Bart Vander Sanden - All Posts
Freelance app and web developer in Leuven, Belgium
2023-03-26T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com
Bart Vander Sanden
hello@bartvandersanden.be
Class
2009-12-07T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2009/12/07/class/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2009/blog/DSCF1581_2.jpg" alt="Class."></p>
Hi everyone
2010-03-03T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2010/03/03/hi-everyone/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/hi-everyone.jpg" alt="Hi everyone!"></p>
<p>I just moved to this new site, so feel free to have a look around.</p>
My desktop...
2010-03-04T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2010/03/04/my-desktop/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/messy.jpg" alt="My desktop..."></p>
Pixel madness
2010-03-11T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2010/03/11/pixel-madness/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/pixelgrid.png" alt="Pixel madness"></p>
<p>I made this after taking a workshop in school where we had to create a grid with Processing. I linked the position of the mouse with the colors to create a nice dynamic color scheme.</p>
Random Relations
2010-03-27T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2010/03/27/random-relations/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/random.jpg" alt="Random Relations"></p>
<p>No inspiration? Try my webpage that puts 2 random words together to get weird associations.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/random" target="_blank" class="button">Visit Random Relations</a></p>
NodeBox
2010-04-21T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2010/04/21/nodebox/
<p>Some small tests with <a href="http://nodebox.net/">NodeBox</a>, an application to generate images by simple coding. It gives designers the opportunity to create complex visuals in mere seconds.</p>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/nodebox/blocks.jpg" alt="Generated field of colored blocks, gradually shifting in color, made with NodeBox."></p>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/nodebox/circles.jpg" alt="Generated field of circles, made with NodeBox."></p>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/nodebox/gradient.jpg" alt="A gradient generated with a small mathematical equation, made with NodeBox."></p>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/nodebox/stars.jpg" alt="A fluffy image, made with NodeBox."></p>
Wake Up! Coffee and Sugar Font
2010-04-25T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2010/04/25/wake-up-coffee-and-sugar-font/
<p>An experimental font created with sugar cubes, dissolved with coffee, one of the most common ways to wake up these days. Filmed and reversed.</p>
<div class="videowrapper">
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/XFJj3LTgWJU" frameborder="0"></iframe>
</div>
<p><a href="https://youtu.be/XFJj3LTgWJU" rel="noopener" target="_blank" class="button">Watch the clip on Youtube</a></p>
Going down the stairs
2010-06-09T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2010/06/09/going-down-the-stairs/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/stairs.png" alt="My desktop..."></p>
Strzebonsky Noizescene & DEViNE Soundsystem at Torres (Leuven) on 17 November 2010
2010-11-21T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2010/11/21/strzebonsky-noizescene-devine-soundsystem/
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/devstrz/IMG_0764.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/devstrz/IMG_0695.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/devstrz/IMG_0620.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/devstrz/IMG_0824.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/devstrz/IMG_0835.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/devstrz/IMG_0890.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/archive/blog/devstrz/IMG_0846.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
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Times Square, New York City in 2011
2011-03-27T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2011/03/27/times-square/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2011/NewYork/20110327-New-York-City-_MG_5609.jpg" alt="Times Square in New York City in the late afternoon in March 2011."></p>
Big Bird
2011-03-31T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2011/03/31/big-bird/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2011/NewYork/20110331--_MG_6367.jpg" alt="A Lufthansa A380 waiting for departure"></p>
<p>Due to the earthquake in Japan Lufthansa sent one of their A380 planes to New York instead of Tokyo. Apparently it's too expensive to keep these planes grounded, so they get rerouted across the world in cases like these.</p>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2011/NewYork/20110401--_MG_6379.jpg" alt="A window view from an A380"></p>
<p>It's a very spacious plane, and surprisingly quiet during the flight.</p>
Byebye old phone
2011-12-30T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2011/12/30/byebye-old-phone/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201112/feab7e2eccda9503a0202f2f57b31f58.jpg" alt="A Nokia E71 smartphone."></p>
Back to work
2012-01-02T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/02/back-to-work/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/60580d61f4151d53e7531f668eeb61b9.jpg" alt="Back to work"></p>
Brussels Airport
2012-01-06T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/06/brussels-airport/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/e20ac0c3f848694ce01350d0be943f97.jpg" alt=""></p>
Work on monday
2012-01-09T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/09/monday-work/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/22e771ddb38a6cb2dceb3720250981dd.jpg" alt="Work on monday"></p>
Friday!
2012-01-13T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/13/friday/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/e877647a28cb37db2bc8523f2d8a00b2.jpg" alt="Friday!"></p>
Baxter Dury at the Botanique
2012-01-14T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/14/baxter-dury/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/b7cda3a93fc97cefc137e5a8c3f07a50.jpg" alt="Now playing: Baxter Dury."></p>
New Build at the Botanique
2012-01-14T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/14/new-build/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/c4de5fbdf1ba1ef651a9cca1750d2e36.jpg" alt="New Build: this is quite good!"></p>
Leuven
2012-01-15T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/15/leuven/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/95f9d387b59a3d6cb7b5503b0051a9f9.jpg" alt="Leuven"></p>
Sunday morning photo editing
2012-01-15T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/15/sunday-morning-photo-editing/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/6af87633d508f23b6494085bfc6111dc.jpg" alt="Sunday morning photo editing."></p>
Too long ago!
2012-01-16T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/16/too-long-ago/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/7d554bb6327d6dfd2ff655eec1f7c570.jpg" alt="Too long ago!"></p>
Gig time!
2012-01-17T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/17/gig-time/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/17254f0a5e132f3fdb0c4bf5052da312.jpg" alt="Gig time!"></p>
The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart
2012-01-17T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/17/the-pains-of-being-pure-at-heart/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/f146c1f0a4d0914494cef362d8702f2a.jpg" alt="The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart"></p>
Good morning
2012-01-25T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/25/good-morning/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/038c53337e96f16458d13482dc54c9d5.jpg" alt="Good morning!"></p>
Rock rally time!
2012-01-27T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/27/rock-rally-time/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/582157c2f8204065dbbb852e1b93bf8d.jpg" alt="Rock rally time!"></p>
One of my pics of friday appeared in the newspaper (Het Belang Van Limburg). Cool!
2012-01-30T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/01/30/newspaper/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201201/c2f2e4d79912cb94516e9a7ed871154b.jpg" alt="One of my pics of friday in the newspaper (hbvl). Cool!"></p>
US Air force
2012-02-03T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/03/us-air-force/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/02ed9ad446162b3231da488d99f03e65.jpg" alt="US Air force"></p>
Rock rally time again
2012-02-04T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/04/rock-rally-time-again/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/34aff52db19231efeebb6086f727fdb1.jpg" alt="Rock rally time again. "></p>
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!
2012-02-11T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/11/clap-your-hands-say-yeah/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/3d9fd6e094e8f5184943ce3a76cff3ca.jpg" alt="Clap your hands say yeah!"></p>
I Break Horses in 15min
2012-02-12T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/12/i-break-horses/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/ef3ef5073e75db9d28f3fae565da2b75.jpg" alt="I break horses in 15min!"></p>
A few weeks ago in Leuven.
2012-02-16T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/16/a-few-weeks-ago-in-leuven/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/a9fba9ad0d3d0ac0a6877fb84dbb858b.jpg" alt="A few weeks ago in Leuven."></p>
Kasabian (had to return the sticker after the show)
2012-02-22T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/22/kasabian-sticker/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/065003ffeb960abf7c6713b4462afe12.jpg" alt=""></p>
Kasabian
2012-02-22T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/22/kasabian/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/02922fc11c66c97f6c1a520fd5d12bd9.jpg" alt="Kasabian"></p>
Surfing
2012-02-27T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/27/surfing/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/3d98a255391f6e2b553d5a73efe31b76.jpg" alt="Surfin'"></p>
Tribes
2012-02-27T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/02/27/tribes/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201202/6d6f146e9f200c67e74db0d45f261241.jpg" alt="Tribes"></p>
At the AB
2012-03-05T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/03/05/at-the-ab/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201203/b40d1fb1b50f1fbda7562f0cc870df23.jpg" alt=""></p>
Justice
2012-03-05T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/03/05/justice/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201203/e8ff58eb9a21de346d814e1014ca13a1.jpg" alt="Justice"></p>
Andrew Bird
2012-03-08T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/03/08/andrew-bird/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201203/dc2c12bd89e351df74a18eb963f0be38.jpg" alt="Andrew Bird!"></p>
The park of the Botanique in Brussels
2012-03-23T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/03/23/park-botanique/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201203/a93fc839dfe5af8449592a8a98f36ba3.jpg" alt="The park of the Botanique in Brussels."></p>
Easter eggs at work
2012-04-02T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/04/02/easter-eggs-at-work/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201204/eebecc1b0119b7310c57ab8f17547bbc.jpg" alt="Easter eggs at work."></p>
Working in an airplane today
2012-04-06T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/04/06/work-in-an-airplane/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201204/52952a31d4ff1da3d2b980311accd44f.jpg" alt="Working in an airplane today."></p>
Double rainbow
2012-04-11T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/04/11/double-rainbow/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201204/4e0ebf03e0396b0632434d7c2bbfbc00.jpg" alt="Double rainbow."></p>
Brussels
2012-04-20T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/04/20/brussels/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201204/39c2fba687692c3cbf711560cff142ec.jpg" alt="Brussels."></p>
Record store day
2012-04-21T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/04/21/record-store-day/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201204/63ff0ac035defd412f717f4efabad495.jpg" alt="Record store day"></p>
<p>Record store day</p>
Sushi
2012-04-22T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/04/22/sushi/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201204/bb6fa166a4f0720137f617570ddaddd0.jpg" alt="Hmmm"></p>
<p>Hmmm</p>
Sunday editing with The Cribs
2012-04-29T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/04/29/ig-400/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201204/033b7720084fbd54826828b7a6229077.jpg" alt="Sunday editing with The Cribs."></p>
Daedalus at the Bozar Night
2012-04-30T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/04/30/daedalus-bozar-night/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201204/eb6754fddbcb991e71897659c451ff9a.jpg" alt="Daedalus at the Bozar Night."></p>
<p>Crazzyyyyyy</p>
Foster The People at the AB
2012-05-06T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2012/05/06/foster-the-people-at-the-ab/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/ig/photos/201205/dc55e3ea98d447fa1fb2abac094ab19d.jpg" alt="Foster The People at the AB"></p>
Eurosonic Noorderslag 2014
2014-01-18T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2014/01/18/eurosonic-noorderslag-2014/
<p>The past three days I was at Eurosonic Noorderslag, a showcase festival in the north of the Netherlands. This is a festival with an impressive number of bands (294 to be exact) performing in tiny venues (like pubs and theaters) across town, playing their hearts out to impress all the important bookers and promotors at the gig.</p>
<p>During these days I’ve met a lot of great people, saw some great (and less than great) bands and had tons of fun.</p>
<p>Here’s a selection of pictures that I took at the festival.
You can also find reports (and more pics) on indiestyle.be (<a href="http://www.indiestyle.be/live/verslag-fotos-eurosonic-noorderslag-dag-1-woensdag-15-januari">day 1</a>, <a href="http://www.indiestyle.be/live/verslag-fotos-eurosonic-noorderslag-dag-2-donderdag-16-januari-2014">day 2</a> and <a href="http://www.indiestyle.be/live/verslag-fotos-eurosonic-noorderslag-dag-3-vrijdag-17-januari-2014">day 3</a>, all in Dutch).</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Nadine%20Shah/Nadine-Shah-eurosonic-noorderslag-groningen-20140118-_MG_5833.jpg" alt="Nadine Shah" class="" data-figcaption="Nadine Shah">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Nadine Shah</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Blaenavon/Blaenavon-eurosonic-noorderslag-groningen-20140117-_MG_5757.jpg" alt="Blaenavon" class="" data-figcaption="Blaenavon">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Blaenavon</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Lower/Lower-eurosonic-noorderslag-groningen-20140117-_MG_5549.jpg" alt="Lower" class="" data-figcaption="Lower">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Lower</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Coely/Coely-eurosonic-noorderslag-groningen-20140116-_MG_5364.jpg" alt="Coely" class="" data-figcaption="Coely">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Coely</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Circa%20Waves/Circa-Waves-eurosonic-noorderslag-groningen-20140116-_MG_5461.jpg" alt="Circa Waves" class="" data-figcaption="Circa Waves">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Circa Waves</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Sam%20Smith/Sam-Smith-eurosonic-noorderslag-groningen-20140115-_MG_5118.jpg" alt="Sam Smith" class="" data-figcaption="Sam Smith">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sam Smith</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Float%20Fall/Float-Fall-eurosonic-noorderslag-groningen-20140115-_MG_5071.jpg" alt="Float Fall" class="" data-figcaption="Float Fall">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Float Fall</figcaption>
</figure>
6th Avenue, New York City
2014-06-13T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2014/06/13/6th-av-new-york/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/NewYork/20140613-New-York-City-_DSF1265.jpg" alt="6th Avenue, Manhattan, New York City"></p>
Arcade Fire at the Sportpaleis in Antwerp
2014-07-01T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2014/07/01/arcade-fire-sportpaleis/
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Arcade%20Fire/Arcade-Fire-sportpaleis-antwerpen-20140610-_B6A1304.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
</figure>
<p>A few weeks ago Arcade Fire performed at the Sportpaleis in Antwerp. Although their latest album was certainly not their best, the concert was great, with a certain energy that just wasn't there at their (disappointing) Reflectors gig at Les Halles De Schaerbeek last year.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Arcade%20Fire/Arcade-Fire-sportpaleis-antwerpen-20140610-_B6A1373.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
</figure>
<p>The lights at this concert were great, but because there was a full film crew in the front stage moving around was nearly impossible. Not a big issue, but this makes it hard to get all the band members on camera (and Arcade Fire has a lot of them).</p>
<figure data-nocaption="true">
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Arcade%20Fire/Arcade-Fire-sportpaleis-antwerpen-20140610-_B6A1254.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
</figure>
<p>You can see more photos on <a href="http://www.indiestyle.be/live/fotos-Arcade-Fire-owen-pallett-sportpaleis-antwerpen-10-juni-2014">Indiestyle</a>.</p>
Tomorrow: Rock Werchter 2014
2014-07-02T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2014/07/02/tomorrow-rock-werchter/
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<p>This Thursday it's time again for Rock Werchter. On the lineup: artists like Damon Albarn, Miles Kane, Franz Ferdinand and Stromae.</p>
<p>The pictures will be available at <a href="http://www.indiestyle.be/">indiestyle.be</a> and <a href="http://www.enola.be/">enola.be</a>. (Photo: Palma Violets, last year at the same festival)</p>
Stromae at Rock Werchter 2014
2014-07-07T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2014/07/07/stromae-rock-werchter/
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<p>Yesterday Stromae finished this year’s edition of Rock Werchter on the main stage, as the finishing touch of an already great edition of the festival.</p>
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<p>The artist had his breakthrough in Belgium a few years ago with ‘Alors On Danse’, but his rise to fame has been unstoppable since the release of his second album ‘Racine Carrée’.</p>
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<p>His headliner spot was received with scepticism by a lot of people, but right from the start of opener ‘Ta Fête’ I knew the festival made the right decision. This was easily one of the best concerts of the festival. Great sound, great visuals, fantastic artist.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Stromae/Stromae-rock-werchter-werchter-20140707-_B6A3310.jpg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="">
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<p>Pictures taken for <a href="https://www.indiestyle.be/" rel="noopener" target="_blank">Indiestyle</a> and <a href="http://www.enola.be/" rel="noopener" target="_blank">Enola</a>.</p>
The Keizersberg in Leuven
2014-07-22T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2014/07/22/keizersberg-leuven/
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/20140722-leuven-_DSF2154.jpg" alt="A man sitting on a bench with his dog running in the grass at the Keizersberg in Leuven at sunset." class="" data-figcaption="Keizersberg, Leuven on a nice summer evening.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Keizersberg, Leuven on a nice summer evening.</figcaption>
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The Dijle, Leuven
2014-07-26T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2014/07/26/leuven/
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/20140726-_DSF2168.jpg" alt="The Dijle in Leuven on a sunny Saturday morning in July." class="" data-figcaption="The Dijle in Leuven on a sunny Saturday morning in July.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Dijle in Leuven on a sunny Saturday morning in July.</figcaption>
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10 years of Josworld: the party
2014-10-13T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2014/10/13/josworld-party/
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/Josworld/josworld-10-jaar-20141010-_B6A4999.jpg" alt="josworld-10-jaar" class="noresize" data-figcaption="josworld-10-jaar">
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<p>Josworld, a Brussels based designers collective, celebrated their tenth birthday last Friday at the Beursschouwburg. Great location, great people, great party. You can find the rest of the pictures on their <a href="https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10154699064220375.1073741832.92645350374&type=1">Facebook page</a>.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/Josworld/josworld-10-jaar-20141011-_B6A5242.jpg" alt="josworld-10-jaar" class="noresize" data-figcaption="josworld-10-jaar">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/Josworld/josworld-10-jaar-20141011-_B6A5191.jpg" alt="josworld-10-jaar" class="noresize" data-figcaption="josworld-10-jaar">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/Josworld/josworld-10-jaar-20141010-_B6A5015.jpg" alt="josworld-10-jaar" class="noresize" data-figcaption="josworld-10-jaar">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/Josworld/josworld-10-jaar-20141010-_B6A5000.jpg" alt="josworld-10-jaar" class="noresize" data-figcaption="josworld-10-jaar">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/Josworld/josworld-10-jaar-20141010-_B6A4946.jpg" alt="josworld-10-jaar" class="noresize" data-figcaption="josworld-10-jaar">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2014/Josworld/josworld-10-jaar-20141010-_B6A4918.jpg" alt="josworld-10-jaar" class="noresize" data-figcaption="josworld-10-jaar">
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Photographing Les Nuits Botanique in 2015
2015-05-27T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2015/05/27/les-nuits-botanique/
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Rone/Rone-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150513-_B6A2821.jpg" alt="Rone performing at Les Nuits Botanique in Brussels in 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Rone">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Rone</figcaption>
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<p>Since 2011 I’ve been part of the official photographer team (with Indiestyle) of Les Nuits Botanique. It’s the perfect kickoff of the festival season with 10 days full of music in some of the most beautiful music venues of Belgium.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/les-nuits/Les-Nuits-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150513-_B6A2380.jpg" alt="The Rotonde at the Botanique as seen from the garden itself." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Les Nuits Botanique">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/les-nuits/Les-Nuits-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150511-_B6A1686.jpg" alt="Concertgoers relaxing in the gardens of the Botanique in Brussels during Les Nuits Botanique." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Les Nuits Botanique">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/les-nuits/Les-Nuits-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150513-_B6A2090.jpg" alt="People waiting at a pond at the Botanique in Brussels during Les Nuits Botanique." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Les Nuits Botanique">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/les-nuits/Les-Nuits-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150509-_B6A1553.jpg" alt="An art installation set up right in front of an existing statue in the gardens of the Botanique during Les Nuits Botanique." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Les Nuits Botanique">
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<p>The festival is situated at the Botanique, an old botanical garden in Brussels that was converted to a concert hall a few decades ago. During Les Nuits the surroundings are also decorated with art, and the old museum at the entrance is transformed to a extremely cozy and intimate venue.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/les-nuits/Les-Nuits-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150509-_B6A1366.jpg" alt="The Grand Salon de Concert at Les Nuits Botanique, as seen from the first floor." class="noresize" data-figcaption="The Grand Salon de Concert">
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<p>Besides a bunch of well-established acts like Hot Chip, Ghostpoet, Villagers and Flying Lotus, the festival is probably best known for its lineup of bands that are on the verge of a big breakthrough.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Hot%20Chip/Hot-Chip-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150517-_B6A4152.jpg" alt="Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip performing at Les Nuits Botanique in 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Hot Chip">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Ghostpoet/Ghostpoet-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150509-_B6A1459.jpg" alt="Obaro Ejimiwe, also known as Ghostpoet, performing at Les Nuits Botanique in 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Ghostpoet">
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<p>In the past musicians like Miles Kane, Chvrches, The War On Drugs and George Ezra all performed at this festival, often just weeks before making their way to the top of the alternative music charts.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Tops/Tops-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150516-_B6A3541.jpg" alt="Jane Penny and David Carriere of TOPS performing at Les Nuits Botanique 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="TOPS">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Superpoze/Superpoze-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150516-_B6A3724.jpg" alt="Gabriel Legeleux, also known as Superpoze, performing at Les Nuits Botanique 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Superpoze">
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<p>It’s too early to know for sure of course, but my gut feeling says that some of the artists of this year's edition, like Rone, Superpoze and TOPS, might join that list very soon after giving some stellar performances.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Fakear/Fakear-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150513-_B6A2254.jpg" alt="Fakear, surrounded by lights, performing at Les Nuits Botanique in 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Fakear">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Walter%20Hus/Walter-Hus-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150513-_B6A2113.jpg" alt="Walter Hus playing on a grand piano at Les Nuits Botanique 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Walter Hus">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Nadine%20Shah/Nadine-Shah-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150514-_B6A3021.jpg" alt="Nadine Shah performing at Les Nuits Botanique 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Nadine Shah">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Pomrad/Pomrad-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150516-_B6A3860.jpg" alt="Adriaan Van De Velde, also known as Pomrad, performing at Les Nuits Botanique 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Pomrad">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/galleries/Briqueville/Briqueville-Les-Nuits-Botanique-Brussels-20150511-_B6A1769.jpg" alt="Briqueville performing at Les Nuits Botanique 2015." class="noresize" data-figcaption="Briqueville">
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<p>Pictures taken for <a href="http://www.indiestyle.be/">Indiestyle</a> and <a href="http://botanique.be/en">Botanique</a>.</p>
Some things to do in Stockholm in a weekend
2015-07-10T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2015/07/10/stockholm/
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150708-Stockholm-_DSF0683.jpg" alt="Two ducks swimming at sunset in the inner city of Stockholm, with a metro train running over a bridge in the background." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<p>A few weeks ago we went to Stockholm for a quick break from work. I’ve visited the city before, but only during winter, with temperatures as low as -20° Celsius and sunsets at 3.30 in the afternoon.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150709-Stockholm-_DSF0849.jpg" alt="Ducks in a park in Stockholm, with the Kaknästornet TV Tower and boats visible in the background." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<p>Summer is a <em>much</em> better time to visit this city. Stockholm feels so much more alive when you’re not walking around in something that feels like a gigantic industrial freezer. It’s also much nicer to go out and discover things while walking around.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150710-Stockholm-_DSF1027.jpg" alt="Metro trains between Söderström and Gamla Stan in Stockholm, moving over a bridge that runs over a bus stop. " class="" data-figcaption="">
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<h2>Things you should do in Stockholm</h2>
<h3>Have a look at the beautiful exhibitions at <a href="http://fotografiska.eu/en/">Fotografiska</a></h3>
<p>The photo museum of Stockholm is a great way to spend half of your day if you’re into photography. We went to check out the exhibitions of Inez & Vinoodh and Nick Brandt, and we were not disappointed at all.</p>
<h3>Hop on a boat to one of the archipelago islands</h3>
<p>The center of Stockholm itself is nice enough on its own, but if you want to discover another side of the area you should visit one of the countless islands in the archipelago. We visited Fjåderholmarna, a small island and apparently a very popular getaway for the locals.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150711-_DSF1302.jpg" alt="Locals relaxing on rocks near the water on Fjåderholmarna, a small getaway island near Stockholm." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150711-Stockholm-_DSF1301.jpg" alt="The sunny sky in Stockholm as seen from a ferry boat on its way to an archipelago island." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<h3>Visit the <a href="http://www.vasamuseet.se/en/">Vasa Museum</a></h3>
<p>The Vasa Museum is one of the must sees in Stockholm if you’re interested in the history of the city. The Vasa was a warship that sunk right after its first journey in 1628, and it was finally lifted out of the water half a century ago. The stunning preservation work on the ship and the recovered documents of that time period give an impressively detailed glimpse in the life of the crew on board the fated ship.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150710-Stockholm-_DSF1107.jpg" alt="A weathered gun port of the Vasa Boat in the Vasa Museum in Stockholm." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<h3>Just walk around</h3>
<p>Stockholm is great to discover by foot. There’s plenty of nature in and around the city, and it would be a shame if you don’t bathe yourself in the beauty of places like Gamla Stan and Djurgården.</p>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150709-_DSF0738.jpg" alt="Kids and pigeons sitting at yellow seating installations at the Sergels torg Plaza in Stockholm." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150710-_DSF0979.jpg" alt="The bridge and gate leading to the Katarinahissen lift in Stockholm, covered in graffiti." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150711-Stockholm-_DSF1234.jpg" alt="A narrow back street at noon in Gamla Stan in Stockholm, with tall orange painted buildings and scaffolding for a renovation in progress." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150710-Stockholm-_DSF1040.jpg" alt="A ferry boat docked at Djurgården, an island in Stockholm, overlooked by dark clouds on an otherwise sunny day." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150710-_DSF0953.jpg" alt="An elderly couple walking up the stairs near Stadsgårdshissen in the Katarina-Sofia area in Stockholm." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<h2>Places to eat</h2>
<p>Scandinavia is super expensive and not really made for the budget traveller. Accommodation, transport, food and drinks are generally priced quite high, but we found a few restaurants that served great food without breaking the bank:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Blå Dörren (Södermalm):</strong> cheap and high quality pub with some great dishes at lunch time. Free salad bar, too!</li>
<li><strong>Barrels (Gamla Stan):</strong> great burgers and great fries.</li>
<li><strong>19 Glas (Gamla Stan, across the street of Barrels):</strong> a small restaurant with friendly staff and a great lunch menu.</li>
</ul>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150708-Stockholm-_DSF0675.jpg" alt="A youth hostel on a long summer night in the old city center of Gamla Stan in Stockholm." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150710-Stockholm-_DSF1153.jpg" alt="The late afternoon sun shining on Rådhusgränd, a street in Gamla Stan in Stockholm." class="" data-figcaption="">
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150710-Stockholm-_DSF1089.jpg" alt="The Kättingflygaren ride at Gröna Lund in Stockholm." class="" data-figcaption="The Kättingflygaren ride at Gröna Lund in Stockholm.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Kättingflygaren ride at Gröna Lund in Stockholm.</figcaption>
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2015/Stockholm/20150710-Stockholm-_DSF1183.jpg" alt="Stockholms stadshus, the City Hall of Stockholm, in the late evening with the sun setting in the west." class="" data-figcaption="Stockholms stadshus, the City Hall of Stockholm, in the late evening with the sun setting in the west.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Stockholms stadshus, the City Hall of Stockholm, in the late evening with the sun setting in the west.</figcaption>
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Trying to get back into blogging
2016-07-23T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2016/07/23/trying-to-get-back-into-blogging/
<p>For years I've been trying to start a blog. Previously, my blogs where always about one subject (concert photography, web design, ...), but this always felt restrictive to me. I'm the kind of person that's always busy with 500 things at a time (to a fault), so I think it's better for myself to just start writing down what comes up in my mind. Let's see if this goes somewhere.</p>
Designing SN Magritte for Brussels Airlines
2016-07-25T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2016/07/25/snmagritte/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2016/sn-magritte-diamond.jpg" alt="A poster on the outside of Brussels Airport to show the design of SN Magritte."></p>
<p>A few months ago I was asked to design a new poster at Brussels Airport for the Magritte plane of Brussels Airlines. It was nice to work with this special plane again, as I also worked on its design a few months prior (with Thomas Dieu and Thomas De Louker).</p>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2016/SNMagritte-20160321_B6A8368.jpg" alt="The full livery of the left side of SN Magritte, an A320 airplane livery of Brussels Airlines to commemorate the Art of René Magritte."></p>
<p>(First photo by <a href="http://offtonorway.tumblr.com/">Thomas De Louker</a>)</p>
Linked: Using A Static Site Generator At Scale: Lessons Learned
2016-08-01T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2016/08/01/linked-static-site-generator/
<p><a href="https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2016/08/using-a-static-site-generator-at-scale-lessons-learned/">Here's an interesting article by Stefan Baumgartner</a> on using Jekyll for larger sites. I've noticed myself that the build time for this (Jekyll based) website takes a lot longer with a large number of posts.</p>
<p>Generating this website with just the blog takes a few milliseconds, but when I add my concert photo galleries it bumps up to 6 seconds.
