Early Morning Walk
Ascension Day brought its traditional weather. Awfully cold with a drop of rain and temperatures just above ten degrees centigrade.
My Love would take care for my transport these days, becaus the parking rules had been changed in Enschede. Now you have to pay more than 2 Euros per hour on sundays and holidays too (they used to be free). An extra trip home - Enschede vice versa costs less!
As a consequence of the relatively harsh weather, I did not see many walkers. No families on the bike, no youngsters with a Ghettoblaster on the carrier or a crate of beer on the handlebars.
When I passed the former Grolsch Brewery and the crossroads Deurningerstraat - Roomweg, I suddenly realised that it was the tenth anniversary of the Enschede fireworks disaster, it was the 13th of May today.
I remember quite well, it was a lovely Saturday and I was in my garden, more or less confined to a chair because I injured my knee in an accident on the bike. I could not do much more than stumbling around with crutches.
The cracks of the small fireworks and the two disastrous explosions could be clearly heard at my place in Hengelo, about 15 kilometers from the disaster area. The damage was 23 dead, over 600 wounded and a complete district flattened. The district of Roombeek still bears the traces of this misery, in spite of all the reconstruction. Today a commemoration was planned, the reason why the evening concert would start half an hour late.
My Love dropped me off at the Van Essengaarde, a street quite close to the Artez Conservatory, so a long walk was not necessary. Yet on this very little trip there were characteristic things to see. A vagabond dragged himself onwards with all his stuff, and a Magnetron lay mortally wounded amidst a few parts on the pavement with an exposed printed circuit board.
Well, depicting street sights was not my purpose today. I entered the conservatory and heard the sound of some steel strings in the distance. It felt a bit like coming home.
The festival was about to start!