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© JvL
The
Zwarte Cross is a big summer festival held in the Achterhoek, a region in the eastern part of the Netherlands. This part of Gelderland is mostly rural, and its culture is quite visible at the festival. The Zwarte Cross (from "black" i.e., illegal, motorcross) is the biggest music/arts festival in the Netherlands -- and also the biggest dirtbike event in the world (
source: wikipedia so it must be true). A pretty special combination. This year's sold-out edition attracted over 200.000 visitors. Many "Proud to be a Farmer" tattoos were clearly visible on the large part of the audience that was shirtless in the heat. The festival is a combination of proper dirt bike races, for-fun races (mopeds, trucks, boats), music (mostly rock, but also metal, dance, gospel, country), theater, stunts -- and science!
For all three days, the Universitent (top-left) featured a mix of 20-minutes band performances alternated by 20-minute science talks. Even drawing in a few percent of the visitors already makes for a huge crowd, and for a packed house (bottom-left), we explained Einstein's theory of Relativity. "If you want to stay young, you've got to go fast!".
© JvL