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th 24-12-04
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the world keeps going round
Very very silly thing I did, and feel kind of ashamed to confess it, even here: I got myself re-infected with LGV. After having warned everybody on many previous entries of this diary about the awfullness of this pretty unknown STD I just had to contract it all over again myself. How stupid can you get? Well it's obviously even easier to get it then I thought!
At least I knew immediately what it was that gave my a fluelike fever and pain in the ass this time around so I was at the GGD the next day and immediately after having t\started the medication the symptoms subsided, but don't feel much in the mood yet to tell you more here, just yet.
Just give me till Xmas to get back on my feet again. |
su 5-12-04
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Last one of the batch
We've had our fair share of royal funerals here over the past 3 years: each time all of Delfts motorwayexits were blocked, the entire city infested with (gorgeous, granted) soldiers in gala uniforms, and citycenter streets blocked for everything but pedestrians. Anyway, now it's time for Bernhard, playboy husband of queen Juliana, who died herself this spring. It is rumoured that even his illigitimate children (3 it is rumoured) will attend the funeral. I personally was charmed by the way Bernhard kept in touch with basic instincts in our society and went as far as he could get away with: In one of those incidents he crossed constitutional lines by paying the fines for supermarket employees who according to our courts went too far in beating up shoplifters. He also accepted a bribe of $ 1 million from the Lockheed factory. He admitted to that in an interview published after his death, so this week. He said "it was a very stupid thing to do, and it only happened because in court circles nobody ever speaks his mind to a guy like me, nobody said that is out of order. I felt I was being courteous. I did not need the money; always had plenty of that". He had spreading cancer, so on wednesday december 3rd he spent all day on the phone, saying farewell to friends, speaking his mind about everybody he felt needed a last scolding, even sent a poem to my newspaper of which I'd like to include the last lines:
I get up each morning and dust off my wits
then pick up the paper and read the 'obits'.
If my name is still missing I know I'm not dead,
so I finish my breakfast and go back to bed.
Around 5 that evening, his correspondence all done, he stepped in the car as he'd done since 1936, next to his chauffeur, who drove him to the Utrecht hospital, where he was declared dead 2 hours later. to celebrate this sympathetic rogue I'll go to the oilparty at The-Boss, also on the funeralroute, this afternoon, before they close it off. |
su 5-12-04
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Let's work
Full effort is directed to a theate project for the next two months again: Last season I refound a very nice company with some gorgeous dancers and a very symathetic choreographers-duo Truus bronkhorst and Marien Jongewaard. With Marien I had worked before in the company Nieuw West and I love him for the head-on gut feeling subject-matter he takes on and the disarming honesty he does it with. I feel very much at home with them now. Unfortunately their funding is under jeapardy, so it may be their last project, aptly named EXIT.
As I don't have much to show of the new project, here are some pix from the program I mentioned here earlier, we did last summer in the Old Church, Amsterdam. I finally received some great pix by a great photographer, I crossed paths with regularly since my student days, Leo van Velzen. Not on topic here, you may say, but I will get back to the regular subject matter over Christmas .
