Beautiful Groningen

A couple of weeks ago I visited a friend in the city of Groningen. This is also the city I was born, but my parents left there when I was three years old.

Groningen is an old city, with plenty of history left. I asked to see a few of the many 'hofjes' Groningen has. In the Middle Ages and in the ages after that, there was no social welfare state, and if you were poor, sick or a widow, it could be very difficult to survive.

Wealthy people in the cities built hofjes, with houses for a specific group of people (the poor, widows etc).
Often the rules of living in a hofje could be very strict, with restricted visiting hours, no alcohol and regular church going, but it was usually a whole lot better than living on the streets.

Nowadays most of the hofjes still excist, but everyone can rent a house here if they want to, and there are also no rules about visitors or going to church. Some of the hofjes are open to the public and it is absolutely lovely to see these quiet little places in the middle of a busy city. If you visit a hofje, you are asked to respect the privacy and the quiet of the people who live there.

But we also visited a beautiful city-park, and a garden that was designed in the 18th century.

And of course we saw the most famous church in Groningen, The Martini tower, or 'the old grey one', as it is often called.