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For the duration of the month of january (oh well, maybe a bit longer...), an eyewitness account of one of the more weirder traditions: The 2007 JCJ van Speijk Kite Meeting.
A short bit of history first. Captain JCJ van Speijk is famous for blowing up his own ship, chockfull of explosives, in 1831 when it was obvious the enemy was about to get hold of it. Legend has it he said: "Dan liever de lucht in!" ("I'd rather go up in smoke!" (coll); the literal translation would be something like: "I'd rather go in the skies"), before he lit the candle. Lots more info on how the JCJ van Speijk tradition came to be can be found at Janneman's site. He's the b*st*rd that started it all...
"It all..." is the tradition to meet on New Year's Day, from noon to 2pm, for a bit of kiting and exchanging best wishes, waffles, and on one occasion even some gluhwein...
Every New Year's Day we meet at the appropriately named "Kollenberg", ("Witches Mountain"), close to Sittard, NL. Not much of a mountain really, in fact not much at all. But it's the highest point for some miles around, so it serves us OK for good winds by inland standards.
JCJ van Speijk Meeting 2007
This was this years invitation, sent by email by Janneman:
From left to right: JCJ van Speijk, and all the regulars except me, because I was in a rather larger kite at the moment this pic was taken, flying back from the US from holiday (there is a summer edition as well, the Summer Speijk, where this photo was taken).
The very very first thing all those that attended will remember about this years edition: the rain. Because it didn't just rain cats and dogs, oh no. It rained camels, and rhinoceroses, and at some point even some elephants...
But that didn't stop M and M, Janneman, F, P, H and P, and me and the Missus. Hey, it's a tradition, you know. Of all the regulars, only L and R were missing.
But only the bravest amongst us, Janneman, H, and M, did actually fly a kite. Because there also was a storm blowing, and us being inlanders we only have light wind kites. Please study this picture carefully:
Notice anything strange? Take a look again, and notice the lines, and more specifically the directions. Plural, yes.
Now I don't know about you, but we know that kites fly on the wind, right? And usually the wind comes from one single direction, right? It didn't on this edition of Speijk. As this photo clearly shows, it was coming from at least three directions at the same time. And so did the rain...
At some point, something had to give, and it wasn't the wind. Poor H had to walk a long way to retrieve his kite, when his line snapped. And M, in the background, had to borrow my kevlar gloves in order to get his kite out of the air without losing a couple of fingers...
But then again, it had its charm in its twisted kind of way. We had some fun, especially when F started volounteering a "We're not weird" to unsuspecting dog walkers.
And the waffles, of course. H had baked them that morning, they were still a bit warm. They were lovely (sorry H, I was still desperately trying to keep my camera dry at that moment).
Janneman brought some as well, but as he was mostly busy with a very enthousiastic kite it took him a while to produce his:
Yes, we seem to have SANEAlexes in The Netherlands as well :-D.
And what about OB, you might wonder? Did he fly a kite?
Erm, yes and no:
Some of us meet only very occasionally. In fact it was exactly one year ago since I last saw H and P (too long mate! we definitely have to meet each other more this year), so we spent some time chatting about this and that. But the weather, it was just too awful, so after an hour we decided it was time to go home for a bit of warmth, and after that the visit to the parents. So we said our goodbyes, and "hope to see you in the summer edition"s. But only after I did some group and mood shots:
The 2007 Speijk attendees.
"A River Runs Through It..."
Reporter: OB. Photographers: Janneman and OB.
