Today, I am not going to complain about any Dutch habit, instead, I will tell you everything about this wonderful day we spent in Zaanse Schans (try to pronounce it if you are not Dutch, and try again, and again, just for the fun).
Last week, we had visitors, my girlfriend's brother and his girlfriend, when we have visitors from abroad, we tend to try to show them some typical places, Marken, Keukenhoff, Kindersdijk, Urk, and all those lovely places you can find in the Netherlands.
This time we decided to go to Zaandse Schans, close to Zaandam, it was a lovely day, we had never been there and it looked like a nice place. It is basically a kind of outdoor museum, with very typical houses, a cheese fabric, a wooden shoes fabric, a few wind mills, etc. Actually the perfect set for whoever wants to discover the Netherlands...
First surprise when we arrived, the entrance was free (which is damn rare here), but fortunately, the parking wasn't, 1 Euro for 30 minutes, 7 Euros above that... So we have visited a few of the fabrics, actually more like complete tourists shops, understand that both the cheese shop and the wooden shoes one sold about the same tourist crap gifts you normaly get in any tourist trap in Amsterdam, but ok, it is a touristic place (although it was pretty deserted on a friday), sot that's what you should expect. And whole in whole the places were pretty nice to visit (especially the klompen shop / musem).
Then after a while walking in the small (and pretty enjoyable I have to admit) village, we started to get hungry, and decided to try one of the few restaurants. And that's were the nightmare started... (You really thought I wouldn't have anything to complain about :D?).
We checked the map, and saw that there was a pannekoeken restaurant, and decided it would be a nice cheap and typical meal, so we headed up there, and found out that the pannekoeken restaurant was actually a kind of self service cafeteria which happened to cook pancakes. Call me cocky if you want, but for 8 Euros for a jam pannecake, I like it to be served at my table, not having to grab it myself, I am not fully found of the "pay and work" formula, so we decided the cafeteria was a no go...
Therefore we checked the cafe next to it, the waiter was well... waiting, in the door frame, looking outside, so I asked him if he was serving food, he told me that yes, he had tostis and other things of the sort, sounded great, therefore we sat at a table at the terrasse, and we waited, like for a menu, or for the guy to come and take our order. And so we waited, during this time, the waiter came back in the door frame, looked around, went back inside... And we waited... until after what I consider a consequent amount of time (like between 5 and 10 minutes, which is half acceptable in a crowdy place, but is a lot when you are about the only persons the waiter has to care about). So we decided to move on and head to the last restaurant...
Before I go on, I should probably apologies to the waiter, because once we were gone, it seemed to me I saw him with a tray at the terrasse, I couldn't say if he really was coming for us, but if you were, sorry dude, I have to admit I don't have much patience... Anyway, as a pure Dutch, he probably doesn't give a damn anyway. That's the good thing with Dutch people, you won't hurt them, because they just don't care...
So we arrived at the last restaurant, "De Hoop op d’Swarte Walvis" which is supposedly a nice place (from what we had read before we went). It was about 14:40, and indeed, we should have paid more attention, the menu sign was indicating that they were serving lunch until 14:30... But hell, if we can't eat, maybe we can at least have a coffee, that's at least what we thought.
So we sat in the sun and waited, waitresses were busy inside setting up tables (probably for the diner), they saw us at a table on the terrasse, went on... One of them eventualy came out, looked at us, didn't say a word and went back in. (I have to confess that at that point I still had hope she might just have been back inside to get her order paperblock, how candide I am...). Of course she didn't came back, well not immediately, but a few more minutes later, came back with her colleague, who asked her (in Dutch obviously):
- in a half wispering, half giggling like a turkey tone "Did you tell them?"
- No they stupid tourist, they will find out...
The second part I just made up cause it was covered by the giggling, so they took off the sign and went back inside... Not a word to us, hideous creatures that we were...
Then came the chef / boss / whoever he was, he smoked his cigarette trying to undertand what we were saying thanks to his "camping french" (Ardeches, frites, boules de petanques) and went back inside, we were completely transparent during all this time...
So here a quick word for you people of the Hoop op d’Swarte Walvis: please, get another job, in a poultry slaughtery, a mud field, a water plant, but don't even try to be in contact with actual people, this behaviour you had is rude, infantile, highly unpolite and stupid. And I hope you girls like this job you are not even doing half well, because with such behaviours, it is probably as high as you can get. Of course, we understood it was too late, but what was the cost for you to be civilised and come gently tell us that service was over? Are you so cheap that even a few words are too expensive for you?
