Sunrise Views at Kralingse Zoom Parking Garage

I wrote about how the Kralingse Zoom parking garage is probably a pretty good spot for watching sunset and/or sunrise. I have since seen both. The sunset is not entirely visible because it sets behind the city buildings in the east, you cannot see the moment it goes down. The colours can still be quite impressive if the weather is good and the lights from the sunset act to engulf and delineate the Rotterdam skyline.

The sunrise, though, gives a more instantaneously stimulating visual (as shown in these photos). It's legitimately print-on-calendar stuff. I know that's not the best way to describe any scenery but I guess the sentiment I'm looking for is "objectively beautiful". That's a paradoxical phrasing too. What I really mean is it fits within an average human conception of what beauty is. I have no contention with this ordinary standard. People travel to extraordinary places, climb mountains and hike for hours in search for the ordinarily-beautiful. It excites me to be able to find that kind of beauty in a place as ordinary as a parking garage next to a metro station. It only makes sense, no?

As mentioned in my previous post, the parking garage in open 24/7. The schedule for the sunrise and sunset in the Netherlands is here. You can come to the spot to witness some natural beauty any day (given that it is not too cloudy). Be reminded, of course, to always have protection for your eyes and do not look into the sun otherwise. It can be dazzling and even dangerous. 

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The sunrise and sunset are not the only moments worth seeing. The twilight just before the sunrise has a great vibe of anticipation and the charming sense of an in-between.

You may also direct your attention to the moon. I still have to figure out how to capture it on camera so it doesn't look like a blot of light, but here is a moment (around sunset) where the moon is directly above Capelle's Crystal Buildings.

Surely the magically adept can utilize this setting for some ritualistic visualisations? The movements of the sun and the moon can be, especially at seasonal markings like the equinox or the solstices, symbolically significant. Back in agricultural times, the seasons dictated everyone's agenda. The coming and going of sky entities was the coming and going of life. They were some of our oldest gods.

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Have you read that recent news story on how the Chinese government had set up an artificial digital sunrise in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, because the pollution is so terrible that the people cannot see the real thing anymore? It has now been proven to be an imagined story, the product of poor journalistic research. Nevertheless, the story was only plausible because we have developed the means and contexts for this practice. Our technology cannot completely replicate the natural sunrise, but it is capable of creating some kind of representation that is probably good enough for aesthetic purposes. We may argue that the technique of representation itself, or language, is one of our most useful technologies. In representations it is possible to make anything.

The things we can make for real are also pretty impressive. The closest we ever got to REALLY making suns was probably by setting off nuclear bombs. They used to watch those in Las Vegas back in the 50s. The Nevada nuke testing schedules were made public at the time, and Vegas planned parties around the detonations. Typically, at the end of the party around 4am, a bomb would set off and people can witness its thrilling display while sipping on cocktails. You need something strong to chase down deathly sights like that. These were instruments of destruction on scales previously only depicted in myths. It's almost like the work of a new god, except it's just us. Extra scary!

Parking Garage Views in Kralingse Zoom

I was waiting for the metro in Kralingse Zoom station, and my specific metro was not coming in for another 7 minutes. I had plenty of time to do something worth-while. I noticed that the stairs leading toward the newly-built parking garage were finally in use, so I went up to check it out. I went up all the way to the top (4th) level which was the roof, I stepped out of the little staircase space and looked around.

HOLY MOLLY ARE YOU KIDDING ME THIS SHIT'S AMAZING

Granted, it was afternoon and I didn't eat anything since I woke up in the morning and was basically operating on two cops of coffee, I wasn't expecting much out of that day until I get some calories in. But man, I was SO pleasantly surprised. This is, by far, the best view in the area and probably one of the best (& freely accessible 24/7) views in greater Rotterdam. It's a precious find.

What I'm digging in particular is the openness of the surroundings, and the fact that you can look out very far in every direction. Whichever side you face, there's a sense of horizon and you are easily immersed in the panorama. I estimate that this place will be amazing for sunrise/sunset watching and I plan to come back to do some of that. During the winter when the sun rises late and sets early, the timing should be easy to schedule.

Here are a few things you can look at on this site. There's a lot more.

I was way captivated by the location and could not get myself to leave in 7 minutes. I was quite pressed for time however and really needed to catch the next metro. On any other day I would have definitely waited for the sunset. 

The next night I travelled through the Kralingse Zoom station again, and having no scheduling restrains this time around, I decided to go experience the night view. My poor photography really doesn't convey how exciting it is to spot the neon logos all across the darkened skyline. 

