Promoveren: Considering a Dutch PhD?

This is the first of a monthly series about being a(n international) PhD student/candidate in the Netherlands. All information is unofficial and different unis/faculties/groups work differently — your mileage may vary.

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At the end of my first year, a colleague lent me Promoveren, a book on being a PhD candidate in the Netherlands, which covers the whole process of finding a position to the defense. Unfortunately it was in Dutch, so it’s useless for foreigners. Whilst reading it, I became so annoyed I almost threw it against a wall (because it described experiences that I had expected to get, but wasn’t getting), but as it wasn’t my copy I couldn’t do that, so I bought my own, which is surprisingly still intact.

If you’re considering coming to the Netherlands for a PhD, then the system could be different to what you’re familiar with in your own country. In Australia, most students apply for a scholarship from the university and provide their own topic (with assistance from their future supervisor) in the application. In the Netherlands, promovendi (the plural of promovendus (male) or promovenda (female)) are considered employees and are paid a salary, either by the university or from external funding. Only a few are on scholarships. (We don’t get student cards either, so there’s no student discounts for cinemas, concerts, museums etc.) Most positions are therefore advertised like a “real job”, including the topic to be researched, and one applicant is chosen for a particular position.

If it is possible, it’s useful to have a face-to-face interview and check out the uni and town. I came for my interview from Hamburg, where I was on holiday at the time. It was a long day, and I arrived an hour late due to some stuffup on the trains (welcome to the Netherlands!), but I got to see the university, have lunch with some future colleagues, talk to my supervisors, and have a look around Eindhoven. It appeared I was in town on a non-PSV home game day, so everything looked pretty reasonable.

Some of the questions recommended in Promoveren to ask during the interview are:

• Will I be attached to a research school? (In the Netherlands, most candidates follow specialised courses through a research school rather than the university. This includes courses in your subject area, as well as presentation and writing skills courses.)
• Will I have my own computer? Are the required experimental facilities available? Is it possible to work from home?
• Am I required to take courses/subjects? Am I required to teach courses/subjects?
• Is there budget to attend conferences/summer schools?
• Who are my supervisors? How often will we meet? Will I have a daily supervisor?
• Are there opportunities to present work to and discuss work with the group at e.g., seminars, lunch meetings?

To this I would add (although some of these are more relevant to Human Resources):

• Will I have to learn Dutch? If so, will the uni pay for courses? Which language are important notices/emails from the department/uni in? Are there courses/opportunities to improve my English?
• What support is there at the uni for the international community, e.g., help with tax, housing issues, English news, cross-cultural differences courses, counselling? What support is there for my partner? (The TU/e has improved significantly in this area since I arrived.)

Of course, it’s possible for supervisors/HR to “fiddle” the answers to these questions and to show you the best side of the group. My future colleagues spoke in English during lunch — this turned out to be a bit of a show as that was (and is still) not my experience as a proper employee. I wrote in my notes from the interview that seminars were every two to three weeks. However, the amount of seminars/group meetings in my first year was well below that. I’m not sure if this was a blip in that almost everyone happened to cancel/forget or if it was always that disorganised. So be warned that you might be getting a warped picture, although what I was told about the weather was spot on.

Probably the most useful thing my future supervisor did was put me in touch with some former employees who now live in Melbourne. This was a great way of getting information. In particular, I am incredibly grateful to Claudia, for her help and support over the last three and a half years — I didn’t believe her at the time that it would be so frustrating, but she was right. I only wish I’d also been able to read Promoveren, as it would have been helpful to understand more about the bigger picture and I could have been even more prepared for entering the Dutch academic system.

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Promoveren: een wegwijzer voor de beginnend wetenschapper (Herman Lelieveldt, 2007, 3rd edition) can be found in bookstores. Some excerpts from the first edition can be found in English at Science.

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Next month: skipping from the pre-beginning to the end — what happens during a Dutch defense (promotie).

Two colleagues kindly provided feedback on this post. One (who doesn’t travel everyday) would like me to mention that the trains are not that bad, the other (who travels everyday) assures me they are.

