Beachclub De Karavaan

This is the part of the Scheveningen beach where you come when you want to have a party. The stretch of beach clubs, including De Karavaan, Indigo and Whoosah have a reputation for wild nightlife - and drugs, although that seems to be a thing of the past. On a Monday morning, things are, of course, much more innocent. We're headed for Beachclub De Karavaan, one of several beach clubs around here that we have never visited before. That is partly because the party beach clubs used to be closed on Monday mornings in 2014, when we did our first survey of the Scheveningen beach clubs, but that seems to have changed as well. When we came here, Rihanna Gaga said she hoped they'd have a playground. They don't and I realise that is one way, as a beach club, to filter your patrons. With a playground, you're bound to have families coming to your place. Without it, the families will head to your neighbours who do have playgrounds, so that you can focus on the pretty young things that come here looking for lounging, cocktails and beats. De Karavaan is very geared towards lounging. There's a series of nice cozy corners with couches facing the sea and the lack of a playground is made up by the fact that the beach is right in front of us, so Rihanna Gaga can just squat and play with the sand. Lazy lounge music is floating around de Karavaan's terrace.

The sun is  blazing in a clear blue sky and we're in a good mood. Today, it's a full schedule. When we're finished at the beach, we're going to check out a new daycare for Rihanna Gaga, because very soon she will go to school and she will need an afterschool daycare as well. She's quite excited about this, but she is more excited about what we will do after that: take the train to Amsterdam to go boating in Amsterdam's canals with my good friend and his four month old daughter. It's a decidedly decadent Monday we have ahead of us.

The waitress takes our order. Although I normally take the regular breakfast, I realise I could do with a break from the ubiquitous croissant/bread/ham/cheese/eggs that seems to be served basically everywhere here, so I order their intrigueing 'nautic egg' instead, which promises a poached egg, spinach and salmon. Because I know Rihanna Gaga will want a croissant, I order that as well, and since the egg comes at 9,50 and the croissant at 3,50, that means the total is not that different from what the standard breakfast would have cost me (€11,50). We also order a latte macchiato and a hot chocolate (which Rihanna Gaga insists upon, despite the sunny weather). Young people sit and work on their laptops in bikinis and swimwear. Two girls next to us are studying for their upcoming exams, and in between that, discuss problems with housemates and the parties they intend to go to. Behind them, a guy is showing off an impressive torso - the kind you only get after hours and hours of working out in the gym - while typing on his computer. I put sunscreen on Rihanna Gaga and she trods off to the beach where she builds a sandcastle that she decorates with litter she finds lying around.

When my egg is brought, it looks impressive: a virtual tower of bread, salmon, spinach and poached egg, dripping with an orange sauce. The sauce and the salmon together, however, make it very greasy and heavy and the rest of the day I'll be walking around with a rather bloated feeling. An ideal breakfast, I guess, for a hangover - or, alternatively, an ideal breakfast to eat before a day spend boozing. And that's probably the point if it. Rihanna Gaga is far too busy collecting litter and only eats half of her croissant and drinks a mere few sips of her hot chocolate. Then she's off again. A colleague calls me to discuss a paper that we're publishing together. It is weird how my academic publishing record only took off once I left academia. I'm still visiting conferences and publishing papers and books, even though I don't really have to anymore. I guess it is something of a hobby now. Other people go fishing, I publish academic research that I do in my spare time. And (but don't tell anyone) maybe part of me still wants to keep the option of returning to an academic career open. Though, I don't really want to - the gruelling working hours, the high pressure of publish or perish, it is all a bit too much and I find it impossible to combine it with the family life I want. We go through the abstract we've created together with two other colleagues, a proposal for a chapter in a book following a conference I went to a few months ago. I open my e-mail to find that another paper I submitted a while ago has been accepted, with only minor revisions demanded. I'm slightly astonished: it was a rush job and the journal I submitted it to is quite prestigious. Once more, I wonder whether I am not setting the bar too high for myself. There's several e-mails from my current job coming in as well, but they are far less interesting. Behind me, a waiter is discussing an upcoming party at this beach club with the girls who should be studying for their exams.

Rihanna Gaga returns to demand I come with her to get water from the sea that she wants to put in an empty crisps bag she found on the beach and which she filled with sand. She wants to take the whole thing with her and put it in her toy kitchen. I decide that, all things considered, that is not an unreasonable demand, so I tell her that once I've paid, I'll come with her. We've got a beautiful day ahead of us and we might as well spend it carrying an empty crisps bag filled with sand, shells, litter and sea water with us.