Soccer: Ajax beat Celtic 1-0 to keep the Dutch team's Champions League campaign alive

Lasse Schoene scored the only goal on Wednesday as Ajax beat Celtic 1-0 to keep the Dutch team's Champions League campaign alive.

Schoene, promoted from midfield to the forward line for the match, rounded off a slick passing move in the 51st minute to secure three points for Frank de Boer's team and end a run of six Champions League matches without a win.

Celtic beat Ajax 2-1 in Glasgow two weeks ago to leave the four-time European champion bottom of Group H with only a single point from three matches and facing elimination from a group that also includes Barcelona and AC Milan.

Barcelona remained top of the group by beating second-placed AC Milan 3-1 on Wednesday. Ajax went third, one point behind Milan.

Ajax dominated possession at the Amsterdam Areana but, as has been the team's problem in recent weeks, it struggled to convert domination into clear-cut chances.

Read more: AMSTERDAM: Lasse Schoene scores as Ajax beats Celtic 1-0 - Soccer | Fútbol - MiamiHerald.com

The Netherlands: New mobile phone alarm system tested today

If you are living in the Netherlands and have a cell phone you have probably heard your phone suddenly give a loud alarm signal. Don't worry.

This was the third test signal by the new Dutch national mobile phone alarm system called NL-Alert.

The system, which works on cell broadcast and is not affected if telephone systems go down, sends messages about catastrophic events, saying where they are and what to do.

This Monday's message once again stated that it was a test message.

"With the test signal people could check-out  if their telephone was properly set to receive the message", said the ministry of Justice.
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Currently, about half of the mobile phones in the Netherlands are able to receive the emergency messages. From the test results it seems iPhones in particular were still having trouble to receive the signal from NL-Alert, while Android phones seemed to do better. In case you need to get additional information on how to set your phone go to the website www.nl-alert.nl

EU-Digest

The Netherlands: The "Ten Boom Family Home Museum" in Haarlem - by RM

When tourists visit Amsterdam among one of the favorite spots to visit is the Anne Frank Museum.  

Another similar museum, but far less visited than the Anne Frank museum is the Ten Boom family home museum in Haarlem. It was used as a refuge for fugitive Jews and resistance fighters hunted by the Nazis.

 In 1944 the Nazis arrested this courageous Christian family and all 5 were sent to prison (death) camps. Only Corrie ten Boom survived the Ravensbruck concentration camp near Berlin after the war had ended

In the early 1970's Corrie's book "THE HIDING PLACE" became a best seller and an award winning motion picture. Corrie died on her 91st birthday, April 15, 1983. 

In the Jewish tradition to die on your birthday is a special privilege. Personally I was most touched by what Corrie ten Boom wrote about fear and worry while in the concentration camp, "worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow; it empties today of its strength".

The "Ten Boom Family Home Museum" certainly is a place to visit when in Holland.

Click here for additional information about the Ten Boom Family Museum  

EU-Digest

Leaving the EU will mean economic disaster for UK or for that matter any other EU member copy-cats - by RM

Whatever your views are about the EU, the first thing that happens when your local political establishment decides through a referendum or other manipulation to get out of the Union, is economic disaster.

In the case of Britain getting out of the EU big companies and financial conglomerates will decamp from London to Frankfurt or Paris. The pound will immediately  fall.. Many of the British exporters have no idea what's going to happen to them, and the banks will not be keen to stick out their neck in their favor.

In general if Britain leaves the EU it would become an economic storm so big it could overshadow anything else the British public would have ever experienced.

In connection with the above, just imagine how any member country which steps out of the EU could handle the NSA spying revelations on European countries and their leaders if they had to do this just by themselves? 

Unfortunately in the case of Britain and the NSA the question which obviously arises and which has not been addressed by the EU Parliament or the Commission is how Britain, a member of the EU, has (is) participating and supporting the NSA spy program on Europeans, without the EU Commission/Parliament or the EU member states having any knowledge of it?

With friends like this who needs any enemies? 

Almere-Digest

Netherlands scores poorly in HSCB survey among Expats as a country they want to work and live in

The Netherlands which claims and is often seen as a great place for foreign companies to establish operations only ranked 18th in the 2013 Expat Explorer Survey  by the HSBC as the best countries for expatriates to live, work and raise your children in. 

