Eindhoven

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Welcome surfing Eindhoven, the major city (210.000 people) of the southern Netherlands, the mechanical engineering capital of Europe and maybe the World. Where Silicon Valley does the software, we do the machines to make the hardware. Philips electronics, DAF trucks and ASML lithography machines are the driving forces behind hundreds of smaller companies in the region.

Next to the companies, Eindhoven is big in high tech research as well. The Eindhoven University of Technology and TNO (a dutch research firm) are big players in the city too.

Fortunately Eindhoven is more than high tech:

Design: With the Design Academy and the faculties of Industrial Design and Building and Architecture at the Eindhoven University of Technology delivers many graduates into the creative business.

Soccer/football: The most successful Dutch soccer-team of the last decade, PSV, plays in Eindhoven at the Philips Stadium, one of the last soccer stadiums not banned from the city centre. Atmosphere on match days is very good, and expect to a lot people to go out after the match to Stratums Eind or De Markt.

Bars: Eindhoven has Stratumseind, a short street with some 50 bars side by side. Dress-code: most girls dress like it's summer, even when it is freezing. Store your wintercoat at one of the bars and hop between them until 4 o'clock. If you like it more easy going and meeting people between 25 - 35 yrs you want to go to De Markt. There are 5 big pubs with an older public. In extension of De Markt you will find an original Iris pub O'Sheas, located in the Jan van Lieshoutstraat. But no matter where you end up, being drunk at 4am, you usually grab a 'Frikandel Speciaal', Döner Kebab or a big Wiener before going home.

Art: The van Abbe Contemporary Museum of Art is an excellent museum of its type within the Netherlands. You can also enter the restaurant and bookstore from the back using the shortest covered bridge in Europe.

Tips

• Visit the Van Abbe Museum on thursday night: it's free then!
• Go for a walk in the Genneper Parken (dutch only), a park that resembles the ancient Brabant landscape. The park also houses the national swimming centre with in- and outdoor pools, an indoor and outdoor skating rink, a pre-historic/medieval open air museum and an ecological farm/shop.
• Try to see a match by PSV. You better try the less important matches, as it can be hard to see a major one without a club-card.
• Do some nightlife. Best in its class in the Netherlands. Major spots: Stratumseind (dutch only), De Markt (central square), Wilhelminaplein, Dommelstraat.
• See a concert in The Effenaar.