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tu 23-11-04
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Men in the Cold
Cultural History again: I've been nagging for so long about the lack of initiative in the current generation of homosexuals. Standard reaction usually was: if you know so well how and what we should do, why don't you do it yourself then. My reply was, I've done that more then enough in the past; it's your turn now. But as that remark fell into dead soil and I'm tired of waiting we're having a remake of the gay-content song-festival we had in the early eighties. So watch out for december 10th. Going to be interesting. |
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mo 22-11-04
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Liam and reporting about NL abroad
As the poster left is a bit too long I have too add some more text:
Liam, you came to know below here, was in NL to do some reporting on what happened the past weeks. He also interviewed Wouter Bos, our Labour leader, but much as I love Liam for his sadist aproach to my person, I was angered by the way the program on BBC1 made it appear that PvdA (duch labour) had learned the valuable lessons of Pim Fortuyn now. Still he tried to make it sound like Pim had an anti social agenda. That's misleading history: Pim was member of labour for 2 decades. He even came from a marxist background, but as the salon-socialists (Pim called them the Left Church), becoz of their fixed outdated dogma's, just did not want to listen to his warnings about too leniant strategies regarding allochtones in innercities, and effectively threw him out, he could not but try to get himself heard on the other side of the political spectrum. That was pure pragmatism. His last political move before he got killed proved that: he wanted to give amnesty to over 4000 political refugees who were already in NL for more then 10 years. Now that was the mess previous PvdA administrations had left behind! Never say anything critical about muslims; they have too long toes, you're bound to step on 'm; that has been PvdA and Green strategy for decades. No, PvdA still has not found any solutions. While our liberals are making daring strides: Addressing the muslim community about issues that clash with basic human values, that is what Miss Ali has been doing, (remember, she also fled from PvdA dogmatism), resulting in a fatwah against her person. She indeed shows where muslims have got to change attitude, to be able to fit in Dutch society, and it seems to me that her words are finally getting through. Liberals are now having to fight off extreme right, which in recent polls has grown alarmingly. While the left stay in the relative safety of their ivory tower, ignoring the world. Hope our national mess will sort itself out within 2 years when elections are due again. |
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su 21-11-04
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Sinterklaas en Zwartepiet
Little insert about significant people in my past. Two of those are currently all over dutch tv as they are core-members of the assistantsforces of our Sinterklaas. (Santaclaus in every other country) Our Santa visits every home in the country on december 5th. Leading up to that lots of toys need to be sold, and the story of the troubles Santa and his Piet's have to get all the prezzies in a boat from Spain to here gets reshot every year, at enormous budgets. A fantastic opportunity for actors who crave an incomeboost at the end of each year. Michiel Kerbosch, (see 24-10-02) and Piet van der Pas (see exes), are two main figures in the fantasie of all Dutch children. Michiel plays the Wegwijspiet (navigatorpete) and Piet is ProfessorPiet (sciencepiet). You should know all Piets are black, painted black that is, and kinda stupid. You would fall for their clumsy act too. |
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sa 20-11-04
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Things move on
Theo , if we attempt a comparison, could best be described as the Michael More of the Netherlands: Not very goodlooking, very loud mouth. Not at all on good terms with the established movie world here, he decided this new film about the assasination of Pim Fortuyn should not be in a movietheater but on internet. And so it goes: The site that will bring the movie next month has gone online and already shows interviews with actors and on the set scenes.
Mind you, the film is not a billed as documentary but as a fictionalised version of what happened on that tragic may 6th 2002. |
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tu 09-11-04
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we only submit out of love, not out of fear
With churches, both christians and mosques and schools going up in flames, half a city under siege just 4 miles from here, we Dutch seem to be in a different world than two weeks ago.
I'm not going to throw more oil on the fire here. But an action thought out by an islamic youth group to publish an anti homo manifest has been stalled due to the current state of affairs, threats and their site being hacked: still the text was published by de Volkskrant, so let's deal with it now and maybe we can make the action more effective when it gets restarted.
They feel it is their contribution to our prime minister's "normes and values (they say "worms and failure") debate" and the first thing that needs to be done in our society is to get the homos and all their indecencies out of media as theater, tv, and the nightlife landscape of our cities.
Please go back in this diary a year or so to find pieces dated 16-12-03, and the one of 18-05-02. That last one lends heavily from Bruce la Bruce, another great filmmaker some guys probably have on their death list, he has many contributions dedicated to his lover, he always calls him respectfully "the Muslim". He had great admiration for him for hardly communicating other then pulling his pants down whenever he felt hot, giving Bruce a quick raw fuck that never took more them 2 minits and never made any more claims to his valueable time then that. Yep, you guys do have a greatly respected arsenal of weapons of ass destruction. Wish your Creator could have helped ours a hand when he was handing out the tools of reproduction. So you see guys: we do own up to being pigs and invite you all to plough our holes and will say "Allah is great" when you're done. We'll be like putty in your hands if only you took the right approach:
use your most potent weapon for the holy cause ! ! ! And the whore I am, will not think twice about a complete make-over and re-tone of this website: Salaam oualaikoum wa Rahmatoellah wa Baratoehoe !
