Creative design: Narrow down or diversify?

The Digital Revolution. We are in the middle of it. In this day and age of rapid developments, should one specialise in one thing (popular or niche), or stay ahead of the curve and learn a bit of everything as to stay up-to-date with skills…
David Enker

Oma Z

It is somewhere in the mid-90s as I visit my grandmother in The Hague. I am in my mid-twenties. Normally the whole family would be there, usually on her birthday. But this is not her birthday, it is just me and her. Her reputation of a divider…

The Angel’s Advocate

It’s always the devil that gets all the credit. In fiction, he’s the one with the booze, the drugs, the women. He is disguised as a handsome man, someone who seems sure of himself and knows all the ways of the world. He can get away with…
David Enker

Toen wij uit Engeland vertrokken

In mei 2011 kwam de Nederlandse journalist en schrijver Joris Luyendijk in Engeland wonen. Afgelopen zomer is hij teruggekeerd naar Nederland en schreef over zijn tijd in Groot-Brittannië een afscheidsbrief in Vrij Nederland. Hij blikt terug…
David Enker

The elimination of pain

what about suffering?

Great dance scenes in films

Some memorable unexpected dance moments in film. 5. Forced dance in Beetlejuice (1988) As if dancing isn't already like being possessed. 4. Napoleon Dynamite charity dance (2004) A very funny film with a hilarious way of helping…

Green Blood

Aliens and space ships, love and humour, tragedy and the after world.... Great song, on loop all week >>   Green Blood by Sonny and the Sunsets   "Well, something happened..." "What's that, Sonny?" "I fell…

Love, Prince

It was already over with my girlfriend when I went to see Prince live in concert in 1992 in Rotterdam. Not that she knew it already, I hadn't told her yet. This coincided with the looming termination of my physics study at uni and leaving the…

The Spirit of Bach

This is music. Glenn Gould Nina Simone 
David Enker

The Path

An exercise in expression   Introduction What are the modes one can resort to when faced with the challenges of life? Here is a possible scenario with 10 modes: 1. Artistic / Literary mode “Art is whether or not there…

A healthy mind in a healthy body (& vice versa)

If there ever is a key to a perfect health and happiness I'd love to use it, but in the meantime this is what I've come up with: 1. Sleep It's not about the quantity but rather about the quality. Fresh air in the bedroom, good pillow and…

The Chaos

A poem demonstrating the irregularity of English spelling and pronunciation. Written by Dutch writer, traveller, and teacher Gerard Nolst Trenité (1870–1946), it includes about 800 examples of irregular spelling.   Gerard Nolst Trenité…

The Age of Anxiety

There is no word in the Dutch language for ‘anxiety’. There are words that come close, like ‘worried’, ‘concerned’, ‘fearful’ or ‘scared’, but none of them come close to the dreadful experience of actual, real anxiety. Does…

Separated Identical Twins – Reunited

What if you would meet your identical twin - as an adult? What would that say about yourself if you would find someone just like you? Will your identity just be relative and not that special or would the excitement be just too big to have a…

Helado Negro

The son of Ecuadorean immigrants, Roberto Carlos Lange, better known by his stage name Helado Negro was born in South Florida in 1980. His childhood was suffused with tropical heat, humidity, hurricanes, all refracted with the rich sounds…

David Bowie, Hero

Just as his latest and enigmatic brilliant video 'Lazarus' came out on his 69th birthday it turned out to be quite something else. Like as with many people David Bowie meant a lot to me. These are my personal highlights: A New Career…

Doppelgängers

They say there is always someone that looks just like you. #lookalikes                       &n…

Chet Baker

There is something about the early 50s.   My Funny Valentine

Slavic Soul

One time on a visit to my father he got out this old record player from the attic and put on a 78 rpm (I believe he got from his father); a Sovjet-labelled record from the Fyodorov Sisters and it was as like a call from another world. There…
Stromae

Stromae

Stromae makes me very happy. This is why:   Stromae on YouTube

Seapony

This Seattle-based indie band is no more. Fortunately their dreamy music lives on. Here are some of my favorites:          

Pushing Doors

  7/7 - 10 years on and the creation of a story   Haarlem, 7 July 2015 It is 10 years ago since that fatal Thursday morning of the 7th of July of 2005 in London when one of four Islamic suicide bombers blew himself up in the Piccadilly…

Bullies in the Park

Not too long ago – in the light of eternity – when I was a kid, about 9 years old, I was walking on clouds. I wanted to reach the sky you see, and now and then I got pretty close. Every day I was walking to school through the…

The Rothko Light

Art isn’t about what you see.