Driving to the south of France, enjoying a beer on a campsite, lazing on a sunny beach or strolling around a big city? Some students will be spending the summer doing something completely different.
Performing on the French Riviera, for example, building wooden pavilions at Lake Balaton, or turning the world of rowing on its head.
For twenty five years now, a two-week music tour of the French Riviera has become the traditional way for the Delft Studenten Big Band to mark the end of the summer examinations. The eighteen jazz aficionados in the Delftsch Studenten Corps will be donning their smoking jackets again this year in the area around St Tropez. Their set will include songs from Frank Sinatra, Count Basie, Duke Ellington and Glenn Miller. From 8 to 19 July, they will be performing at various campsites, town squares and beach venues in France. “A three-hour performance every single evening can be hard work, but we find it very energising,” says manager Michiel Smit. “Afterwards, we amble slowly back to our hammocks on the campsite.” Life in the Big Band can be quite bizarre. “Last year, after an impromptu performance in St Tropez, we were invited to play on a sixty-metre yacht owned by an incredibly rich Russian. A few days later, one of his friends was celebrating his birthday and also wanted a performance, but the tour was almost over. “No problem,” he said, “I am celebrating my birthday in Split and will fly you all there.” We spent three days performing in Croatia. It was amazing.”
www.bigband.corps.nl
Student korfball association Paal Centraal originally planned a simple group holiday as an opportunity to relax. However, since the association is celebrating its twentieth anniversary, it makes sense to do something special. Playing korfball abroad, for example. “Not too far away and not too nearby,” says anniversary committee member Margit Heine. “Something original, sporting and cultural.” The eventual decision was for a summer camp in Hungary. A total of 30 korfball players will spend the period from 7 until 17 July training, coaching and playing against Hungarian and other Dutch teams. Of course, there will also be time to unwind: walking, relaxing by the lake and spending a few days in Budapest. “There, we will spend a day playing ‘Who is the mole?’ with all kinds of challenges and visit the best bathhouse in the city.” It will be a special treat for Margit because she comes from Budapest. “There is an island and a bridge called Margit there, so there are lots of signs pointing in my direction!”
www.paalcentraal.nl
A sun-drenched Monte Carlo, Albert II, Prince of Monaco on the podium, music by the Delft Studenten Big Band in the background as you skilfully negotiate the slalom in your solar boat, have a go at sprinting and complete as many rounds as possible within two hours. Yacht Club de Monaco arranges all your overnight stays and you may even end up becoming the winner of the Solar 1 Monte Carlo Cup. All of this may sound like a dream, but it’s what the Solar Boat Team will be up to from 10 to 12 July. Team Manager Tomas te Velde remains level-headed about it all: “It is a great way to end the year.” But before that, they need to win the greatest competition for solar energy boats: the DONG Energy Solar Challenge in Groningen and Friesland, from 28 June until 5 July. Then 21 students will be heading for Monte Carlo. “They really know how to put on a show there,” says Te Velde about special guest Prince Albert II. “It is an ideal place for networking. Eurosport is covering it, so we will also be on TV!”
http://www.solarboatteam.nl/event/solar-1-monte-carlo-cup-2014
Just imagine it: endless cornfields close to Lake Balaton, with a view over a beautiful valley. And then, under the supervision of artists and architects, building wooden pavilions and objects to be exhibited in various different places. At the end, you may even win a prize from the judges. This is Hello Wood! Nine students of Architecture are looking forward to spending 19 to 27 July with art and architecture students from 15 different countries attending workshops on the subject of balance. The students will be building a space ship, a wobbly kaleidoscopic tower or a hot-air balloon in the shape of storm clouds: all of them made from wood. Inspired by the idea ‘every downside has its advantages’, TU Delft visiting lecturers Suzana Milinović and Rufus van den Ban have devised a fun challenge: build several wooden bathtubs, put them on top of each other and take practical advantage of the fact that it is difficult to make them watertight.
