now. But I haven't had a single drink all year and I'm proud of that. I just have to keep working hard and can't go out and party. I'm competing against the best in the world here – Max [Verstappen], Oscar [Piastri], Charles [Leclerc] and George [Russell]. If I make even the slightest mistake, I have to pay for it immediately,' he added. Also Read: Lando Norris: 'Not satisfied': Lando Norris opens up about car struggles despite leading F1 title race In the last race in Jeddah, Norris started from 10th position but climbed to finish fourth at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. His latest interview hints that the driver has decided not to take so much pressure as he gears up for the Miami Grand Prix after more than two weeks of break. Get the latest IPL 2025 updates on Times of India , including match schedules , team squads , points table and IPL live score for CSK , MI , RCB , KKR , SRH , LSG , DC , GT , PBKS , and RR . Don't miss the list of players in the race for IPL Orange Cap and IPL Purple cap .
Daily Mirror
23-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mirror
Lando Norris reveals key lifestyle change to help bid to land F1 title glory
Lando Norris is looking to become the Formula 1 world champion and in a bid to do so has given up alcohol as he cited the small margins in an immensely competitive season Lando Norris admits he's given up alcohol in his bid to become the Formula 1 world champion. The McLaren driver is among the favourites to land the title and admits he "can't afford" to dabble in partying. Norris is now a multiple race winner following his breakthrough in Miami - which is nearly 12 months ago. The F1 grid will head to Florida in less than a fortnight and upon their visit their last year the McLaren driver made unwanted headlines after cutting his nose whilst partying. He suffered a facial injury while partying in the Amsterdam. He cut his nose on broken glass during the Koningsdag (King's Day) celebrations in the Dutch capital during a rare week off and had to don a bandage on his nose - images of which went viral on social media. Back then Norris wasn't in a title fight but now is firmly in the picture and, whilst he admits he'd love to enjoy a drink with his pals, he has had to up his discipline given the nature of his challenge and the calibre of those he's competing against. He told Viaplay: 'I would have loved to go again because it was one of the best days of my life. And last time, I won in Miami straight afterwards. I miss all my friends. I had a good week in Amsterdam with Martin [Garrix, DJ], but I'm fighting for the World Championship now. 'I can't afford to do that now. I have to go back home and train. The [Jeddah] race was physically demanding and I'd like to have a drink now. But I haven't had a single drink all year and I'm proud of that. I just have to keep working hard and can't go out and party. I'm competing against the best in the world here – Max [Verstappen], Oscar, Charles [Leclerc] and George [Russell]. If I make even the slightest mistake, I have to pay for it immediately.' Norris won the season opener in Australia but has been unable to stand on the top step of the podium since with several errors costing him in the weeks since. He finished fourth in Sunday's Saudi Arabian Grand Prix with a crash in qualifying all but ruling him out of a race win before Sunday. He's seen team-mate Oscar Piastri win three races already this season with the Australian cutting a cool figure as he held off Max Verstappen in Jeddah. That has sent the McLaren driver to the top of the standings as he makes the most of the pace of the car underneath him. Norris only finished off the podium for the first time in Saudi Arabia but by his own admission has struggled at times, particularly in qualifying. He called himself an "idiot" after his recent crash and later said: "I should be fighting for pole and especially on a Q1 [sic] lap I shouldn't be taking any silly risks like I seem to have done. I'm going to review it all, like I said." The Brit has also confessed: 'It's when I perform well, when I'm having fun, and I'm relaxed. I'm probably putting too much pressure on myself at the minute."
BBC News
21-02-2025
- Lifestyle
- BBC News
The sweet Dutch sandwich that makes no sense
There's a pervasive belief in the Netherlands that this unconventional meal helps lift the national mood. "I think I'm an addict, basically," says Marije Nicklin, who grew up on the Dutch island of Terschelling. The Dutch expat, who has been based in West Yorkshire, UK, since 2002, is obsessed with hageslag, carefully rationing the packets her parents post to her and the bag-loads she brings back on the ferry. "I've got quite a lot in storage," she says. "I do start to twitch when I see the end is coming." Translated as "hailstorm", hagelslag are crispy, oblong-shaped sugar strands, just a few millimetres long. They are most commonly chocolate-flavoured and coated in a shiny glaze. In a supermarket in any other country, you'd likely see them in the cake toppings section reserved for a special occasion, but in the Netherlands, where more than 14 million kilograms of hagelslag are consumed per year, many people eat them every week, sprinkling them liberally onto buttered bread as a quick breakfast, snack or lunch. The hagelslag sandwich (broodje hagelslag) is surely an anachronism in this age of sugar awareness, but there's a pervasive belief in the Netherlands that this unconventional meal helps lift the national mood. Good hagelslag is crunchy on impact but then melts in the mouth. Each season sees new variations appear in the shops: little bunnies for Easter, for example, or orange hagelslag for Koningsdag, an annual orange-themed street party to celebrate the King's birthday. The small packs seen in many hotel breakfast buffets are ideal for novices, and a few years back, one supermarket even experimented with pick 'n' mix. Whichever variety you choose, the habit is widespread, with an estimated 750,000 hagelslag sandwiches consumed each day. Strictly speaking, hagelslag is a sugar-based vermicelli sprinkle that is chocolate or fruit-flavoured, but the name has become a catch-all for other cheerfully packaged