Still fast enough, but I can imagine this becoming a problem at a larger scale.</p>
<p>His solution (splitting up the different parts of the website) is interesting, simple, and very effective.</p>
Brussels North Station
2018-02-13T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/02/13/brussels/
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<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/IMG_7145.jpg" alt="The side entrance of Brussels North Station as seen from the Noordplein." class="noresize" data-figcaption="The side entrance of Brussels North Station as seen from the Noordplein.">
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Our travel video of Japan
2018-08-01T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> 3 weeks<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
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<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ADzHovermMw" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
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<p>A few months ago we spend around three weeks in Japan to discover their nature, culture and food. With our phones in hand we documented this trip, in which we traveled to Tokyo, Nikko, Kyoto, Nara, Osaka, Kobe, Hiroshima, Miyajima, Okayama and then back to Tokyo.</p>
<p>We filmed this footage with an iPhone 8, a Samsung Galaxy S5 and a Sony RX100 Mark III.
Editing was done in Premiere Pro on a Macbook Pro 13" (2017), but the .hevc files out of the iPhone were nearly impossibly slow to work with, so they were first converted to a bunch of low resolution proxy files to make them usable in Premiere. Apparently Final Cut Pro X is a lot better for these (4k60) files, but oh well.</p>
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<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan/">Our travel video of Japan (this post!)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan/">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan/">Visiting Nikko for half a day</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan/">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan/">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan/">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan/">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan/">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan/">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
Chinatown in New York City
2018-10-30T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/10/30/chinatown-new-york/
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2016/NewYork/IMG_9521.jpg" alt="Bayard Street in Chinatown, Manhattan, New York City (taken in 2016)." class="" data-figcaption="Bayard Street in Chinatown, Manhattan, New York City (taken in 2016).">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Bayard Street in Chinatown, Manhattan, New York City (taken in 2016).</figcaption>
</figure>
Sleeping cat
2018-11-06T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/11/06/sleeping-cat/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/IMG_2910.png" alt="Our cat, sleeping on our couch (drawn with Clip Studio Paint on my iPad Pro)."></p>
<p>A drawing of our cat, sleeping on the sofa.</p>
<p>I'm trying out <a href="http://clipstudio.net/">Clip Studio Paint</a> on my iPad Pro as a drawing app, and it's quite nice. The lines feel a bit more refined that those drawn by <a href="https://procreate.art/">Procreate</a>, but it's not a big difference. I'll see if I'll keep using it before my trial period ends.</p>
Fixing locale errors with Jekyll plugins on Linux
2018-12-29T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/12/29/jekyll-on-ubuntu-locale-errors/
<p>I've been working on setting up my blog in a way that makes it possible for me to edit and update this website from anywhere. Jekyll makes it easy to create a website that's fully portable by not working with a database, which makes it easy to just push and pull your data from Git, but until a few days ago I just compiled this website on my laptop. This works nice enough, but I have to rely on a traditional computer to do the updates.</p>
<p>To counter this, I've decided to move the build process to a <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_private_server">VPS</a>, so I can just build the website with a simple command over SSH, on any device that can remotely log in to this server.</p>
<p>Jekyll is nowadays a pretty well documented framework, and installing it to my Ubuntu 16.04 server was as easy as following the steps from the <a href="https://jekyllrb.com/docs/">Jekyll website</a>.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, running the <strong>jekyll build</strong> or <strong>jekyll serve</strong> command resulted in a mysterious error:</p>
<pre><code>Error: \xE6 Code: US-ASCII
</code></pre>
<p>I noticed that this is the unicode character for the æ ligature, and I started looking for this character in my files to replace it with an HTML entity. I didn't find the character in any of my files (not even in the exported site on my laptop), so this didn't help.</p>
<p>I then tried to create a new jekyll site with the make command, and this website worked perfectly right away. Strange.</p>
<p>I then tried to add the posts from my website to the newly created site, and those also generated on the first try.</p>
<p>I found that the only difference between my site and the new site were that I used a few plugins to help me do some basic tasks (like creating a sitemap, for example). This resulted in discovering that the <em>jekyl-autoprefixer</em> plugin was the cause of the error.</p>
<p>This is an important plugin for me as I'm using <em>flex</em> and (more importantly) <em>grid</em> in my css, technologies that are not yet fully baked in all browsers, so they often need browser specific fallbacks which are automatically generated by autoprefixer.</p>
<p>I then found a <a href="http://hollybecker.net/blog/2017-10-22-til-sass-locale-gen/">blog post by Holly Becker</a>, in which she solved a similar issue. She described that this problem was fixed by setting the Lang and Language variables to <em>en_US.UTF-8</em> so Ruby (the environment that Jekyll uses) doesn't fall back to an incompatible language. This didn't solve it for me, but the error was similar enough to my issue that I felt that I was looking in the right direction at least.</p>
<p>While searching around I stumbled on a <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/36262382/jekyll-says-liquid-exception-invalid-byte-sequence-in-us-ascii-in-documentation/38316690">question on StackOverflow</a> that mentioned the same solution, but with a few variables added. And voila: adding LC_ALL to en_US.UTF-8 solved the issue:</p>
<pre><code>export LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8
</code></pre>
<p>I suspect that it's also perfectly possible to change en_US.UTF-8 to your preferred language, given that it's unicode compliant. The default charset of the locale is (if I understand it correctly) set to ASCII, which does not have the æ character available. This issue is probably not only related to that character, but the unicode charset is large enough to account for most non-ASCII characters.</p>
Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo, Japan
2019-01-02T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Tokyo, Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> 5 days<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tsukiji/9827EB9A-8A86-439F-B577-B829C731AA2C.jpg" alt="A view over the Tsukiji Outer Market as seen from the bridge, looking over the various gift shops and sushi stalls." class="" data-figcaption="Tsukiji Fish Market as seen from the bridge.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Tsukiji Fish Market as seen from the bridge.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Japan is a fascinating country: for centuries it was nearly fully isolated from other countries, creating a culture that's vastly different from the rest of the world.</p>
<p>We wanted to travel to the country for ages, and last year (after careful budgeting and planning) we finally took an 11 hour plane ride to the other side of the world and discovered their beautiful nature, great food and amazing culture for ourselves. Our first stop: <strong>Tokyo</strong>.</p>
<!--excerpt-->
<h2>Tuna at Tsukiji Fish Market</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tsukiji/9A3F4998-8353-4178-9C05-0DF622FC204E.jpg" alt="A tuna set (with regular tuna, fatty tuna and a few tuna maki rolls) at a Sushi Zanmai restaurant in Tsukiji, Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Breakfast sushi at 7 in the morning.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Breakfast sushi at 7 in the morning.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tsukiji/FB5FECB8-2F49-4446-9DCA-34C5598CA85B.jpg" alt="Coloured boxes and containers in the Tsukiji Fish Market region in Tokyo." class="" data-figcaption="These boxes are everywhere in this neighbourhood.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">These boxes are everywhere in this neighbourhood.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tsukiji/IMG_7513.jpg" alt="A parked scooter with a big blue box strapped to its back in the outer market of Tsukiji in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="More boxes in Tsukiji.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">More boxes in Tsukiji.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tsukiji/tsukiji-outside.jpg" alt="Bikes and carts on a rainy day in front of the covered area at Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="At the market itself.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">At the market itself.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tsukiji/tsukiji-workers.jpg" alt="A worker carrying a cart with foam cooling boxes and a blue tarp at Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Workers at Tsukiji Fish Market.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Workers at Tsukiji Fish Market.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tsukiji/namiyoke.jpg" alt="A woman praying and another woman taking pictures at the Namiyoke Inari Shrine, south of Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The Namiyoke Inari Shrine, just a few steps away from the market.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Namiyoke Inari Shrine, just a few steps away from the market.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tsukiji/74D3E1A7-9222-44A3-BA20-916D7C0B37A3.jpg" alt="Fox statues with red yodarekake around their necks at the Namiyoke Inari Shrine near Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Fox statues at the Namiyoke shrine.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Fox statues at the Namiyoke shrine.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>On our first day after arriving in the country we tried to embrace our jetlag by going to <strong>Tsukiji Fish Market</strong> in the early hours of the morning. It was a very populair destination for tourists as it was a major source of fish for restaurants, but as this popularity makes it harder for the workers to do their actual job <a href="https://www.japan-guide.com/blog/schauwecker/181015.html">the market moved to a different location a few months ago</a>. We were lucky enough to be there before the move happened, so we still go to experience the “classic” location.</p>
<p>We went straight from the station to one of the restaurants in the nearby shopping street to have some <strong>sushi for breakfast</strong> (this didn’t feel that strange to us as we were disoriented by the jet lag anyway). The taste of the sushi is so much better than in Belgium. Everything just tasted amazing, especially the fatty tuna, which felt a bit like eating butter.</p>
<p>We didn't eat at the vendors in the fish market themselves, as it was a rainy day and the restaurants were packed by people who were trying to stay dry.</p>
<h2>Looking over the city in Shinjuku</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/IMG_7954.jpg" alt="Looking over Koshu-kaido Ave in the afternoon from the bridge that connects the two main buildings of Shinjuku station in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The roads underneath the bridge connecting the two main buildings of Shinjuku station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The roads underneath the bridge connecting the two main buildings of Shinjuku station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/IMG_7970.jpg" alt="The Park Hyatt Hotel on the left and the Toyko Opera City building on the right, as seen from one of the Metropolitan Office buildings in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The view over Tokyo as seen from one of the Metropolitan Office buildings.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The view over Tokyo as seen from one of the Metropolitan Office buildings.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/FEA4C9A6-2A77-4C16-BEF8-66865A174B36.jpg" alt="The sun setting over Tokyo, as seen from one of the Metropolitan Office buildings." class="" data-figcaption="The skyline of Tokyo at sunset.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The skyline of Tokyo at sunset.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/IMG_7993.jpg" alt="A small street in Shinjuku in Tokyo, Japan in the evening, filled with electronics stores." class="" data-figcaption="Electronics stores in Shinjuku.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Electronics stores in Shinjuku.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p><strong>Shinjuku</strong> hosts the largest train station in the world, but from the outside this isn't really noticable. It's crowded, yes, but not surprisingly so. We didn't visit the inside of the station during rush hour though, so we can't judge on that front.</p>
<p>A few minutes from the station is the <strong>Metropolitan Office Building</strong>, which is free to enter and which has a nice view of the skyline of Tokyo at the top. Apparently it's possible to see Mount Fuji in the distance on very clear days, but we didn't manage to get a glimpse of it during our visit.</p>
<h2>The Senso-ji Temple in Asakusa</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/ECE9A70F-E7F8-4A05-A2DF-A9C0DF4DD31E.jpg" alt="The main building of the Senso-ji temple in Asakusa in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The main building of the temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The main building of the temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/7B402946-D557-4B48-AAED-73E9F83A49B7.jpg" alt="Tourists and students in front of the Senso-ji temple, with the Tokyo Skytree tower visible in the back." class="" data-figcaption="The Tokyo Skytree and a part of the Senso-ji temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Tokyo Skytree and a part of the Senso-ji temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/8860BC04-379D-409B-A5AD-3D04FF2F8AFD.jpg" alt="One of the many gold and vermillion coloured pagodas at the Senso-ji temple." class="" data-figcaption="One of the many pagodas at the Senso-ji temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of the many pagodas at the Senso-ji temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/F417F23C-DE73-4CA5-947C-E143AF8EB2AC.jpg" alt="People praying with incense burning behind them at the main building of the Senso-ji temple in Asakusa in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A view from that same building.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A view from that same building.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_7784.jpg" alt="Visitors burning incense sticks at the Senso-ji temple in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Incense sticks at the Senso-ji temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Incense sticks at the Senso-ji temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_7745.jpg" alt="A traditional inspired painting on one of the shutters of a store in the area of the Senso-ji temple in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A painting on one of the shutters of a nearby store.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A painting on one of the shutters of a nearby store.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_7794.jpg" alt="Neatly packed garbage at a small restaurant in Asakusa in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Neatly packed garbage, ready to be picked up.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Neatly packed garbage, ready to be picked up.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>The <strong>Senso-Ji temple</strong>, probably one of the most recognisable buildings in Tokyo, is a massive tourist hot spot. It's one of those locations that's on nearly every tourist checklist and considered to be one of the essential things to visit in the city.</p>
<p>I personally found it to be a bit too crowded. It's a nice temple, but it's a bit hard to soak it all in if you have to share the experience with thousands of other people on a small piece of land at once.</p>
<p>Regardless, the striking red color of the different buildings makes it a cool thing to photograph.</p>
<p>Right in front of the temple are a few streets full of souvenir shops and food stalls serving small snacks. We were also approached multiple times by groups of young students, asking us where we're from in their best English. After pinpointing Belgium on a map (and helping them practice English in the meantime) we received an origami bird. Cool!</p>
<h2>Blade Runner vibes in Shibuya</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/635A8FFE-AA4F-4FD1-9130-EBBD6309980E.jpg" alt="Shop signs reflecting in a small pool of water while people are walking by in Shibuya in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Reflecting pools in Shibuya.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Reflecting pools in Shibuya.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/ED11709F-9CD4-4C8B-A983-90160B3C56B4.jpg" alt="Street lights in Shibuya in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Shibuya.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Shibuya.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/IMG_0366.jpg" alt="The famous Shibuya Scramble Crossing as seen from Shibuya Station on a rainy day in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The famous Shibuya Scramble Crossing as seen from Shibuya Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The famous Shibuya Scramble Crossing as seen from Shibuya Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/IMG_7612.jpg" alt="A business man walking in a side street of Shibuya with a transparent umbrella in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Shibuya has an amazing vibe when it's raining.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Shibuya has an amazing vibe when it's raining.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/IMG_7630.jpg" alt="Looking up to a building in Shibuya while it's raining." class="" data-figcaption="More rain...">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">More rain...</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/IMG_7671.jpg" alt="A taxi car driving around a shopping street in Shibuya while the area is being lit by the signs of the nearby buildings in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="... and lots of lights.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">... and lots of lights.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/IMG_0268.jpg" alt="Pink Sakura flowers at the south entrance of Shibuya Station at night." class="" data-figcaption="Sakura flowers at the south entrance of Shibuya Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sakura flowers at the south entrance of Shibuya Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p><strong>Shibuya</strong> is a famous neighbourhood in Tokyo known for its <strong>impact on fashion</strong> (as it's a popular shopping district with many flagship stores), the <strong>Hachiko statue</strong> (a statue of a dog who waited for his late owner to return from work for years) and the iconic <strong>Shibuya Scramble Crossing</strong> in which millions of people cross the streets daily.</p>
<p>We went to visit the area when it was pouring outside. As there are neon lit shop signs and huge billboards everwhere, we felt like we were part of a scene from the movie <em>Blade Runner</em>. Most store buildings contain separate stores on each level, so the sprawling amount of shop signs also add to the whole cyberpunk atmosphere.</p>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/IMG_7652.jpg" alt="A plate of conveyor belt sushi at a Genki chain restaurant in Shibuya, Japan, with a touch screen that is used to order food, drinks and snacks." class="" data-figcaption="Conveyor belt sushi at Genki.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Conveyor belt sushi at Genki.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/genki.jpg" alt="Moving plates on a conveyor belt at Genki Sushi in Shibuya. These plates stop right in front of the customer and will wait until they are picked up." class="" data-figcaption="You order from the touch screen, and just a few minutes later your food flies towards you.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">You order from the touch screen, and just a few minutes later your food flies towards you.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>In contrast with Times Square in New York City (which is also a sight to behold with its flashy lights), this neighbourhood is actually also popular with locals and not just with tourists. It's a bustling collection of shops, bars and restaurants, and there's always something to do, to buy, and to eat.</p>
<p>We went to check out the conveyor belt sushi at <strong>Genki Sushi</strong>. At this chain (it has multiple restaurants across Tokyo) you can order your food on touch screens at your table, which gets delivered on rails just moments after touching the order button. Surprisingly, the sushi is actually quite good, and although you don't really interact with the staff and the place is always packed, it was quite a nice experience. The food is also not expensive at all, making it a worthwhile visit.</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shibuya/IMG_0288.jpg" alt="A bartender serving cocktails at Bar Legacy, a speakeasy bar in a basement near Shibuya Station." class="" data-figcaption="Drinking great cocktails at Bar Legacy (note: the bottle of Champagne wasn't ours).">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Drinking great cocktails at Bar Legacy (note: the bottle of Champagne wasn't ours).</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We also found ourselves at <strong>Bar Legacy</strong>, a tiny speakeasy style bar in a basement near the south entrance of Shibuya station. This place is not necessarily the cheapest place to get a drink, but the vibe inside is fantastic, the staff is really friendly and the drinks are great (if you're into cocktails, that is).</p>
<p>Another nice place is <strong>Gyukatsu Motomura</strong>, a small restaurant just around the corner of Bar Legacy that only serves Gyukatsu (deep fried beef covered in breadcrumbs). We found this recommended on Google Maps, where a lot of comments said that the waiting line is long but worth it. We expected it to take half an hour or so, but in the end it took us nearly 1.5 hours to get seated.</p>
<p>Fortunately, the food was really really good, which more than made up for the wait. There's only room for around 8 people at a time, which also explains the line.</p>
<h2>The Meji Shrine in Yoyogi Park</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_7826.jpeg" alt="A large wooden torii gate at the entrance of Yoyogi Park in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The large torii gate at the entrance of the park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The large torii gate at the entrance of the park.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_7830.jpeg" alt="The top left corner of a large wooden torii gate at the entrance of the Yoyogi Park in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A close up of the same torii gate.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A close up of the same torii gate.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/IMG_7843.jpg" alt="A wall of stacked sake barrels at the Yoyogi Park in Tokyo, given as gifts from other countries." class="" data-figcaption="Sake barrels stacked as a wall.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sake barrels stacked as a wall.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/IMG_7878.jpg" alt="An overview of the Meji Shrine in Tokyo, Japan, with a large torii gate in the center." class="" data-figcaption="The entrance to the Meji Shrine itself.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The entrance to the Meji Shrine itself.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/IMG_7900.jpg" alt="The inner court of the Meji Shrine in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Inside the inner court of the Meji Shrine.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Inside the inner court of the Meji Shrine.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/IMG_7905.jpg" alt="Wishes written on pieces of wood (called 'Ema') which are attached to designated walls at the Meji shrine in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Wishes written on pieces of wood (called 'Ema') which are attached to designated walls at the shrine.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Wishes written on pieces of wood (called 'Ema') which are attached to designated walls at the shrine.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/shinjuku/IMG_7912.jpg" alt="The NTT Docomo building in Shinjuku peaking between the trees of the Yoyogi Park in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The NTT Docomo building as seen from Yoyogi Park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The NTT Docomo building as seen from Yoyogi Park.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>Just a bit up north from Shibuya you can find the <strong>Meji Shrine</strong>, a shrine to honour emperor Meji (†1912). To get to the shrine itself, you have to pass through its surrounding park via a short walk. It's a beautiful location, with lots of torii gates, small rivers flowing underneath short bridges and lush trees: a place of tranquility to escape the crowds of Shibuya.</p>
<h2>Flowers and history in Ueno Park</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/9992434D-03EC-4821-BDA4-3D305383FA93.jpg" alt="A taxi waiting in front of the entrance of Ueno Station in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A taxi in front of the entrance of Ueno Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A taxi in front of the entrance of Ueno Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_1556.jpeg" alt="A clean, near empty street underneath a metro line with closed shops in Ueno, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A typical Ueno street.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A typical Ueno street.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/BDA167AB-03FC-41D0-B9ED-DA2098B71EF9.jpg" alt="Sakura flowers blossoming in Ueno Park in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Sakura flowers in Ueno Park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sakura flowers in Ueno Park.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/E4D5C110-0E57-4116-805D-EA0C49486BDE.jpg" alt="O-mikuji fortunes attached to a fence in Ueno Park in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Ueno Park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Ueno Park.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_0388.jpeg" alt="The entrance of the Tokyo National Museum in Ueno Park, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The Tokyo National Museum.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Tokyo National Museum.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_0405.jpeg" alt="The main stairs in the entrance hall of the Tokyo National Museum in Ueno Park in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The entrance hall of the museum.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The entrance hall of the museum.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_0390.jpeg" alt="Religious sculptures in the Tokyo National Museum in Japan." class="" data-figcaption="One of the sculptures in the museum.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of the sculptures in the museum.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>Another large train station is located in <strong>Ueno</strong>. As is common with a lot of other train stations in Tokyo, it's a bit hard to find your way around. This probably has to do with the separation of the different train companies in the country: there are a few railway companies that work independently, so getting from one line to the other might involve having to go through an entirely different section in the station. We got confused quite a number of times in Ueno station, as this was the first main hub we had to use in the beginning of our trip.</p>
<p>Besides the station, there's also a pretty big park in Ueno (aptly called <strong>Ueno Park</strong>, of course). At the time we went there (in the beginning of March) the park wasn't that interesting yet (as most flowers and trees were not in bloom yet, but there was this lone tree with blooming <strong>Sakura flowers</strong> which gathered a rather large crowd around it.</p>
<p>At the end of our trip we also went to visit the <strong>Tokyo National Museum</strong>, which is located at the end of the park. We went there during a rainy day, which of course meant that the museum was packed with people that also wanted to escape from the poor weather.</p>
