1995 - The UnDutchables (10 page)

1. Take a few one-guilder pieces as deposit for use of a trolley. Until 1988/89 the peel-off ring-tab from a beer or soft drink can was considered by much of the population to be legal tender for this purpose.
   
2. If a
   cloggy
   offers you an empty trolley in exchange for a guilder, beware! Either the mechanism for refunding your guilder is broken, or the wheels malfunction.
   Conversely, if you are the one with an empty trolley, never abandon it. In pouring rain, gale, hail, sleet or snow, you must return it to collect your investment—one guilder. Failure to do so will immediately brand you as a dumb foreign tourist who has no idea of the real world. If you find you simply must abandon it, get out of the way as quickly as possible. You may be crushed in the rush to redeem it.
   
3. Frequently block aisles with trolley.
   
4. Recruit kids to covertly load other customers’ trolleys with expensive items.
   
5. At the check-out, the cashier must make two announcements:
   dag!
   and
   zegels? Dag
   means ‘good-day’ and
   zegels
   means ‘savings stamps.’ The latter is NOT a guttural
   Sieg Heil
   , as many Germans have learned to their cost.
   
6. Check egg cartons for quantity and condition of contents. At least one egg will usually be broken or missing. Mote also the ‘Dutch dozen’ (
   dozijn
   ): ½
   dozijn
   —6, while 1
   dozijn
   can be 10 or 12.
   
7. Prod and poke delicate items. When about to leave, complain to the shop assistant about the poor quality of the produce.
   
8. Place little faith in barcode scanners and the like at the check-out. Review your receipt for errors before leaving the supermarket. If you don’t, you may well come away unaware that the price reductions which attracted you in the first place were never applied.
   

Statiegeld
is the word applied to deposits on beverage containers. A beer bottle has a certain
Statiegeld
value; a full crate has the quantity value plus some extra for the plastic container.

In a well publicized incident, a Dutchman lifted a quantity of bottled refreshments from a shop. He immediately deposited them in the store’s recycling machine, thereby destroying the evidence of his crime and was duly rewarded for his environmental efforts in cash.

For discarding glassware with no value, there are recycling bins on street corners: one for coloured glass and one for clear glass. You may have to wait your turn to use these bins since it requires some studying before throwing bottles away. The owners want to make sure first that they don’t ruin themselves financially by inadvertently throwing away a bottle for which they paid
Statiegeld
.

At the time of writing,
Statiegeld
is in danger of becoming extinct. Shopkeepers find the whole process too time-consuming, space-consuming and expensive(!) and want the system eliminated. The irony here is that the scheme was originally introduced not so much as a recycling effort, but more as a marketing ploy to attract customers. With coins being ‘reimpursed,’ the idea was an immediate success with customers, and a typical supermarket now finds it has to sort recyclable containers into 70 different crates and 90 different pallets. Much to the retailers’ delight, studies are now underway to determine whether recyclable packaging or disposable packaging is better for the environment! Add to this the increasing black market in ‘
statiegelded
’ containers (some shopkeepers build expensive high fences to protect their stocks of used bottles) and the whole thing seems doomed. (For more on recycling, see Chapter 15.)

Borgsom
is similar, but is applied to video camera rentals, safe keys, Bicycle rentals, etc. Anything that will make it, they’ll take it—and sometimes they’ll fight you tooth and nail not to reimburse it.

If you are not sure if you are paying
borgsom
on a transaction, a good indicator is when the vendor asks you for some
legitimatie
(see Chapter 10)—although it is unclear why a vendor needs proof of identity in order to borrow a few guilders from you.

We strongly doubt that
borgsom
will be threatened with commercial extinction in the foreseeable future.

1. When visiting fashion shops, take ear defenders with you to avoid permanent ear damage from the compulsory disco music blaring incessantly therein.
   
2. If you notice someone searching through a full rack of clothes, stand nearby and push the clothing apart so that you close the gap the person has made.
   
