The Netherlands: Toilet-bowl toss for Queen’s birthday - by Zoran Bozicevic

Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands

Today "Queens Birthday" was a national holiday in the Netherlands . For a pictorial review of the festivities click on the link below.

For more: Toilet-bowl toss for Queen’s birthday | Photos | National Post

The Netherlands: Queen's Day: Go Dutch for an alternative royal celebration -

While much of the world's attention will be fixed on a certain royal wedding in London, Prince William's nuptials are not the only royal affair happening this weekend.

The orange craze, or "oranjegekte" in Dutch, returns to Netherlands on Saturday, when millions of revelers wearing head-to-toe orange will hit the streets across the nation to celebrate Queen's Day.

The Dutch royal occasion has been celebrated for over 100 years and is the annual official celebration of the Queen's birthday. The national holiday is a chance for revelers to take part in "vrijmarkts", or free markets, play traditional Dutch games with their families, listen to music and get decked out in their best Saturday orange.


For more: Queen's Day: Go Dutch for an alternative royal celebration - CNN.com

Radio Netherlands: Orange headscarves for Dutch Muslim women

For the complete report from Radio Netherlands click on this link

Orange headscarves for Dutch Muslim women

This year, Muslim women in Haarlem will be able to celebrate Queen's Day appropriately dressed. A group of students will hand out more than 5,000 orange headscarves on 30 April to promote tolerance in the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The orange headscarves will allow Muslim women to express their loyalty to their faith as well as to the queen. The two students who took the initiative for the action say they are annoyed by the rabble rousing in politics and in society over the wearing of headscarves. The orange headscarves have been partly paid for with a 3,000-euro prize awarded by the Haarlem council to the two students' their initiative.