<h2>Sumo wrestling history and eating delicious food in Ryogoku</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/ryogoku/IMG_8005.jpg" alt="A taxi waiting near Ryogoku Station, lit by the restaurant signs in the street at night in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A taxi near Ryogoku Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A taxi near Ryogoku Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/ryogoku/IMG_7464.jpg" alt="A person entering a tonkatsu restaurant in Ryogoku, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A Tonkatsu restaurant recommended by our hostel (their food was great).">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A Tonkatsu restaurant recommended by our hostel (their food was great).</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/ryogoku/IMG_7547.jpg" alt="Restaurant signs near Ryogoku Station in Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Restaurant signs near the station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Restaurant signs near the station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/ryogoku/IMG_7467.jpg" alt="An Izakaya filled up with business men as seen from outside, in Ryogoku, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="An Izakaya filled up with business men enjoying their evening off.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">An Izakaya filled up with business men enjoying their evening off.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>If you cross the bridge over the Sumida River on the east of Ueno, you'll arrive in <strong>Ryogoku</strong>, a relatively quiet neighbourhood with tons of small restaurants next to the station. It looked like it's also a popular spot to visit after work, as the streets filled up in the evening with people in business attire.</p>
<p>On the other side of the station you can find the <strong>Ryogoku Kokugikan</strong>, the place where most of the sumo tournaments in Japan are held during the year. When we visited this place, only the gift shop and the museum were open. The gift shop was very nice, with friendly staff members, and the museum was small, but quite interesting and the entrance was free. It contains a lot of documents and items from ancient wrestlers, and a life sized painting of <strong>Ikuzuki</strong>, one of the tallest Sumo wrestlers ever to exist (according to Google: about 2.27m). It's definitely worth a visit if you're into the sport.</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/tokyo/IMG_8204.jpg" alt="A sushi set at a small basement restaurant in Ryogoku in Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Great Sushi in Ryogoku. This place was run by an older couple in a small basement, where we tried to explain where Belgium is located (apparently everyone knows football player Eden Hazard over there).">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Great Sushi in Ryogoku. This place was run by an older couple in a small basement, where we tried to explain where Belgium is located (apparently everyone knows football player Eden Hazard over there).</figcaption>
</figure>
<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan/">Our travel video of Japan</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan/">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo (this post!)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan/">Visiting Nikko for half a day</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan/">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan/">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan/">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan/">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan/">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan/">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
Visiting Nikko for half a day, Japan
2019-01-05T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Nikko, Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> 1 day<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8062.jpg" alt="The main road of Nikko, Japan, as seen from the train station." class="" data-figcaption="Arriving in Nikko">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Arriving in Nikko</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A few days into our trip to Japan we went on a quick outing from Tokyo to Nikko, a small village north of the huge busy metropolis. Nikko is mostly known for its numerous shrines, which are part of the UNESCO World Heritages.</p>
<!--excerpt-->
<h2>Getting to Nikko via the Shinkansen Train</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8022.jpg" alt="Breakfast on the Shinkansen train to Utsonomiya" class="" data-figcaption="Breakfast on the Shinkansen train to Utsonomiya">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Breakfast on the Shinkansen train to Utsonomiya</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8046.jpg" alt="An open train door at Kanuma station, between Utsunomiya and Nikko station." class="" data-figcaption="On the local train to Nikko">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">On the local train to Nikko</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>We went to Tokyo Station to validate our JR Pass, and then we took the Shinkansen to <strong>Ustonomiya</strong>, where we had a small stop to transfer to a local train to Nikko itself. The trip from the capital of Japan to our destination took around 2 hours, with some nice rural views to keep us occupied.</p>
<h2>The cool breeze of the mountains in Nikko</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8077.jpg" alt="The Shinkyo Bridge in Nikko, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The Shinkyo Bridge">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Shinkyo Bridge</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/0A96D9F3-16FD-4375-A384-B8CF5FD5CC3D.jpg" alt="A river running underneath the Shinkyo Bridge in Nikko, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The river underneath the Shinkyo Bridge">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The river underneath the Shinkyo Bridge</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8066.jpg" alt="A lamp post with a dragon ornament and some houses in Nikko, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Lamp post in Nikko">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Lamp post in Nikko</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8074.jpg" alt="Buildings in Nikko, Japan, with a small road leading upwards a small hill." class="" data-figcaption="Nikko">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Nikko</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After getting out of Nikko Station we were struck by the cold weather. Nikko is located at a much higher altitude than Tokyo (Tokyo is near sea level, Nikko is about 1.000 meters higher), so this shouldn't be that much of a surprise. Also: the fresh mountain air is in stark contrast with the (admittedly still pretty clean) urban air of Tokyo.</p>
<p>It's possible to take a bus from the station to the shrines, but instead we opted for going there by foot to explore the village a bit and to see what else there was to do. Unfortunately, most shops seemed to be closed. Maybe we came on the wrong day? Or maybe we were there too early in the day?</p>
<p>Right in front of the shrine area we passed by the <strong>Shinkyo Bridge</strong>, where we met a Japanese couple that were practicing English with passersby. We talked a bit about us visiting Japan, them wanting to visit Brussels, and their dream to be a travel guide in their city, located a bit to the west of Tokyo.</p>
<h2>The temples of Nikko</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8117.jpg" alt="A building in vermillion red, part of the Rinnoji Temple complex in Nikko, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="One of the Rinnoji Temple buildings">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of the Rinnoji Temple buildings</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8130.jpg" alt="The Gojunoto (five-story pagoda) of the Toshogu Shrine in Nikko, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The Gojunoto (five-story pagoda) of the Toshogu Shrine">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Gojunoto (five-story pagoda) of the Toshogu Shrine</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8152.jpg" alt="The Taiyuinbyo Shrine in Nikko, Japan, a black woorden building decorated with gold, on top of a hill and surrounded by trees." class="" data-figcaption="The Taiyuinbyo Shrine, decorated with gold">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Taiyuinbyo Shrine, decorated with gold</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8156.jpg" alt="The shrine is surrounded by trees" class="" data-figcaption="The shrine is surrounded by trees">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The shrine is surrounded by trees</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After climbing up the stairs near the bridge we got to the <strong>Rinnoji Temple</strong>, of which the <strong>Sanbutsudo</strong> (the main building) was being renovated at the time. This meant that it was enclosed by scaffolding with a print of it outside. It was still possible to visit the inside of the building, but it was a bit less tranquil than we hoped as workers in and outside of the building were patching up the place with hammers and circular saws.</p>
<p>It was also nearly freezing outside, and as you have to remove your shoes before entering each and every shrine we didn't went inside all of the temples (like the Toshogu shrine).</p>
<p>After visiting the <strong>Taiyuinbyo shrine complex</strong> (and climbing a not insignificant amount of stairs - it was after all still pretty cold outside) we went back to the main street of Nikko to find something to eat.</p>
<h2>A delicious Yuba meal</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8164.jpg" alt="A yuba meal set at Zen in Nikko, Japan, with Wagyu beef wrapped in Yuba (tofu skin), some kind of tofu pudding, a bowl of miso soup and garnishes." class="" data-figcaption="Yuba meal set at Zen, with Wagyu beef wrapped in Yuba (tofu skin), some kind of tofu pudding, a bowl of miso soup and more">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Yuba meal set at Zen, with Wagyu beef wrapped in Yuba (tofu skin), some kind of tofu pudding, a bowl of miso soup and more</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8172.jpg" alt="The entrance sign at Zen, a small modern restaurant in Nikko, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The entrance at Zen">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The entrance at Zen</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After a quick search on Google and Yelp we stumbled upon a restaurant called <strong>Zen</strong>. It offered a meal set based around <strong>Yuba</strong> (tofu skin), and the whole experience was superb. The food was delicious, the staff was nice and the restaurant was beautiful inside, with a small enclosed zen garden (lit by a roof window). Highly recommended.</p>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8180.jpg" alt="The feet of three travellers at a waiting sign at the Shinkansen train track at Utsonomiya, waiting for the train to Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Waiting for our Shinkansen back to Tokyo">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Waiting for our Shinkansen back to Tokyo</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nikko/IMG_8183.jpg" alt="The Shinkansen train arriving at Utsonomiya station, on it's way to Tokyo, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The Shinkansen train arriving at Utsonomiya station, on it's way to Tokyo, Japan.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Shinkansen train arriving at Utsonomiya station, on it's way to Tokyo, Japan.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>We spent around half a day in Nikko before returning to Tokyo. It's a nice trip to get away from the crowded capital, and well worth a visit. But don't forget to check the weather beforehand and wear a pair of warm socks just in case.</p>
<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan/">Our travel video of Japan</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan/">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan/">Visiting Nikko for half a day (this post!)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan/">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan/">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan/">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan/">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan/">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan/">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
A useful tool: mybrowser.fyi
2019-01-06T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/06/mybrowser-fyi/
<p><a href="https://mybrowser.fyi/"><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/blog/mybrowser-fyi.png" alt="A screenshot of mybrowser.fyi"></a><br>
<a href="https://andy-bell.design/">Andy Bell</a> created this small tool to find out the basic configuration of your browser and device, called <a href="https://mybrowser.fyi/">mybrowser.fyi</a>.</p>
<p>It's simple, yet extremely handy as you can send this site to a client, and they can send back the results in an instant. It's a lot easier than the old fashioned way by explaining to the client over the phone where they can find the about menu of their browser.</p>
Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto, Japan
2019-01-12T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Kyoto, Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> 4 days<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8836.jpg" alt="The morning sun shining on a couple of red torii gates at the Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A couple of torii gates at the Fushimi Inari Shrine.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A couple of torii gates at the Fushimi Inari Shrine.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Kyoto is probably the second most popular destination in Japan after Tokyo, and it's seen as one of the most important <strong>historic centers of Japan</strong>.</p>
<p>It's easy to get there by using the Ihari Shinkansen line, a ride that takes a few hours. Unfortunately, the trip to the freezing shrines of Nikko caught me off guard and got me a cold. I had to wear a mouth mask to keep my illness contained, as is usual in the country.</p>
<p>It also didn't help that it was pouring outside, and our room in the ryokan wasn't ready yet, so we had to find another place to kill a few hours.</p>
<!--excerpt-->
<h2>Killing time in Arashiyama</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8235.jpg" alt="A boat docked near the Togetsukyo bridge in Arashiyama, Kyoto (Japan) on a rainy day." class="" data-figcaption="A boat near the Togetsukyo bridge in Arashiyama.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A boat near the Togetsukyo bridge in Arashiyama.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8258.jpg" alt="A detail shot of decoration on the Togetsukyo bridge in Arashiyama, Kyoto (Japan)." class="" data-figcaption="A detail shot of decoration on the Togetsukyo bridge.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A detail shot of decoration on the Togetsukyo bridge.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8272.jpg" alt="A man waiting on a train in the Arashiyama Train Station in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The train station of Arashiyama.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The train station of Arashiyama.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>As a result, we went out to discover the <strong>Arashiyama region</strong> near our accommodation. The district is enclosed by a large set of mountains, resulting in spectacular panoramic views around the <strong>Togetsukyo bridge</strong>, the most prominent piece of architecture in the neighbourhood.</p>
<p>It's bit touristic, but still very nice, with lots of nice gift shops and picturesque locations, like a small train station where you can get on a scenic train ride across the area.</p>
<h2>A full ryokan experience with a tea ceremony, an onsen and a kaiseki meal</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/food.jpg" alt="A kaiseki meal in a ryokan in Kyoto, Japan: matcha tea, sashimi & yuba; hot pot with fugu & tofu; sushi with shiitake, red snapper, egg and ginger; octopus with sweet carrot and bamboo; miso & salmon with egg; shark fin soup with a meatball of shark; miso soup with ginger; mochi with sesame powder and strawberry." class="" data-figcaption="Left to right; top to bottom: matcha tea, sashimi & yuba; hot pot with fugu & tofu; sushi with shiitake, red snapper, egg and ginger; octopus with sweet carrot and bamboo; miso & salmon with egg; shark fin soup with a meatball of shark; miso soup with ginger; mochi with sesame powder and strawberry">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Left to right; top to bottom: matcha tea, sashimi & yuba; hot pot with fugu & tofu; sushi with shiitake, red snapper, egg and ginger; octopus with sweet carrot and bamboo; miso & salmon with egg; shark fin soup with a meatball of shark; miso soup with ginger; mochi with sesame powder and strawberry</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8372.jpg" alt="A breakfast meal in a ryokan in Kyoto, Japan: salmon, rice, eggs, ginger, natto, tofu (in a hotpot) and miso soup." class="" data-figcaption="Our breakfast: salmon, rice, eggs, ginger, natto, tofu (in a hotpot) and miso soup">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our breakfast: salmon, rice, eggs, ginger, natto, tofu (in a hotpot) and miso soup</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8283.jpg" alt="A room in a ryokan in Kyoto (Japan) with tatami flooring, a chabudai (a short table) and fusuma (sliding doors made from wood and paper)." class="" data-figcaption="The inside of our room in the ryokan.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The inside of our room in the ryokan.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8358.jpg" alt="A bamboo wall with some flowers near the entrance of a ryokan complex in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A bamboo wall with some flowers near the entrance of the ryokan complex.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A bamboo wall with some flowers near the entrance of the ryokan complex.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>A few wet hours later we finally were able to enter our <strong>ryokan</strong>. A ryokan is a traditional Japanese inn for accommodation, often with an onsen available for guests and an extensive meal with lots of different courses (called kaiseki ryori).</p>
<p>Before we got to that part of the experience, we first got accustomed to our room with a small <strong>tea ceremony</strong> with matcha tea and some sweets to counter the bitterness of the drink.</p>
<p>After that, we were handed a <strong>yukata</strong>, a traditional form of a kimono. Think of it as a Japanese style bathrobe.</p>
<p>After the wardrobe change we went to try out the <strong>onsen</strong>, a traditional Japanese hot spring with a temperature of around 40 degrees Celcius (around 104° Fahrenheit). Putting your full body (except your head, of course) in is too hot, but otherwise it’s a very relaxing experience. It made me forget my cold for a few hours at least.</p>
<p>Later in the evening we were served our <strong>kaiseki meal</strong> in our room. Our host tried to explain everything as much as possible in English, but when he couldn't find the word he was looking for he used my phone to let Google Translate help out. In one case the translation went the other way around though: he proudly presented us pufferfish in English, which translates to <em>fugu</em> in Japanese: the infamous fish known to be deadly if not prepared correctly. I’ve heard a lot of people complain that Fugu tastes too chewy, but I found it to be quite good actually (although not good enough to order on my own). Once again we were also reminded of the fact that Eden Hazard is probably the most famous Belgian around at the moment, as our host was raving about him when we told us about our home country.</p>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8378.jpeg" alt="A short table (chabudai) used as a dining table for a kaiseki dinner in a ryokan in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Our dining table...">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our dining table...</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8353.jpeg" alt="Futons on a tatami floor in a ryokan in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="...which got removed in an instant, to be replaced by our futons.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">...which got removed in an instant, to be replaced by our futons.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After our dessert we were asked to move to a smaller room next to the dining area, when the crew of the ryokan put away the dining table and placed our futons on the tatami floor. This happened so fast that we could already sit down again before we realized what happened.</p>
<p>In the morning we also got a pretty substantial <strong>breakfast with salmon, eggs, and more</strong>. This was served in a large dining hall across the street.</p>
<h2>The bamboo grove in Arashiyama</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/956A50C6-112B-4EC7-92EF-D8C952426BFA.jpg" alt="Tourists walking through a path with bamboo trees swaying in the wind in the Bamboo Grove in Arashiyama, Kyoto (Japan)." class="" data-figcaption="The bamboo grove in Arashiyama.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The bamboo grove in Arashiyama.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8400.jpg" alt="A Taiyaki snack, consisting of batter and red bean paste, bought from a food stand near the Bamboo Grove in Arashiyama, Kyoto (Japan)." class="" data-figcaption="A Taiyaki snack.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A Taiyaki snack.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8402.jpg" alt="Dango balls, made with rice flour and covered with a sweet sauce, bought from a food stand near the Bamboo Grove in Arashiyama, Kyoto (Japan)." class="" data-figcaption="Some Dango balls with a sweet sauce.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Some Dango balls with a sweet sauce.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/arashiyama/IMG_8485-1.jpg" alt="Bamboo trees pointing at the sky in the Bamboo Grove in Arashiyama, Kyoto (Japan)." class="" data-figcaption="Looking up to the sky inside the bamboo grove.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Looking up to the sky inside the bamboo grove.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After breakfast we went to discover Arashiyama further. We wanted to visit the <strong>bamboo grove</strong>, but after walking for about 10 minutes on a small road near the river we were stopped by a local. <em>You're walking on the wrong road if you want to visit the grove, Google Maps is wrong.</em> A quick look today tells me Maps team has fixed this in the meantime, but according to the local this was a common mistake at the time.</p>
<p>The grove is actually situated on a small street next to the main road we visited the day before, and it's actually fairly easy to find if you look for the shop that sells Dango Balls (a snack made out of rice flour) and Taiyaki (a sort of cookie filled with red bean paste).</p>
<p>Despite the crowds the walk inside the grove was a very peaceful affair. There was even a small zen garden inside!</p>
<p>The grove was a bit dark and cramped in the beginning, but it opened up considerably mid-way, with much wider roads and a bit more sky visible. Due to the windy weather the trees were also swaying back and forth as if they were doing a workout. Sturdy, yet fragile at the same time.</p>
<h2>Moving to a hostel in Central Kyoto</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8579.jpg" alt="A citrus tree growing over a river in Kyoto, Japan on a sunny day." class="" data-figcaption="A citrus tree in Kyoto.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A citrus tree in Kyoto.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8741.jpg" alt="The main hall of Kyoto station in the afternoon, when the low sun hits the interior inside." class="" data-figcaption="The main hall of Kyoto Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The main hall of Kyoto Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8746.jpg" alt="People walking through Kyoto station in Japan while the sun is setting." class="" data-figcaption="The late afternoon sun playing around in Kyoto Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The late afternoon sun playing around in Kyoto Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8769.jpg" alt="Kyoto Tower and the moon at night, taken across the Yodobashi Camera store nearby." class="" data-figcaption="Kyoto Tower at night, taken across the Yodobashi Camera store nearby.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Kyoto Tower at night, taken across the Yodobashi Camera store nearby.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After our night in the ryokan and our walk through the grove we retrieved our bags at the ryokan and went to the center of Kyoto to get to our next accommodation, a hostel near <strong>Kyoto Station</strong> (spending more than one night in a ryokan would endanger our wallets way too much).</p>
<p>Turns out that sleeping practically next to the station makes exploring the area really nice, as a lot of things are within walking distance.</p>
<p>The train station itself is also quite the sight: easy accessible and with a huge entrance hall.</p>
<p>The city itself is also vastly different from Tokyo. While Tokyo is gigantic and cramped, Kyoto is more <strong>rural and modest</strong>.</p>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8547.jpg" alt="A cup and a small bottle of sake in a small izakaya in the center of Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Sake at an izakaya.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sake at an izakaya.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8548.jpeg" alt="Yakitori - chicken on a skewer - in a small izakaya in the center of Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Yakitori at that same izakaya.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Yakitori at that same izakaya.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8554.jpeg" alt="Tonkatsu - deep fried chicken covered with panko breadcrumbs - in a small izakaya in the center of Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Tonkatsu.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Tonkatsu.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8559.jpeg" alt="The entrance of an izakaya at night in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The entrance of the izakaya.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The entrance of the izakaya.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>In the evening we went to an <strong>izakaya</strong> (a traditional Japanese bar) near our hostel. While we went there quite early to claim our seats, it was quickly filled up with other visitors in business attire, who's main goal was probably to let off some steam after work.</p>
<p>We had a ton of sake, but also some yakitori, fish and tonkatsu at our seats in front of the bar, while the business men were getting drunk in the back, before calling it a night to get some rest.</p>
<h2>Walking to Higashiyama, Kiyomizudera & Gion</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8612.jpg" alt="A red temple at the Kiyomizudera temple complex in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="One of the temples at Kiyomizudera">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of the temples at Kiyomizudera</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8587.jpeg" alt="The Kamogawa river in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Walking through Kyoto brought us over the Kamogawa river.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Walking through Kyoto brought us over the Kamogawa river.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8595.jpg" alt="Tourists wearing traditional geisha clothes while walking through the Higashiyama area in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Tourists in geisha clothes.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Tourists in geisha clothes.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8626.jpg" alt="A gate at the Kiyomizudera complex, overlooking Kyoto and its surrounding mountains." class="" data-figcaption="A gate at the Kiyomizudera complex, overlooking Kyoto and its surrounding mountains.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A gate at the Kiyomizudera complex, overlooking Kyoto and its surrounding mountains.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>Kyoto also differs from Tokyo in terms of <strong>public transport</strong>. Tokyo is filled with train stations, so it's easy to go anywhere in an instant (if you figure out their train system first). Kyoto, however, only has a few train lines on the north/south axis, with the rest reachable by bus.</p>
<p>We couldn't understand how the bus system works (we only got it at the end of our trip in Okayama), so we went to Higashiyama on foot. Doable, but not ideal. We managed to see more of the city this way though.</p>
<p><strong>Higashiyama</strong> is a small district with the <strong>Kiyomizudera shrine</strong>, known for its wooden balcony and waterfalls in the main building. The walk up the mountain brought us through a touristy shopping street where there are tons and tons of gift shops and snack bars. We encountered lots of tourists dressed in kimonos, which surprised us until we found the rental shops a few minutes later. We didn't join in on the fun though.</p>