Are you thinking of coming to the Netherlands for a doctorate? Are you here already? Are you an international PhD candidate in another country? What do you wish you’d known or asked before you started?

Food: Trying to eat out

It is said that by moving overseas you learn a lot about yourself. I recently discovered that I have no sense of taste. It’s not so much that I have no taste, I’ve just never learnt to connect tastes with descriptive words. Working out the ingredients in a dish is a slow process, and if something tastes awful, then I have no idea whether to add sugar, salt or pepper to it or to bin it. The annoying thing about this revelation is that it occurred not while cooking, not while eating out, but in Dutch class, when I was asked if I liked bitter foods. There was absolutely no food in sight. At least we were talking about food disorders at the time, and not camping or the environment or Jan Smit, so it was on topic. It’s nice to know that my avoidance of a career in catering or food criticism has been vindicated.

Therefore, talking about food quality is rather pointless. I just have to go with the opinions of other expats who are rather underwhelmed by the food in the Netherlands. My issues concern the lack of choice, both on the menu and price-wise, value for money, and service. Going to the movies in Melbourne and need a quick meal beforehand? Try pasta, pizza, burgers, Portuguese chicken, sushi, noodles, crepes etc. etc. Going to the 6:30pm session at Pathe Eindhoven? See you at Eazie for some noodles. I suppose it does make life easy, if a little dull.

On the way to night classes in Melbourne, I would sometimes pick up something in the city for dinner. I originally enrolled for night Dutch classes, because I figured I could do the same here. I quickly worked out that there is a lack of cheap, quick options in Eindhoven. It essentially comes down to noodles or a kebab. You might also be able to get a sandwich. Sushi will set you back over €10 to get enough for a substantial meal (as opposed to about €4 in Melbourne), and the only pizza slice place in the city is shut by dinner time. I hadn’t discovered La Place, a nice-enough buffet-like chain, at the time, but they are also closed by 7pm. Pancakes are also quick, but cost €8-10 for one with decent toppings. Taking something to work is not an option — we have no microwave on our floor and the one upstairs is a nightmare to operate. For those who like global fast food chains or deep-fried indeterminate meat, that’s also an option, however I do like my food to be vaguely recognisable.

I spoke to an American expat who eats out every night in Eindhoven, and claimed he sometimes ate “cheaply”. When challenged, he also listed noodles and shoarma as his cheap options. So that’s it, at the moment. A new trend in the Netherlands is pasta in a box and the chain GoPasta is set to open in Eindhoven soon (2009 according to their website). A trip to the Utrecht outlet was okay for €5, however Julia’s at Amsterdam Central station is better.

So, eating out quickly and cheaply is not really on, and eating out “normally” costs too much money and time. However, given my lack of taste, I will never be one of these people who can really “cook” — all I can do is follow a recipe. That then leads to another set of problems in sourcing ingredients …

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Is the range of “fast” food as small in other Dutch cities or is it just Eindhoven? Do the Dutch really go home before a night class to have dinner? Have you eaten my cooking and survived to tell the tale?

Pride and shame

This week is Australia Day (also known as Invasion Day to the indigenous community). Apparently half the population goes to an event or explicitly “celebrates” with family and friends. I think I’m in the other half. For me, there’s a day off work, there’s tennis on the TV (the Australian Open always includes 26 January), and there’s the Hottest 100 countdown on Triple J, the young peoples’ radio station.

The Dutch community in Melbourne organises a family day on the Sunday before or after Queen’s Day, which I’m looking forward to more than the authentic celebrations in the Netherlands. However, even on the other side of the world, I don’t feel the need to get all patriotic by wrapping myself in a flag and drinking a VB, so no Coco’s Outback (Amsterdam), Walkabout (Breda) or Krazy Kangaroo (Eindhoven) for me this Tuesday.

I’m always curious what is interesting and significant enough about Australia to be reported outside the country. This time last year there was blanket coverage of the bushfires. One story that has appeared a few times since I moved to the Netherlands (especially in NRC and nrc.next) is the proposed national internet filter, which is not the most positive story: the government wants to legislate mandatory filtering of not just illegal content, but other content that is not really illegal. As the OpenNet Initiative noted, all the attention means “one might think Australia were the first or only country to ever filter the Internet”.

