22 posts
Curaçao Jews Home page –Learn about the Jews of Curaçao: their rich history, magnificent synagogues, historic cemeteries, fascinating museums, and other delightful other sites. Find everything you need to plan a visit. CuracaoJews.org is an initiative of the Jewish Cultural Historical Museum as we approach 400 years of Jewish life recorded on the island of Curaçao.
Just playing with my new blogging platform to see if it works ok!
I admit I am always a little bit offended when I hear that a friend of mine (François?) chooses Aruba as a vacation destination. And it happens pretty regularly. Oh I always say that the two islands are very similar, but the truth is that I’ve spent very little time in Aruba, so… Anyway, for those of you who want to explore this delicate topic more deeply I present to you:
Aruba versus Curacao: Caribbean Showdown – Curaçao Chronicle:
At first glance Aruba and Curacao seem very similar. They’re both Dutch islands, they are about 75 miles apart from each other off of the coast of Venezuela and they even have most of the same cultural influences. But believe me; the two islands couldn’t be more different. These differences aren’t a bad thing; it’s just that some travelers will prefer one over the other depending on the type of vacation experience they’re looking for.
An annual event, the streets of Willemstad (Curaçao)are covered with art by well known artists:
I was recently visiting Curaçao and remembered that I had read that Netflix was now available in South America so I thought I would check it out. (Curaçao is not technically in South America but close enough!) Well, it worked.
For one reason or another, I found a british program called “The Hour” which I also remembered having been positioned as the BBC’s answer to Madmen. Which it is not.
What it is, is a compelling drama about the creation of an hour long news program on the BBC in the years following WWII.
So compelling in fact, that we watched the whole mini-series (6 or 7 episodes) while we were ther...
It felt like a war zone without the danger! [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofUdhro7G2o&w=420&h=315]
Here’s how we make Garoza (Charoset) in Curaçao.
Trust me, add a little horseradish, a couple of matzah, delicious!
You may not follow the news, but Curaçao is undergoing major constitutional changes, as are all the Netherlands Antilles. In fact, as of this Sunday, Oct 10, (“10-10-10”) the Netherlands Antilles will cease to exist as a legal entity. The easiest way to explain this to Americans that I have come up with is, that it’s as if all the islands of the State of Hawaii decided that they should all be their own state, the state of Oahu, of Maui, etc.
This is from an article in the BBC Caribean:
“A series of negotiations, with Holland in the role of part partner/part arbiter, resulted in an agreement in which Curacao and St Maarten will become ‘separate countries’ with direct ties to Holland.
The t...
This is probably not high on your radar, but if you have interest in the island of Curaçao you may have heard about the big referendum issue that is being hotly debated these days. I won’t even try to capture the sides of the argument, rather I want to refer you to this outstanding paper written by people from Harvard Law School that cover the issues and sides thoroughly. It is, by the way, extremely well written.
Here’s a taste:
“These issues were counterbalanced by a major advantage we brought to this ...
Recently I visited Curaçao to participate in the celebration of the 275th anniversary of the building of the Snoa. This is from an article written by Sam D. Gruber (who I met there) “As evening fell in Willemstad in Curacao on April 16, scores of well-dressed people headed to the narrow Hanchi di Snoa, and into the courtyard of the Snoa — Curacao’s venerable synagogue built in 1732, home to Congregation Mikvé Israel-Emanuel, the oldest surviving synagogue in the Americas, and one where no Sabbath or major holiday has gone uncelebrated in 275 years.”
Read the whole article ‘A Birthday Celebration for Curaçao’s historic synagogue.
Here’s an email I received recently. How many different languages do you count? “Danki pa e artíkulo d Sam. Mi a haña un email di dje siman pasá kaminda ela kontami ku pronto e artíkulo lo sali i ku e lo manda mi e link. Maar jij was veel sneller. Avery a gusta e artikel hopi (mi tambe trouwens). Lo mi skibi Sam. He is a good writer. Trouwens su mama a muri in the meantime (ela skibimi).