<p>The area around the entrance of the Kiyomizudera temple has <strong>a great view over Kyoto</strong> (but the skyline of the city itself isn't that spectacular), but we didn't visit the main building (the wooden black hall) itself as it was too crowded and I was still not feeling too well.</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8652.jpg" alt="Wooden buildings in the Gion District in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The Gion district with its wooden buildings.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Gion district with its wooden buildings.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Walking back we stumbled upon the <strong>Gion region</strong> where we walked around for a bit, strolling in between the very well kept wooden buildings. After leaving the area we started to realise that quite a few persons walking around were geishas. We found out later that this place is also known as the <strong>geisha district</strong>, so this shouldn't come as a surprise.</p>
<h2>Nishiki Market and the Higashi Honganji temple</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8675.jpg" alt="A food stall in Nishiki Market in Kyoto, Japan, selling grilled eel, as seen from inside." class="" data-figcaption="Eating eel at one of the shops in Nishiki Market.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Eating eel at one of the shops in Nishiki Market.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8671.jpeg" alt="People walking in Nishiki Market in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Nishiki Market.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Nishiki Market.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8730.jpg" alt="Kyoto Tower on a sunny day, as seen from the moat at Higashi Honganji temple." class="" data-figcaption="Kyoto Tower as seen from the moat at Higashi Honganji temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Kyoto Tower as seen from the moat at Higashi Honganji temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8712.jpeg" alt="The central area at Higashi Honganji temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The central area at Higashi Honganji temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The central area at Higashi Honganji temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8718.jpeg" alt="A wooden carving in on of the wooden entrance gates of Higashi Honganji temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Wooden carving in one of the massive wooden entrance gates.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Wooden carving in one of the massive wooden entrance gates.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8722.jpeg" alt="A statue of a dragon dispensing water at a purification fountain at Higashi Honganji temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A dragon dispensing water at a purification fountain.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A dragon dispensing water at a purification fountain.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After passing through Gion we arrived at <strong>Nishiki Market</strong>, a large market hall with tons of food related stands, and also tons of people that are eager to try out the different snacks the vendors sell over there. We ate some grilled eel and mochi (rice flour sweets), both of which were quite tasty.</p>
<p>With our stomachs filled we strolled back in to the direction of Kyoto Station, where we came across the <strong>Higashi Honganji temple</strong>, a large Buddhist temple in the center of the city. We went there right before closing time, so we just went in and out for a short time.</p>
<h2>Fushimi Inari Shrine</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8826.jpg" alt="Red torii gates at Fushimi Inari Shrine, at the intersection where the road splits up into two roads." class="" data-figcaption="The torii gates, at the intersection where the road splits up into two roads.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The torii gates, at the intersection where the road splits up into two roads.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8787.jpg" alt="The crowded entrance of the Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto, Japan, looking in the direction of the train station." class="" data-figcaption="A look at the entrance of the shrine. If you squint you can see the train station in the back.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A look at the entrance of the shrine. If you squint you can see the train station in the back.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8804.jpg" alt="A fox statue with a red yodarekake around its neck at Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="One of the many fox statues around.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of the many fox statues around.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8817.jpg" alt="Red torii gates with a lantern at Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Another view of the torii gates.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Another view of the torii gates.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8873.jpg" alt="The Kumatakasha shrine, up the mountain at Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="The Kumatakasha shrine.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Kumatakasha shrine.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>The <strong>Fushimi Inari shrine</strong> is one of the most iconic Japanese shrines with its walkway consisting of thousands of <strong>torii gates</strong> (symbolising the entrance to a sacred area). It shouldn't come as a surprise that this place is <em>packed</em> with tourists. We went there on a Sunday (which in Japan makes a huge difference in crowd sizes), but it wasn't problematic as it's a large site spread out across quite a few parts.</p>
<p>There's also a good reason why it's so popular. It's filled with great traditional architecture, cool <strong>fox statues</strong> (<strong>Kitsune</strong> in Japanese, which are seen as the messengers of the gods) and, yes, a stunning amount of bright red gates that have to be seen to be believed. It was also nice that people at the famous spot where two walkways intersect (see the first picture of this section) were waiting in turns to take a picture. No photo bombs, just a nice line of people waiting to get that one shot.</p>
<p>After the collection of torii gates you can also do a mountain hike to get a view over the city, but we didn't do that as it was early and we didn't have breakfast (and thus lacked the energy to climb a mountain) yet. We made it to the <strong>Kumatakasha shrine</strong> though, a cool and cosy looking shrine right before the real hiking starts.</p>
<h2>Learning about the sake brewing process at the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8940.jpg" alt="A chimney used in the sake brewing process at Gekkeikan Okaru Sake in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A chimney used in the brewing process.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A chimney used in the brewing process.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8917.jpg" alt="Traditional sake-making tools at the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Traditional sake-making tools at the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Traditional sake-making tools at the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8921.jpg" alt="A pile of plastic rice in the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A giant pile of (plastic) rice.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A giant pile of (plastic) rice.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8934.jpg" alt="A large wooden steaming bowl used in the sake brewing process with a stand (labeled Han-yaku) attached to it at the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A large wooden steaming bowl for the sake with a stand (labeled Han-yaku) attached to it.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A large wooden steaming bowl for the sake with a stand (labeled Han-yaku) attached to it.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8936.jpg" alt="Sake barrels at the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum in Kyoto, Japan to illustrate the logistics of delivering sake barrels to customers." class="" data-figcaption="Sake barrels, ready to be shipped by boat across the country.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sake barrels, ready to be shipped by boat across the country.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_8941.jpg" alt="Empty sake barrels at the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Empty sake barrels.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Empty sake barrels.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>Kyoto is also known for its <strong>sake district</strong> in the Fushimi area, where tons of sake breweries are located, some of them which are open to visit. We went to the <strong>Gekkeikan Okura Sake museum</strong>, a brewery of a sake that's readily available in Belgium and also quite good. It's one of the oldest companies in the world, and the museum is focused on celebrating this fact by showing the traditional brewing process, with every sign also translated in English (which is unfortunately not always the case in Japan).</p>
<p>It's a great place to visit if you want to know more about the sake process itself (we learned, for example, that sake used to be transported by boat across the rivers to Osaka, and that the lids of the bottles have a rocking mechanism that helps consumers (factory workers, mostly) from keeping their drinks from tipping over on the (at the time) rocky trains on their commute).</p>
<p>An entry ticket also gives you a small taster (which you can take home) and a taster of three different drinks at the end of the tour, with lots more to buy in the gift shop. Keep in mind that these bottles are quite large, so make sure they fit in your checked luggage before you commit to buying one.</p>
<h2>Thousands of small statues at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9050.jpg" alt="Buddhist statues and flowers at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Buddhist statues guarding the area.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Buddhist statues guarding the area.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9001.jpg" alt="A small river in a residential area near Saga-Toriimoto in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A small river we encountered during our walk to Saga-Toriimoto.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A small river we encountered during our walk to Saga-Toriimoto.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9008.jpg" alt="A small offering shrine at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A small offering shrine.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A small offering shrine.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9019.jpg" alt="Statues at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple in Kyoto, Japan, dressed in red and white clothes." class="" data-figcaption="Some statues were dressed in red or white clothes.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Some statues were dressed in red or white clothes.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9021.jpg" alt="Coins offered on a Buddhist statue at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Monetary offerings.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Monetary offerings.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9028.jpg" alt="Buddhist graves at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Buddhist graves at the temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Buddhist graves at the temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9031.jpg" alt="A sign at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A sign at the temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A sign at the temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9033.jpg" alt="Hundreds of small statues at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="Some of the hundreds (thousands?) statues at the temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Some of the hundreds (thousands?) statues at the temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kyoto/IMG_9039.jpg" alt="A tanooki statue at Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple in Kyoto, Japan." class="" data-figcaption="A tanooki statue, quite a bit different from the other statues around.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A tanooki statue, quite a bit different from the other statues around.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>The last visit we did in Kyoto was at the <strong>Adashino Nenbutsu-ju temple</strong>, located to the northwest of the city. We went there by walking from Arashiyama to <strong>Saga-Toriimoto</strong> (a street filled with traditional gift shops), which was a very nice and mellow walk through a residential neighbourhood.</p>
<p>We managed to arrive seconds before they would close the temple (it closes at 5 in the afternoon, but we literally arrived at 4:59 - we only found out these closing times right before entering), but we were still allowed in luckily enough.</p>
<p>The temple is filled with <strong>thousands of small statues</strong> packed together to symbolise the dead. It's a strangely serene sight to behold, but also quite creepy, especially as there was a crow that was cawing constantly during our visit, with no one else around and the sun disappearing behind the mountains.</p>
<p>Unfortunately I was feeling sick the whole time when we were in Kyoto, so we couldn't do as much as we wanted to. We missed out on the Kyoto Imperial Palace, the Kinkakuji temple, Iwatayama and more, so hopefully we will make it back there someday.</p>
<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan/">Our travel video of Japan</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan/">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan/">Visiting Nikko for half a day</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan/">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto (this post!)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan/">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan/">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan/">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan/">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan/">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara, Japan
2019-01-13T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Nara, Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> 1 day (+ overnight stay)<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9275.jpeg" alt="Sunset at the Todaiji temple." class="" data-figcaption="Sunset at the Todaiji temple.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sunset at the Todaiji temple.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Nara used to be the old capital of Japan, and nowadays it's mostly known for its shrines (which are also part of the <strong>UNESCO World Heritage</strong>, like the ones in <a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan.html">Nikko</a> and <a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan.html">Kyoto</a>) and its hundreds of <strong>tame deer</strong> which roam the area freely. It's a 50 minute train ride from Kyoto, so it's easy to just hop on a train to get there.</p>
<!--excerpt-->
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9261.jpg" alt="A street in the center of Nara." class="" data-figcaption="A street in the center of Nara.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A street in the center of Nara.</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The Todaiji temple</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9152.jpg" alt="The Daibutsuden hall. Even at a distance it's already gigantic." class="" data-figcaption="The Daibutsuden hall. Even at a distance it's already gigantic.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Daibutsuden hall. Even at a distance it's already gigantic.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9156.jpg" alt="A bit closer to the Daibutsuden hall." class="" data-figcaption="A bit closer to the Daibutsuden hall.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A bit closer to the Daibutsuden hall.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9160.jpg" alt="A lamp post near the hall." class="" data-figcaption="A lamp post near the hall.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A lamp post near the hall.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9169.jpg" alt="The huge Buddha statue inside." class="" data-figcaption="The huge Buddha statue inside.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The huge Buddha statue inside.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9174.jpg" alt="Another Buddha statue inside." class="" data-figcaption="Another Buddha statue inside.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Another Buddha statue inside.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9184.jpg" alt="Guardians protecting the Buddha statue." class="" data-figcaption="Guardians protecting the Buddha statue.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Guardians protecting the Buddha statue.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9195.jpg" alt="A dressed up statue of Binzuru (Pindola Bharadvaja), one of the disciples of Buddha, just outside of the hall. " class="" data-figcaption="A dressed up statue of Binzuru (Pindola Bharadvaja), one of the disciples of Buddha, just outside of the hall. ">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A dressed up statue of Binzuru (Pindola Bharadvaja), one of the disciples of Buddha, just outside of the hall. </figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After a short walk from the center of Nara (it's a small city which you can easily cover by foot) we got to the <strong>Todaiji temple complex</strong>, the main tourist attraction of the city. It's mostly known for the <strong>Daibutsuden</strong>, the <strong>large wooden temple</strong> which you can visit for a small entrance fee. The temple burned down a couple of times in the past, but it was always rebuilt with more or less the same structure. The current incarnation is the smallest one yet strangely enough, but it's still massive.</p>
<p>Equally impressive is the gigantic <strong>Buddha statue</strong> inside, which is a giant bronze construction of about 15 meters (49ft) high, which is accompanied by a number of slightly smaller statues of guardians and gods.</p>
<p>The hall also contains a few relics and mockups of previous versions of the temple.</p>
<h2>Nara Park</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9209.jpg" alt="A deer watching over the Todaiji temple in the distance." class="" data-figcaption="A deer watching over the Todaiji temple in the distance.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A deer watching over the Todaiji temple in the distance.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9237.jpg" alt="Another deer roaming in the park." class="" data-figcaption="Another deer roaming in the park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Another deer roaming in the park.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9230.jpeg" alt="One of the many ponds in Nara Park." class="" data-figcaption="One of the many ponds in Nara Park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of the many ponds in Nara Park.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9238.jpeg" alt="The deer also roam around the city sometimes." class="" data-figcaption="The deer also roam around the city sometimes.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The deer also roam around the city sometimes.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>The Todaiji temple is also partly located in <strong>Nara Park</strong>, a large park to the east of the city center and filled with friendly deer - until they smell food and start hunting you. If you buy one of the snacks in the area (like, say, a baked sweet potato), make sure there are no mammals around.</p>
<p>You can also work around this by buying the deer special cookies, which a lot of vendors nearby are eager to sell you. The deer expect you to buy this seemingly, as they will stare at you until you either walk away or you feed them.</p>
<h2>Food in Nara</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9215.jpg" alt="A sweet potato, seconds before it almost got snatched by a deer." class="" data-figcaption="A sweet potato, seconds before it almost got snatched by a deer.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A sweet potato, seconds before it almost got snatched by a deer.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9220.jpg" alt="Our takoyaki balls." class="" data-figcaption="Our takoyaki balls.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our takoyaki balls.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9249.jpg" alt="A store which shows the mochi making process." class="" data-figcaption="A store which shows the mochi making process.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A store which shows the mochi making process.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9244.jpg" alt="Freshly made mochi." class="" data-figcaption="Freshly made mochi.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Freshly made mochi.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9256.jpg" alt="Persimmon leaf sushi with some green tea." class="" data-figcaption="Persimmon leaf sushi with some green tea.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Persimmon leaf sushi with some green tea.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>You can also find a small street in the park with <strong>a high concentration of food stalls and restaurants</strong>. We went straight for the stand that sold <strong>takoyaki</strong>, dough balls filled with pieces of octopus and topped with a sweet sauce, sweet Japanese mayonnaise and dried bonito flakes (which appear to be dancing due to the heat of the batter). It's a surprisingly hearty dish, but don't make the mistake we did by eating it straight away. Let it cool off for a bit, trust me.</p>
<p>Back in the center of Nara we came across a <strong>mochi store</strong> were they make this rice snack right in front of you, and apparently they also <a href="https://youtu.be/tmSrULDVRPc">put up a show</a> when they mix the rice flour for the snack. We only saw the machines doing their thing, before the snacks mysteriously placed themselves in our hands and in our mouths. Hmmmm.</p>
<p>One of the local specialities is <strong>persimmon leaf sushi</strong>, sushi wrapped in - you guessed it - a persimmon leaf. It's similar to regular nigiri sushi, but it's wrapped and compressed tightly inside the leaf for a few days, causing the taste of the leaf to be added to the sushi. It wasn't really to my tastes, but I'm glad that I tried it at least.</p>
<h2>Otaimatsu at the Omizutori festival</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9283.jpg" alt="Waiting in line for Otaimatsu." class="" data-figcaption="Waiting in line for Otaimatsu.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Waiting in line for Otaimatsu.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/nara/IMG_9287.jpg" alt="Fire!" class="" data-figcaption="Fire!">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Fire!</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>When we booked our trip we thought we would just hang out in Nara for a day and that we would go to Osaka the next day, but a few weeks before arriving we found out there's a yearly tradition in the city at the same moment we would be there, called <strong>Omizutori</strong>, an event in March which, in part, also covers <strong>Otaimatsu</strong>, a torch festival at the Nigatsudo hall near the Todaiji temple.</p>
<p>The event involves <strong>large wooden torches (which are set on fire, obviously)</strong> that are carried across the balcony so that the embers sprinkle over the audience to bring good luck to them in the new year. This event is repeated every evening for two weeks, but on the day we were there (<strong>12 March</strong>) the amount of torches (and thus also the amount of fire) was increased (this always happens on the 12th day of the festival).</p>
<p>We went to the Todaji temple quite early to secure a spot in front of the entrance, and soon after thousands of people also joined in on the waiting. It was very crowded, but also handled in a typical Japanese fashion: video screens were hung up with announcers describing the festival, policemen were keeping everything in control, and, most importantly, everyone was forced to follow a specific path at a specific walking speed, to make sure that everyone could see the burning torches.</p>
<p>It was a strange way to do things, but it worked out perfectly as a way to do crowd control (but I don't see it working in Europe or in the US).</p>
<video controls="" preload="metadata" poster="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/video/nara-otaimatsu-screenshot.jpeg">
<source src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/video/nara-otaimatsu.mp4" type="video/mp4">
<p>Your browser doesn't support HTML5 video, but <a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/video/nara-otaimatsu.mp4">here's a link to the video file</a>.</p>
</video>
<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan.html">Our travel video of Japan</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan.html">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan.html">Visiting Nikko for half a day</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan.html">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan.html">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara (this post!)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan.html">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan.html">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan.html">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan.html">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka - Japan
2019-01-24T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Osaka, Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> 2 days<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/E6A63745-14EC-4D11-AD64-FFD7E414BCC0.jpg" alt="Sumo wrestlers in action at the Edion Arena in Osaka." class="" data-figcaption="Sumo wrestlers in action at the Edion Arena in Osaka.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sumo wrestlers in action at the Edion Arena in Osaka.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Osaka is the second largest city in Japan, and a central hub to quite a few important cities in the area, like Kyoto, Nara and Kobe. We went to Osaka via a short 30 minute train ride from <a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan.html">Nara</a>. The city is probably best known for its wide variety of <strong>high quality food</strong>, but we went there to attend the <strong>yearly Sumo competition, the honbasho</strong>, in the Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium (also called the Edion Arena).</p>
<!--excerpt-->
<h2>Osaka style okonomiyaki and Shinsekai</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9355.jpg" alt="Osaka style okonomiyaki: so good." class="" data-figcaption="Osaka style okonomiyaki: so good.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Osaka style okonomiyaki: so good.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9345.jpg" alt="A shopping street in the center of Osaka." class="" data-figcaption="A shopping street in the center of Osaka.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A shopping street in the center of Osaka.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9370.jpg" alt="The Shinsekai neighbourhood, with the Tsutenkaku Tower as the main focal point." class="" data-figcaption="The Shinsekai neighbourhood, with the Tsutenkaku Tower as the main focal point.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Shinsekai neighbourhood, with the Tsutenkaku Tower as the main focal point.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>We arrived the day before our planned sumo day, so after dropping off our bags at our hostel we went out to discover the city a bit.</p>
<p>We heard from countless people that we should definitely try out the Osaka variant of <strong>okonomiyaki</strong>, a pancake dish with lots of eggs, cabbage and flour inside, on top of a variety of other stuff like meat, fish and dashi.</p>
<p>We found a highly rated restaurant on Google close to our hostel, and after wandering around a bit (it's not easy to find a restaurant in Japan when you can't read its name) we entered a small eatery in the <strong>Ebisuhigashi area</strong>. We ordered the speciality dish of the restaurant: an okonomiyaki dish with pork belly, minced meat, octopus and more inside. The dish was made at the counters of the restaurant, where the chef did its thing by mixing everything together and cooking it on his griddle. Afterwards, they would bring us the dish on large spatulas, to drop it on the hot griddle that was mounted in the center of our table. This griddle kept the okonomiyaki at its hot temperature while you carve off pieces to eat.</p>
<p>Describing okonomiyaki is a bit difficult: every ingredient has its own prominent taste without overpowering anything. It's a delightfully confusing dish with a totally unique flavour. Be warned though: it's not recommended to treat this as a light snack in between. It's a very hearty dish that doesn't leave your stomach empty afterwards.</p>
<p>To digest this savory meal we went for a walk in the nearby <strong>Shinsekai area</strong>, an area that seemed to be quite popular with the local youth. We strolled around for a bit, bought a few stickers for our travel journals in a nearby stationary shop and had a energizing coffee in a trendy cafe (called <strong>The Pax</strong>) with a slide inside to get back down from the first floor.</p>