Despite what the government says, it’s not similar to how filters work in other European countries, and it appears that the government have not learned from the criticisms of other systems, such as the Dutch system. It’s creating more problems (e.g., who knows if the criteria for the blacklist will expand in the future) whilst not really helping to solve the real problem (how to keep children safe online — the filter is but one initiative). The whole plan makes Australia look dreadfully backward, incompetent and uninspiring.

This week there is a blackout planned, during which websites and avatars will be blacked out in support. It probably won’t make a lot of difference, but it’s good to see the Australian fighting spirit emerging on our national day. And I’ll be happy if I can access Triple J’s webstream to hear the end of the Hottest 100 countdown.

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Do you celebrate national days outside your home country? Are you ever ashamed (and want to bang your head against something solid) when your home country is in the media?

Weather tales

Over the last few weeks there has been some chaos surrounding the snow, the heaviest fall in four years. Bus services were altered, train services were reduced, and many flights were cancelled. Traffic conditions were not great, cycling was treacherous (the word of the season), and walking required some sort of fancy hiking shoes to avoid falling over. For those looking to increase their transport options, many driving exams were cancelled, especially in the north.

Many football matches were postponed — one Eredivisie round will be finished this weekend. On the other hand, many pairs of skates were sold. Some natural ice locations were given the all clear to skate on, which is “part of the Dutch cultural heritage” [en].

Last weekend’s national kortebaan championships (it translates to “short track”, but it’s different to short track in format; it’s ideally a natural ice event) was the farewell for skater Erben Wennemars, who missed out on Olympic qualification and had been talking up the first Elfstedentocht in 13 years on Twitter. It appears too much snow has ruined the Elfstedentocht route, so the skaters who did qualify for Vancouver are pleased that they can continue with their planned preparations and won’t miss the tour of tours.

As of Saturday, there is still a layer of snow/ice about, even after Thursday’s sun and a week of above zero temperatures. Firework debris from New Year’s Eve is resurfacing as it melts. Most of the roads and bike paths have been cleared, but some footpaths remain difficult to negotiate. NS are still experiencing train problems and are offering discounted travel to all travellers, not just those with discount cards, during the weekday offpeak.

I missed a defense in Delft, skipped some German classes (as I wasn’t sure how accessible the bike paths would be), haven’t been able to start walking/jogging/running again, had some restless nights worrying about planes (that luckily left as scheduled), but could still get to work and the shops, so my plans were not hugely affected. Others weren’t as fortunate. The snow may be pretty, but it is also pretty effective at disrupting regular activities.

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How were your plans affected over the last few weeks? Did you see anyone skating on natural ice? For those from warmer climes, would you prefer snow/below zero temperatures or heatwaves?

New Year episode

The night before the last of our travels, we headed out to the grand cafe, right on Dutch dinner time. Whilst waiting for service, we checked the snow forecast on my iPod. Delays could be expected at Schiphol, extreme weather warnings in the north. This was problematic — the hotel required full prepayment for the peak season and at least one part of the flights was a sale fare. If the plane didn’t depart, would we be able to go at all?

The next morning it was raining. However the south was unaffected by the warnings, so we just had to get on a train and see what happened at the other end. Surprisingly, despite all the warnings, there were very few problems. Later that afternoon we arrived in Vienna: home of Sachertorte, cafes, opera, and never-ending souvenir shops in which any mildly famous Austrian is condemned after death to a new lifetime of appearing on chocolate boxes. If you don’t subscribe to that level of tackiness, then there’s always a tshirt/mug/clock that states “No kangaroos in Austria”.

Our “local” informed us that there would be a big party in the city for New Year’s Eve. He wouldn’t be there, as it wasn’t his thing, but as tourists we might find it interesting. This echoed my enthusiasm when a colleague told me she would be in Sydney at this time — I have zero interest in sitting for ten hours holding a place doing nothing just to see some fireworks.

