2500 people are welcome at the festival this weekend. The rules in Belgium are less strict than in the Netherlands. A maximum of 750 visitors are allowed here and multi-day events are still not allowed.
And so Eric Lenders went to Belgium to finally go to a performance by his favorite band Rowwen Hèze.
Whole audience is clapping
On the phone Eric can hardly be understood under the festival noise. “Wait, I’m out of the noise for a while!”
A little later we manage to tell about the festival. “It’s great. The Belgian rock band De Kreuners is now playing, everyone is excited, the entire audience is clapping. It’s as if everything is possible again. And then Rowwen Hèze still has to come.”
And it is also great for the artists to be at a festival again, Eric sees: “The Kreuners just spoke to the audience: ‘Do you have any idea what it’s like to play here again?’ It gave me goosebumps.”
Eric comes from Panningen, thirty kilometers from Bree. “That means nothing. Yet I see few Dutch people here, especially Belgians.”
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It does feel a little different, a festival in corona time. “It is strange to be among so many people again. You try to keep a little distance, which makes the atmosphere a bit quieter than usual.”
As it should
And that in Belgium is allowed what is prohibited in the Netherlands? “It’s bizarre that there is such a difference. It’s as if nothing is wrong here. I spoke to a Belgian who said that nobody adheres to the rules in the Netherlands, but here those rules are not even there.”
Anyway, Eric is happy that he can finally see Rowwen Hèze perform again, as it should be. “Last week I was at a concert in the Netherlands, 750 people were allowed to come and you had to sit. Here in Bree everyone can just stand. I get the feeling as if there has never been corona. It’s fantastic.”
Nightlife is also getting back on track in Germany. The nightclubs were allowed to open again tonight. Correspondent Jeroen Akkermans visited:
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