(may god bring you peace, merci, blessings and lots of semen) |
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tu 02-11-04
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another black day
The most bizar thing just happened this morning: Just a few days before the film about the assasination of Pim Fortuyn was to première, The filmaker has been assasinated too. His website was down but is back up, news is still unfolding. We're all bewildered. He was an outspoken, radical, cynical, very loud- or should I say foul-mouthed, sharp and whitty. He took over the candle of Pim to highlight the ignorance and stupidity of the MultiKUL brainwash here. I felt he was one of the greatest guys to disagree with. But religious fundamentalists, so history has proved, have never in the front row when whichever god handed out intelligence or sense-of-humor. The killer has been caught, a 26 year old maroccan, Muhammad Bouyeri. He shot 11 times at Theo, who fell of his bike. He also stabbed a note to his body with a knife. What's on it was a warning to miss Ali, that she will be next. It looks like after 05-06, the day Pim was killed, (we say it the other way around) a 9-11 mood has returned
to our country today. Damsquare in front of the royal palace in Amsterdam was filled to capacity in a very noise,
but dignified gathering, after mayor had called for a loud demonstration tonight, to show we consider freedom of speech the most fundamental value of our society. Madame Tousaud's, had placed Pim Fortuyn in their show window, 20 metres above the square.
If you can read dutch go read this guestcolumn he wrote for the Dutch Socialist Party, which he dispised. That is what he was like, looking up his opponents and confrontation. hard, but straight. In it he also wondered why his father gave 900 works of Vincent van Gogh, now worth thousands of millions, to the state, instead of leaving Theo just one, to help finance his movies. One of his latest film projects was the motive for his murder: together with parliamentarian Ayaan Hirshi Ali, he made a short film as a outcry agains the treatment of women in the muslim world. In it he showed tortured and abused women. Nude, with Korantexts written over their bodies. Simply recounting horrific experiences and showing the bruising and scars.
I just saw a woman of arabic descent on tv saying: There is no longer time for us to camouflage, excuse, miniaturize, hush over. We must make it clear in the strongest possible way that this is not tolerated. What will have to be finished she said for starters is allowing double nationalities: everybody must make a choice what he stands for. The power of violence or the power of tolerance and the free word. Police originally said the culprit was not amongst the 150 extremists that they keep a close look at, but that he was a friend of Samir Azzouz, 18, the Rotterdam terrorist who caused a code-orange here 2 monhs ago, he was apprehended then, but this guy was not considered worth examining. Someone has just found out this murder happened exactly 9 hundred and 11 days after the one on Fortuyn.
This bit has been re-written two days later: a dozen other people were arrested, all part of the group the killer came from, so there wàs a conspiracy! I should think authorities in Amsterdam should close down the El Tawheed-mosq there. To finalize a repeat chat copy:
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su 30-10-04
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the fire has been extinguished
The hot piece I forwarded here in chat form last week seems to have become even more fateful: It was the last Vagscat èver: Harry, the manager, has decided to abolish them. Apart from sad I feel very much betrayed and angry. He said that he took the desision on his own because he was tired of carrying responsibility for two decades. Now first, I think he cannot take this kind of decisions as Vagevuur is an association, where responsibility is shared by a board and members in which the general council of members has a final say. Second, wasn't there a passage in the founding articles that said the club should be about improvement and widening of sexual liberty? Long gone are the days when the first gay activist group that later formed Vagevuur were demonstrating in drag in front of churches on sundaymorning educating children there with a small yellow booklet with the great title: "Dirty is Sweet". No, instead we have a sorrow pathetic group of scary
chickens, who have lost their fighting spirit and crawl into a corner out of fear for local authorities and their regulations. Hey guys, WAKE UP before it's too late! Harry has stayed there too long! Instead of moaning he should wake up and stay loyal to the boys who have made Vagevuur to what it is, guys like Martin, the original founder of the scatparties. He could unite with other groups that are troubled by local authorities (it was only 5 years that our club in delft was threatend in it's existence coz of not complying with ridiculous sound regulations, we still have the same soundstystem there, are on good foot with all neighbours and the city has fired the overzealous civil servants [servant?] due to budget cuts). We see signs everywhere that regulations have gone way-too-far and the tide is turning, if only the guys in Eindhoven had a little more staying power, eh, callus on their soles, uh soals, and sided with their
supportes instead of with authorities.