<h2>Dotonbori</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9437.jpg" alt="Takoyaki at one of the many snack bars at Dotonbori." class="" data-figcaption="Takoyaki at one of the many snack bars at Dotonbori.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Takoyaki at one of the many snack bars at Dotonbori.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9447.jpg" alt="Neon lights in Dotonbori." class="" data-figcaption="Neon lights in Dotonbori.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Neon lights in Dotonbori.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9463.jpg" alt="The Dotonbori canal." class="" data-figcaption="The Dotonbori canal.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Dotonbori canal.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>In the evening we went through the busy <strong>Namba region</strong> to get to <strong>Dotonbori</strong>, a restaurant packed area running next to the Dotonbori canal. It's one of those areas that are a must visit in Osaka, even if it's just to experience the <strong>blinding amounts of neon lights</strong> in the streets and the huge crowds waiting to get a bite to eat at one of the <strong>many snack bars</strong>.</p>
<p>We ate a few <strong>takoyaki balls</strong> at a restaurant with a huge octopus hanging over it as an appetizer before going on a quest to find something more substantial to eat. A quick search on Yelp gave us a nice looking place near the central station, but when we went in we were confused as the restaurant looked like a cheap chain restaurant, dirty tables and a terrible looking menu.</p>
<h2>Gyukatsu Tomita</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9478.jpg" alt="Gyukatsu: deep fried beef." class="" data-figcaption="Gyukatsu: deep fried beef.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Gyukatsu: deep fried beef.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9481.jpg" alt="You can also cook your gyukatsu further on the small stove in front of you." class="" data-figcaption="You can also cook your gyukatsu further on the small stove in front of you.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">You can also cook your gyukatsu further on the small stove in front of you.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9608.jpg" alt="Roaming the streets of Namba." class="" data-figcaption="Roaming the streets of Namba.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Roaming the streets of Namba.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>We quickly found out why: the restaurant we were looking for was at the same address, but it was located upstairs, something that seems to be a perfectly normal thing in Japan. We quickly changed floors and finally got to the place we were looking for: <strong>Gyukatsu Tomita</strong>. The place is known for its <strong>gyukatsu</strong>, deep fried beef covered with breadcrumbs served with cabbage and yam. It's a simple yet effective recipe, as its taste was amazing. Together with our okonomiyaki just a few hours earlier this was one of our food highlights of the full trip.</p>
<h2>The sumo tournament</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9567.jpg" alt="Sumo wrestlers doing an exhibition ceromony in the ring." class="" data-figcaption="Sumo wrestlers doing an exhibition ceromony in the ring.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Sumo wrestlers doing an exhibition ceromony in the ring.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9493.jpg" alt="Nobori banners outside of the arena." class="" data-figcaption="Nobori banners outside of the arena.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Nobori banners outside of the arena.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9500.jpg" alt="The inside of the arena in the morning. The lower sumo divisions don't attract nearly as much spectators as the highest ranks." class="" data-figcaption="The inside of the arena in the morning. The lower sumo divisions don't attract nearly as much spectators as the highest ranks.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The inside of the arena in the morning. The lower sumo divisions don't attract nearly as much spectators as the highest ranks.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9532.jpg" alt="Entrance for the wrestlers to the ring." class="" data-figcaption="Entrance for the wrestlers to the ring.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Entrance for the wrestlers to the ring.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/osaka/IMG_9535.jpg" alt="Our boxed seats. Not really comfortable." class="" data-figcaption="Our boxed seats. Not really comfortable.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our boxed seats. Not really comfortable.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>The day after we prepared ourselves for the honbasho, the yearly sumo championship in Osaka. These tournaments are organised 6 times a year across Japan, and in March the spring edition (the <strong>haru basho</strong>) takes place in the Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium.</p>
<p>For those that don't know the sport: sumo revolves around two wrestlers fighting to throw each other out of the ring (the <strong>dohyo</strong>). These professional wrestlers together train at sumo stables throughout the year, and this commitment also translates in a carb rich diet to gain weight as efficiently as possible, which helps in getting the upper hand while pushing your opponent off the ring.</p>
<p>Our friend is a big fan of the sport, so we actually scheduled our trip around this event. We ordered our tickets via <a href="https://buysumotickets.com/">Buy Sumo Tickets</a> a few months before (these tickets sell out fairly quickly), which was very fast and easy (and fully in English). Their service delivered the tickets to our hostel a few days before we arrived, which were in turn nicely delivered to us on check in. Neat!</p>
<p>We bought box seats, which are located relatively close to the stage (but not close enough to get squished by a sumo wrestler that gets thrown off the stage - which happens all the time), but as these boxes only contain 4 thin pillows they were very uncomfortable to us (we aren't used to sitting cross-legged at all).</p>
<p>I think if we were to buy tickets again, we would consider getting seated tickets at the back of the arena. These are a bit further away from the stage, but they looked way more comfortable. Keep in mind that these seats are (in contrast with our boxed seats) not numbered, so either you get someone to guard your spots or you risk having to find a new place if you get something to eat.</p>
<p>Also: we got a bento box at one of the small shops in the venue, but the food inside wasn't great (especially as it was not cheap at all). The box itself was nice enough to keep as a souvenir, though.</p>
<p>The event itself starts with the lower divisions wrestling with each other in the morning, and in the afternoon the higher division bouts take place. Most matches only take a few seconds at best, but it's wonderful to see the whole arena tense up right before two heavyweight champions clash into each other.</p>
<p>Most of the time in between the bouts is spent by the crew preparing the ring, sponsors getting presented on that same ring, and various rituals done by the wrestlers themselves (like throwing salt across the ring to purify the stage). It's a very relaxed atmosphere all around, where people are having a good time with friends to celebrate their heroes.</p>
<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan.html">Our travel video of Japan</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan.html">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan.html">Visiting Nikko for half a day</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan.html">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan.html">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan.html">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka (this post!)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan.html">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan.html">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan.html">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
My winter commute in Belgium
2019-02-03T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/03/winter-pictures-brussels-leuven/
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/winter/IMG_2661.jpeg" alt="The station of Leuven at sunset." class="" data-figcaption="The station of Leuven at sunset.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The station of Leuven at sunset.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/winter/IMG_2738.jpeg" alt="The city hall tower of Brussels near the Grand Place." class="" data-figcaption="The city hall tower of Brussels near the Grand Place.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The city hall tower of Brussels near the Grand Place.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/winter/IMG_2745.jpeg" alt="The Anspach Boulevard in Brussels." class="" data-figcaption="The Anspach Boulevard in Brussels.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Anspach Boulevard in Brussels.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/winter/IMG_2753.jpeg" alt="A road near Saint-Catherine in Brussels." class="" data-figcaption="A road near Saint-Catherine in Brussels.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A road near Saint-Catherine in Brussels.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/winter/IMG_2759.jpeg" alt="Train tracks from Brussels to Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="Train tracks from Brussels to Leuven.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Train tracks from Brussels to Leuven.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/winter/IMG_2839.jpeg" alt="A cold morning in Brussels North Station." class="" data-figcaption="A cold morning in Brussels North Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A cold morning in Brussels North Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/winter/IMG_2851.jpeg" alt="The sun going down near the Rogier metro station." class="" data-figcaption="The sun going down near the Rogier metro station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The sun going down near the Rogier metro station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/winter/IMG_2859.jpeg" alt="On my way to Brussels after a night that brought us a bit of snow." class="" data-figcaption="On my way to Brussels after a night that brought us a bit of snow.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">On my way to Brussels after a night that brought us a bit of snow.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>Lately I've been taking pictures whenever I'm traveling between Leuven and Brussels.</p>
<p>The days are getting longer again, and the sun has been rising and setting during the morning and evening rush hours. It gives me a sense of calm during these moments when the daily commute is anything but.</p>
Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe, Japan
2019-02-04T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Kobe, Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> 1 day (+ overnight stay)<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9690.jpg" alt="A bridge near the Meriken Park in Kobe." class="" data-figcaption="A bridge near the Meriken Park in Kobe.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A bridge near the Meriken Park in Kobe.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>After finding our way through the maze that is Osaka Station (seriously, it's a gigantic and confusing underground labyrinth) we took a short train ride to <strong>Kobe</strong>, a port town to the west of Osaka, and world famous for its local speciality dish: <strong>Kobe beef</strong>.</p>
<!--excerpt-->
<h2>Eating Kobe beef at Ishida</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9638.jpg" alt="Our slice of meat, ready to be grilled." class="" data-figcaption="Our slice of meat, ready to be grilled.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our slice of meat, ready to be grilled.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9635.jpg" alt="Our wagyu appetisers." class="" data-figcaption="Our wagyu appetisers.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our wagyu appetisers.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9644.jpg" alt="Our Kobe beef on the teppanyaki grill." class="" data-figcaption="Our Kobe beef on the teppanyaki grill.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our Kobe beef on the teppanyaki grill.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9647.jpg" alt="A salad as our side dish, to (slightly) offset all the fat of the steak." class="" data-figcaption="A salad as our side dish, to (slightly) offset all the fat of the steak.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A salad as our side dish, to (slightly) offset all the fat of the steak.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9650.jpg" alt="Our slices of Kobe beef." class="" data-figcaption="Our slices of Kobe beef.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our slices of Kobe beef.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After dropping off our luggage at our hotel (which was located on the artificial Port Island, and reachable by a short and fully automated train ride over the water on the Port Liner line) we went straight to a beef restaurant near the <strong>Kobe-Sannomiya Station</strong> called <strong>Ishida</strong> (they have multiple locations across the city), where we ordered the <strong>lunch menu</strong>. This menu consisted of <strong>roast beef as an appetiser, a salad, fried rice, and the illustrious Kobe beef as the main dish</strong>.</p>
<p>These beef restaurants are based around <strong>tables with teppanyaki grills in the middle</strong>, where the chef will prepare your piece of meat right in front of you. It's part show, part practicality, as this ensures that you can eat the meat right after it has been cooked to preserve the taste as much as possible.</p>
<p>Kobe beef is known to be one of the many <strong>high quality variants of wagyu</strong> (a catch-all term for <strong>Japanese beef</strong>, which is also the literal translation of the word). Legend has it that they serve the animals beer and massage them, but apparently its flavour is just a result of a <strong>highly strict and regulated breeding process</strong>.</p>
<p>One of the characteristics of Kobe beef is its <strong>very high concentration of fat</strong>, which is clearly visible in the <strong>marbling</strong> of the meat. The amount of fat is so high, in fact, that the chef doesn't need to add butter or oil to the griddle, they just cut off a piece of the fat to oil up the plate.</p>
<p>After reading up on everyone raving about the taste of the beef I have to be honest: you could taste that the quality was very high, but the beef was a bit of a disappointment for me. Yes, it melts straight away in your mouth, and yes, it's totally different from any other beef I've ever had, but I'm not too keen on the <strong>super fatty and oily beef taste</strong> (and yes, I know that's the point of Kobe beef). However, I'm glad that we tried it.</p>
<h2>Walking around the streets of Kobe</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9628.jpg" alt="Walking through one of the overpasses on Port Island." class="" data-figcaption="Walking through one of the overpasses on Port Island.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Walking through one of the overpasses on Port Island.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9673.jpg" alt="A statue at the Ikuta shrine." class="" data-figcaption="A statue at the Ikuta shrine.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A statue at the Ikuta shrine.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9692.jpg" alt="The Great Hanshin Earthquake Memorial." class="" data-figcaption="The Great Hanshin Earthquake Memorial.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Great Hanshin Earthquake Memorial.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9704.jpg" alt="A small street near the Chome area in Kobe." class="" data-figcaption="A small street near the Chome area in Kobe.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A small street near the Chome area in Kobe.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/kobe/IMG_9710.jpg" alt="One of the many walking bridges over the busy streets in the center of Kobe." class="" data-figcaption="One of the many walking bridges over the busy streets in the center of Kobe.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of the many walking bridges over the busy streets in the center of Kobe.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After our lunch we strolled around the city a bit to burn some of the excessive calories we obtained at the restaurant (on paper these beef sets might look small, but it's <strong>quite filling</strong> in reality).</p>
<p>Something that we noticed right away was that there's some sort of <strong>permanent beef smell</strong> in the air near the crowded areas. The local food industry clearly embraces its reputation as a beef paradise.</p>
<p>We went to check out a few small shrines in the area (like the <strong>Ikuta shrine</strong> near Sannomiya Station), walked through <strong>Chinatown</strong> (where there were lots of food stalls selling small Kobe beef snacks - which we didn't try, we were still stuffed) and landed at the <strong>Meriken Park</strong>, a small quiet park near the water, with a small memorial for the victims of the <strong>Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake</strong> in which more than 6,000 people lost their lives. The memorial shows a part of the damaged park, in the state it was in after the 1995 disaster.</p>
<p>We then walked to the north of the city for the <strong>Shin-Kobe Ropeway</strong>, a sightseeing spot with a <strong>view over the city</strong>. But alas: the ropeway was closed that day and it was getting a bit too late to do the full hike to the top, so we took a train to our hotel, went to the local Lawsons store to get something cheap to eat (we spent our daily budget on the beef), watched the recap of the sumo championship that day, before hitting the sack to get some much needed sleep.</p>
<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan.html">Our travel video of Japan</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan.html">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan.html">Visiting Nikko for half a day</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan.html">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan.html">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan.html">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan.html">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe (this post!)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan.html">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan.html">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
Chinese New Year in Leuven
2019-02-11T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/11/chinese-new-year-in-leuven/
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/blog/IMG_2943-4.jpeg" alt="Chinese dragons roaming the streets of Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="Chinese dragons roaming the streets of Leuven.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Chinese dragons roaming the streets of Leuven.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Last weekend the Chinese community of Leuven celebrated their start of the new year for the first time in Leuven. The weather was awful (lots of wind and tons of nearly ice cold rain descended on us), but we quite enjoyed the exhibition shows of the local martial arts and dancing groups, and the march through the city with the dragons leading the way.</p>
<p>Here's to a great Year of the Pig!</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/blog/IMG_2933-3.jpeg" alt="The dragon puppets, ready to come alive." class="" data-figcaption="The dragon puppets, ready to come alive.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The dragon puppets, ready to come alive.</figcaption>
</figure>
Place Rogier - Brussels
2019-02-14T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/14/rogier-brussels/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/blog/IMG_2963-3.jpeg" alt="A picture of the sun rising at Place Rogier in Brussels."></p>
Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb - Japan
2019-02-17T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Hiroshima, Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> 1 day<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9796.jpg" alt="Looking over the Motoyasu river, with the Atomic Bomb Dome on the right." class="" data-figcaption="Looking over the Motoyasu river, with the Atomic Bomb Dome on the right.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Looking over the Motoyasu river, with the Atomic Bomb Dome on the right.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Hiroshima is one of those cities that symbolise a key moment in the history of our world: it was the <strong>first city to be attacked with an atomic bomb</strong>, which was a turning point at the end of the Second World War, but at a significant human cost of <strong>more than 100,000 casualties</strong>. It had a profound effect on both Japan and the world at large, of which we still feel the results to this day.</p>
<!--excerpt-->
<h2>Hiroshima style okonomiyaki</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9785.jpg" alt="The entrance of Nagata-Ya, right after we left." class="" data-figcaption="The entrance of Nagata-Ya, right after we left.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The entrance of Nagata-Ya, right after we left.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9772.jpg" alt="The chefs preparing our okonomiyaki." class="" data-figcaption="The chefs preparing our okonomiyaki.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The chefs preparing our okonomiyaki.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9777.jpg" alt="Our Hiroshima style okonomiyaki." class="" data-figcaption="Our Hiroshima style okonomiyaki.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our Hiroshima style okonomiyaki.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>Before going to the Peace Memorial Museum we went to drop off our luggage at a <strong>specialised locker service in Hiroshima Station</strong> for a few hundreds Yen. This kept us from having to drag along our stuff across the city, as we wouldn't be staying overnight in Hiroshima. It's a <strong>cheap and hassle free</strong> way of keeping our things safe.</p>
<p>We went to eat <strong>okonomiyaki</strong> in a restaurant called <strong>Nagata-Ya</strong>, around 20 meters from where the bomb was dropped. Hiroshima style okonomiyaki differs from the Osaka style. The one in Hiroshima is made with noodles, and the ingredients aren't as mixed together as those in Osaka. These okonomiyakis are different from each other with their own distinct taste, but truth be told: I really loved both styles, and I can't say I prefer one over the other.</p>
<p>We went to the restaurant a bit before noon, which apparently was an excellent choice as the place was starting to get flooded by people when we left just after noon.</p>
<h2>Peace Memorial Park</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9801.jpg" alt="A monument at the memorial." class="" data-figcaption="A monument at the memorial.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A monument at the memorial.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9817.jpg" alt="The Cenotaph for the Atomic Bomb victims." class="" data-figcaption="The Cenotaph for the Atomic Bomb victims.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Cenotaph for the Atomic Bomb victims.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After our lunch we went straight to the <strong>Peace Memorial Park</strong> across the bridge. This park used to be the <strong>commercial center</strong> of the city, but the atomic blast destroyed everything, and after the war this place was kept as a <strong>memorial for the victims</strong>. It's <strong>a very serene place</strong>, with a few statues and thousands of paper cranes made by both local children and children from all around the world.</p>
<p>We talked to a local man named Jin about <strong>international politics</strong>, and the (lack of) self defense systems of Japan, which was a hot topic amongst the Japanese in those months (North Korea launched a test missile over Hokkaido a few months earlier). Given the location and the timing this talk was quite impactful to us.</p>
<h2>Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9819.jpg" alt="The main building of the museum. It was closed during our visit, so the collection was visible in the building on the left." class="" data-figcaption="The main building of the museum. It was closed during our visit, so the collection was visible in the building on the left.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The main building of the museum. It was closed during our visit, so the collection was visible in the building on the left.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9823.jpg" alt="A projection inside of the museum." class="" data-figcaption="A projection inside of the museum.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A projection inside of the museum.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9827.jpg" alt="A moving projection of the blast radius over the city. The map has a before and after view, of which the latter one is a horrifying visualisation of the destruction caused by the bomb." class="" data-figcaption="A moving projection of the blast radius over the city. The map has a before and after view, of which the latter one is a horrifying visualisation of the destruction caused by the bomb.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A moving projection of the blast radius over the city. The map has a before and after view, of which the latter one is a horrifying visualisation of the destruction caused by the bomb.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>The largest building of the museum was being renovated when we were there, so the collection was moved to a <strong>temporary location</strong>, in a building that's a lot smaller than the regular museum.</p>
<p>The collection of the museum mostly consists of a large array of <strong>archival footage</strong> of the city <strong>before the bomb</strong>, and <strong>the months right after</strong>. It's a shocking look at how an event of a few seconds can alter (and end) the lives of thousands of people.</p>
<p>Even more horrifying are the <strong>video testimonials of locals</strong> that describe in great detail the moments after the bomb hit, what they felt, who they lost and what they thought it was at that time. It's a surreal thing to talk about, something that's unimaginable to most people.</p>
<p>In the museum there was also a massive <strong>timeline of all the events that lead to the development and deployment of the bomb</strong>, how the <strong>Japanese empire reacted and crumbled</strong>, and how it <strong>affects geopolitics to this day</strong>. It really puts everything in perspective, and it made one thing very clear to me: <strong>peace is fragile and it can disappear in a flash.</strong></p>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9868.jpg" alt="The Atomic Bomb Dome." class="" data-figcaption="The Atomic Bomb Dome.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Atomic Bomb Dome.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9838.jpg" alt="The Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall, an underground monument aiming to save the memories of the survivors of the attack." class="" data-figcaption="The Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall, an underground monument aiming to save the memories of the survivors of the attack.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall, an underground monument aiming to save the memories of the survivors of the attack.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9846.jpg" alt="The walls contain - if I understood it correctly - a list of the survivors of the blast." class="" data-figcaption="The walls contain - if I understood it correctly - a list of the survivors of the blast.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The walls contain - if I understood it correctly - a list of the survivors of the blast.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>The museum was a <strong>must see</strong>, together with the <strong>Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall</strong> (a circular hall underground a few steps from the museum) and the <strong>Atomic Bomb Dome</strong> (an exhibition hall that survived the blast despite being one of the buildings closest to the explosion). It's an essential visit to understand the world a tiny bit better.</p>
<p>It's also a testament to the <strong>resilience of mankind</strong>, as there are few things in Hiroshima to remind of the disaster outside of the memorial, and together with cities that were also destroyed during the war (like Tokyo, which was nearly completely burnt to the ground by fire attacks) they are thriving nowadays.</p>
<h2>Hiroshima Castle Park</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9874.jpg" alt="The entrance of the Hiroshima Castle park." class="" data-figcaption="The entrance of the Hiroshima Castle park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The entrance of the Hiroshima Castle park.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9876.jpg" alt="Trees inside of the park." class="" data-figcaption="Trees inside of the park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Trees inside of the park.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/hiroshima/IMG_9883.jpg" alt="Hiroshima castle." class="" data-figcaption="Hiroshima castle.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Hiroshima castle.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After we were overwhelmed at the museum we went for a walk through the park of <strong>Hiroshima Castle</strong>. It's a big park surrounded by a moat, with quite a few big trees inside and a short hike up a small hill to reach the castle itself. We didn't visit the building itself, as we had to catch our train to our next destination: Miyajima.</p>
