Like last week, it's a beatiful day when we arrive at the beach. We have decided to try our luck at the northern beaches one more time and settle for Barbarossa Beach, a fancy affair just beyond the boulevard.
Barbarossa is one of the most beautiful beach clubs in Scheveningen. In fact, from an architectural point of view, it might very well be the most beautiful. Designed in an amazing modernist fashion, consisting of straight angles only interupted by a few more skewed lines, Barbarossa could be the setting of a late fifties, earlie sixties black and white films in which women in straight dresses and men in double breasted jackets and turtle necks, wearing thick rimmed glasses, discuss existentialism.
We are dressed for the occasion - both of us are wearing blue and white striped longsleeve shirts. And for all I know, Rihanna Gaga might be discussing existentialism with me: she has developed the habit to express what to me seem like randon sounds, but which she delivers with a look of great seriousness and authority that suggest that what she says is actually full of meaning and urgency. The extremely friendly waiter is wearing the same type of shirt as us. Indeed, people passing by might think we were hired by the beach club, because we fit the setting almost too well to be genuine.
The waiters are still building up the terrace, distributing marine blue and striped pillows among the wooden furniture. Slowly, the beach is coming alive, the early runners and yoga people are replaced by sun worshippers, people walk their dogs and waiters and waitresses pass by on their way to their job.
Barbarossa has a large breakfast menu, but no set breakfast. I order a cheese and chives omelet, a mint tea and for Rihanna Gaga a smoothie. Unfortunately, the smoothie is unavailable. The atmosphere of the place gets to me, so I order a prosecco as well, before convincing my girlfriend to come and join us. This might very well be the last summer day of the year.
We're sitting in the front of the beach club, on the lower terrace that is next to the beach itself. The muffled beats of the uptempo lounge music mingle with the sounds of the waves. I sip my prosecco and Rihanna Gaga walks around the beach club. When my omelet arrives, she nibbles on some bread and steals the tomatoes from the accompanying salad. Then she tries to take my glass of prosecco away from her, but I tell her she'll have to wait for a year or eighteen before she can have that.
Through the large windows I can see a man standing in the backroom of Barbarossa, speaking emphatically to a group of people in formal clothing sitting around a large table and writing on a flipover. A bussiness meeting. Everytime I've passed Barbarossa in the morning, I've seen these kind of meetings. And indeed, Barbarossa is probably the most suitable beach club to have these kind of meetings in.
My girlfriend arrives and has a prosecco as well. After that, we walk along the sea for a while, before returning home.
Barbarossa is one of the most beautiful beach clubs in Scheveningen. In fact, from an architectural point of view, it might very well be the most beautiful. Designed in an amazing modernist fashion, consisting of straight angles only interupted by a few more skewed lines, Barbarossa could be the setting of a late fifties, earlie sixties black and white films in which women in straight dresses and men in double breasted jackets and turtle necks, wearing thick rimmed glasses, discuss existentialism.
We are dressed for the occasion - both of us are wearing blue and white striped longsleeve shirts. And for all I know, Rihanna Gaga might be discussing existentialism with me: she has developed the habit to express what to me seem like randon sounds, but which she delivers with a look of great seriousness and authority that suggest that what she says is actually full of meaning and urgency. The extremely friendly waiter is wearing the same type of shirt as us. Indeed, people passing by might think we were hired by the beach club, because we fit the setting almost too well to be genuine.
The waiters are still building up the terrace, distributing marine blue and striped pillows among the wooden furniture. Slowly, the beach is coming alive, the early runners and yoga people are replaced by sun worshippers, people walk their dogs and waiters and waitresses pass by on their way to their job.Barbarossa has a large breakfast menu, but no set breakfast. I order a cheese and chives omelet, a mint tea and for Rihanna Gaga a smoothie. Unfortunately, the smoothie is unavailable. The atmosphere of the place gets to me, so I order a prosecco as well, before convincing my girlfriend to come and join us. This might very well be the last summer day of the year.
We're sitting in the front of the beach club, on the lower terrace that is next to the beach itself. The muffled beats of the uptempo lounge music mingle with the sounds of the waves. I sip my prosecco and Rihanna Gaga walks around the beach club. When my omelet arrives, she nibbles on some bread and steals the tomatoes from the accompanying salad. Then she tries to take my glass of prosecco away from her, but I tell her she'll have to wait for a year or eighteen before she can have that.
Through the large windows I can see a man standing in the backroom of Barbarossa, speaking emphatically to a group of people in formal clothing sitting around a large table and writing on a flipover. A bussiness meeting. Everytime I've passed Barbarossa in the morning, I've seen these kind of meetings. And indeed, Barbarossa is probably the most suitable beach club to have these kind of meetings in.
My girlfriend arrives and has a prosecco as well. After that, we walk along the sea for a while, before returning home.
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