Groningen Local Customs

This picture of me is taken on Sint Maarten, which is on the 11th of November. You can compare it a bit with Halloween and "trick or treat", but without the costumes. It is an event for the children. Late in the afternoon, just before it gets dark, the children go from door to door with a chinese lantern in their hands, singing special Sint Maarten songs :

♫♫ Sint Maarten, Sint Maarten,
De koeien hebben staarten,
De meisjes hebben rokjes aan,
en daar komt Sint Martinus aan. ♫♫

Hahaha, sorry for that, some childhood memories of the songs we used to sing. I couldn't resist putting the lyrics on this page :-)

And after singing this little song you get candy! Isn't that great! Hahaha, I always loved getting candy! And you can see that clearly in this picture :-) My eyes are sparkling :-))

Sint Maarten is not know throughout the whole country and sadly to say it seems to be disappearing, but here in Groningen the tradition still seems to live on.

Since Groningen is known for being a university city I have to show you a picture of the main building of the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen (University of Groningen) or RUG.

Academy Building
"The current main building of the University dates from 1909 and was designed by the renowned government architect Vrijman. The façade is adorned with five allegorical sandstone figures: Minerva, Scientia, Historia, Prudentia, and Mathematica. The aula has stained-glass windows by Johan Dijkstra, and a mural by Wout Muller and Mathijs Röling." from the University website

When in groningen you can't miss the bicycles. Groningen is a university city. as students do not have much money, most of them travel by bike. The entire city centre is open for bicycles and on foot only.

In 2002 it was announced bicycle city of the Netherlands.
In Groningen a bicycle is 30% faster then a car. In the city are 24 guarded bicycle stands.

People from Groningen are proud of their heritage. They have their own dialect, flag and even anthem.

The city flag is a flag with three horizontal stripes: white-green-white. It is used on the official city holiday: august 28th.

What is august 28th? It is the day that the city was freed in 1672. The bishop of Munster, Bernhard van Galen, was forced to end the siege of the city after six weeks. The city was shot and had bad damages by the bombs of the bishop. The bishop was named Bommen Berend (bombing berend), and the festival to commemorate this day is stil called Bommen Berend by the locals.

Every year on the 28th of august there is a huge party ending with fireworks. The carnival is in the city the entire week.

Every year on Good Friday we have our Flower Market.
The city center is then filled with marketeers selling off their flowers and the streets are packed with people, amongst them many Germans who come here specially.
I can recommend it, but be warned! it gets crowded so better not bring your little kids, especially not when they still are in a pram.
Of course the terrases are open too so if you need to rest your tired feet you can sit down and have a drink.

On the photograph the window of my favourite baker: baker Bart, right in city center, close to Grote Markt (great market square).
Bloemenmarkt means Flower Market.

May 11th --> start of the Giro in Groningen.
Great atmosphere and lots of people watching.
First, soldiers glided down the Martini tower carrying flags of the organising parties and the flags of the countries represented by the cyclists.
Lots of Italian carabinieri (police) and press.
The color of the Giro is pink, so most people wore something pink.
Eventho there was little sun, the temp was not too bad.

On August 28th the streets are even more lively than usual and around almost every corner there s something going on or something worth to have a look at.
I spotted these 3 guys wearing jacket, most likely they had to organise part of the festivities.

The Noorderzon is a cultural festival that takes place each August for ten days in Groningen, in the North of Holland.
The heart of the festival is in a beautiful small city park, called the Noorderplantsoen, about 5 minutes from the city centre by foot.
Got curious and wanna read more? Go here!