Was at Amsterdam's Leatherpride party last nite: It may be ridiculous that a thousand + guys let themselves be hurled by busses to an industrial area where they do no harm, but at least there we were allowed to do what we like: expensive, but that did not seem to be a problem: great catering, salads, sandwiches and even hot stuff like noodles and soup, a one acre dancefloor (uh, is 100 x 100 mtr is a hectare). And even more playground, filled with 2 stories of scaffolding , dozens of slings, crosses, hoisting equipment, cages, huge goldenshowersection. And best: there were condoms and safesex warnings, but people were left to their own responsibility, no self appointed guards there scaring the punters to "behave or else", indeed only killing the atmosphere and making everybody feel guilty that continuation of the parties is determined by their behaviour. I just had to unwind from the misery last nite: it may not be wise, but I needed it: fingered and tongued a condom from a guys ass and shared it's content
in a prolonged hot kissing and drooling session. HMMM! felt sooo liberating! To end this sorry episode another lament copied from a column by one of our countries most famous lawyers in Amsterdams Gay and Night magazine:
Turning my Butt
Often did that the past year, Partying in Berlin, Ibiza, Barcelona, Paris, Antwerp, even NYC! Have become quite an expert in getting cheap accomodation and flights on the net. The net is specially invented for gay guys wanting to flee Amsterdam. Planes , clubs and bars everywhere are full of similar minds that no longer think what's happening to our so called European gay Capitol is funny.
My dossier filingcabinet is overflowing withwith cases where local authorities are doing their upmost to make life of queers impossible. Very illustrating is one I got last week: a boybrothel has gotten a monthlong withdrawal of license for not complying with rules: a guy stripping onm the stage was breaking the rule that he did not have an ID in his pocket. He did have it in his pants at the dressingroom. Police found a couple who had hired an sm room for the night. Automatically they presumed the youngest one was the prositute who of course could not produce a lkisence. "We've been living together for 6 years, officer" "nonsence, you picked him up on the street! Case closed", and indeed premisses closed. Mayor Cohen and our lesbian Innercitymayor AnneLize vander Stoel have made adhering to the petty rules their staff feels obliged to churn out. Close the darkrooms, obviously those overpaid nitwits at cityhall feel that what they cannot have at home, others should also be denied.
What indeed are they interfering with? We're perfectly capable of determining how, where and with who we want to have sex. The canalpride parade and pridenight are also threatened in their future existence: Midnite is lightsout, bedtime everybody! 400.000 people watch the parade despite of the fact it's almost made impossible to reach the innercity. The internationally renowned Thermos nightsauna, under threat to lose it's licence. IT, once the city's most known Homo Temple, closed. Must I go on?
All that while everywhere else in Europe gay culture is flourising and more vibrant then ever. No autorities interfering when light is out in cellars there. I feel urged to go to cityhall and deposit a truckload of lubricant on the steps there so that the moral police can slither straight into the Amstel. But hey: the resignation with which our community is accepting all this is the most unbearabe! I so agree with Oscar Hammerstein: let's not give up and flee abroad: fight and resist, like we did last century! |
sa 29-10-04
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learning all the time"Can someone tell me what 'Schiacciacazzo' means?", someone asked at the SM-art group. The answer came promptly:
schiaccianoci = nutcracker / noci = nuts
schiacciapatate = potato press / patate = potatoes
schiacciasassi = [steam]roller, bulldozer/sassi= stones
therefore:
schiacciacazzo = cock press [clamp] / cazzo = cock
usefull information as Cazzo are my fav porn producers
while we're on the subject of Italy, And also to show how the moral gap between Europe and America is deepening, at a time when due to US election all this will hardly be noticed across the Atlantic:
The European parliament has just sacked the very Roman Catholic commissioner for justice, because he sais homosexuality is a sin and he cannot work to improve equal opportunities for homo's. In consequence the entire euro-top governing commission is
dismissed and Italian prime minister Berlusconi has to find a new candidate. It's weird to see that now a lot of guys here start to feel sorry for the sacked mr. Buttiglione, argueing that he also has the right to express his opinions. And that he by admitting it openly and leaving gay issues to be handled by his colleagues acted very honorably.