<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan.html">Our travel video of Japan</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan.html">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan.html">Visiting Nikko for half a day</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan.html">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan.html">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan.html">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan.html">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan.html">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb (this post!)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan.html">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama, Japan
2019-05-23T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan/
<p><strong>Location:</strong> Miyajima and Okayama, Japan<br>
<strong>Duration:</strong> An overnight stay + half a day in Miyaijma and the same in Okayama<br>
<strong>Period:</strong> March 2018</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0032.jpg" alt="The Great Tori during high tide." class="" data-figcaption="The Great Tori during high tide.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Great Tori during high tide.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan.html">After our trip to Hiroshima</a> we took a <strong>short boat ride</strong> (for which you can use a JR Pass!) to get to Miyajima, a small but beautiful island a bit south of our previous city.</p>
<p>We decided to stay on the island for the night, as we spent most of our other nights of our trip in cities or large villages.</p>
<!--excerpt-->
<h2>Miyajima (Itsukushima)</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_9930.jpeg" alt="The Great Torii, just as the sun was setting and the water was receding." class="" data-figcaption="The Great Torii, just as the sun was setting and the water was receding.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Great Torii, just as the sun was setting and the water was receding.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_9971.jpg" alt="The shopping streets are deserted in the evening." class="" data-figcaption="The shopping streets are deserted in the evening.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The shopping streets are deserted in the evening.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_9979.jpg" alt="A hotel at night." class="" data-figcaption="A hotel at night.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A hotel at night.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>We arrived at <strong>Itsukushima (the official name of Miyajima)</strong> in the evening, right as the sun was starting to set behind the mountains. We took this opportunity to quickly visit the main attraction of the island, <strong>the Great Torii</strong>, a gate that's located on the beach and is designed to be partly submerged in water during high tide, giving it a <strong>floating appearance</strong>.</p>
<p>By the time we arrived <strong>most tourists also seemingly left the island</strong>, and the sea was already slowly receding. While this low tide meant that we didn't see the gate in its most picturesque form, the view was still beautiful and we could walk right next to the water.</p>
<p>What surprised us was that there's really <strong>not a lot of things to do on the island in the evening</strong>. There are no convenience stores on the island, and the open restaurants in the area were either on the higher scale of the budget or small izakaya bars aimed at the few tourists that stay overnight.</p>
<p>We opted to eat in one of the izakayas and went to our hotel afterwards to get some rest.</p>
<h2>A second visit to the Great Tori</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_9983.jpg" alt="Our view outside of our window in the morning, with the Great Torii in the distance." class="" data-figcaption="Our view outside of our window in the morning, with the Great Torii in the distance.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Our view outside of our window in the morning, with the Great Torii in the distance.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_9993.jpg" alt="Looking at the mountain peaks from the busy shopping streets in Miyajima." class="" data-figcaption="Looking at the mountain peaks from the busy shopping streets in Miyajima.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Looking at the mountain peaks from the busy shopping streets in Miyajima.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0003.jpg" alt="The torii gate as seen from one of the viewing points around it." class="" data-figcaption="The torii gate as seen from one of the viewing points around it.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The torii gate as seen from one of the viewing points around it.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0014.jpg" alt="The deer of Miyajima are considerably more friendly than those in Nara." class="" data-figcaption="The deer of Miyajima are considerably more friendly than those in Nara.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The deer of Miyajima are considerably more friendly than those in Nara.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>We woke up to a beautiful morning and a <strong>cool sea breeze</strong> blowing through our windows. It really felt like we were in a <strong>totally remote place from the rest of Japan</strong>.</p>
<p>In the early morning the tourists flooded back to the island, much like the water that engulfed the beach by now and <strong>made the Great Torii finally float</strong>.</p>
<p>The area leading up to the gate was starkly different from yesterday. Most of the gift shops were back open, ready to get down to business with the sightseers. As expected the tori gate was packed with curious visitors, creating <strong>a line that extended far into the road leading up to the shrine complex itself</strong>. After taking a few obligatory pictures of the gate we decided to skip waiting in the crowds.</p>
<h2>Climbing Mount Misen</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0037.jpg" alt="A sign pointing us in the right direction." class="" data-figcaption="A sign pointing us in the right direction.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A sign pointing us in the right direction.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0039.jpg" alt="A bridge we crossed during our walk." class="" data-figcaption="A bridge we crossed during our walk.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A bridge we crossed during our walk.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0056.jpg" alt="Looking over the island in our cable car." class="" data-figcaption="Looking over the island in our cable car.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Looking over the island in our cable car.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>Instead, we decided to hike on <strong>Mount Misen</strong>, one of the numerous mountains on the island. At the start of our walk we were offered to buy a ticket for a bus ride to the base of the mountain, but we decided to enjoy the beautiful weather by <strong>walking on foot to the ropeways</strong>.</p>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0072.jpg" alt="The ropeway station at the top." class="" data-figcaption="The ropeway station at the top.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The ropeway station at the top.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0076.jpg" alt="Walking through the lush foliage at Mount Misen." class="" data-figcaption="Walking through the lush foliage at Mount Misen.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Walking through the lush foliage at Mount Misen.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0093.jpg" alt="The Misen Hondo temple near (but not quite at) the peak of Mount Misen." class="" data-figcaption="The Misen Hondo temple near (but not quite at) the peak of Mount Misen.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Misen Hondo temple near (but not quite at) the peak of Mount Misen.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0100.jpg" alt="Buddhist statues at Misen Hondo." class="" data-figcaption="Buddhist statues at Misen Hondo.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Buddhist statues at Misen Hondo.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0099.jpg" alt="The Reikado Hall." class="" data-figcaption="The Reikado Hall.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Reikado Hall.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0104.jpg" alt="A stunning view from the hiking trail (with the ropeway station visible on the left)." class="" data-figcaption="A stunning view from the hiking trail (with the ropeway station visible on the left).">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A stunning view from the hiking trail (with the ropeway station visible on the left).</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/miyajima/IMG_0124.jpg" alt="Back to the mainland." class="" data-figcaption="Back to the mainland.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Back to the mainland.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>After being dropped off at the top of the <strong>Miyajima Ropeway</strong> we went on for another walk to the <strong>Misen Hondo</strong> and the <strong>Reikado Hall</strong>, two shrines on the mountain, with a <strong>beautiful view</strong> over the sea in between the trees on the route. We totally <strong>underestimated the hike</strong> though, and skipped the last leg to the very peak of the mountain. Maybe it was too hot for this kind of activity? Or maybe our physique is just not up to par (no, that's impossible…). Anyway, we went back down to the elevator, went to eat oyster donburi in the village and took a boat back to the station to get to Okayama via the <strong>Shinkansen</strong>.</p>
<h2>Okayama</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0141.jpg" alt="Okayama in the evening." class="" data-figcaption="Okayama in the evening.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Okayama in the evening.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0156.jpg" alt="A cool looking fountain at Okayama Station." class="" data-figcaption="A cool looking fountain at Okayama Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A cool looking fountain at Okayama Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0160.jpg" alt="One of the many underground passages in Okayama." class="" data-figcaption="One of the many underground passages in Okayama.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of the many underground passages in Okayama.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0161.jpg" alt="A nifty looking pond in one of the passages in Okayama." class="" data-figcaption="A nifty looking pond in one of the passages in Okayama.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A nifty looking pond in one of the passages in Okayama.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>We chose to visit <strong>Okayama</strong> as a <strong>short stay-over on our way back to Tokyo</strong>. It's not a popular destination amongst foreign tourists, but after visiting nearly every major tourist destination in the central region of the country it was a fine break of pace.</p>
<p>The city is quite large and at a quick glance very similar to, say, Hiroshima. It's a modern city with <strong>tons of high rise concrete buildings</strong>, but it unfortunately <strong>lacks a bit of the charm</strong> of cities like Nara and Tokyo.</p>
<p>We arrived in the evening, went to look for food and snacks at a nearby supermarket, which we fashionably ate at our hotel before hitting the sack to get some much needed rest after our mountain hike.</p>
<h2>Okayama Castle</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0203.jpg" alt="Okayama Castle looking over the Asahi River." class="" data-figcaption="Okayama Castle looking over the Asahi River.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Okayama Castle looking over the Asahi River.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0184.jpg" alt="Another look at Okayama Castle." class="" data-figcaption="Another look at Okayama Castle.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Another look at Okayama Castle.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0193.jpg" alt="Looking over Okama on the top floor of the castle." class="" data-figcaption="Looking over Okama on the top floor of the castle.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Looking over Okama on the top floor of the castle.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>In the morning we took a bus to visit <strong>Okayama Castle</strong>, a reconstruction of a castle that was ruined during the second World War. The <strong>sturdy fortress</strong>, built with giant stones and black slabs, has a <strong>great view over the city</strong>, but unfortunately <strong>most of the signs are only written in Japanese</strong>, making it a bit hard to read up on its history during our visit.</p>
<h2>Korakuen Garden</h2>
<div class="image--gallery">
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0173.jpg" alt="The Yuejian Bridge over Asahi River that connects Okayama Castle to the Korakuen Garden." class="" data-figcaption="The Yuejian Bridge over Asahi River that connects Okayama Castle to the Korakuen Garden.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Yuejian Bridge over Asahi River that connects Okayama Castle to the Korakuen Garden.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0213.jpg" alt="Exotic birds in Korakuen Garden." class="" data-figcaption="Exotic birds in Korakuen Garden.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Exotic birds in Korakuen Garden.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0215.jpg" alt="A large pond in the garden." class="" data-figcaption="A large pond in the garden.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A large pond in the garden.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2018/japan/okayama/IMG_0218.jpg" alt="These ponds also contain a ton of koi fishes." class="" data-figcaption="These ponds also contain a ton of koi fishes.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">These ponds also contain a ton of koi fishes.</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p>Right outside of the castle you can cross the small <strong>Yuejian Bridge</strong> over the <strong>Asahi River</strong> that leads to the <strong>Korakuen Garden</strong>, a large landscape garden with <strong>tons of exotic birds</strong> and <strong>koi fishes</strong> in its numerous ponds. It's also seemingly a popular location for taking your <strong>wedding photographs</strong>. We lost count on how many wedding gowns and heavy duty cameras we spotted during our short stroll through the park.</p>
<h3>Other posts about this trip</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2018/08/01/japan.html">Our travel video of Japan</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/02/tokyo-japan.html">Exploring the different neighbourhoods of Tokyo</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/05/nikko-japan.html">Visiting Nikko for half a day</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/12/ancient-kyoto-japan.html">Discovering the ancient history of Kyoto</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/13/burning-torches-in-nara-japan.html">Burning torches at the Omizutori festival in Nara</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/01/24/sumo-honbasho-osaka-japan.html">Attending a sumo honbasho in Osaka</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/04/kobe-beef-japan.html">Eating Wagyu beef and walking around in Kobe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/02/17/hiroshima-atomic-bomb-japan.html">Hiroshima and the aftermath of the atomic bomb</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/23/miyajima-okayama-japan.html">Climbing Mount Misen in Miyajima and a quick stopover in Okayama (this post!)</a></li>
<li>Hakone (coming soon)</li>
<li>Hakodate (coming soon)</li>
<li>Sapporo (coming soon)</li>
<li>Otaru/Yoichi/Noboribetsu (coming soon)</li>
</ul>
Playdate - a new handheld console by Panic
2019-05-25T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/05/25/playdate/
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/blog/Playdate-model-shot.jpeg" alt="A press shot of the Playdate (© Panic)." class="" data-figcaption="A press shot of the Playdate (© Panic).">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A press shot of the Playdate (© Panic).</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This week <a href="https://panic.com/">Panic</a> announced <a href="https://play.date/">Playdate</a>, a quirky new yellow handheld console with a black and white screen and a crank. <strong>It's wonderfully bizarre</strong>, and I want to order one ASAP.</p>
<p>For long-time Apple users in the web and design sector <strong>Panic</strong> probably doesn't need an introduction anymore: they created a host of great apps, like <strong>Transmit</strong> (an FTP client), <strong>Coda</strong> (a web development app) and <strong>Prompt</strong> (an SSH client for iOS). They've also published the excellent game <strong>Firewatch</strong> and will release <strong>Untitled Goose Game</strong> somewhere this year (really looking forward to that one!).</p>
<p>With Playdate, however, they're finding themselves out of their usual software expertise and created a hardware device that totally goes against the grain, and I love it for that:</p>
<ul>
<li>It's <strong>tiny</strong> (you can <a href="https://play.date/media/">view a model in Augmented Reality on their media page</a> if you're on an iOS device)</li>
<li>It has a <strong>black and white screen</strong> (not greyscale) with a <strong>low resolution</strong> of 400x240 pixels and <strong>no backlight</strong></li>
<li><strong>It doesn't have big-name games</strong> announced for it, and it probably won't in the future</li>
<li>There are just <strong>12 games announced</strong>, and they will be released <strong>week by week</strong></li>
<li>It has <strong>just a few buttons (and a cute crank)</strong> for controls</li>
<li>In fact, it doesn't even run Android or Linux, Panic created <strong>their own operating system</strong> specifically for this device.</li>
</ul>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/blog/playdate-ar.jpeg" alt="A 3D model of a Playdate in Augmented Reality, next to a Nintendo Switch for scale." class="" data-figcaption="A 3D model of a Playdate in Augmented Reality, next to a Nintendo Switch for scale.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A 3D model of a Playdate in Augmented Reality, next to a Nintendo Switch for scale.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It's fun and weird and I think it's great that the Playdate <strong>forces developers to be creative</strong> by the lack of tons of buttons (or a touch screen) and a fairly limiting screen. It reminds me a bit of the original <strong>Game Boy</strong>, where the original launch games were short and simplistic (like Super Mario Land, Alleway and, of course, Tetris), but after some time developers started to work with these limitations to create ambitious adventures like The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening and Pokémon Gold/Silver. I'm hopeful that developers will see these limitations as opportunities to <strong>create something new and fresh</strong>, and I'm excited to see it play out when it launches somewhere next year.</p>
My favourite announcements at Apple's WWDC 2019
2019-06-09T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/06/09/apple-wwdc-keynote/
<p>Apple held its yearly Worldwide Developers Conference again last week for the developers on their platforms. It always starts with <strong>a big keynote on Monday</strong>, where Apple shows the rest of the world what's coming up for all of its platforms in the near future. Contrary to, say, their yearly iPhone event in September, this keynote always puts the focus on their software. Likewise, I follow these events very closely to see what will change for me in the next months, both as a developer and as a user of their systems.</p>
<p>You can watch <a href="https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2019/101/">the full Keynote on Apple's website</a>, and if you're interested in learning more in depth, you're free to check their developer portal for <a href="https://developer.apple.com/videos/wwdc2019/">a list of all presentations of the week</a> (if you just want to see a more in depth presentation of their software updates, I can highly recommend their <a href="https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2019/103/">Platforms State of the Union talk</a>).</p>
<p>For me, these were the things that interested me the most:</p>
<h2>iOS 13 (for iPhone)</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/wwdc/Apple-ios-13-photos-screen-iphone-xs-06032019.jpg" alt=""></p>
<p>This was - in my opinion - a rather small update. It's not really surprising as iOS is getting pretty mature by this point, so I don't really mind it. The system is finally getting a <strong>dark mode</strong> (which I probably won't use), the Photos app is getting revamped (with an <strong>algorithmic overview of your images</strong>, and <strong>video editing capabilities</strong> - you can finally crop and apply filters to your clips), and the other built-in apps are getting small but useful tweaks. Nothing earth shattering, but iOS is already very robust.</p>
<h2>iPadOS</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/wwdc/Apple_iPadOS_Apple-Pencil_060319.jpg" alt=""></p>
<p>The new operating system for iPad is getting a significant overhaul this time around, and it will also sport a new name: <strong>iPadOS</strong>. We'll have to see what this name change will really mean for the development of the platform. Does this new name only signify that the iPad will have a slightly different feature set as the iPhone? Or will this allow Apple to release new versions of iPadOS on a different schedule than iOS? Only time will tell.</p>
<p>This update was something that I was looking forward to, as I tend to use my iPad for basically everything that's not client related work. I write and update this website from my iPad, I edit all my photos and videos on this device, I do my drawings and design mockups with the Apple Pencil and I do most of my web surfing and email from this tablet. If I could, I would like to use my iPad way more in a professional setting, but at the time there are just too many roadblocks to make this feasible.</p>
<p>This upcoming release of iPadOS brings the ecosystem a whole lot closer to a full blown productivity device, and it's basically everything I wanted to happen (except for an iPad version of Xcode, but oh well):</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Better multitasking:</strong> it will be a ton easier to change between apps in multitasking by swiping at the bottom of the app to switch. Apps also get the ability to open multiple windows which you can put next to each other or next to other apps.</li>
<li><strong>Mouse support:</strong> this was not shown during the keynote, but you can now connect a Bluetooth mouse to your iPad as an accessibility option. You can even assign shortcuts to each button on the mouse.</li>
<li><strong>System wide Apple Pencil palettes:</strong> Apple now provides an API to give developers the possibility to add Pencil support without having to write their own system. The Apple Pencil is not widely supported in apps for the moment, so this is a welcome addition.</li>
<li><strong>USB drive support:</strong> this is the biggest new feature for me. I use my iPad as my only computer when I'm traveling, and this will help tremendously with transfering RAW images from my camera or videos from my phone to my iPad to edit them and back them up. You can already plug in USB devices, but you can only import images/videos directly to your Photo Library. This makes it clunky and confusing, as I don't want these raw files cluttering up my library before I edit them. This new feature gives the user the option to just copy these files in a directory in the Files app, and it's also not limited to photos/videos anymore.</li>
<li><strong>Zip and unzip archives:</strong> the Files app now also supports extracting files from .zip archives. It's not something I will use daily, but I've had situations where people send me zip files and I didn't have my laptop with me, so it will be great to review these files in a pinch (this was possible before via other apps too, but it was not user friendly at all).</li>
<li><strong>Scroll bars:</strong> you can now touch the scroll bars on the right side of the screen, so you can jump where you need to go directly, without having to swipe 10 times in a row to get to the bottom of the page.</li>
<li><strong>Updates to Safari:</strong> Safari on iPad used to be more or less the same on iPhone and iPad, and this meant that a lot of sites (like Google Drive and Figma) would just serve their mobile sites to iPad users. Most sites weren't affected all that much (as having a fully responsive website shouldn't differentiate between devices anyway), but a lot of those that didn't are used intensively by their users (as they're often quite complex web apps).<br>
iPadOS changes this by forcing websites to use their desktop versions when you use Safari in full screen mode. This brings the browser much closer to Safari on the Mac, so web apps will now function correctly and will behave like they should on a large screen. This upgrade of the browser also brings a slew of other changes to drastically improve the user experience:
<ul>
<li>Safari now has a <strong>download manager</strong>, so you can download files from sites like WeTransfer and Box straight to the file system (instead of having to juggle with the share sheet).</li>
<li>The user can set their desired <strong>preferences per site</strong> (like zoom levels).</li>
<li><strong>The number of shortcuts is greatly expanded</strong> when using a physical keyboard (you can now zoom in and out with the keyboard, save pages, download links via a shortcut, etc…).</li>
<li>Interestingly, Safari automatically adjusts to the mobile version of a website if the screen gets small enough (like when you are multitasking). You can also force to load the mobile version of websites by holding down on the refresh button for a while.</li>
<li><strong>Hover events</strong>: as tablets don't have the possibility to check if the user is hovering over an element (you're either touching the element or you're not), Safari changes hover events to click events if the resulting changes to the page are meaningful (e.g. if hovering over an element only changes the color of the element Safari will ignore the hover, but if it changes the content of the page it will trigger this change when the user clicks on the element). This works in most instances, but sometimes it doesn't detect these events correctly, causing the page to ignore important stuff. The latest version of Safari will optimise this behaviour to be more reliable.</li>
<li><strong>Frames inside of a page will now be automatically hardware accelerated.</strong> In the current version these subframes are not accelerated, causing them to be a stuttery mess when you try to scroll through them.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<p>It's worth it to <a href="https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2019/203/">check out the full presentation on Safari for iPad</a> if you're interested in the details of these changes.</p>
<h2>WatchOS</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/wwdc/apple-watchos6_noise-app_060319.jpg" alt=""></p>
<p>Each update to WatchOS brings small changes that make the Watch a tiny bit better, but these things add up. It's a slow but steady process that makes the device more interesting to own each passing year (and it caused me to finally bite the bullet and get a Series 3 Watch a year ago).</p>
<p>This year is no different: most of the changes don't drastically overhaul the functionality of the Watch, but they are nice nonetheless:</p>
<ul>
<li>The Watch now supports <strong>fully independent apps:</strong> you don't need your iPhone anymore to install and run apps, so your entire app can live and breath on your wrist.</li>
<li><strong>Extended runtime:</strong> apps are now also allowed to keep on running in the background (instead of getting shut down after a relatively short time right now). This is a great change that will make tracking apps a lot more useful (like sleep trackers that wake you up after a certain point in the morning)</li>
<li>Apple also added a bunch of new <strong>health related features:</strong>
<ul>
<li><strong>Apple Watch will get a decibel meter:</strong> as someone who spent <a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/concerts">way too much time at concerts</a> in the past, I'm fully aware of the risks of loud environments, and having an app that automatically alerts you in potentially dangerous situations is a great feature. I'm curious to see how accurate this meter will be, though.</li>
<li><strong>Activity Trends:</strong> the Health app will put your activity on a timeline, so you can check if you're improving your workout routine or if you're slacking.</li>
<li><strong>Menstrual cycle tracking:</strong> this is also a small yet great feature to keep track of your menstrual cycle.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<h2>Mac Pro and Pro Display XDR</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/wwdc/Apple_mac_pro_new_display_final_cut_screen_060319.jpg" alt=""></p>
