viktoritilburg

I spent last weekend in Cologne. The trip there was organized by Mo, one of the I*ESN mentors. We were 21 people going to his hometown early Friday afternoon. It takes three hours to reach Cologne from Tilburg and we needed to change trains in Venlo and Mönchengladbach.

Friday night started with a trip to RheinEnergieStadion. Going by tram from Barbarossaplatz to the stadium took way longer than I expected it to. We split up once we got to the stadium as we had tickets in different sections. I was in the same section as Aslan, Michael and Mark. We had heard from Mo that our section was close to the away fans, so we decided to support 1. FC Köln before entering the arena and bought scarves. But, when we reached our seats we realized that they were not seats in reality. We were surrounded by supporters of Borrussia Mönchengladbach. Michael and I decided instantly that it would be much more fun to become Mönchengladbach supporters. They have a richer history of Swedish players than Köln as well, so I did not mind at all. Borrussia Mönchengladbach won with 3-0, which is huge for an away team in a derby. A cultural observation is that the amount of police officers and cars at this game was absurd. Every away team tram leaving the stadium were accompanied by at least ten police cars.

We went partying with most of our group at a student club called Das Ding. Not everyone went to the game so this was a nice way to meet up with the people who went to the Christmas market at Neumarkt. The party went on a little bit longer than what is good so unfortunately a few of us did not leave the hotel with Mo, our expert on how to make the most out of Köln. So, when I left the hostel with the Canadian guys Julien and Mark. We sat up an appointment to meet up with Mo and the others at the Dome. Unfortunately we did not find each other, and it turned out that the three of us were all out of call credit. We saw some parts of the city that day anyway but it seemed like the others had a better time than us. Anyway, we went to the ESN Glow in the Dark party Saturday night where most of us had a good time.

Since the city tour people had not been able to climb the tour of the Dome Saturday, we could join them for that during Sunday. It was a stunning view from up there, and I can’t help to feel amazed that it is possible to build building like that without cranes. We went back to Tilburg at 4 pm and the most entertaining part while going back home was between Venlo and Tilburg. Everyone was very tired and every single joke was an success no matter how bad it was. And then we had Aslan’s stories of Kazakhstan. I had a great weekend and I would like to once again thank Mo for organizing this trip.

I will participate in Harkfestijn tonight. Harkfestijn is a Beer Drinking Relay in teams of five people. I am participating in this annual Merlijn event with Deadwalkerz (Doodlopers). Consisting of VDM, Bobbie Ruijs, Ennik, Stefan and yours truly.

Houdoe!