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Lowlands

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Lowlands!

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Posted by Rob (#1) on August 14, 2008 09:20 CEST

Reminder: I'll be blogging live from Lowlands festival this weekend on my Capsi Journal.

Lowlands 2008 Live Moblog

Man-made objects visible from the moon

Personal

Posted by Rob (#1) on September 24, 2007 14:57 CEST

Most people believe that the only man-made object visible from the moon is the Chinese wall. As usual, most people are wrong. The Chinese wall might be long, but it's certainly not significantly wide. If it were visible (and it isn't), then certainly a lot of canals, highways and dikes would be too. So please, ignore that urban myth for once and for all because it's simply that: a myth.

So are any man-made objects visible from space? The palms in Dubai might be a good candidate. If you know where to look, both the Jebel Ali and Jumeira Palm islands appear as tiny pixels in Google Earth as soon as your zoom level takes you somewhere between 3000 and 4000 kilometers of eye altitude. That's still a long distance away from our definition of where space begins (I believe 62km is the norm), but so far it's the best we got. Or is it?

I'm willing to argue that we, the Dutch, can actually claim to have made the most visible object: Flevoland. Google Earth is not very useful here because surrounding land blur the distant images into one colour, but again: if you do know it's there, you can easily see it stretches more than a single pixel from the same distance. And it would have to, because this man-made island is probably the biggest artificial object mankind has ever made: dikes, mills and pumps have reclaimed over 1400 square kilometers of land. With a population of over 300.000, the island is not just a fun housing project, but an entire province. And even if it isn't visible from space: it's home to Lowlands festival and therefore worthy to be mentioned.

PermaLink: Man-made objects visible from the moon
Tags: Dubai, Google Earth, Lowlands, Flevoland, reclamation, space, Chinese wall, Jumeira Palm, Jebel Ali Palm
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Back from Lowlands

Gigs

Posted by Rob (#1) on August 21, 2007 22:26 CEST

I'm too drunk to give a detailed review of Lowlands, but here are the highlights:

Best: the Enter Shikari mosh pit and Battles. And my tent being dry, big and easy to handle. Worst: some standup comedy late at Sat night, Kaiser Chiefs. Disappointing: Eagles of Death Metal, spending over 400 euro on beer and food. Very worst: it's over! Very best: more llow in 52 weeks! ;)

Unrelated note: great girls at Lowlands, but I can't help myself and miss Laura very much. Damn you, special one! <3

PermaLink: Back from Lowlands
Tags: Lowlands, camping, Laura, festival, beer
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Back from Lowlands

Personal

Posted by Rob (#1) on August 22, 2006 22:43 CEST

I'm back from Lowlands. I even already worked a full day and am now busy uploading all the pictures. I'll write a full report later but to summarise: I loved the people. gigs, food, pot and drinks. But I love Inge the most. :)

Lowlands festival ticket

Gigs

Posted by Rob (#1) on August 14, 2006 16:24 CEST

Don't worry Inge, I finally got around to purchasing a ticket this morning. I couldn't be bothered before but your "it's almost sold out" message made it seem like a good idea to take care of it. Now someone please remind me who's playing where and when, so I can pick a list of bands to see. Oh, never mind, I finally found a proper schedule including stages and times on the web site. I'm not happy about the Lostprophets/Pennywise conflict but at least Less Than Jake is a solid excuse for not having to see Muse.