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su 24-10-04
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VgSct , or back to core-biz on this log . .
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su 17-10-04
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Angels in americA"I'm going to hell for doing this, big deal, can't be anything worse then NYC !" Just a line I heard a minit ago from the feverish sweaty nightmare that inevitably ended in death I knew only too well and have seen enough of to last me a lifetime. It was so familiar 15 years ago. Did see the play over a decade ago. It was done in 4 nights then. The main caracter who played it here was really dying of aids
and died a few months after the last performance. This HBO version is outstanding. Hits harder than seeing it in the safety of a theater surrounded by strangers. I just don't know if I can take it and want to see all 6 episodes: Too painfull, too real, too fresh the memories. Does make it feel like only yesterday that I was standing at Pieter's bed, at Leen's bed, HansPaul's. The puke, the sweat, the fevers, the deliriumdreams. But then, maybe I'm ready for a good year-long depression; I certainly feel like staying in bed for a fortnight although I'm not sick.
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tu 12-10-04
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hell broke lose !The dutch gay youth magazin expreszo was spread around allschools in NL in a special million-copies edition, payed for by the ministry of education focussed at being gay at school and
trying to make homo's an issue to be talked about in everyday life. It was sent back en-masse by governors at christian and muslim schools.
 Maybe I would also send back the magazine, but only because it painted a too bland, soft, cowardice picture of us homo's. It looks like we are back to the early seventies, when we did show up as gay community in public for the first time.
We were much more aggresive back then: demonstrated in drag on sundaymorning at conservative churches distributing a gay-sex education-booklet adressing under 12 kids which was called "vies is lekker" or "dirty is nice".
 Let me take this opportunity to draw your attention to a gay youth publication that is more to my liking: Scumbag Fagmag sooooo sweeet !!! Good to see there are still creative kids around!
Funny thing is that we also have a very very dul gay publication here called gaykrant. That one was sent to all old peoples homes. Even there 90 % sent them back with the response nobody is homo in our home !
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mo 11-10-04
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top 10 greatest Dutch of all timeWe had an election of the 100 most popular dutch citizens the outcome of the top ten was shuffled about and we'll have a month of national debate on how this list will look. - Johan Cruijf
- Erasmus
- Pim Fortuyn
- Anne Frank
- Vincent van Gogh
- Antoni van Leeuwenhoek
- Willem van Oranje
- Rembrandt van Rijn
- Michiel de Ruyter
- Willem Drees
interesting to see in the coming weeks who will be voted the greatest. At least in the list are two painters, two politicians who were assasinated, two others that were not, two Delft citizens and one personal friend, or should I say one guy I fucked with. He will not win as he was too controversial but there's NO doubt who I will vote for. |
tu 7-10-04
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moviesJust got back in from the weekly visit to the movienite at our local communitycenter. I'm afraid I have a new film to add to the top 3 list just started below here on sept 18 and already saturated with 9 masterpieces. Today I saw "Our Lady of the assassins" (La virgen de los sicarios), a mix of Fellini's cityscape depictions an Pasolini's fatalism set in drugs- and crime infested city of Medellin in Columbia, south America anno 2000, so present day. Don't try to count the number of people getting killed in it. It still is the most impressive, humorous and intense homosexual lovestory registered on film to this day.
Small but funny detail in the movie is that the night skies of Meddelin light up with huge fireworks each time the Columbians have managed to get another million-dollar drugs-shipment into the USA.