With some of the tallest buildings in the country and world-renowned iconic architecture , Rotterdam probably has the most visually interesting cityscape in the Netherlands. It'd be a waste to NOT look at it regularly. The other place I know that is good for watching the physical city is at Wilhelminapier. It's a photographer-favourite and the view there is, needless to say, phenomenal. But I hope to discover more viewing spots like this one in Kralingse Zoom that are outside of the main city, that enables wider and more inclusive perspectives.

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(I don't know if you have noticed, but it's pretty obvious that this blog is heavily inspired by Urban Adventures in Rotterdam. There's an article he did years ago about going on the rooftops of parking garages and appreciating the views. It is, as he had described, "an unexpected island of privacy in the urban chaos". This is where I have picked up the practice.)

Elevator Pitch

I've found a spot to listen to elevators. I was here for 20 minutes or so, it's kind of hypnotic.

I've never really gotten into listening to urban noises but I figured I probably should. I like sounds and I like the juxtaposition of foreground and background. Foregrounds and backgrounds are relative ideas, always subjective and sometimes arbitrary. But it's pretty lame to take them for granted---what sound is a background noise and what makes it so? I want to try to actively listen and consciously decide on what sounds should come forth to occupy my attention. I can't do that ALL the time obviously because that would drive me insane, but I want to start doing it once in a while and seek out soundscapes that I don't usually notice.

I think a good listening spot needs to meet two criteria. Firstly, you should be in a position where you won't disturb the sound source. Following this, you should probably also not be in a place where you would directly creep people out because then they would alter the soundscape by loudly saying things like hey what the hell are you doing here man get out of my garden. This relates to the second criteria: you should be in a position where people won't disturb you. Thirdly, I prefer a place with the acoustics for mad reverb but I guess this one is optional.

This elevator spot meets all criteria and more. It's on the highest(8th) level of a parking garage, on top of the HEMA in Beursplein. It's called Q-Park. I was here on a Friday evening and there were no cars parked on this top level at the time, so the elevators never came up to this floor. I think most people don't like to park high if they can park low, and at a time where there're not many cars in town they can park pretty low. The way it worked out is that there were still cars coming in and out the lower levels, and on Fridays the HEMA stays opened until 9 o'clock, so there is a pretty big time-window in which the elevators are constantly in use but no one who uses it would come to where this spot is. It makes for an ideal listening set-up. Also the reverb is siiick.

My priority is not in recording so the footage above is pretty rudimentary but I just wanted a sample to share. There are several components to the sound here: that 2-step-ringing when the elevators reaches a floor, the motors working, the sound of a metallic scrapping, and of course the sound of people stepping in and out of elevators*. The two elevators both produce these sounds upon triggering and sometimes they harmonize, with every sound travelling up the shaft. Aside from the elevators, there are also secondary sounds from the streets and the city outside. They are dimmer, but if an ambulance on sirens rushes by or something it also plays a prominent part. When I was there it was raining pretty hard and this contributed to the general mooding too.

This soundscape is actually aesthetically pleasing, and if I brought a chair and a book I could potentially spend a long time here. But also in terms of meanings, I like the idea that these sounds are each initiated by people interacting with the elevator, with the building, and although they don't notice it, it is as if they are playing the building as a grand musical instrument. My listening to this live performance and their not being aware of my presence is in itself a kind of unilateral relationship. I have made it pretty clear that I am very fond of these sounds, and I don't even know any of these people. Nevertheless the setting provides a system by which anybody can participate to produce something that I, in a listener's position, can enjoy. And this is a system that I have found, the elevators were probably not designed with this purpose in mind, but maybe they should be. If buildings were designed to receive, remix, direct and present sounds, they can potentially generate a lot of unique musical experiences and social practices. I hope to find more spots for these sonic observations in Rotterdam. The quick idea is checking out other multi-layered parking garages and their elevator spaces.

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*the thought that there's some dude listening to you walking in and out of an elevator is probably very creepy in itself, not to mention that you might have also had a conversation with a friend in the elevator or something. But if I did park my car and were just waiting for my elevator in that space, I could've heard you anyway. Although the enclosed elevator gives the appearance of private space, it is not always designed to keep your sounds private and doesn't claim to do so. If someone overheard your conversation in public, is it just as creepy? Maybe. It's a pretty grey area. These considerations again remind us to be aware of what we expect spaces to do, what they actually do, and how we can always give it some extra thoughts when we use any space to do anything.

and elevators are already a little creepy. Have you seen that film?