International Song Contest #6

Welcome to edition 6 of the International Song Contest: a contest in which I share music from all over the world with you. I wish you lots of fun listening to the songs (hope that you find something you like). And if you have the time and energy for it I would really appreciate it if you could vote for your favourite songs in Eurovision style via the form below. Since there are usually not many voters in this contest, your vote WILL make a difference for the results of the contest, which I will publish after the voting is over.

Voting rules:
- Voting goes via the traditional Eurovision-system, see below.
- You can vote for your own country, as long as you promise to vote honestly.
- You can vote until 1 February 3:00pm CET.
- Voting tip: personally I find it easy to rate the songs I like 1-5* while listening to the recap video and rank them afterwards based on this rating

After the voting has ended I will publish the results on my blog and make a fancy animation of the voting process, to give the viewer the feeling that he or she is watching the results of the real Eurovision song contest.

Recap video:

List of participants:

1.	Netherlands	Rigby	Earth Meets Water
2.	Australia	Bobby Andonov	War Is Love
3.	France	Fréro Delavega	Le Chant Des Sirènes
4.	Italy	Violetta Zironi	Dimmi Che Non Passa
5.	Namibia	Shishani	Raining Words
6.	Albania	Miriam Cani ft. Alban Skenderaj	Ende Ka Shprese
7.	Hungary	Paddy & The Rats	Pilgrim On The Road
8.	Germany	Nica & Joe	Build A Palace
9.	Switzerland	Eliane	Venus And Mars
10.	Russia	Sofiya Fedorova	Muzika Lyubvi
11.	Malta	Airport Impressions	Berlin
12.	Colombia	Fanny Lu	Fanfarrón
13.	Croatia	Mejaši	Zorica
14.	Finland	Sturm und Drang	Molly The Murderer
15.	Denmark	Tim Schou	Supernova
16.	Estonia	Traffic	Für Elise
17.	Norway	Silya & The Sailors	Extraordinary
18.	USA	The Civil Wars	Kingdom Come
19.	Czech Republic	Jaro Smejkal	Never Mind
20.	Malaysia	Putri Norizah	Hi Sayang
21.	South Africa	Riana Nel	Glass
22.	Moldova	Ionel Istrati	Eu Numai, Numai

You can click on the song title to watch the video on YouTube.

Voting section

Voting is closed.

Funniest Dutch commercials ever

Today I watched the annual award show for the best Dutch commercial of 2014. In the Netherlands we are quite creative when it comes to thinking of good, interesting or funny commercials. And I'm a kind and giving person, so I won't keep all the fun just for myself. So today I will share some of my personal all-time favorite Dutch commercials.

5. Pearle Optician - Shouldn't you get glasses?

Not much to write about this one: it speaks for itself. Since it's all in Dutch, let me translate what they are saying a bit.
Man in the truck: "Shouldn't you get glasses?"
Other man: "Why? Do you know how much that costs, man?"
Voice-over: "Look. That's why Pearle has the Budget Selection. (...)"

4. Centraal Beheer Achmea - Prison guard

Insurance company Achmea has been known for coming up with creative commercials every year that end with "Even Apeldoorn bellen...", which can be roughly translated to English as "Just call us...". Every commercial starts off relaxed, but then somehow the main character of the commercial ends up in a situation where things go wrong. And then all you need to do to make things right is to call your insurance company.
In the following commercial we see a prison guard who wants to impress his colleague on his first day, but again: things go wrong. Not sure how much Achmea can help in this particular situation, but if the guy has a health insurance with Achmea, at least he doesn't need to worry about the hospital bill...

3. KPN - Generation KPN

Watch and see how the current generation plays hide and seek...

2. Heineken - Walking fridge

This commercial puts a smile on my face every time I see it. I can watch it 10 times in a row: the smile is always there. It may be internationally famous, but it's originally a Dutch commercial (I can tell by the house owner's accent) so I can still put it here. Enjoy!

1. Cup a soup - Sjors

I present to you: Sjors, my childhood hero. I used his quote "Hij is weer heerlijk, Coby" ("It's delicious again, Coby" - which he is saying to the lady in the cafetaria next to the soup machine) from this commercial for several years whenever my mother (who is not named Coby) had cooked a delicious meal. It drove her crazy, by the way.

About the commercial: when the new brand Cup a soup entered the market, they wanted all offices to buy a Cup a soup machine. They tried to achieve this by introducing the character of Sjors: the big shot manager who is achieving many great things all because he has a cup of soup every day at four o'clock.
Watch and see what happens when people interrupt Sjors while he is having his "moment" at 4 o'clock...