3. Take your children and encourage them to play hide-and-seek amongst garment rails.
   

1. If you see an item you wish to buy, show minimal interest in it. Tell the vendor you saw the same thing for less than half the price at another stall in order to launch into a healthy bartering session.
   
2. If a crowd has gathered around a particular stall, push into the crowd, dig your elbows into those in front of you and breathe heavily in their ears to give them the hint to move out of your way. Conversely, if you are in the front row of a crowd studying the display of a stall and others try to elbow their way in, hold the fort. Do not leave until the crowd has dissipated.
   
3. When the market is extremely busy, walk against the flow of traffic, stopping frequently for no particular purpose.
   

DRIVING

As with shopping (see Chapter 12), a first experience of ~ driving in Holland can be positively bewildering. But do not be dismayed. You are not an inferior driver. You have simply missed some elementary unwritten rules of the road.

1. Drive as close to the car in front of you as possible.
   
2. Change lanes constantly while driving. Roads are built from taxpayers’ money. If you’ve paid your taxes, it’s your right to use as much of YOUR road as possible.
   
3. At least two cars should go through each red light. Avoid, at all cost, reducing speed or stopping. Any brake-light indication combined with an amber or recently-red traffic signal will subject you to a barrage of stereophonic horn-blasting even though it is considered vulgar to use the car horn except in an emergency.
   WARNING: Beware of elderly drivers. They stubbornly adhere to the old-fashioned system of preparing to stop when the lights turn amber, and religiously stop at red lights. These senior citizens are the cause of many collisions
   .
   
4. If you witness a motorist driving through a red light, sound your horn violently in tribute while you visually scold the violator for his flagrant disrespect of the law.
   Move alongside him and pound your head with your right hand. Appropriate angry facial expressions, bouncing up and down on your seat. Yelling
   idioot!
   (idiot),
   godverdomme!
   (God be damned) and
   klootzak!
   (scrotum) are beneficial. Never mind the fact that you are more of a traffic hazard than he was as you accelerate, slow down and wander across the fast lane, concentrating on your gesticulating.
   
5. If you are the first car to stop at a red light, do not expect to be able to see the traffic lights. Thanks to brilliant Dutch engineering, your car will be sitting directly under the lights. Just relax and rely on a honk or two from the car(s) behind you. Horns are guaranteed to sound if you do not react instantly to the green light. Alternatively, step out of your car until the light changes. This at best is taken as a display of protest by the locals, and at worse is taken as an expression of your individuality. Both earn you much respect.
   

Dutch democracy on the road is exemplified by inconsistent yield signs, well described by the saying:

Sometimes the small roads have to have the power
.

There would appear to be no general rule such as ‘priority to the right’ or ‘priority to the main road.’

Consider roundabouts as an example. In some places, the car coming from the right has the right of way. In other places, the car on the roundabout has the right of way. Elsewhere, traffic lights are used.

As local respect for speed limits is non-existent, popular means to slow down the traffic in residential areas include one-way streets and
drempels
(berms, or speed bumps).

Revised traffic laws (introduced in 1991) supposedly gave drivers more responsibility by reducing the number of rules to be followed. A ‘
rule of thumb
’ was proclaimed:
GIVE PRIORITY TO YOUR INTELLECT
(which perhaps explains why no one gives way in traffic). Why such a fuss? The answer may lie in the list of Dutch notables caught in the act of committing driving offences that year, including:

• members of the royal family (again)
  
• the Prime Minister and members of his Cabinet, including the Minister of Defence
  
• Chairman of the Council for Traffic Safety.
  

The latter expressed much indignation at receiving a ticket for driving at 160 km/h (104 mph), declaring that it was a ‘
witch hunt for high officials who drive too fast
. ’

Traffic jams (
files
) are a frustrating experience in any country. In Holland, the feeling is worse with the realization that the 100 km (65 mile) line of stationary vehicles would more than span the width of the country.

What is unique is the wealth and extent of studies, proposals and laws generated to reduce them. When it was established that those selfish people who enjoy horse riding cause some jams, a law was passed requiring the horse (not its rider) to wear licence plates on either side of its head—a sure way to improve traffic flow.