Anyway, we ended up at the local Burger King (it is along the road, just before Zaandse Schans, for those of you who might get hungry while visiting the place), and we have been served by Marvin, who to be very honest wasn't the fastest fast food guy I had ever seen, and I would certainly have mistakely shot him had I been in a zombie movie. But at least Marvin was a nice guy and served us in a polite way, well, HE did the job he was paid for. No more, no less.
To conclude, if ever you want to go to Zaandse Schans, don't. It is not really worth it, too much of a tourist place and you are treated like yesterday's jam even when the place is empty.
I can't recommand the Hoop op d’Swarte Walvis either, but if the food is as good as the service, I am happy we didn't eat anything, we would probably have been sick for a few days...
mardi 24 mars 2009
mercredi 18 février 2009
A Door are like your mouth...
Once you've open it, there is a moment to close it...
Here starts our new lesson in basic manners, but before we really start on this, I want to clarify a point: very recently I have been struck by a terrible truth, I have been wrong all along... According to several of my Dutch friends (whom strangely enough all seem pretty much well mannered), it is not that Dutch are so impolite, it is all about Hilversumers... It seems to be common knowledge to most Dutch natives that people from Hilversum are real pains in the a...
I don't really know why, but several non Hilversumers I know seem to agree with that (they even came to talk about it without any incentive from me), it seems Hilversumers drive like assholes, can't say "hello", are rude, and, from personal experience... Can't close a damn door!
My theory about why this touches Hilversum more than any other place (supposedly) is that Hilversumers are a mix of paysans and cocky parvenus (or "Kakkers", as are the local aristocrats called), therefore they probably have this mix of rudeness from the paysan side and of overated egocentristic pride from the cocky side.
However, living in Hilversum, I am trying my best to forget my manners and become a real asshole, but till now I could hardly suppress the "sorry" escaping my mouth when I notice I bother someone (to be honest most people will apologize when they notice they hurt you in some way, the biggest problem being in making them notice...), anyway, there is one thing in particular I terribly hate, coming most of the time from teenagers and young adults, but sometimes also most surprisingly from adults, the ones from the generations that was still supposed to have received some basic social life education from their parents. For those people, it seems way harder to close a door that it is to open it...
I happen to go eat at Bagels and Beans for time to time with friends, it is a nice cosy place where you eat decently healthy snacks and the atmosphere is pretty enjoyable, that is until some trash group of 18 girls come in all jiggleling, go find a sit, leaving the door open behind them, as the place is often pretty crowdy, they often don't get a sit and leave the place... and the door open...
Ok, there is a pretty simple reason in my reasonning for that: they come in pack! No seriously, here is the deal: the first gets in (and therefore opens the door, that's pretty important for the rest of the process), then comes the second in, and so on, till the last, who simply comes in, and doesn't close the door.
"But why?" will you ask, well, don't burn your brain, I thought about it for a long while, and here are my theories:
1- She doesn't know she is the last of the pack: therefore, believing she is followed by one of her peers, she simply gently leaves the door open for her to get in.
2- She did not open it: of course, she didn't open it (remember? the first one did it, this is a stack, they have to enter one after the other, the door opening is not large enough for all of them to get in at the same time), so why should she close it? The bitch who opened it should close it, in this case, the best solution would be for each of them to get in in a 3 steps process: open the soor, get in, close the door, next!
3- (and I am afraid it is unfortunately the one reason closest to reality) She doesn't even think about it: and why would she? It doesn't bother HER does it? No, then whythefuckshouldshecareaboutit? well... indeed... I can't fight against such a good argument.
So, you will tell me, "what's the big deal?", well I will tell you what's the deal, I wouldn't really mind if we were living in some tropical or tempered counrty, I might not even care in summer, but hell, when it is -5 freaking degrees outside, and there are people inside (where it is about 20 degrees, and you have to remove your 5 layers of clothes) IT DOES FREAKING MATTER!
Of course most people who are bothered will simply close the door in a little exasperated gesture 8 times during their lunch, so they probably don't care that much... For my part, I think someone with so little social abilities, so much selfishness or so much lazyness does not deserve to have hands... It is such a gift, think about the pinguin, I am pretty sure pinguins would love to be able to close doors! So if you don't use your hands (or your brain) then you probably don't need those.
So little people of Hiversum, do yourself (and myself) a favour: learn to use your brain and hands (Yeah, I know sometimes hard to coordinate both) and learn how to close a door (it is actualy the same movement you did to open it, only reversed, requires quite some brain processing, but after a couple of times it is almost natural).