The shops closed at 3pm on December 31 as Silvester is considered a public holiday, and then the Silvesterpfad kicked off. The trail ran for 2km, complete with stages and food stands and 700,000 people. Many stands were selling toys, in particular small pigs. These, along with clovers and mushrooms, are considered lucky and are exchanged on New Years’ Eve. At one point, we lost the trail, but found people arriving for the Kaiserball at the Hofburg, a highlight of the Vienna ball season. At midnight, following a mid-evening nap and dodging the fireworks around the Stephansplatz, we waltzed in the New Year to the sounds of Strauss.

On January 1, the hotel provided us with cake for breakfast and a doggie bag. The receptionist gave us a small good luck token for our purses, which would bring us luck this year. A flick through the most-read paper in the country revealed an excessive use of exclamation marks (every day, not just on January 1) and a Page Three girl (but not on page 3).

At the strike of the Eurovision anthem, we arrived at the Rathaus to watch the Neujahrskonzert live on a big screen in the freezing cold. Seeing as we had saved €30-900 by not having a ticket (although we didn’t go in the lottery in the first place), the ongoing mobile phones and disrupted views could be overlooked. One lady had a different opinion and spent 2.5 hours physically moving people who stood in her way.

At the end of the week, proficiency in the language was somewhat lacking: doe maar zwei being one of the worst transgressions. However, we had become proficient in avoiding costumed ticket hawkers and in ordering from a menu that contained several pages of coffee and cake options. After all the cakes, hot chocolates, schnitzels, cakes, boiled beef, cakes, and coffees, we returned to a still-snowy Netherlands and a vegetable stirfry. Prosit Neujahr!

Christmas episode

At the beginning of December, a trip to the shops involved encounters with several people dressed in bright jester-like outfits with black faces and curly wigs and lollies and musical instruments. This amused my partner. That people feel the need to go to so much effort bemuses me — it’s not a question of painting themselves black, green or red. How long does it take to get clean again?

On the weekend the cold kicked in, a visit to Belgium led to the discovery that they know how to put on a Christmas market, almost on a par with Germany. The markets and the skating rinks in Brussels, Antwerp, Bruges and Ghent were packed, especially in the evenings. The main difference was fewer lebkuchen and roasted nuts stands (and, in a Gallic twist, more escargot stands). However, the hot chocolates with large shots of Baileys made one forget about the lack of goodies.

If the trains didn’t return to normal following several days of weather-related delays and cancellations, we would have to skip our trip to Amsterdam. As it was, the direct train to Amsterdam was in the 20% of trains that didn’t return, but a half hour stop in Utrecht didn’t seem unreasonable. After a trip to the Hermitage and a bit of shopping, some “locals” introduced us to Amsterdam’s €5 pizza district and a pub with La Chouffe on tap. We arrived at Amsterdam Centraal at 11:15pm to find we’d missed the last direct-ish train and we would be on the last train of the night home: a stoptrain that arrived at 2:15am.

A search for La Chouffe suppliers in Eindhoven the following morning revealed a bottle shop in Hurksestraat, opposite Praxis, a hardware store. Two years ago I rode to Praxis and bought a Christmas tree, which is still sitting on my window sill as a form of guard dog. I set off through the discoloured-snow-now-ice for the 4km ride, tracing the landmarks. After Albert Heijn I was in unfamiliarity and was looking for a left turn. A stop to check the map showed that I’d fallen for the same problem as two years ago. The route shown by Google Maps is not suitable for bikes, and an extra 500m to the main road and then turning back was required.

The trains were running as normal on Christmas Day. On arrival at Breda, the rain began. Puddles were forming in the footprints in the ice, so we stomped and slipped along. Again, landmarks were traced: the park, the barracks, the church.

Me: Is that Australian pub really Australian or not? We should turn left somewhere but I would have remembered the pub.
iPod: You are on the wrong side of the church. Turn left now.
Partner: This is a pedestrian shopping street. It doesn’t look like anyone lives here.

I rang a doorbell between shops and the door opens: the first shelter from the rain since the station. Feliz natal, feliz aniversário. For Christmas, chocolates. For the birthday boy, a N’ice Chouffe and giftwrapped Crownies and Boags. A Jamie roast was underway, accompanied by Jamie vegetables, Jamie gravy and Jamie Yorkshire puddings. Instead of John Lennon and Chris Isaak, there was Chico Buarque on vinyl. An over-alcoholic trifle with poor quality Dr Oetker jelly was followed by cupcakes and TU/e Christmas box-style Ludo.