If you're sick of your home country and are yearning for a change, you might want to consider settling in Asia for the next chapter of your life.

A new study by HSBC ranks several Asian nations among the best countries for expatriates in 2013. The annual Expat Explorer Survey analyzes the findings from 7,000 expats to rank their new homes according to criteria including economics, experience, and raising children.

When considering all three categories, China comes out on top with high scores in economics and experience. Despite faring poorly in the field of raising children, expats in China report high salaries and better quality of life than in their home countries.

Switzerland tops all nations in terms of economics, though it remains unranked overall due to insufficient data in the raising children category. Hailed as a "beacon of growth," Switzerland instills financial optimism in its new inhabitants, with expats citing strong fiscal policy and healthy markets.

When it comes to experience, however, Thailand outpaces the field, thanks to top scores for healthy diet, working environment, social life, local shops and markets, and local culture. Expats living in Thailand enjoy a high quality of life with little trouble integrating; 76% noted how easy it was to make friends in their new land.

And of course, food plays an important role in satisfying these expats. Like Switzerland, however, Thailand also could not be ranked overall because of its lack of data on raising children.

In that category, Germany reigns supreme, with high scores in child education, quality of childcare, and child health and wellbeing. Expat parents laud German education options as cost-effective while still reporting an improvement in the quality of schooling over those available in their home countries. Deutschland also received high scores in economics, helping the nation to place second overall among all three criteria.

http://www.expatexplorer.hsbc.com/#/countries

Sinterklaas: Tensions mount in the Netherlands as UN questions ‘Black Pete’ Christmas tradition - Elisa Criado

It emerged last week that a UN working group is investigating the Dutch custom of white people dressing up as ‘Zwarte Piet’ (Black Pete) as part of their traditional Christmas festivities.

The leader of the UN group, the Jamaican academic Verene Shepherd, has spoken out against the practice on Dutch national television, condemning it as ‘a throw-back to slavery’.

The figure of ‘Zwarte Piet’ is an integral part of the Dutch Christmas tradition. In the Netherlands, children receive gifts on the fifth of December from ‘Sinterklaas’, a version of Saint Nicholas, along with his black slave helpers. These were originally portrayed as scary figures that would beat naughty children with a bunch of twigs and take them away in a sack to Saint Nicholas’ fictional home in Spain.

Today they are mainly characterised as the clown, acrobat, joker and entertainer. Although the custom is clearly linked to slavery and colonial times, most children are currently told that Black Pete gets his colour from the soot in the chimneys when he delivers their presents.

A few weeks before the culmination of festivities on the fifth, Sinterklaas and his ‘helpers’ arrive by boat and are greeted by the local children in large-scale events that are staged across the country. The largest event takes place in Amsterdam and is broadcast on national television. Both professional ‘Pieten’ and many volunteers paint their faces black, their lips red and don curly black wigs and gold earrings.

It is also customary for the children watching the event to do the same. They greet the procession of Sinterklaas and the Pieten by singing traditional songs, lyrics of which include: ‘Even though I’m black as soot, I mean well’.

 Note EU-Digest: What an utter waste of time and money  for the UN  to meddle in this traditional Dutch children and family celebration which in no way is meant to degrade or mock black people.Doesn't the UN have better things to do?

Read more Tensions mount in the Netherlands as UN questions ‘Black Pete’ Christmas tradition - World - News - The Independent

The Netherlands: Powerful storm hits Europe -over 100 million euros damage to the Netherlands infrastructure

A storm battering north-western Europe has killed eight people - four of them in southern England.

Two people died when their car was crushed by a falling tree in Gelsenkirchen, in western Germany. Two children in the car were injured.

In Brittany, western France, a woman was swept out to sea. And in the Dutch city of Amsterdam a tree felled by the wind crushed a woman by a canal.

Many trains were cancelled in and around London and in north Germany.

In many cases in the UK fallen trees had to be cleared from railway lines.

At least 50 flights have been cancelled at Schiphol airport in the Netherlands, and the German broadcaster ARD says there are severe delays at Hamburg airport.

In the UK as many as 600,000 homes suffered power cuts, though many were later reconnected.
Power cuts also hit 42,000 homes in northern France, and at Belle-Ile in Brittany a woman was swept into the sea from a cliff.

Estimated damage to the Netherlands infrastructure is likely to go above 100 million euros

EU-Digest