The 3-day excursion to the Netherlands was one of
the highlights for the VIZ students. Whether they cruised along the
canals of Amsterdam, visited museums or enjoyed a workshop at the beach,
the program was filled with engaging activities.
The first two days of this excursion were spent in the capital
Amsterdam. While exploring the city, we realized why Amsterdam is called
the “Venice of the North”. The city is built entirely on poles and you
can find about 165 canals and 1281 bridges. We were all surprised by the
fact that in Amsterdam it is more likely to be run over by a bike than a
car. Everybody rides their bike over there and we learnt that Amsterdam
has more bikes (1 million) than people.
Right after our canal
cruise, we visited the Anne Frank House, a museum dedicated to the
Jewish wartime diarist Anne Frank. Almost everybody of the group read
her diary in school and it was impressive to actually see the original
house where Anne lived and hid in.
For our physical well-being, we
ended the day in a typical dutch restaurant, where we enjoyed a so
called “Rijstafel”, a delicious dish made with potatoes, different types
of meat, red cabbage, pears and so on.
The next day it was time
for our company visits. Half of the group went to an animation and
visual effects studio called Lemonade Animation the other half went to a
graphic design studio called Fabrique. We were lucky to casually talk
with the founders and get to see the heart of the studios. Both visits
became an important learning experience for the Visualization students.
Before
we hit the road to the beach, we stopped at the famous Van Gogh museum
to see the works of the Dutch painter. The museum holds the largest
collection of Van Gogh's paintings and drawings in the world.
Perhaps
the most challenging aspect of the excursion was the workshop at the
North Sea. The students were given the task to develop a light object
which is able to move on the beach only with wind power. This could be
done with mechanics or by “wind kite” principle. A final race decided
about the best beachrunner and the winners were rewarded.
Check out our pictures at:
http://aibvizexcursionamsterdam13.tumblr.comWritten by Inga Bruckmann, Program Assistant VIZ Spring 2013
In the midst of the discussion of the Pope’s
resignation and the anticipation of his successor, the New Europe
students played their part in the religious conversation during an
excursion to Mainz last week. South of Bonn, Mainz also sits on the
Rhine River and is the site of several aspects of historical—religious
significance in Europe.
It was a center of the “Christianization” of Germanic peoples and
became a powerful city of Catholic influence during the era of the
Holy Roman Empire. It also served as the home of Johannes Gutenberg,
who invented the movable type printing press and first used it for the
printing of the Bible. While here, the New Europe students were able to
create personal graphics on some of these presses, as well as tour the
cathedral at the town center. In addition, we had the opportunity to
listen to and talk with a rabbi at the Jewish synagogue in Mainz—a site
of very much turmoil, recovery, and reinvention since its devastation
during World War II. The new synagogue we visited was recently completed
in 2010 and stands as an architectural marvel of the city, functioning
not only as a place of worship, but also as a testament to the
resilience of the Mainz Jewish community. It makes a monument to a more
tragic time in history in Germany, but also clearly looks to future
progress in its design.