The studies, proposals and laws certainly made a difference. In 1994, a new national traffic jam record was set: on February 23
rd
, there were 43 traffic jams and 530 collisions, totalling 360 km (234 miles) of fuming, honking, clogged
cloggies
.

There are two ways to obtain a Dutch licence: by taking lessons through an authorized driving school (
rijschool
) or by surrendering a valid foreign licence for a Dutch one.

The
rijschool
is rigorous and expensive, with rates at about
HFL
2,000- to prepare you for your first driving test. All manner of interesting and unique equipment is used; some classrooms provide individual steering wheels and gear levers for the simulation phase. Do not be discouraged if you fail several driving tests; each additional course will only cost you roughly half as much again. And how good is the tuition? 30% of driving instructors give lessons without wearing a seat belt; with an average of 30 lessons required before taking the test, only 40% of driving students pass on their first attempt (1992). Strangely, the high cost of driving lessons has not been affected by protest (see Chapter 11).

Not all foreign licences can be surrendered for a Dutch one. Ontil the 1970’s, most foreign licences were acceptable. Many Dutch would go to, for example, Egypt to obtain their licence. The total cost of the trip (including the licence) was less than the Dutch
rijschool
-fees. In other words, the
cloggies
got a free vacation trip in the deal.

Now a foreign licence cannot be exchanged for a Dutch one unless the bearer can prove that he/she lived or worked in the foreign country for at least six months.

As Dutch territories (immune from the classification ‘foreign’) were an exception to this rule for many years, places such as the Netherlands Antilles soon became the new favourites for obtaining licences. 1991 statistics showed more than 2,000 new Netherlands Antilles licences issued to residents of Holland were exchanged for the ‘real thing’ when the newly-inducted motorists returned home. In the previous year, this figure was 500.

The Antillean island of Saba has freely admitted that its economy was directly dependent upon the
rijschool
-trade. Tourism income (stemming mainly from this) was around
HFL
500,000 per year, with an island population of approx. 1,000. Dutch students for driving lessons were recruited at the rate of 60 per week. As 1992 came to a close, so did this convenient method. Licences now are issued in the Netherlands Antilles only if six-month residency and other conditions are met.

There is one final route: join an experiment. Transport tutelage is a popular target for social experimentation, especially when combined with minority-group involvement. Look for programmes along the lines of this 1992 scheme:

In an effort to help reform problem boys, some 30 Moroccan, Surinamese, Antillean and Turkish boys received a three-week crash course in driving at an army camp near Hilversum in order to get their licences. The goal was to prevent them from a ‘negative spiral’ of crime. The driver’s licence was to make it easier for each of them to find a job.

ON DUTCH CUSTOMS

All hail the Dutch, long-suffering neutrons in the endless movement against oppression and exploitation. Let us hear it for the Dutch, bland and obliging victims of innumerable wars which have rendered their land as flat as their treats. Every one of them is an uncle, not a one can muster real courage. All hail the Dutch, nonpeople in the people’s war!

—Tony Hendra, National Lampoon, 1976

The Dutch boast that they are a non-racist nation. In the 1960’s, the Dutch were extremely proud of the lack of prejudice and racial problems in Holland (although in the 1940’s the first Indonesian immigrants were looked down upon as second-class people). But there was a reason for this situation: non-Caucasians were a rarity in Holland in those days. The result was that darker-skinned people were idolized by the Dutch.

Things changed when Suriname became independent, and hoards of Surinamese flooded the country. The crime rate, drug abuse and number of people on welfare increased phenomenally. Immigration procedures soon tightened for dark-skinned applicants, hence, ‘
We support your cause, we appreciate your dilemma, but don’t want you here
.’ Or, in the words of Dr. H. G. Boswijk, an Amsterdam clergyman, ‘
When Surinamers come to our churches, people observe a friendly distance. They say,
YOU ARE WELCOME BUT LEAVE US ALONE
. It’s a kind of implicit apartheid
.’