Crafted on a scale of 1:25, it is the smallest city in Holland. And it probably reflects the characters of a real city and its surroundings.

The brochure handed to us at the ticket counter says that Madurodam was named after George Maduro, a law student at Leiden. As a reserve lieutenant, he became a casualty of World war II. This place was his parents’ wish to erect a monument for him. In parallel, a member of support council of the Dutch Student Sanatorium Foundation was looking for funds to support ill students. And the two ideas and plans came together: a miniature city erected as a monument and aimed at raising money for Student Sanatorium.

Madurodam is an acronym for miniaturization at its best. I am kidding of course, but the scaled models¹ here are par excellence.

You would mistake pictures of these models for real places, if you do not have people, in it, towering over them.

Also, there are some easter eggs in certain models. Put a 10 euro cent coin and the model or things or people around it or in it come alive and do their chores.

So we spent a lovely Saturday afternoon, with the sun shining brightly, in Madurodam.

1. Scaled models of places in Holland. [←]

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