<p>So yeah, these new pro devices are super cool and look ridiculously powerful, but there's no way for me to justify getting them (and I also don't have the funds to make this even remotely possible). If you're in the niche that Apple is trying to serve (medium to high end media production on tight deadlines) you're probably already making room on your desk for this huge screen and heavy tower.</p>
<h2>macOS Catalina</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/wwdc/Apple-macOS-Catalina-sidecar-tethered-woman-drawing-06032019.jpg" alt=""></p>
<p>Like most years prior to 2019, the Mac doesn't get as much flashy updates as the other platforms, but there are a few things of note for power users:</p>
<ul>
<li>The default <strong>Bash Unix Shell is getting replaced by Zsh</strong> for new users. Zsh has some nice usability features over Bash (like better autocompletion, colors and case insensitivity).</li>
<li>Safari gets a <strong>CPU Usage Timeline</strong> where developers can easily monitor CPU usage for drawing and running scripts. (You can already <a href="https://developer.apple.com/safari/technology-preview">try this out in the Technology Preview</a></li>
<li><strong>Changes to security:</strong> macOS Catalina will be stored on a <strong>separate volume</strong> on the drive, <strong>Kernel Extensions</strong> will run separately from the protected OS environment (greatly reducing security threats), and <strong>apps will need to ask for permission to access user folders</strong>, so they can't silently go through your personal files.</li>
<li>You can now <strong>use your iPad as a second monitor with Sidecar</strong>. You could already do this with other apps (like Astropad and Duet Display), but it's nice that it's fully integrated right into the operating system. Like Astropad, you can also use your pencil to basically turn your iPad into a Wacom Cintiq, so you can draw directly on the screen in Photoshop and Illustrator.</li>
<li><strong>Project Catalyst:</strong> developers can now (relatively) easily convert their iPad apps to Mac apps by adding the Mac as a build target in Xcode. The interface paradigm between both platforms vastly differs, so developers will still need to put in quite a lot of work to make their apps feel at home on the Mac, but this hopefully gives them more incentive to create apps for the Mac, something that's getting increasingly rare during the last few years.</li>
</ul>
<h2>SwiftUI</h2>
<p>This was the biggest thing for developers: instead of relying on two separate frameworks for creating interfaces (AppKit for the Mac, UIKit for iOS - which will also work on the Mac via Catalyst), Apple is creating <strong>a whole new framework for all their devices</strong> at once, and simplifies the process immensely.</p>
<p>What does this mean for us? <strong>Developers can now write the same interface code for all Apple devices</strong>, from the tiny Apple Watch to the giant new 6k Mac screens. These different platforms all used to have their own frameworks, which meant that you had to switch around different code bases for each device category, adding a ton of work for those that had to implement these interfaces.</p>
<p>SwiftUI instead promises to streamline this process by vastly simplifying the code needed to create interfaces and, more importantly, by making this same code run on each of their platforms. It also has a fantastic looking preview tool that runs in real time in a simulator and on your devices themselves. It brings creating interfaces much closer to HTML and React, making it so much easier for a whole group of aspiring developers to jump in on the platform.</p>
<h2>Focus on privacy</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/wwdc/Apple_iPadOS_Sign-In_060319.jpg" alt=""></p>
<p>Another big theme at WWDC was a huge focus on privacy, which is great:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Sign In With Apple:</strong> Apple is offering an alternative to the ubiquitous Google/Facebook sign in buttons by creating their own API, with a neat feature: users can hide their own email addresses by having Apple generate a random email address (per app/site) that redirects incoming mail from the app/site to the regular address of the user, effectively making email addresses fully anonymous.</li>
<li>HomeKit data (like video streams from home security cameras) will get <strong>encrypted on the device of the users</strong> themselves and not on the servers of Apple, effectively making spying on users much harder.</li>
<li><strong>Location data usage by apps will be much more transparent:</strong> if an app uses your location in the background, the operating system will periodically show the user a map where all their location data for that app was retrieved. This screen will of course allow the user to opt out of this tracking straight away. It's a neat way to visualise data collection and to make users aware of what is being tracked.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Voice Control</h2>
<div class="videowrapper">
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/aqoXFCCTfm4" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</div>
<p>For a project I'm working on I tried out the accessibility features of iOS a few weeks ago, and more specifically the VoiceOver function that reads the content of the screen to the user. It's great that you can use your phone without being able to look at your screen, but it took me quite some time to figure out how the controls work.</p>
<p>The new Voice Control feature switches this up and brings accessibility to a whole new level. This system (for iOS, iPadOS and macOS) gives the user <strong>full control over their device by dictating straight forward sentences to do anything they want.</strong> For example: users can ask the device to click on a specific button anywhere on the page without having to navigate there, or they can simulate touch gestures like zooming in by asking the OS to perform that action. It's a big step up for accessibility.</p>
<p class="footnote">All images are © Apple 2019.</p>
The CN Tower in Toronto, Canada
2019-09-26T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/09/26/toronto-canada/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/blog/DSF9091-2.jpeg" alt="The CN Tower in Toronto, as seen from Ward's Island."></p>
Mechelen - Belgium
2019-11-18T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2019/11/18/mechelen/
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2019/blog/IMG_6487.jpeg" alt="Mechelen - Belgium." class="" data-figcaption="Mechelen - Belgium.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Mechelen - Belgium.</figcaption>
</figure>
Rue du Marché aux Fromages in Brussels in the morning
2020-01-12T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2020/01/12/rue-du-marche-aux-fromages/
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/brussels/rue-du-marche-aux-fromages_DSF0541.jpg" alt="Rue du Marché aux Fromages in Brussels in the morning." class="" data-figcaption="Rue du Marché aux Fromages in Brussels in the morning.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Rue du Marché aux Fromages in Brussels in the morning.</figcaption>
</figure>
Tips on Working From Home as a Web Developer
2020-03-29T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2020/03/29/working-from-home-web-dev/
<p>As more and more people are working from home at the moment due to the measures taken for <strong>Covid-19</strong>, I thought it might be interesting to write down some tips and tricks I've learned in the last couple of years while having my main desk at home.</p>
<p>As an <strong>independent web developer since 2016</strong>, I'm spending the majority of my working days at home. At first, not having to leave the house to get work done <strong>seems like a dream</strong>, but it took quite some time to find the <strong>right balance</strong> of work, life and general happiness.</p>
<p>Wether you're forced to stay at home or by choice: <strong>staying inside has some major benefits, but don't forget to take the pitfalls into account.</strong></p>
<h2>Your Work Space</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/wfh/home-office-desk.jpg" alt="My home office desk."></p>
<p>Not having to go to an office might give the impression that you might as well <strong>work wherever you want at home</strong>, but I highly suggest <strong>setting up a dedicated space</strong> for your computer for the foreseeable future. As the name implies, working from home still involves, well, working, and if you're working from, say, your couch (don't even think about working from your bed), you'll start to associate that place with work after a while.</p>
<p>If possible, try to create a work space in a spare room, and if that's not possible, sit at a table with a decent chair. <strong>Your sanity (and your back) will thank you later.</strong></p>
<h2>Working with Other People</h2>
<p>Fundamentally, working from home means you won't see your colleagues and clients face to face anymore.</p>
<p>It's still important to have some line of communication at your disposal to keep everyone on the same page, but modern apps and services allow for ways of working that are more tuned to the realities of being in another place than just using a phone to make calls.</p>
<h3>Try to Use Asynchronous Communication Channels</h3>
<p>In my opinion <strong>there's no point in trying to make working from home feel like you're working in the office.</strong> If you're working in an office it's quite easy to get everyone together in a meeting room, but you can't do this if everyone is at a different location.</p>
<p>While it's possible to set up a video call over Skype, Google Meet and Zoom, it's probably easier to <strong>embrace communicating asynchronously</strong>.</p>
<p>What does this mean? Basically: when you send or receive messages, <strong>you don't have to reply to them instantly</strong>. This takes away the pressure to drop everything on the spot to pick up the phone, so it's <em>way</em> easier to focus on the task at hand.</p>
<h4>Some <strong>tools</strong> optimised for this way of working</h4>
<ul>
<li><strong><a href="https://slack.com/">Slack</a>:</strong> the de facto standard for asynchronous messaging in the work place nowadays. You can create separate channels for each project, which keeps everything clean and tidy.</li>
<li><strong><a href="https://trello.com/">Trello</a>:</strong> an excellent project management tool to keep track of the things you have done and need to do.</li>
<li><strong><a href="https://www.git-scm.com/">Git</a>:</strong> version controle software that helps developers work together on code. Also very useful for developers to keep track of their code changes. Often used on <strong><a href="https://github.com/">GitHub</a></strong> or <strong><a href="https://bitbucket.org/">BitBucket</a></strong>.</li>
<li><strong>Email:</strong> tried and tested, this is still an excellent way of communication.</li>
</ul>
<h4>Some <strong>tips</strong> on working asynchronously</h4>
<ul>
<li><strong>Turn off notifications.</strong> If it's super important they will call you.</li>
<li><strong>Don't forget to share your progress with your team or client.</strong> When I push a new update to a site in development I try to send them a list of the changes, so they don't have to find out themselves after the fact.</li>
<li>If anyone shares their progress with you: <strong>confirm that you received and read it,</strong> even if you don't have any remarks.</li>
<li>Try to <strong>group your questions/remarks/progress</strong> in a single message per job. It's hard to follow along if you have to get through each message/mail one by one.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Online meetings</h3>
<p>Sometimes online meetings are still necessary. For example, <strong>talking to a new client</strong> is probably easier with video and audio, sometimes things are <strong>too hard to explain in text form</strong>, or you want to guide your client to a <strong>step by step process</strong>.</p>
<p>In these cases, <strong>make sure you've tested your audio and video settings</strong> beforehand (most tools, like Zoom, Google Meet and Skype have tests for this), and <strong>set up some rules</strong> for these situations with the people you're living with (don't let them turn up their music, wear headphones, don't have two meetings at the same time if they're sitting next to you, …).</p>
<h3>Be realistic with your timings</h3>
<p>Working from home is different in a lot of ways compared to the usual office stuff. Some people tend to get <strong>more stuff done at home</strong>, but others might <strong>work at a slower pace</strong>. We're going through some strange times so <strong>don't expect the output to be the same as before</strong>.</p>
<p>Also, if you're working on stuff that needs a lot of horsepower and you don't have your work desktop with you: <strong>let your team/client know that you won't work at the same speed.</strong></p>
<h3>Leave Your Work 'At Work'</h3>
<p><strong>Try not to work outside of your regular work hours.</strong> Working from home should not mean working longer without a good reason, so <strong>don't check your mails in the evening,</strong> and <strong>don't pick up the phone after regular working hours.</strong> And put your laptop away during the weekend.</p>
<h3>Prioritise</h3>
<p>This probably goes without saying, but <strong>give priority to projects and clients that are feeling the effects of the corona virus</strong> over projects that are not impacted.</p>
<h2>Stick to a Routine</h2>
<p>Most people have a relatively <strong>strict schedule</strong> when they're working outside of the house: they get up in the morning, they get dressed and have breakfast, they take a car or public transport and they arrive at the office. After work, they head home and (ideally) won't think about work until the next morning.</p>
<p>When working from home, this schedule often gets thrown out of the window, yet it might be <strong>a good idea to keep a routine.</strong> This way, you'll have a <strong>clear structure in your day,</strong> so you'll be able to <strong>focus better on your work</strong> and you'll be able to <strong>clear your head afterwards.</strong></p>
<p>Here are some personal routines that work for me at the moment:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Try to wake up at your regular time</strong> (unless you're usually waking up at an ungodly early hour, then by all means, stay in bed longer).</li>
<li><strong>Get dressed before starting your work day.</strong> This really helps me in feeling ready for the day.</li>
<li><strong>Check the day of the week before starting work.</strong> It sounds ridiculous but staying inside for days at a time can be very disorienting.</li>
<li><strong>Don't take long lunch breaks.</strong> I feel like taking long breaks at noon (more than 30 minutes) breaks up the day too much, so I try to make them short and sweet.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Saving Precious Time from your Commute</h2>
<p>Another part of not going into an office is that <strong>you won't have to endure traffic or your commute each day.</strong> While you might be tempted to just stay in bed longer or start working earlier, I'm finding this extra time to be great to work on other stuff:</p>
<h3>Cooking</h3>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/wfh/food.jpg" alt="A loaf of home made bread"><br>
One of the key parts of making working from home enjoyable for me is that I have tons of moments I can use to prepare food. Most of the time the recipes that I'm using are not hard, but <strong>they ask for some patience,</strong> so quite regularly I take my laptop near the kitchen so I can keep an eye on a sauce I'm making, or a roll of bread that's sitting in the oven.</p>
<h4>Some resources for inspiration:</h4>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.bingingwithbabish.com/">Binging With Babish</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.bonappetit.com/">Bon Appetit</a></li>
<li><a href="https://cooking.nytimes.com/">New York Times Cooking</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/legourmettv/videos">Glen & Friends Cooking</a></li>
</ul>
<h3>Learn and Read Stuff</h3>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/wfh/books.jpg" alt="A bunch of books"></p>
<p>These times are great for <strong>learning new stuff and improving your skills.</strong> Use your saved commute time as a way to read up on things you always wanted to learn more about but you never found the time for, or just use it to get through your untouched books on the shelf.</p>
<p>These are some things that I've been working through lately:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://aneventapart.com/news/videos">An Event Apart</a> recently uploaded tons of conference talks from last year. Great for learning more about the state of the web.</li>
<li>As always, <a href="https://css-tricks.com/">CSS-Tricks</a> and <a href="https://www.smashingmagazine.com/">Smashing Magazine</a> are great sites to improve your web skills.</li>
<li>Over the years JavaScript has been changing quite drastically, and I, like many others probably, often use the outdated syntax instead of the new, more streamlined ES2015 (and up) way of doing things. <a href="https://eloquentjavascript.net/">Eloquent Javascript</a> has been a great help in resetting my way of thinking about JavaScript as its clear writing will help both novice coders and more experienced veterans.</li>
<li><a href="https://reactjs.org/">The documentation of React</a> is quite good and perfect if you want to try out the framework.</li>
<li><a href="https://www.humblebundle.com/">Humble Bundle</a> often sells excellent programming books dirt cheap. At this moment they're selling a collection of O'Reilly books at an insanely low cost.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Pet Projects</h3>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/wfh/raspberry-pi.jpg" alt="A set of Raspberry Pi computers with an eInk and OLED screen"></p>
<p>Maybe you want to write about stuff, maybe you want to create a small app, maybe you want to get into photography, or maybe you have a bunch of Raspberry Pies lying around that you haven't used in ages. <strong>Use your extra time to finally work on these pet projects.</strong></p>
<h2>Other Tips During These Times</h2>
<ul>
<li><strong>Try not to check the news too much.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Reach out to your friends and colleagues</strong>, ask them how their day is going.</li>
<li><strong>Call your friends and family often</strong></li>
<li>Don't forget to <strong>relax.</strong> Play some video games, watch a movie, listen to some music, …</li>
</ul>
Video: 10 modern layouts in 1 line of CSS
2020-08-04T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2020/08/04/modern-layouts-css/
<p>Here's an excellent video by Una Kravets on using CSS Grid and Flexbox to easily create great looking layouts with simple lines of CSS code:</p>
<div class="videowrapper">
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/qm0IfG1GyZU" frameborder="0"></iframe>
</div>
<p>(Don't forget to play around with the examples on her <a href="https://1linelayouts.glitch.me/">demo site</a>)</p>
<p><a href="https://css-tricks.com/10-modern-layouts-in-1-line-of-css/">Via CSS-Tricks</a></p>
An end to 2020 - things I've listened to and played in 2020.
2021-01-05T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2021/01/05/2020-music-and-games/
<p>Happy new year! I don't think anyone can say that 2020 was a normal year with everything that went down in the world. I'm hopeful that 2021 will be better, but before we turn the page I wanted to write down a list of the stuff in media that made last year a bit more bearable.</p>
<h2>Music</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/blog/music-2020.jpg" alt=""></p>
<p>For the last couple of years I didn't pay much attention to new music, and I basically kept listening to the artists I was already familiar with and what The Algorithm (by Apple Music and/or Spotify) presented to me.</p>
<p>In 2020 I started to break away from this habit by actively looking for artists I've never heard of, even in genres I'm not really into, and we started to share new music among a bunch of friends to keep us busy during lockdown. Turns out that there was still plenty of good new music to discover this year!</p>
<h3>My favourite albums of 2020 (in alphabetic order)</h3>
<ul>
<li><strong>Billy Nomates</strong> - Billy Nomates</li>
<li><strong>Four Tet</strong> - Sixteen Oceans</li>
<li><strong>I Like Trains</strong> - KOMPROMAT</li>
<li><strong>Jessie Ware</strong> - What's Your Pleasure</li>
<li><strong>Kelly Lee Owens</strong> - Inner Song</li>
<li><strong>Nadine Shah</strong> - Kitchen Sink</li>
<li><strong>Phoebe Bridgers</strong> - Punisher</li>
<li><strong>Run The Jewels</strong> - RTJ4</li>
<li><strong>Working Men's Club</strong> - Working Men's Club</li>
</ul>
<h3>A bunch of great songs released this year</h3>
<ul>
<li><strong>Phoebe Bridgers</strong> - Moon Song</li>
<li><strong>Deradoorian</strong> - Saturnine Night</li>
<li><strong>Billy Nomates</strong> - Call In Sick</li>
<li><strong>HAIM</strong> - Los Angeles</li>
<li><strong>Sharon Van Etten</strong> - Let Go</li>
<li><strong>Nation of Language</strong> - The Wall & I</li>
<li><strong>Pillow Queens</strong> - Gay Girls</li>
<li><strong>Khruangbin</strong> - So We Won't Forget</li>
<li><strong>This Is the Kit</strong> - This Is What You Did</li>
<li><strong>Porridge</strong> - Long</li>
<li><strong>Arab Strap</strong> - The Turning of Our Bones</li>
<li><strong>Four Tet</strong> - Insect Near Piha Beach</li>
<li><strong>Rudy De Anda</strong> - Espume</li>
<li><strong>Burial, Four Tet & Thom Yorke</strong> - Her Revolution</li>
<li><strong>Keleketla! & Coldcut</strong> - Freedom Groove</li>
<li><strong>Cold War Kids</strong> - Ceiling Fan</li>
<li><strong>Run The Jewels</strong> - walking in the snow</li>
<li><strong>Animal Collective</strong> - Piggy Knows</li>
<li><strong>Moses Boyd & Obongjayar</strong> - Dancing in the Dark</li>
<li><strong>Waxahatchee</strong> - St. Cloud</li>
<li><strong>Michael Stipe & Big Red Machine</strong> - No Time For Love Like Now</li>
<li><strong>Hamilton Leithauser</strong> - Wack Jack</li>
<li><strong>Tom Misch & Yussef Dayes</strong> - Tidal Wave</li>
<li><strong>Skiska Skooper</strong> - Dreamgazer</li>
<li><strong>Riz Ahmed</strong> - Mogambo</li>
<li><strong>Austra</strong> - Risk It</li>
<li><strong>I Break Horses</strong> - I'll Be the Death of You</li>
<li><strong>Benjamin the Room</strong> - Home</li>
<li><strong>Nadine Shah</strong> - Kitchen Sink</li>
<li><strong>Jessie Ware</strong> - Soul Control</li>
<li><strong>Wye Oak</strong> - AEIOU</li>
<li><strong>Smith & Burrows</strong> - All the Best Moves</li>
<li><strong>Working Men's Club</strong> - Teeth</li>
<li><strong>Kelly Lee Owens</strong> - Melt!</li>
<li><strong>I Like Trains</strong> - The Truth</li>
</ul>
<h2>Games I've played in 2020</h2>
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/blog/hades.jpg" alt=""></p>
<p>Despite having plenty of time during our various lockdowns this year I didn't go all overboard with playing games.
This list doesn't contain just games released in 2020, but also games that I first played this year.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Super Mario 3D All-Stars</strong> (Nintendo Switch): 2 classic games (Mario 64 and Super Mario Galaxy) and 1 ok-ish game (Mario Sunshine) in one package. I played those games to death already when they were new, but they're still great.</li>
<li><strong>Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore</strong> (Nintendo Switch): a traditional JRPG wrapped in a saccharine JPOP package. It's ridiculous but it works quite well.</li>
<li><strong>Animal Crossing: New Horizons</strong> (Nintendo Switch): this was a right place - right time game for me (and the rest of the world, apparently). The first few weeks (or months?) were great as everyone was slowly discovering all the nooks and crannies of this deliberately slow game, and I still occasionally boot it up to check up on my fellow villagers.</li>
<li><strong>What Remains of Edith Finch</strong> (Nintendo Switch): a very short game that reveals its secrets beautifully by using the gameplay as a vehicle for its moving story.</li>
<li><strong>A Short Hike</strong> (Nintendo Switch): even shorter than What Remains of Edith Finch, and it doesn't contain any new ideas, but it's all in the execution - a perfect feel good game that excels in its simplicity.</li>
<li><strong>Luftrausers</strong> (Playstation Vita): a quirky arcade game where you control a combat plane by alternating between shooting, racing through the sky and letting your plane stall to recover your health. Again, very simple but really addictive.</li>
<li><strong>Streets of Rage 4</strong> (Nintendo Switch): a direct sequel to the Megadrive/Genesis classics from the 90s, with a great multiplayer component and tons of things to unlock.</li>
<li><strong>Dragon Quest XI</strong> (Nintendo Switch): a cozy feel good game with few surprises, but sometimes that's all it takes to have a good (albeit very long) time.</li>
<li><strong>Hades</strong> (Nintendo Switch): I'm not really into these roguelike games where you play the same parts over and over again, but Hades ties this repetition to its story. A small thing on paper, but a huge difference in reality.</li>
<li><strong>Trine 4</strong> (Nintendo Switch): I'm currently playing this online with a bunch of friends. It's extremely buggy and it tends to disconnect every hour or so, but it's still plenty of fun.</li>
<li><strong>Divinity: Original Sin 2</strong> (Nintendo Switch): this is an amazing High Fantasy strategic RPG with an excellent battle system and fantastic world building. Made in Belgium, too!</li>
<li><strong>Doom Classic</strong> (Nintendo Switch): I played the shareware version of this game a lot on PC back in the day, but it took until now to finally play the full game. It still plays remarkably well.</li>
</ul>
Walks in Leuven
2021-02-07T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2021/02/07/walks/
<p>Some pictures taken during a few of our many (but not enough) walks in and around Leuven these past few months.</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/20201108-_DSF4103.jpg" alt="Kessel-Lo Provincial Domain." class="" data-figcaption="Kessel-Lo Provincial Domain.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Kessel-Lo Provincial Domain.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/20201108-_DSF4170.jpg" alt="A bird and a duck in the Kessel-Lo Provincial Domain." class="" data-figcaption="A bird and a duck in the Kessel-Lo Provincial Domain.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A bird and a duck in the Kessel-Lo Provincial Domain.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/20201121-IMG_9744.jpg" alt="The train tracks entering Leuven as seen from the Stoemperspad walking bridge." class="" data-figcaption="The train tracks entering Leuven as seen from the Stoemperspad walking bridge.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The train tracks entering Leuven as seen from the Stoemperspad walking bridge.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/20201121-_DSF4181.jpg" alt="The central University Library of Leuven, with trains in the foreground." class="" data-figcaption="The central University Library of Leuven, with trains in the foreground.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The central University Library of Leuven, with trains in the foreground.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/20201121-_DSF4190.jpg" alt="Leuven Station." class="" data-figcaption="Leuven Station.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Leuven Station.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/20201121-_DSF4218.jpg" alt="Saint John the Evangelist’s Church at Park Abbey in Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="Saint John the Evangelist’s Church at Park Abbey.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Saint John the Evangelist’s Church at Park Abbey.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/20201121-_DSF4261.jpg" alt="A tree at one of the lakes of Park Abbey in Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="A tree at one of the lakes of Park Abbey.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A tree at one of the lakes of Park Abbey.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/leuven-new-years-day-2.jpg" alt="The historical Town Hall and Saint Peter's Church on New Years Day in Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="The historical Town Hall and Saint Peter's Church on New Years Day.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The historical Town Hall and Saint Peter's Church on New Years Day.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/leuven-new-years-day.jpg" alt="The Bondgenotenlaan on New Years Day in Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="The Bondgenotenlaan on New Years Day.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Bondgenotenlaan on New Years Day.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/leuven-park-snow-1.jpg" alt="Snow in the Provincial Domain." class="" data-figcaption="Snow in the Provincial Domain.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Snow in the Provincial Domain.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/leuven-park-snow-2.jpg" alt="Ducks swimming around in the Provincial Domain." class="" data-figcaption="Ducks swimming around in the Provincial Domain.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Ducks swimming around in the Provincial Domain.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/leuven-park-snow-4.jpg" alt="A statue in the Provincial Domain." class="" data-figcaption="A statue in the Provincial Domain.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A statue in the Provincial Domain.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/leuven-rain.jpg" alt="The Bondgenotenlaan on a quiet, rainy morning in January." class="" data-figcaption="The Bondgenotenlaan on a quiet, rainy morning in January.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The Bondgenotenlaan on a quiet, rainy morning in January.</figcaption>