I also just read some of the reviews of US critics at the IMDB pages: Brainless! These reviewers obviously have never seen a film originating outside Hollywood: they would even consider the Sound of Music depressing, because it has the threat of a Nazy future of Austria looming throughout.
Oh yes, we here in NL just decided to send in "Simon" a movie by Eddy Terstall in the catagory of international film to the Oscars 2005. It is a big hit here, but will not even get nominated, coz it's a typical Dutch film, with drugs, gay marriage and euthanasia in the main storyline. |
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tu 5-10-04
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Tears for Fearsfor need of details about some personal history I checked up on the logpage of januari 2003, to re-read the lyrics of that great song that got re-released this year as a slow ballad and was a big hit by Gary Jules.
I got all sentimental again; switched on the good old "Hurting" cd and melted away again replaying "pale shelter". I even drew the old vinyl 12 Inch of ""shout" out of its very dusty cover for a replay. WOW! Did not succeed in finding "sowing the seeds of love". Must have lost that somewhere along the way.
anyway . . .
Halfway on my trip through memory lane I googled the group and . . . Lord behold . . . The two boys re-united! Even have a new album out, so go see their all new website NOW!
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mo 4-10-04
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US electionsI intended not to interfere with the elections on the other side of the altantic ocean., but if the US administration decides to interfere in things that concern me a great deal, like messing up what freedom of expression is about and using its administrative power to get creditcardcompanies and a major network like Yahoo to crack down on adult entertainment.
I feel there is a need to at least give my opinion and hope that you guys over there will do the right thing.
Luckily you seem to have drawn some conclusions from the first presidential debate this weekend: it's better to change your mind then to stand firm when you know you're wrong.
And please don't conclude now that I dislike Americans, au contraire! Just like was the case with Willem O, in the piece below, I too have warm, eh hot feelings towards some bright minds and delicious rimmers from your great country
but I do hope you guys by now have learned the dangers of choosing a religious fanatic as leader . . .
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thu 30-09-04
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Willem Oltmans Another great role model had his life terminated today. This is how we do these things here in NL these days; he was 79 years old and cancer did not leave him any nice perspective. a translation of some memories by Cees vander Pluijm
Personally I find Willem the most successfull Dutch media homo, he was even funnier then Pim Fortuyn. Humor and self-relativation a rarely seen combo in tv-land. If Pim was the little yapper, Willem was the biter. He yells, rams it in, shreeks and hollers with raised highpitched queeny voice like we've never seen before. And not only does he say he's always right, he always gets to be right!
Also very funny is that he knows the world. Name an international politician and Oltmans sat on his bedside, if he's not been under the sheets, and heard him out. He never kept these things secret. Name dropping? he invented it!
He just never kept any secret, not that he came from the best circles in the Dutch Indies, not that he had the same nannie as Beatrix, not that Russian sailors were the hottest cratures of this world, and not that at age seventy he still frequented all darkrooms in Amsterdam, as his motto was: You gotta keep da plumbin' runnin' . Oltmans is a walking diary and we're all allowed to read as he goes along.
I saw him recently at Barend en van Dorp (NL's most watched daily talkshow) In his unequivical charming-naughty way he gossipped about the royal court. Willem Alexander had complained at a banquet in London that the mayor of Amsterdam performed gay marriages. When someone suggested to the prince he should talk in a more respectful tone, the prince cursed and replied that he would say what he damned well pleased.
Willem is a renowned journalist, so when he sais something like that we all know this really happened that way. The Royal spokespersons have not made an oficial denial. But no questions have been asked in parliament either; we just let it slip
and leave Oltmans to his role : the royal pain in the ass, and the bad uncle of Albert Verlinde and Peter van der Vorst, two gay presenters of our most watched gossip tv show.
