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September 17th, 2002 Long live the Queen! The link above leads to a page of photographs of Henk and I, in the Hague, on September 17th. The third Tuesday in September always is 'Prinsjesdag' (Princes' day) in Holland - it is the day on which the Queen's cabinet of ministers presents its budget for the coming year, by way of a speech read out by the Queen, but written by the then prime minister. On this day, therefore, the Queen and a large portion of her family travel to the Ridderzaal, an old banquet hall located within the Binnenhof, where our government resides, in order to read the speech. It is an occasion of much pomp and circumstance. For Henk and I, since last year, Princes' day has coincided with the day we travel down to the Hague to cash in on our marching season - by ordering personal batons to our medals at van Wieliks', the Imperial Chancellery of Dutch Orders: the only company in country allowed to produce Royal Dutch medalry. We therefore refer to Princes' day as 'Van Wielik-day'. 'Long live the Queen', by the way, is what the Parliament's chairman traditionally concludes his reply to the reading of the speech by Her Majesty by, and is what a Dutchman would say where an Englishman would exclaim 'God save the Queen'. |
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