Chag Sameach (Shavuot)”
Yeah a weird thought. So when I came across an analysis called The Dutch Defend Their World Empire, I was fascinated, in a sick sort of way. “[snip…]The Dutch problem can best be described with the words, “not enough”. Not enough forces to successfully repel an invasion of Aruba, Curacao, and Bonaire; not enough naval power to carry out operations to retake the islands; their fighters do not have enough range; and not enough logistical support to support an operation.[snip…] (from The Dutch Defend Their Empire)
Also, from the comments:
“[snip…]The United...
This is the Seaquarium beach area. It’s very beautiful as you can see. Click on the photo if you dare. It’s huge but impressive.
For those of you who avidly follow Curaçao politics, yes, all two of you, and I know who you are, do you think this is a good thing? I am not so sure… “The Dutch government has signed an agreement granting qualified autonomy to the territories of Curacao and St. Maarten, paving the way for the formal end of the Netherlands Antilles.” (from Radio Jamaica)
We’ll see how it develops.
Curacao has in the past won or gotten very close to winning the overall Little League World Series! So far it looks like the Curacao team has won the Caribean title. Take a look at the standings so far: Little League World Series Standings
Oddly enough the way the overall World Series is structured is that the US always makes it to the Semi Finals. Seems a bit rigged don’t you think? At least it’s better than the big leagues where the “World” in “World Series” means US and Canada 🙂
FlightStats – Worldwide flight status / tracker with historical performance data
Comprehensive airport and flight information: delays, actual times, estimated times, scores etc.
(tags: travel flight airtravel)
Interesting article about Curacaoan identity
Ingredients for Web 2.0 Success
(tags: funny)
Here’s a really fun article in the Washington Post about Curacao…
(tags: curacao Travel interesting)
I’ve discovered how hard it is to work on a laptop with a tiny screen, 1.2GHz and, esepcially, 256Mb of memory. Sloooooow! I’ve been keeping up with emails but not really getting into a blogging mindset. This is just a cheat post to make my blog not appear dead 🙂 Curacao? Those of you who know me, know. Those who do not, probably don’t know where Curacao is. Look it up on a map. A little island (and I mean little) in the Caribean, right off the coast of South America. It’s where I was born and grew up,so I get back here regularly. Nice.
I don’t know how I missed this article, but it sure is an interesting and significant development for one, like me, who was born and grew up in Curacao.
“Under the new structure, the Netherlands Antilles will be dissolved and Curacao and St. Maarten will become separate, autonomous members of the kingdom, according to the agreement signed by the leaders Saturday night in Curacao.” (from Miami Herald)
Technorati Tags: curacao, netherlandsantilles
Did you know that Curacao is the 7th favorite place that travelers from Boston consider when they are looking for nude beaches in the Caribean? Miami is the first, Aruba the second.
This important bulletin brought to you by Kayak Buzz, a neat web-2.0-kayak-mashup-with-google that I just came across. You can look at the URL above to see how it’s formed. The funny thing is that the nude beach search isn’t available unless you include the magic, secret “&ac=nude” clause.
You should check out Kayak, it’s a really good travel search site that automates what you know you are already doing – which is to visit all the other travel sites with the same itinerary to see who has the best deal at this moment.
Technorati Tags: travel
There’s this little island in the Caribean called Curacao. I happen to know a lot about it because that’s where I was born and grew up. Now I live in the United States, but continue to keep up with what’s going on in there. This is from an article about an Open Source Conferencethat happened, where else? Yes, right there in Curacao.
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When I agreed to speak at this island’s first-ever free/open source conference last Wednesday, I was warned that Linux and open source were not well-known here. This was not true, but most of Curacao’s Linux and open source software users thought they were alone…
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I am away from home, at my home in Curacao for a reunion of Salas folks from around the world. I saw an childhood friend of mine, Raul, who asked me ‘So what’s a blog, anyway’? I was taken aback, because, what would Raul be doing, reading my blog, and especially with the rather ‘odd’ image that I left as the top entry before I headed down here? So, this is just a reminder of what I already knew, of course, that anyone around the world can read this. And secondly, that anyone with the name Salas might be tempted to see what’s to be seen on www.salas.com, so be careful what shows up on the front page!
A blog is a contraction of the word “Web Log”, as in web diary or web journal. A blog is a w...