Thank you for your attention. next time I will explain you why it is handy to let people out of the doorway before you get in...
Here starts our new lesson in basic manners, but before we really start on this, I want to clarify a point: very recently I have been struck by a terrible truth, I have been wrong all along... According to several of my Dutch friends (whom strangely enough all seem pretty much well mannered), it is not that Dutch are so impolite, it is all about Hilversumers... It seems to be common knowledge to most Dutch natives that people from Hilversum are real pains in the a...
I don't really know why, but several non Hilversumers I know seem to agree with that (they even came to talk about it without any incentive from me), it seems Hilversumers drive like assholes, can't say "hello", are rude, and, from personal experience... Can't close a damn door!
My theory about why this touches Hilversum more than any other place (supposedly) is that Hilversumers are a mix of paysans and cocky parvenus (or "Kakkers", as are the local aristocrats called), therefore they probably have this mix of rudeness from the paysan side and of overated egocentristic pride from the cocky side.
However, living in Hilversum, I am trying my best to forget my manners and become a real asshole, but till now I could hardly suppress the "sorry" escaping my mouth when I notice I bother someone (to be honest most people will apologize when they notice they hurt you in some way, the biggest problem being in making them notice...), anyway, there is one thing in particular I terribly hate, coming most of the time from teenagers and young adults, but sometimes also most surprisingly from adults, the ones from the generations that was still supposed to have received some basic social life education from their parents. For those people, it seems way harder to close a door that it is to open it...
I happen to go eat at Bagels and Beans for time to time with friends, it is a nice cosy place where you eat decently healthy snacks and the atmosphere is pretty enjoyable, that is until some trash group of 18 girls come in all jiggleling, go find a sit, leaving the door open behind them, as the place is often pretty crowdy, they often don't get a sit and leave the place... and the door open...
Ok, there is a pretty simple reason in my reasonning for that: they come in pack! No seriously, here is the deal: the first gets in (and therefore opens the door, that's pretty important for the rest of the process), then comes the second in, and so on, till the last, who simply comes in, and doesn't close the door.
"But why?" will you ask, well, don't burn your brain, I thought about it for a long while, and here are my theories:
1- She doesn't know she is the last of the pack: therefore, believing she is followed by one of her peers, she simply gently leaves the door open for her to get in.
2- She did not open it: of course, she didn't open it (remember? the first one did it, this is a stack, they have to enter one after the other, the door opening is not large enough for all of them to get in at the same time), so why should she close it? The bitch who opened it should close it, in this case, the best solution would be for each of them to get in in a 3 steps process: open the soor, get in, close the door, next!
3- (and I am afraid it is unfortunately the one reason closest to reality) She doesn't even think about it: and why would she? It doesn't bother HER does it? No, then whythefuckshouldshecareaboutit? well... indeed... I can't fight against such a good argument.
So, you will tell me, "what's the big deal?", well I will tell you what's the deal, I wouldn't really mind if we were living in some tropical or tempered counrty, I might not even care in summer, but hell, when it is -5 freaking degrees outside, and there are people inside (where it is about 20 degrees, and you have to remove your 5 layers of clothes) IT DOES FREAKING MATTER!
Of course most people who are bothered will simply close the door in a little exasperated gesture 8 times during their lunch, so they probably don't care that much... For my part, I think someone with so little social abilities, so much selfishness or so much lazyness does not deserve to have hands... It is such a gift, think about the pinguin, I am pretty sure pinguins would love to be able to close doors! So if you don't use your hands (or your brain) then you probably don't need those.
So little people of Hiversum, do yourself (and myself) a favour: learn to use your brain and hands (Yeah, I know sometimes hard to coordinate both) and learn how to close a door (it is actualy the same movement you did to open it, only reversed, requires quite some brain processing, but after a couple of times it is almost natural).
Thank you for your attention. next time I will explain you why it is handy to let people out of the doorway before you get in...
lundi 26 janvier 2009
Dutch are polite... In their own way
Before you read further, and if you haven't yet, I strongly recommend you to read my disclaimer, so that you can plainly enjoy your reading.
A thing that I always found pretty paradoxical in the Netherlands, is that Dutch people are actually very polite, yes, they are, really, have you never noticed? They don't swear! Or so nicely: "godverdorie", "Tjonge jonge" etc. That's so cute! And they are so pure, they even get shocked whenever you use the F word, or when you express your discomfort in an annoying situation:
"Putain! Fait chier ce con de train de merde á etre toujours en retard! Merde!"
