Hello Amsterdam!

(Amsterdam-Zuid. Where did I leave my bike again?)

After two months away, I came home to mousetraps at our apartment in Amsterdam. Annelien couldn’t come pick me up at Schiphol airport with my one million bags. She was spending the day with a friend and I had to pick up the keys to our apartment at the neighborhood grocery store. I am now home alone and I am supposed to cook dinner. But before I make baba ganoush with some special tahini – I am making Annelien’s favorite dish because the last few months have been a bit difficult and I have to make up for it – I’ll write my blog post for this week.

(Little house in Bern.)

After a rocky summer, I decided to try to spend more time in Amsterdam. So now I have to learn to speak, think and act Dutch if I want to thrive here. If you don’t look the part, you have to act it. And because I am so tall and blond and have a super soft “g” when I speak Dutch, I’ll have to make an extra effort to blend in.

Usually, the Dutch start speaking French to me when they see me. When I arrived here earlier today, the KLM air hostess greeted me with “Bonjour, bienvenue à Amsterdam.” They are obviously hard to understand when they try to speak French, these super tall Dutchmen on their bikes and in their boats, but I assume she said “bonjour” and nothing more offensive. I don’t know where she learned French and I sure hope it wasn’t from some Flemish teenagers because when we were younger, we used to teach American friends that “Voulez-vouz coucher avec moi?” means “Hello, nice to meet you.”

(Hobbemakade, Amsterdam.)

In Flanders, we speak our own version of the Dutch language. We understand the Dutch and they understand us but we still think the others speak funny. Flemish evolved differently and now it sounds as if we speak a two-hundred year old language, much to the joy of the Dutch. My Dutch friends usually tell me that they find Flemish so charming and I am not sure that is meant as a compliment. Sometimes you don’t want to be charming and cute, you want to be heard and taken seriously.

(Mogeen, Amsterdam.)

We think the Dutch have big mouths, are loud and tall and overwhelming. But we also think that they are extremely talented, great communicators and amazing designers. Maybe we’re a little jealous that they dare to think for themselves and that they are so comfortable in their own skin. Dutch kids are among the happiest in the world. And maybe we’re a little self-conscious in Flanders because the Dutch think we are quaint and sweet and not too smart. We know that they like to joke about us.

(Bern, Marzilistrasse. "La lenteur, c'est le secret du bonheur.")

But let me end with a sweet story I heard this weekend. Two women went shopping at a local Albert Heijn supermarket in the south of the Netherlands, on the Belgium border. A driver with a Dutch license plate pulled out of a parking spot while another little car with a Belgian license plate pulled in. They accidentally hit each other. Both drivers got out and looked at each other. The Dutch driver, a woman, said – in that matter-of-factly way like only the Dutch can: “Oh, it’s not too bad. Our little cars only kissed each other.” The bystanders waited anxiously for the Flemish woman’s reaction. She walked towards the Dutch woman, hugged her and kissed her firmly on both cheeks. Then they both drove away.

(Mural art. Vijzelgracht, Amsterdam).