http://www.hellowood.eu/137267/hello-wood-2014
Aside from a few minor details, the design of rowing boats has remained unchanged for decades. Students in the Rise dream team think it is high time to design a faster boat. This summer, they will still be in the process of building and testing. During the rowing world championships at the Bosbaan rowing lake on 27 August, Rise hopes to break the double coxless four rowing world record. Their plan is to fit two hydrofoils under the boat, which will lift it out of the water and reduce resistance by around 50%. The material used must not give way and will be more rigid. The students are designing a new shape of blade for the oars and will be using a rolling rigger. The seats that usually move with the rowers are fixed and the rigger, which holds the oars, moves instead. Why would you want four rowers to keep moving backwards and forwards? With the seats fixed and the rigger allowed to move, you are only shifting 10 kg instead of your whole bodyweight. So what could be better than spending the summer transforming the world of rowing?
www.risedelft.nl
Intoxicating music, exotic cocktails and dancing until the early hours. Around 40 members of the student salsa association SoSalsa are looking forward to spending Thursday 7 to Sunday 10 August in Belgium. Belgium? Yes, Belgium: the Antilliaanse Feesten in Hoogstraten. This annual music festival is the leading European festival for Caribbean music. “It’s really famous,” says Vivian Geraads, who graduated a while ago in Industrial Design Engineering and now teaches dancing in the Sport & Culture Division. “It is a kind of family festival that has grown to become something like Lowlands. Around 35,000 people will be there. There are two main stages, one small stage and a dance hall with parquet floor in a kind of circus tent. It is a great atmosphere with people from all kinds of cultures. Once at the festival, they feel as if they are back in their own country. There are whole families staying at the campsite.” Three-quarters of the members of SoSalsa will be attending: students, PhD candidates and alumni. They will be enjoying non-stop Latin American music and even plan to take their own dance floor to the campsite.
www.sosalsa.nl
Two weeks at Lake Como brainstorming about energy policy and entrepreneurship with students from Denmark and Italy. Rob de Jeu can’t wait: after all, he is president of the Energy Club. Together with nine other outstanding Master’s students from Delft, De Jeu will spend 7 to 18 July in Italy at this intensive summer course in successful leadership, innovation and entrepreneurship in the energy sector. It features lectures, project work, panel presentations, business games and debates on such subjects as decision-making in the energy sector, trends in smart grids, green innovation and writing business plans. “The idea is to develop your leadership qualities and become a driving force in the energy sector,” says De Jeu. He’s a first-year Master’s student in sustainable energy technology and tries to attend a course every year. “I just love it.” He finds conventional holidays boring. “I do like visiting cities, but after a few days I have seen enough. I prefer to meet other people and learn something. My best friends think I’m mad.”
www.energyclub.nl
Driving 15,000 km through South America with an old Land Rover Defender painted orange and a motorbike, with the World Cup in Brazil as your final destination. It is a very different way of relaxing after your Bachelor’s degree programme or graduation. Ab Streppel, Jasper de Lange, Bijn Worms and Egbert Pot started their Drive2Develop journey on 4 May: heading from Santa Marta in Colombia via Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Argentina and Uruguay, all the way to Brazil. En route they are supporting a range of good causes. In Colombia they delivered a load of toys to the charity Mi Casa en Ipauratu (‘My house in Ipauratu’), whose work includes educating children with serious learning difficulties. They have had some heart-warming encounters and are extremely enthusiastic about the great landscape they are seeing, including the Bolivian salt flats. In their Land Rover, which includes a home-made bed, an enormous roof rack and a relaxing toilet seat on the tow bar, they have now transported seven sewing machines and mountains of tools for the charity Mama Alice, which provides free accommodation for street children and trains them in metalworking while teaching mothers to work as seamstresses. They have already trashed their motorbike, but the Land Rover is still on target to reach the World Cup.
www.drive2develop.com
facebook.com/drive2develop
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