Atari Day
in the Netherlands
by TXG
Yes, finally
there was a meeting again in the Netherlands
on 23 February 2003. After many years of silence
some people on the Dutch mailing list atari-nederland
at yahoo-groups decided to try to arrange a
meeting. At first it would be a small meeting
for a few ST users, but after that I helped
a little bit and with a little promotion we
had about 40 people. Althought we didn’t have
a lot of time we have managed all this in a
few weeks.
At the meeting
there was some interesting hardware to see,
like a few ST Books, I also brought my ST
Book...
![[Photo: Atari 1450XLD and ST Book]](images/dutch001.jpg)
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This
picture shows an Atari 1450XLD
and ST Book, nice to see
these two rare items... I was
happy that Bo and Ernest
Schreurs brought these things
to show us.
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![[Photo: ATW800]](images/dutch002.jpg)
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But
we had more rare things
people normally don't see like
this Atari ATW800...
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![[Photo: ATW800]](images/dutch003.jpg)
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Inside
the ATW800.
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![[Photo: View of the room]](images/dutch004.jpg)
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Here
is a complete view of the
room...
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![[Photo: Atari T-shirts]](images/dutch005.jpg)
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And
of course most people knew how
to show they are real Atari
freaks...
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At this meeting
there were more people than we expected, but
this was very positive of course, it just meant
we couldn't fit everything in one room
so the Atari Jaguar people moved to the hall
and put some tables there. I brought some flags
and banners with me to give it a better look...
And I brought my entire Jaguar gaming collection.
We played Battlesphere
Gold, Aircars and Doom with two linked Jaguars,
next time we will try to set up a bigger network
with Battlesphere Gold, most of the owners of
this game just ordered a ScatBox just like me...
![[Photo: TXG playing Jaguar]](images/dutch006.jpg)
We also had a
projector showing a movie about the history
of Atari that was a special from the G4 TV channel.
I sold CDs with this movie for €1.
![[Photo: Atari movie]](images/dutch007.jpg)
Some people gave
demonstrations, but there was so much to do
that I missed it... but I have a picture of
it.
![[Photo: Karaoke?!]](images/dutch008.jpg)
We also had our
little Atari trash corner, everything that was
put there was for free and at 12:00 people could
jump on it and grab the things they needed.
There were printers, monitors, STs, software
and other hardware.
![[Photo: Atari trash corner]](images/dutch009.jpg)
![[Photo: Atari trash corner]](images/dutch010.jpg)
It was nice to
see everybody could find something they needed.
Fox-1/MNX found a monitor switch for his ST.
I just got some software that was lying around.
The meeting place was
very special, it's a classroom in a school where
normally 30 STs are used for music lessons.
And of course this big Atari flag that the organiser
didn't sell to me...
![[Photo: Atari classroom]](images/dutch011.jpg)
![[Photo: Atari classroom]](images/dutch012.jpg)
But there was
even more... like some people sold Atari
items... Mr Atari and his wife were selling
lots of items, like XL/XE software, 2600 software,
Jaguar software and also some consoles.
![[Photo: Wolfgang Burger]](images/dutch013.jpg)
One other nice
thing is that the president of ABBUC Wolfgang
Burger had found some time to come. Of course
it was also a little promotional tour for him,
I did like it, and would like to say to him
when he reads this article, "Thanks!"
![[Photo: Wolfgang talking to Sijmen]](images/dutch014.jpg)
As you can see
there was a lot to do for a little meeting but
there were also people that just brought their
Atari computers and wanted some problems solved
like connecting SCSI devices to a TT030
and/or exchanging software.
![[Photo: Room full of Atari equipment]](images/dutch015.jpg)
![[Photo: Graphics display]](images/dutch016.jpg)
![[Photo: Busy table]](images/dutch017.jpg)
Then we had some
news reporters that were interested. We even
had a half page newspaper article the next day
with a color picture of this event.
![[Photo: Wolfgang talking to newspaper reporter]](images/dutch018.jpg)
![[Image: Scan from newspaper]](images/dutch019.jpg)
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Report
about the fair in the Dutch
newspaper Dordtenaar, scanned
by Jos Vlietstra. [Click
to enlarge]
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I know it's hard
to tell how the complete day was but believe
me, we already planned a new one Sunday 8 Februari
2004... So write it down...
txg@myatari.net
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