</figure>
Out and about with a Game Boy Camera
2021-02-15T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2021/02/15/game-boy-camera/
<p><img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/gbcamera/gameboy-camera-feb21.png" alt="Three pictures taken with a Game Boy Camera: a mansion, my girlfriend in front of a mansion, and trees."></p>
<p>After finding a Game Boy Camera for cheap some time ago I kept the thing inside of a drawer, waiting on the perfect time to slot them into my old Game Boy to take amazingly high resolution (128 x 112 pixels) photographs.</p>
<p>Yesterday I finally took out my cool retro toy on a stroll in the local park, which resulted in these pictures.</p>
<p>Using the Game Boy Camera to take pictures is easy: you turn on the Game Boy, you select the giant 'shoot' button, you point at whatever is recognisable through 4 shades of grey and you press the A button. The results are - as expected - extremely grainy and nearly indecipherable, but the charm is there and the look is unmistakingly unique from phones that take near flawless pictures nowadays.</p>
<figure data-nocaption="true">
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/gbcamera/IMG_0479.jpg" alt="A Game Boy Color with a Game Boy Camera inserted, with the lens pointing at trees in a park in Leuven, Belgium." class="" data-figcaption="A Game Boy Color with a Game Boy Camera inserted, with the lens pointing at trees in a park in Leuven, Belgium.">
</figure>
A review of potato chips flavors in Thailand
2021-02-21T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2021/02/21/thailand-potato-chips/
<p>Over the years we've found ourselves looking for weird and new potato chips flavors whenever we're traveling, as we've noticed that these snacks are popular all over the world, but the common flavors vary greatly across borders.</p>
<p>Most of the time we could find plain salted chips everywhere, but otherwise the default flavors are unique in each country.</p>
<p>For example: in Belgium Paprika chips is the most common flavor, in the United Kingdom it seems to be Salt & Vinegar. The United States apparently loves Sour Cream, and Japanese convenience stores are filled with Seaweed chips.</p>
<p>These snacks start to become interesting when you look for the unique flavors that you probably can't find anywhere else (like Wagyu Beef Chips in Japan), and as they tend to be dirt cheap and (often, but not always) delicious it shouldn't come as a surprise that we try them out as much as we can.</p>
<p>At the beginning of last year we found ourselves in Thailand, and of course we went to the local 7-11 convenience stores to find new chips flavors to discover. If we had room to spare in our stomach after eating all the other delicious dishes the country is known for, that is.</p>
<p>Here's a list of the things we ate, and what we thought of them:</p>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Mieng Kam Krob Ros Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Very noticable lemongrass flavor with an extra layer of lime. Not spicy at all. There's a faint taste of shrimp noticeable. Sweet.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Pretty good!</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-mieng-kam-krob-ros.jpg" alt="Lays Mieng Kam Krob Ros Flavor">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Saengwa Prawn Salad</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Fairly complex flavors: you can taste the mint, lime, lemongrass and shrimp all at the same time without them getting mixed up together. Maybe also a hint of fish sauce. Very refreshing and very close to the real dish.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Great.</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-saengwa-prawn-salad.jpg" alt="Lays Saengwa Prawn Salad">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Spicy Lobster</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Powdery texture, similar to Pringles chips. The lobster taste is refreshing and a bit salty. The dash of lime taste gives it a pleasant sourness. Slightly spicy.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Good.</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-spicy-lobster.jpg" alt="Lays Spicy Lobster">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays 2 in 1: Grilled Prawn and Seafood Sauce Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>2 types of chips mixed together in the same bag. Grilled Prawn: very dominant taste of prawn. Maybe a little bit too much to my liking. Surprisingly not spicy at all, but there's a subtle smokiness to its profile. Seafood Sauce Flavor: very sour taste (like the real condiment). A bit spicy, a bit sweet. </p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Decent but not really balanced.</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-grilled-prawn-and-seafood-sauce-flavor.jpg" alt="Lays 2 in 1: Grilled Prawn and Seafood Sauce Flavor">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Salted Egg Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Tastes like its name: like egg yolk and salt. Very bizarre taste, some will love it, but it could be off putting for many people. Creamy texture with a bit of funk. </p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> No, didn't like this at all.</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-salted-egg-flavor.jpg" alt="Lays Salted Egg Flavor">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Crab Curry Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Very pronounced yellow curry flavor. Slight sweet taste of crab, but very subtle. </p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Tasty!</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-crab-curry-flavor.jpg" alt="Lays Crab Curry Flavor">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Green Curry Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Tastes remarkably like real Thai green curry. The coconut milk flavor is very noticeable, together with Thai basil and a bit of lemongrass. Starts to become quite spicy after a while. </p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Good.</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-green-curry-flavor.jpg" alt="Lays Green Curry Flavor">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Taro Spicy Octopus Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Sticky texture, as if the surface is covered with a coat of sugar. Way too spicy but the octopus flavor itself is alright. Not a lot of chips inside of the bag.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Disappointing.</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/taro.jpg" alt="Taro Spicy Octopus Flavor">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Extra Barbecue Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Salty and covered with smokey barbecue spices. No heat.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Unremarkable. This seemed to be one of the default flavors in Thailand.</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-extra-barbecue-flavor.jpg" alt="Lays Extra Barbecue Flavor">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Sweet Basil Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Salty and sour (because of the lime). Also has a subtle tomato flavor? Hard to define. The sweetness of sweet basil is there. </p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Decent, but nothing too special. </p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-sweet-basil-flavor.jpg" alt="Lays Sweet Basil Flavor">
</div>
<div class="fiche-element">
<div class="fiche-content">
<h2>Lays Basil Chicken Flavor</h2>
<div class="fiche-text">
<p>Tastes like chicken stock and vegetable oil, with Thai basil on top and a subtle undertone of fried rice. A bit spicy, and the heat lingers on for quite a while afterwards. </p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Tasty.</p>
</div>
</div>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2020/thailand/chips/lays-basil-chicken-flavor.jpg" alt="Lays Basil Chicken Flavor">
</div>
Even more walks in Leuven
2021-04-11T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2021/04/11/more-walks/
<p>Another batch of photos of the things we've come across on our walks in Leuven lately.</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/IMG_0745.jpeg" alt="Handbooghof, Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="Handbooghof, Leuven.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Handbooghof, Leuven.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/IMG_0777.jpeg" alt="Kruidtuin (Botanical Garden), Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="Kruidtuin (Botanical Garden), Leuven.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Kruidtuin (Botanical Garden), Leuven.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/IMG_0787.jpeg" alt="Kruidtuin (Botanical Garden), Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="Kruidtuin (Botanical Garden), Leuven.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Kruidtuin (Botanical Garden), Leuven.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/IMG_0810.jpeg" alt="" class="" data-figcaption="A Magnolia tree in the Kruidtuin.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A Magnolia tree in the Kruidtuin.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/IMG_0824.jpeg" alt="The pond of the Kruidtuin (Botanical Garden) in Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="The pond of the Kruidtuin.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The pond of the Kruidtuin.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/IMG_0832.jpeg" alt="The entrance of the Kruidtuin (Botanical Garden) in Leuven." class="" data-figcaption="The entrance of the Kruidtuin.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">The entrance of the Kruidtuin.</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2021/leuven/IMG_0964.jpg" alt="A small pond near the De Bron park in Leuven, Belgium." class="" data-figcaption="A small pond near the De Bron park.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">A small pond near the De Bron park.</figcaption>
</figure>
Happy new year - notes on 2021
2022-01-25T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2022/01/25/2021-notes-music-and-games/
<p>Happy new year! (Even though we're already near the end of January)</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2022/blog/IMG_1756.jpg" alt="Getting vaccinated." class="" data-figcaption="Getting vaccinated.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Getting vaccinated.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We didn't have the sudden "halt" of public life in 2021 like we did last year during the first lockdown, and we as a society got a better understanding of the characteristics of the virus so it was a bit easier to live with the situation. Less uncertainty, more room for doing normal stuff.</p>
<p>It was really nice to meet up with friends again that we didn't see (at least not physically) for a year or so during the summer, and while we're being a bit more cautious at the moment due to the gigantic wave of Omicron cases everywhere, we're getting hopeful that we're moving in the right direction with Covid.</p>
<p>2021 was an exceptionally busy year for me:</p>
<ul>
<li>I started my own LLC called <strong>Studio Pompelmoes</strong>.</li>
<li>I worked together with quite a few great new clients on some exciting projects, while still taking care of my existing clients.</li>
<li>We finally started renovating our home. Hopefully this will be done for the most part in 2022.</li>
<li>I once again tried out tons of new recipes in the kitchen and started sharing these with friends & family more often.</li>
<li>I got vaccinated three times!</li>
</ul>
<p>Hence, I did not find that much time to listen to music or play games, but that's probably a good thing, right...?</p>
<h2>Music</h2>
<p>This year I couldn't find real stand out albums for me that hit the right notes, but I did like a fair amount of individual songs.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>illuminati hotties</strong> - Mmmoooaaaaayaya</li>
<li><strong>Asta Hiroki</strong> - Entropy</li>
<li><strong>William Doyle</strong> - Nothing at All</li>
<li><strong>Luna Li</strong> - Cherry Pit</li>
<li><strong>Emeka Ogboh</strong> - Everydaywehustlin</li>
<li><strong>Home Is Where</strong> - Assisted Harakiri</li>
<li><strong>TV Priest</strong> - Press Gang</li>
<li><strong>Lost Girls</strong> - Menneskekollektivet</li>
<li><strong>Nick Cave & Warren Ellis</strong> - White Elephant</li>
<li><strong>Hannah Peel</strong> - Ecovocative</li>
<li><strong>Death from Above 1979</strong> - Modern Guy</li>
<li><strong>Black Country, New Road</strong> - Sunglasses</li>
<li><strong>Black Honey</strong> - Back of the Bar</li>
<li><strong>Waxahatchee</strong> - Streets of Philadelphia</li>
<li><strong>Sprints</strong> - Ashley</li>
<li><strong>A.A.Williams</strong> - Into My Arms</li>
<li><strong>International Music</strong> - Insel der Verlassenheit</li>
<li><strong>jess joy</strong> - a love song</li>
<li><strong>Natalie Bergman</strong> - Shine Your Light on Me</li>
<li><strong>Cassandra Jenkins</strong> - Crosshairs</li>
<li><strong>Kero Kero Bonito</strong> - Well Rested</li>
<li><strong>Tune-Yards</strong> - be not afraid.</li>
<li><strong>Owiny Sigoma Band</strong> - Changamooka</li>
<li><strong>Anika</strong> - Finger Pies</li>
<li><strong>The Antlers</strong> - Green To Gold</li>
<li><strong>Squid</strong> - Pamphlets</li>
<li><strong>Jessie Ware</strong> - Please</li>
<li><strong>Sophia Kennedy</strong> - I Can See You</li>
<li><strong>Nation of Language</strong> - This Fractured Mind</li>
<li><strong>Japanese Breakfast</strong> - Tactics</li>
<li><strong>Sea Power</strong> - Two Fingers</li>
<li><strong>Public Service Broadcasting</strong> - Blue Heaven (feat. Andreya Casablanca)</li>
<li><strong>TOPS</strong> - Party Again</li>
<li><strong>Phoebe Bridgers</strong> - That Funny Feeling</li>
<li><strong>Kurt Vile</strong> - Run Run Run</li>
<li><strong>Gustaf</strong> - Best Behavior</li>
<li><strong>Ada Lea</strong> - damn</li>
<li><strong>Sons Of Kemet</strong> - Hustle</li>
<li><strong>Ducks Ltd.</strong> - Old Times</li>
<li><strong>Wodan Boys</strong> - Validation</li>
<li><strong>Sprints</strong> - Modern Job</li>
<li><strong>Villagers</strong> - So Simpatico</li>
</ul>
<h3>Older music that I listened to a lot as well</h3>
<ul>
<li>Various Motown songs, like those of <strong>The Marvelettes</strong>, <strong>The Supremes</strong>, <strong>Four Tops</strong> and <strong>Jimmy Ruffin</strong></li>
<li><strong>My Bloody Valentine</strong> - Loveless</li>
<li><strong>Glasvegas</strong> - Glasvegas</li>
<li><strong>Julia Jacklin</strong> - Crushing</li>
<li><strong>Animal Collective</strong> - Merriweather Post Pavilion</li>
<li><strong>Keith Jarret</strong> - The Melody At Night, With You</li>
<li><strong>The Velvet Underground</strong> - The Velvet Underground & Nico</li>
</ul>
<h2>TV series I liked</h2>
<p>We started looking further than Netflix and tried out a few different streaming services. Both Apple TV+ and Amazon Prime have less content than Netflix, but they all have a few gems available. We also tried out Disney+, but I personally couldn't get into the various Marvel shows or The Mandalorian.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Fleabag</strong> (Amazon Prime)</li>
<li><strong>The Morning Show</strong> (Apple TV+)</li>
<li><strong>Ted Lasso</strong> (Apple TV+)</li>
<li><strong>The Marvelous Ms. Maisel</strong> (Amazon Prime)</li>
<li><strong>For All Mankind</strong> (Apple TV+)</li>
<li><strong>The Witcher</strong> (Netflix)</li>
</ul>
<h2>Games (all played on Nintendo Switch)</h2>
<figure>
<img src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2022/blog/tetris-effect.jpg" alt="Tetris Effect Connected." class="" data-figcaption="Tetris Effect Connected.">
<figcaption aria-hidden="true">Tetris Effect Connected.</figcaption>
</figure>
<ul>
<li><strong>Tetris Effect Connected</strong>: Tetris with tons of neat audiovisual effects added on top of it. It's by far the best version I've ever played (and I adore Tetris).</li>
<li><strong>Shin Megami Tensei V</strong>: a rock hard RPG set in a post apocalyptic Tokyo infested with mythical demons. Slowly chipping away at this one.</li>
<li><strong>Metroid Dread</strong>: I really liked what I played so far, but I put it aside when things got busy at work.</li>
<li><strong>Crysis</strong>: played this on PC back when it was first released at terribly low framerates, and now it's running fine on a cheap tablet. Besides looking great it's also an excellent and fun sandbox game.</li>
<li><strong>Quake</strong>: like Doom last year, this is one of those games that I played a lot back in the day on PC. It still holds up really, <em>really</em> well.</li>
<li><strong>Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury</strong>: finished the main course with my girlfriend. She went on to fully complete the rest of the game (including all secrets) on her own.</li>
<li><strong>Monster Hunter Rise</strong>: one of my friends kept raving about this series, and I finaly played my first entry with Rise. It's indeed quite good!</li>
<li><strong>Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2</strong>: a near flawless remake of the first 2 games, but that's also its biggest flaw - I played this so much back in the day that there was nothing really new for me in here.</li>
</ul>
Park Nieuw Zuid in Antwerp - March 2022
2022-04-10T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2022/04/10/antwerp/
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<source srcSet="/images/2022/antwerp/IMG_4912-2x.webp 2x, /images/2022/antwerp/IMG_4912.webp" type="image/webp">
<img srcSet="/images/2022/antwerp/IMG_4912-2x.jpg 2x" src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2022/antwerp/IMG_4912.jpg" alt="Park Nieuw Zuid in Antwerp, Belgium." class="" data-figcaption="Park Nieuw Zuid in Antwerp, Belgium.">
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Getting into medium format photography with a Mamiya 645
2022-04-14T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2022/04/14/mamiya-645/
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<source srcSet="/images/2022/mamiya/IMG_4178-2x.webp 2x, /images/2022/mamiya/IMG_4178.webp" type="image/webp">
<img srcSet="/images/2022/mamiya/IMG_4178-2x.jpg 2x" src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2022/mamiya/IMG_4178.jpg" alt="A Mamiya 645 (original model) medium format camera with a Sekor 110mm f/2.8 lens." class="" data-figcaption="A Mamiya 645 (original model) medium format camera with a Sekor 110mm f/2.8 lens.">
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<p>I recently acquired an old Mamiya 645 (original model) medium format camera with a bunch of lenses. Years ago I dabbled a bit in analog photography with my dad's old Canon AV-1, and I recently felt the itch to once again pick up taking pictures on film.</p>
<p>Then, suddenly, this camera popped up for the right price at the right time, so I decided to go for it!</p>
<p>A few first impressions:</p>
<ul>
<li>This thing is heavy, but it feels <em>right</em>. It's substantially larger than most 35mm cameras, but not unreasonably so. Just throwing it in my bag with my other stuff won't be an option though.</li>
<li>The camera came with an aditional prism viewfinder with a built in light meter. Its light meter is either broken or highly inaccurate, but there's an app available on iOS called <em><a href="https://apps.apple.com/be/app/pocket-light-meter/id381698089">Pocket Light Meter</a></em> which the camera of your phone to calculate your aperture and shutter speed. It's a bit of a bummer that this is an extra step in the process, but that's not that big of an issue because...</li>
<li>... This camera <em>really</em> forces you to slow down before you take a picture. It was clearly not designed as an action camera as focussing is much slower (and much more important in medium format, as in general the Depth of Field is much narrower for the same Field of View compared to 35mm). This of course is part of its charm nowadays.</li>
<li>The waist viewfinder really feels counterintuitive at first. The image is flipped horizontally which just feels <em>off</em> after decades of experience with modern systems.</li>
<li>This camera also included a regular prism viewfinder which feels more in line with a 'normal' camera, but this of course also lacks a bit of the charm.</li>
</ul>
<p>There was an old roll of film (a Kodak Portra 400 color film roll, to be exact) inside that was in there for at least 10 years. I finished the roll fully expecting it to have washed out colors, but it's actually still quite ok? The only issue I have is that I still need to find a way to digitise these images that works for me.</p>
<p>At the moment I taped the developed roll to a light panel and took a picture of it with a macro lens on my Fuji XT-3, after which I imported the pictures to Lightroom to be processed with <a href="https://www.negativelabpro.com/">Negative Lab Pro</a>, a plugin to correctly invert a negative roll of film to a positive image, but there are some odd light streaks on the sides of the images which seem to be caused by the light panel. This method seems to have a lot of potential, but I'm still figuring out the small details for this.</p>
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<source srcSet="/images/2022/mamiya/positive-_DSF7851-2x.webp 2x, /images/2022/mamiya/positive-_DSF7851.webp" type="image/webp">
<img srcSet="/images/2022/mamiya/positive-_DSF7851-2x.jpg 2x" src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2022/mamiya/positive-_DSF7851.jpg" alt="One of my first shots with my Mamiya, taken in Antwerp." class="" data-figcaption="One of my first shots with my Mamiya, taken in Antwerp.">
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<figcaption aria-hidden="true">One of my first shots with my Mamiya, taken in Antwerp.</figcaption>
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Batch convert all JPEG images in a folder to WebP with ImageMagick
2022-07-03T00:00:00+02:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2022/07/03/webp-imagick/
<p>I'm in the process of converting all (or at least most) images on my website to look nicer (meaning: sharper with 2x their resolution) on modern high resolution screens. <a href="https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/HTMLImageElement/srcset">This is actually fairly easy</a>, but unfortunately this blows up the bandwidth needed to load my site.</p>
<p>Enter WebP! This image format is not that new anymore, but in the last couple of years browser support became high enough to make this a sensible default for most scenarios. Unfortunately, my photo editing software of choice (Adobe Lightroom) does not natively support exporting to WebP, so here's a short line of code that you can enter in your terminal to convert all JPEG images in a folder to WebP:</p>
<p><code>mogrify -format webp -quality 80 *.jpg</code></p>
<p>This is running on ImageMagick and is structured as follows:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>-format webp</strong> is the output format of the images (you can also change this to <strong>-format jpg</strong> for example to convert this back to JPEG).</li>
<li><strong>-quality 80</strong> sets the compression quality (with 0 being maximally compressed and 100 having near lossless compression). I find 80 to be a good compromise between quality and file size, but your mileage may vary.</li>
<li>*<strong>.jpg</strong> searches for all files ending in .jpg. You can of course also change this to <strong>.png/.bmp/.gif/.tif/...</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>In my experience, most images (depending on their complexity) get reduced to around 70% percent of their original file size, and in some instances this drops to 50% or even 40% of the original size. These are in my opinion giant savings, so I'd highly recommend trying this out for yourself.</p>
<p>Pro tip: WebP also supports transparencies, so if you don't need pixel perfect accuracy this format is also a great way to make more complex images quite a bit smaller.</p>
<h3>Prerequisites</h3>
<ul>
<li>You need to have <strong>ImageMagick</strong> (also called <strong>Imagick</strong> or even just <strong>Magick</strong>) installed. If that's not the case, <a href="https://imagemagick.org/script/download.php">you can find the installation guide over here</a></li>
<li>Mogrify overwrites existing images if their filenames match, so make a backup of your precious files beforehand.</li>
</ul>
Stuff I listened to in 2022
2023-03-19T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2023/03/19/2022-in-review/
<p>Yeah, I know, it's March already. This post was sitting as a draft on my computer since December of last year or so, but rather than thinking "This is too late to be relevant!" I decided to post it anyway.</p>
<p>Just like in <a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2021/01/05/2020-music-and-games/">2020</a> and <a href="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2022/01/25/2021-notes-music-and-games/">2021</a> I kept track of the songs that grabbed my attention. I found that 2022 was a <em>great</em> year for music (but is it ever not, honestly?), which led me to this larger-than-usual list of songs:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Aldous Harding</strong> - Fever</li>
<li><strong>Alex Cameron</strong> - Oxy Music (feat. Jason Williamson)</li>
<li><strong>Alex Cameron</strong> - Prescription Refill</li>
<li><strong>Andrew Bird</strong> - Underlands</li>
<li><strong>Angel Olsen</strong> - Chasing The Sun</li>
<li><strong>Anika</strong> - Godstar</li>
<li><strong>Art d'Ecco</strong> - Erasure</li>
<li><strong>Audiobooks</strong> - Tryna Tryna Take Control</li>
<li><strong>Big Thief</strong> - Blurred View</li>
<li><strong>Billy Nomates</strong> - Blue Bones (Deathwish)</li>
<li><strong>Blossoms</strong> - Ribbon Around The Bomb</li>
<li><strong>Blunt Chunks</strong> - Wasted</li>
<li><strong>THE BOBBY LEES</strong> - Hollywood Junkyard</li>
<li><strong>Brittany Davis</strong> - Momma's Gotta Go</li>
<li><strong>Charlotte Adigéry</strong> - Ceci n'est pas un cliché</li>
<li><strong>Congotronics International</strong> - Mulume/Change</li>
<li><strong>Courting</strong> - Loaded</li>
<li><strong>Courting</strong> - Tennis</li>
<li><strong>Delicate Steve</strong> - Street Breeze</li>
<li><strong>Dolores Forever</strong> - Conversations With Strangers</li>
<li><strong>Ducks Ltd.</strong> - In Between Days (feat. Jane Inc.)</li>
<li><strong>Early James</strong> - Real Low Down Lonesome</li>
<li><strong>Elanor Moss</strong> - Cosmic Memory</li>
<li><strong>Emeka Ogboh</strong> - Verbal Drift</li>
<li><strong>Emily Lubitz</strong> - Foolish Kids</li>
<li><strong>Empress Of</strong> - Save Me</li>
<li><strong>Empress Of</strong> - Turn the Table</li>
<li><strong>FKA twigs</strong> - oh my love</li>
<li><strong>Floating Points</strong> - Vocoder</li>
<li><strong>Foals</strong> - 2am</li>
<li><strong>Fontaines D.C.</strong> - Skinty Fia</li>
<li><strong>FredAtlast</strong> - This Town</li>
<li><strong>Ganser</strong> - People Watching</li>
<li><strong>Georgia Harmer</strong> - Be Here</li>
<li><strong>Gretel Hänlyn</strong> - Drive</li>
<li><strong>Harry Styles</strong> - As It Was</li>
<li><strong>The Haunted Youth</strong> - I Feel Like Shit And I Wanna Die</li>
<li><strong>Jane Inc.</strong> - Contortionists</li>
<li><strong>Jane Inc.</strong> - Human Being</li>
<li><strong>Jessie Ware</strong> - Free Yourself</li>
<li><strong>Jon Hopkins</strong> - To Feel Again / Trois</li>
<li><strong>Julia Jacklin</strong> - Love, Try Not To Let Go</li>
<li><strong>Katy J Pearson</strong> - Howl</li>
<li><strong>Kevin Morby</strong> - This Is a Photograph</li>
<li><strong>Kiwi jr.</strong> - Night Vision</li>
<li><strong>Lynks</strong> - Perfect Human Specimen</li>
<li><strong>Men I Trust</strong> - Billie Toppy</li>
<li><strong>Metronomy</strong> - Hold me tonight (feat. Porridge Radio)</li>
<li><strong>My Idea</strong> - I Should Have Never Generated You</li>
<li><strong>Nuha Ruby Ra</strong> - Self Portraiture</li>
<li><strong>Opus Kink</strong> - St. Paul of the Tarantulas</li>
<li><strong>Panda Bear</strong> - Edge of the Edge</li>
<li><strong>Personal Trainer</strong> - Key of Ego</li>
<li><strong>Phoebe Bridgers</strong> - Sidelines</li>
<li><strong>Plains</strong> - Problem with It</li>
<li><strong>The Paranoyds</strong> - Lizzie</li>
<li><strong>Porridge Radio</strong> - Back To the Radio</li>
<li><strong>Rahill</strong> - Aht Uh Mi Hed</li>
<li><strong>Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever</strong> - Tidal River</li>
<li><strong>Say She She</strong> - Prism</li>
<li><strong>Sea Power</strong> - Fear Eats the Soul</li>
<li><strong>Shalom</strong> - DTAP</li>
<li><strong>Sharon Van Etten</strong> - Used To It</li>
<li><strong>Shilpa Ray</strong> - Lawsuits and Suicide</li>
<li><strong>Sinead O Brien</strong> - Like Culture</li>
<li><strong>The Smile</strong> - You Will Never Work In Television Again</li>
<li><strong>Spoon</strong> - Held</li>
<li><strong>Sprints</strong> - Delia Smith</li>
<li><strong>Stromae</strong> - L’enfer</li>
<li><strong>TOPS</strong> - Perfected Steps</li>
<li><strong>TRAAMS</strong> - Breathe (feat. Softlizard)</li>
<li><strong>Tomberlin</strong> - easy</li>
<li><strong>The Weeknd</strong> - Less Than Zero</li>
<li><strong>Wet Leg</strong> - Being in Love</li>
<li><strong>Whitney K</strong> - While Digging Through the Snow</li>
<li><strong>Wodan Boys</strong> - Slam It Like Djokovic</li>
<li><strong>Yard Act</strong> - 100% Endurance (Elton John Version)</li>
</ul>
Parijsstraat, Leuven - March 2023
2023-03-26T00:00:00+01:00
https://www.bartvandersanden.com/blog/2023/03/26/leuven/
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<img srcSet="/images/2023/leuven/IMG_5052-2x.jpg 2x" src="https://www.bartvandersanden.com/images/2023/leuven/IMG_5052.jpg" alt="Parijsstraat, Leuven, Belgium." class="" data-figcaption="Parijsstraat, Leuven, Belgium.">
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