sugary toppings found on the same supermarket shelf, such as curly vlokken (chocolate flakes) and muisjes, sugar-coated aniseed seeds that look like tiny mice and are typically served on beschuit (rusks). In the 17th Century, aniseed was thought to aid lactation and help the womb contract, and pink or blue muisjes on beschuit are still served today to celebrate the arrival of a baby. For Nicklin, whose favourite variety is the puur (dark chocolate), the crunchiness is very important. "It's the bite with hagelslag. I don't think you can get that with any other spread," she says. "It still makes me feel happy." She bats back any suggestion that this sweet sandwich is messy to eat, explaining that her family use high-sided plates to catch any stray strands, which she insists are returned empty. "It's a crime to leave any on the plate," she says. The first hagelslag, in the form of aniseed muisjes, is thought to date to the late 19th Century when Cornelius Rutgerus de Ruijter sold them from his bakery in Baarn in the province of Utrecht. The brand, now known as market leader De Ruijter, expanded their production to factory-made fruit hagelslag in 1928 and chocolate hagelslag and flokken in the 1950s. Even Dutch royalty loved the sugary treat. King Willem III made the brand a purveyor of the court in 1883. And in 1985, under Queen Beatrix, De Ruijter received the Koninklijk (royal) predicate, an honour, a spokesperson from parent company Kraft-Heinz told BBC Travel, which "can only be carried by Dutch companies who have been officially recognised for their important position within their discipline, are at least 100 years old and are considered of national importance". Quite a fanfare for a modest chocolate sprinkle. On an industrial estate in Tilburg – a short distance from the border with Belgium, wheresprinkles are commonly called muizenstrontjes (mouse droppings) − an immense but unremarkable building houses the world's largest hagelslag factory. Photographer Jordy Leenders from Eindhoven is one of the lucky few who has seen inside. Commissioned in 2018 to take photographs of its inner workings, he said he felt, "like I was Charlie, being invited to the chocolate factory for a tour". Having gone through a machine that rid him of dust and disinfected his hands and arms, Leenders, kitted out in ear defenders and factory scrubs, emerged into a space filled by what he describes as a kind of "indoor rollercoaster… crisscrossing the room" made up of "mazes" of vast conveyor belts moving the hagelslag through different stages of preparation to perfect their size, texture and shape. "Though the smell of chocolate is strong in the early stages when you're working with a raw material, it's the noise that really hits you," he says, describing the sound of the hagelslag being emptied from the silos "like pouring 2,000kg of rice into a bucket". He notes that one of the most memorable sights was the extrusion process, which creates "a very long string of hagelslag that they break off and cut" before spraying it with a fine mist of sugar to give it its appealing gloss. Leenders was astounded by the "absurd scale" of the factory and the complex processes required "in order to deliver a decoration to put on your sandwich". "When you have it in your hands, you're thinking that it is pretty simple," he says. For newcomers to the Netherlands, it's the foodstuff itself that can be baffling. Colleen Geske, who moved to Amsterdam from Canada in 2005, has a clear memory of the first time she encountered hagelslag. Her first employer in the Netherlands shared a cafeteria with various tech, finance and law firms. "Every lunch hour, I would see these tables of men in suits that were eating what I could only describe as the lunch of a four-year-old," recalls the author of Stuff Dutch People Eat and co-host of the Stuff Dutch People Like podcast. "They were all with cartons of milk and having their bread with hagelslag. To me, it was such a bizarre sight." "Hagelslag tells us a lot about the Dutch," Geske adds. "When you strip it away, the Dutch are not pretentious at all. They don't care what people think of them often… They're not over-analysing this, thinking: Is this healthy? Is this for children? They're just indulging in a relatively simple pleasure." Hagelslag occupies a special place in a cuisine, which is in general, "quite practical, quite basic", she adds. "Hagelslag is the one kind of sparkly, shiny, interesting, funny, kind of quirky thing about a Dutch meal." More like this:• Is the future of French cheese at stake?• Thunder tea rice: The 2,000-year-old healthy grain bowl• A restorative soup made for cold season But the tradition of eating this illogical little lunch is not all about the taste, she notes. "I think, personally, that it's also this feeling of nostalgia that the Dutch have around eating hagelslag. It's like that one thing that you grew up with as a kid that you're still 'allowed' to do as an adult." Due to its high sugar content, her own children are only allowed it at weekends. They're very specific about how it must be made, telling Geske: "No, you need more butter and you have to put way more hagelslag on, and it has to be evenly distributed to the very edges..." Leenders admits that the Dutch are eating "basically a crushed chocolate bar on their sandwich", which, he says, "doesn't really make sense if you're looking at it from a nutritional perspective". But that has never put him off. "I've been raised in the Netherlands so I'm a frequent hagelslag eater," he says. "I don't think you will encounter any Dutch household without at least one pack of hagelslagin their kitchen cabinets." As far as Leenders is concerned, there's nothing childish about hagelslag. "It's for all ages," he insists. "I know people over 60 who still start their day with a sandwich with hagelslag on top of it." "I struggle to get it in my head why they think it's for children," agrees Nicklin. "My dad always had hagelslag on his bread. And she can't think why anyone would think a hagelslag sandwich makes no sense: "If that's what they believe, then they're obviously not Dutch." -- For more Travel stories from the BBC, follow us on Facebook, X and Instagram.