After a month of seasonal discoveries, we were looking at more maps and timetables and were preparing to try our luck at the airport for yet another merging of cultural celebrations. But would the snow hold off?

Orchestrated organisation

The Dutch have a reputation for being extremely organised. An example of this is that tickets for concerts are known to go on sale 364 days in advance. Case in point: tickets for Within Temptation’s Amsterdam concert at Carré on 26 April 2010 went on sale 27 April 2009. This is a one-off thing though.

There are also a range of more regular concerts that are bookable (and as a result sell out) ages in advance. Brabant’s favourite son Guus Meeuwis has put on concerts at the Philips Stadion for the last five years now. Next concert? 11 June 2010. When did tickets go on sale? 12 June 2009. I kid you not. It’s not sold out yet though.

The most far ahead I’ve booked tickets for a seated event is five months. (Even booking tickets to Mamma Mia! three months ahead was problematic, as it turned out one companion had to be in Utrecht the day of the performance for a workshop which we didn’t know about at the time of booking.) This was for the Night of the Proms, an annual concert which started in Antwerp 25 years ago and now travels to the Netherlands, Germany, and sometimes Spain and France. The lineup changes every year — this year we were treated to Roxette, Sharon from Within Temptation, OMD, and classical guitarists the Katona twins.

The nature of a “prom” is that there is a standing area in which people can move around. It did look like fun in that area — there was dancing at one point — however one would get tired standing for three hours. The audience was mostly adult groups with some families here and there. I think there was a mix of people who attend every year as well as a large number of Roxette fans (including my companions).

In the first half, each artist performed one or two songs with the orchestra, interspersed with orchestra-only classics. After the interval, some of the artists performed duets, while Roxette performed a longer set by themselves. The night headed towards an end with a singalong of Land of Hope and Glory (a feature of British proms) and an apparently well-known song from one of the artists who performs most years at the Prom and whom I’d never heard of before. If I’d heard of John Miles and his 1976 UK top 3 single “Music” before, then I could have sang along as well. That was a clue that most of the attendees were regulars.

There’s really nothing in Australia that compares to these annual recurring seated events, which also includes Holiday on Ice, Christmas circuses etc. I think it becomes a bit of a ritual. Carols by Candlelight comes close, however tickets go on sale eight weeks in advance, and it’s also telecast on live screens in the city and on TV, so you don’t have to be there for it to be a ritual. In the Prom programme, there was an order form to get tickets for next year’s Prom, even before the artists have been announced.

I wonder what the driver is here: whether the managers or ticket companies like doing things so far ahead or whether society demands it. Either way, there doesn’t seem to be the same frenzy for tickets that accompanies concerts in Australia (although getting Pinkpop tickets is now becoming a rush like the Big Day Out). However, I won’t be getting tickets for one of Within Temptation’s April shows: I still have no idea what I’ll be doing that far ahead and by the time I do know, it’ll be sold out.

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This time last year, I went to Breda to check out the glass house set up for the annual 3FM (the Dutch equivalent of Triple J) Serious Request, from which DJs broadcast for a week in order to raise money for Red Cross (Rode Kruis) activities. Eindhoven made the shortlist to host the house this year, however lost to Groningen. As a semi-replacement, Eindhoven students are currently living in their own glass house for 100 hours at the Catharinaplein, before travelling to Groningen on Tuesday to deliver their collection. Donations can be made online by requesting a song, purchasing Christmas cards and stamps or creating a virtual help package and will go towards malaria prevention programmes.

Lichtstad

How many Dutch people does it take to change a lightbulb?
Three. One to change the bulb, and two to hold the bicycle steady.

Many activities, permanent and seasonal, focus on light and how it was behind the development of Eindhoven. Which makes it all the more hilarious when all the lightbulbs in my apartment blow at the same time — this time it took a week to find replacements, due to Philips changing product lines (because of the new European rules about incandescent bulbs, I assume) and Albert Heijn’s infamously useless shelf stocking policies. So much for living in the Lichtstad.

