In January the exchange group from Tio Utrecht went for a city walk in Utrecht. Lecturer Noortje Jonker went with them and tells us all about the trip. "The weather was very Dutch, a strong damp wind and low temperature. But that didn’t prevent us from doing a very courageous thing: eating wet herring at 9.45 h in the morning at the local vegetable and fruit market. The herring was indeed cold and salty and one of the lecturers slipped it into the throat like an ... Bbrrr!"
From the market to the Bijenkorf
"We much preferred the hot kibbling which is basically chunks of cod fish in a batter and fried in hot oil, warm and savoury! After this fish experience we crossed the road over to the Bijenkorf which is one of the most luxurious shops in town and we looked at the Miffy traffic light which was put up by the council to honour Dick Bruna, the 'father' of this little rabbit."
Architecture in Utrecht
"We got to know the Jugendstil/Rococo architecture in the center of Utrecht and the modern, just redesigned new architecture of Hoog Catharijne as well as the 18th century way of building huge houses alongside the old canal. We learned that rich people at the time owned two houses, one for the summer and a smaller one, which was less costly to heat up, for the winter period."
Homeless people
"At the HEMA we had a look at the modern and very colourful products and just outside the shop we bought the local homeless newspaper from a friendly man. We had a little chat with him about his activities to buy himself a warm meal and a bed for that same night. We found out that Utrecht has less and less homeless people because of this newspaper project, which was first invented by the British and called 'The Big issue'."
To the pub
"By then we had become quite cold so we went into a pub called Graaf Floris for cappuccinos, hot chocolate milk and their specialty which is an apple dumpling filled with raisins and marzipan. All in all it was a great and interesting morning."
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