To finish off some quotes from the tv talk he had recorded to be shown after his death:
No, I do not hate the Americans, what-èver gave you that idea? I lived there 20 years, the best years of my life! No, the Americans are the best cocksuckers to be found; I just feel sorry that this nitwit tricked them to be their president: He does nòt understand the Islami's, never will. Americans have been bombing all over ther world the pas century but never in history had a bomb fall on their country, so I thought they would learn something from 9-11. Bush certainly did not; he goes on in the same arrogant way: The Islam world does not want to conquer the United States, they only want to be respected.
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tu 28-09-04
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HazesWorking on the euro-mess pornvid trilogy I decided, as the 3 aparts were based around the 3 countries I know best, the UK, my own country NL and Germany, to
base the music on their respective national heritage.
Now with the Uk, there is no problem in that field: their pop-music is one of the countries major export articles, and quite a number of gay, cult and dirty themes can be found easily. Both in present time
as with their great composers of 19th and early 20th century. I chose Britten and Elgar as well as Gary Glitter, T-rex, Pink Flyd, Soft Machine too. With the Germans something funny is going on: they have a great heritage, although it is hard to make the distinction of what is Austrian and what German. So I did not use Mozart or Beethoven, nor
Johan Strauss, although I was tempted to try the combination of waltzes and dirty fucking, But did use Richard Strauss, Richard Wagner and Kurt Weil. For the modern touch I used dance from Paul van Dyk and rough-edged T. Raumschmiere, also some Kraftwerk, but then I came to the hard part.
There is no feeling for camp with the Germans: I wanted to put in some of their greatest crooners, like Reinhard May, Freddy Quinn, Marianne Rosenberg, but got some very negative reactions to that idea: it feels like the modern day gay german is truly ashamed about their national heritage. So I left it at only one song, not even sung in German, by Modern Talking. Very much contrary we Dutch have warm feelings and the greatest of fun, especially with a few drinks behind us, with the "Schlager" repertoire. Some gay bars even specialise in that kind of music, especially around Rembrandsplein in Amsterdam. "Ich bin wie du", "Junge komm bald wieder", or "Du bist alles was ich habe auf der welt"
everybody can sing along with these tunes, and does!
To illustrate the status of what for you Americans can best be described as "Dutch country-music" let me report on what happened this week: The Dutch peoples-singer, there is just one person here who deserved that status, André Hazes died at age 53. That meant that all major tv-networks dedicated their entire news to only that fact, and replayed his major shows, concerts and movies non stop for the remainder of the week. If you walked through citycenters, it's nothing but his songs that floated from all bars. Recordshops have completely sold out anything they had. His most sentimental song was re-released and was nr 1 in seconds. The expected trafficmayhem and railwaychaos did not happen coz most of the 50000 that the Ajax stadium holds arrived for the public farewell hours early to sing songs outside. His coffin was moved to the center of the field where a stage was set up and his songs were done by all major dutch artists and speeches given by the major of Amsterdam and his 10 year old son. Over half the entire dutch population watched the 3 hours tv coverage, which was another incredible record, and I too had tears in my eyes more then once. Tuesday all radiostations played his most loved song at midday and everybody who could flyed kites, or ballons. It's good that we can sometimes forget about US elections, climate change, assasinations in Soudan and Irak, but it will be a relief
that wednesday we can return to normal. | | | | | | | | | | |
The night before the Greek opening Dutch tv showed 3 hours of film that Leni Riefenstahl made to celebrate the olympic games of 1936 in Berlin. Granted, it did show a bit too much of Herr Adolf, but apart from that it was the most impressive piece of photography celebrating the beauty of the male body I èver saw. Luckily at that time the Germans had plenty of self esteem and were not in the mood to give on issues like anglo-saxon prudishness. Their, to this day, deep felt bond between the natural human body and nature was not compromised. So WOW, were there naked men in there! Naked while showering, naked wrestling, discus or spearthrowing, swimming, sauna-ing, all filmed with incredible technology and respect. Also I saw with my own eyes that even though the Nazi's did try to belittle all the victories of black men, Leni did nothing of the sort in her film. Au contraire: All the black runner triumphs are there in full. She was too much in awe about the black bodies there to cut out anything. She proved that same point much later again by making movies about old african tribal culture. Just verify that by looking over the exellent 