During the Museumweekend earlier this year, I visited the Gloeilampfabriekje. This is housed in one of the original lightbulb factory buildings in the centre of Eindhoven and is only accessible as part of a tour. Old equipment and examples of lightbulb fabrication techniques are demonstrated. The factory was set up by Gerard Philips in the late 1800s, who had learnt about lightbulbs while he was working in Scotland and brought his knowledge back to the Netherlands. Most of the original employees were young girls from the surrounding farms, which was a reason for locating the factory in the “countryside”. Some of the tour guides were pointing out their grandparents in the old photos.

Move forward to the mid 1940s, when the Lichtjesroute was started to celebrate the liberation of Eindhoven after WWII. I rode a portion of it again, however discovered it was practically same as last year with a few new features and some lights had changed positions. The rainbow on the Vestdijk (complete with pot of gold) was impressive. My cycling companions noted that it had a very community feel about it. Again, it’s something that has to be experienced.

Jumping forward in time to the current age and the GLOW light art festival. Although it seemed like there was less walking involved this year, installations didn’t seem as evenly spread throughout the city — several things were probably more easily reached with a bike. I liked what I saw though. The addition of performance locations was slightly annoying (in that one had to time the tour correctly in order to arrive at the performance on time), however it was a welcome change from installation after installation. The brass band outside the church was great (although we weren’t treated to Led Zeppelin as shown in their promotional clip) and so was the Designhuis with the giant lightbulbs emitting light and noise. For those who couldn’t make it to Eindhoven: by visiting a particular website, you could control a spotlight located at the train station set up to follow people.

The local student news website Shift040 pointed out that light artists are somehow immune from energy saving protests, so I’m curious to see if GLOW changes next year in response to this. The Lichtjesroute organisers are currently changing the bulbs in their displays for LED lamps, however it will be a slow and expensive process. Maybe it would be quicker if they didn’t need two people to hold the bike steady.

Ferhalen

Eleven provinces later, I’ve seen a fair bit of the Netherlands. I finally picked up my Fryslân stamp by visiting Leeuwarden (known as birthplace of Mata Hari, and as the starting point of the skating tour Elfstedentocht) and Sneek (known for watersports and the Weduwe Joustra brewery, responsible for the local liquor Beerenburg (jenever with herbs) — and stop two on the Elfstedentocht).

A foggy day in Leeuwarden.

Fryslân has two official languages: Frisian and Dutch. Frisian seems to be similar to Luxembourgish in usage — it’s not heard too much on the streets, but spoken more in private. I only heard a few words spoken, most noticeably by a mother to her children. A few steps later, she was speaking Dutch to a stranger at the ATM.

Several bookstores in Leeuwarden had extensive Frisian sections, and there is also a speciality bookstore/publisher. Poetry could be found embedded in the footpaths of Leeuwarden. The website Praat mar Frysk [fy], fronted by international supermodel Doutzen Kroes, encourages people to speak Frisian in stores and with your friends (that’s as much as I could understand).

Fryslân did not disappoint on the local food front. Sûkerbôle is a form of sugar bread which is wonderful warmed up in the oven. It’s not dissimilar to the consistency of hot cross buns, but with sugar instead of fruit and peel. Oranjekoek is also delicious, and is apparently the celebration cake of choice in the north. I’d much prefer that to vlaai any day, although the almonds in it would drive me mad after a while.

To make up for missing a family wedding, I went to see an exhibition of dinnerware given as wedding presents at the Keramiekmuseum. One room displayed gifts to the members of the royal family on the occasions of their weddings, and another showed gifts to general members of the population over the last 100+ years. Some of it was lovely, and some really hideous. I’m not sure if I’d be admitting that I received an Ikea 365+ set as a present. On top of that, some of the accompanying wedding photos were hilarious. I wonder if my sister-in-law received any dinnerware …

One of my major issues with Eindhoven is that the market is never open at convenient times. In Leeuwarden, the city market is on Fridays between 7:30am and 4:30pm. I saw produce still exchanging hands at around 5pm. On top of that, the side streets contained some cute independent shops, while the large chains still had a presence around the market area.

While I was in Leeuwarden, I stayed a night at the Stenden University Hotel, staffed by current students of hotel and hospitality management. It’s quite strange to walk through the uni on the way to the rooms — no wonder a guide was needed. In general, the students were very enthusiastic and professional, however checking out did cause a few problems. For the price, the room was huge with a luxurious bathroom, and the buffet breakfast was delicious.

Taking into account people/culture, food, museums, shopping and hospitality, Fryslân delivered a relaxing weekend break. Some souvenirs are yet to be sampled: a bottle of Beerenberg and traditional biscuits known as dúmkes.

In order to complete the set of provinces, I need to visit one more. The travel guides however are not promising so far — the only interesting thing I’ve found about Drenthe is cycling. If anyone has any ideas for Drenthe, I’d love to hear them.

As featured at Dutch Design Week

Dutch Design Week is a huge event in Eindhoven every October. More so this year, as Eindhoven is currently one of the finalists (with Helsinki) for World Design Capital 2012. Apparently 115,000 visitors checked out at least one of the 290 events at one of 60 locations (however I have no idea how that number was calculated, seeing as most events were free).

Best of the awards: During Brazil Contemporary I visited Museum Boijmans van Beuningen and quite liked its strange looking coat rack which spins around and coathangers bounce up and down. This so-called merry-go-round coat rack picked up the overall prize at the annual Dutch Design Awards. The Popular Choice prize was given to an enormous flying carpet that brings a little bit of green to a city centre.

Best-dressed: It didn’t occur to me that the town would be crawling with designers dressed up to the nines, but it was.

Things that were functional: A lot of things fitted into this category, including:

• A bed frame that can change into a single bed, a double bed or two singles. You’re looking at around €3000 for the frame and mattress set though.
• A chair with a built-in magazine rack. Very useful for waiting rooms.
• Ever been stuck at an airport for hours on end with nowhere to sit? Well, you might find a set of bizarrely-shaped suitcases which can be formed into a mini-couch useful. Although what happens if you’ve already checked your luggage in?

Things that are semi-functional: Douwe Egberts demonstrated a prototype of their touch-screen vending machines. Points for the first screen, which effectively became a giant iPod after you ordered, displaying local news and weather. The next two screens were rather pretty and pointless, while the last required you to jump up and down to “collect” the ingredients for your chosen beverage before it would spit it out. Apparently the coffee was quite nice — hot chocolate wasn’t on offer so I couldn’t try it out.

Possibly functional for someone but not me: Ever wanted to perform for your friends but have no musical ability? Then Mustick is for you. Kind of ditto for the Dancerail, although this was commissioned by a professional dance company who are using it in performances. Both were projects by TU/e Industrial Design students.

Taking the online to the real world: Coathangers with built-in LEDs — the hangers will light up depending on what you already have in your shopping basket. A “what other people bought” for physical shops.

Things that were pretty and have a use but you wouldn’t use them because they’re too pretty: Carola Zee makes gorgeous bowls and cups.

Things that were original but really had no functional use: A tie between the paper animals at MU (including imaginary animals made from newspapers) and the province flags at Krabbedans whose patterns were a punchcard representation of the provincial anthems.

Strange food: At Strijp-S there was a cafe serving only potato-based dishes. Potato muffins, potato bread etc. It was fittingly called the Potato Eaters. Didn’t get a chance to sample anything though. I also would like to know what one ate during a Dutch Design Dinner — it cost €135 (including drinks).

Sustainability/reusability: This was part of the theme for the Design Capital bid, so items such as bags and other products made from Colombian truck tyres, sustainable cable holders made from potato peel and corn, and electric cars and public chargers were on display.

After a whole week visiting something almost every day, I was exhausted and I wasn’t even involved. It was fascinating to see lots of different ideas in one go and many designers were on hand to demonstrate their products and explain the process. Now the wait is on for the announcement of World Design Capital 2012 in late November.

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Dutch Design Week returns to Eindhoven 16-24 October 2010.