And I find this especially funny, first because I might like to shock people, particularly when the shock is obviously faked, but the funniest thing is: this same nicely dressed lady, whose little sensitive hears you just mutilated to death with this "horribilidingly" ugly word, this same person will see no offense in bumping heavily into you in the street sending you rolling three meters back on the pavement (Dutch women are usually quite impressive to me, kind of 1,80m for 90 kg) and just going on her way without even a glance at you (do not expect a "sorry", people are not sorry here, well maybe they are you can still move...).
How incredible is that? It is like a cruise boat's captain being shocked at the sight of a fisherman peeing in the see from the front bridge of his boat but not having the slightest problem with sinking this same fishing boat in a painless (for the cruiseboat) collision and continuing his way.
Ok, I agree the analogy is a bit excessive.... A tanker would have been more appropriate than a cruise boat...
Anyway, that's the kind of story every single foreigner's experienced at least once in the Netherlands.
Now, to you my Dutch reader (yes, you, the one that read that far, you like to suffer right?), hurting someone and not showing the slightest sense of regret, THIS IS BEING RUDE!
So our first lesson today, you walk in the street, you bump into someone (we all know it was accidental, but it does not excuse you), a little "sorry dude", "no hard feelings", even a simple look (after a few years of hard training, you can even add a smile to it, but that's mainly for masters) is always appreciated.
I know it seems worthless, it won't make you any richer, there seems to be no gain in it, but it simply makes you look a bit human, and if you start behaving like a human with other human being, they might act the same in return (although I know many Dutch people consider being polite as a sign of weakness that other would then avidly abuse).
Anyway, that's it for today's lesson, in the next lesson we will learn to close a door after entering a public place...
A thing that I always found pretty paradoxical in the Netherlands, is that Dutch people are actually very polite, yes, they are, really, have you never noticed? They don't swear! Or so nicely: "godverdorie", "Tjonge jonge" etc. That's so cute! And they are so pure, they even get shocked whenever you use the F word, or when you express your discomfort in an annoying situation:
"Putain! Fait chier ce con de train de merde á etre toujours en retard! Merde!"
And I find this especially funny, first because I might like to shock people, particularly when the shock is obviously faked, but the funniest thing is: this same nicely dressed lady, whose little sensitive hears you just mutilated to death with this "horribilidingly" ugly word, this same person will see no offense in bumping heavily into you in the street sending you rolling three meters back on the pavement (Dutch women are usually quite impressive to me, kind of 1,80m for 90 kg) and just going on her way without even a glance at you (do not expect a "sorry", people are not sorry here, well maybe they are you can still move...).
How incredible is that? It is like a cruise boat's captain being shocked at the sight of a fisherman peeing in the see from the front bridge of his boat but not having the slightest problem with sinking this same fishing boat in a painless (for the cruiseboat) collision and continuing his way.
Ok, I agree the analogy is a bit excessive.... A tanker would have been more appropriate than a cruise boat...
Anyway, that's the kind of story every single foreigner's experienced at least once in the Netherlands.
Now, to you my Dutch reader (yes, you, the one that read that far, you like to suffer right?), hurting someone and not showing the slightest sense of regret, THIS IS BEING RUDE!
So our first lesson today, you walk in the street, you bump into someone (we all know it was accidental, but it does not excuse you), a little "sorry dude", "no hard feelings", even a simple look (after a few years of hard training, you can even add a smile to it, but that's mainly for masters) is always appreciated.
I know it seems worthless, it won't make you any richer, there seems to be no gain in it, but it simply makes you look a bit human, and if you start behaving like a human with other human being, they might act the same in return (although I know many Dutch people consider being polite as a sign of weakness that other would then avidly abuse).
Anyway, that's it for today's lesson, in the next lesson we will learn to close a door after entering a public place...
Disclaimer
Background
I wanted to write a blog for a long time now, being a ITer, I was mainly targeting a technical blog, but there are already so many around, most of them much better than what I could produce. So the idea came to me a little while ago, having started a new job I now have to commute by train again (which I hadn't have to do in the last 3 years or so), that's when it became obvious to me, I had to write about people's everyday incivilities.... Why would I care? Well, let's call it a therapy, and let's say it prevents me from tearing all my hair apart in frustration and will hopefully save me from an anus cancer in twenty years...
but why the Dutch?
That's indeed a very good question, being French, protocol, manners and politeness are concepts that I highly value. If you have ever lived in the Netherlands, you have probably been told that Dutch are directs, franks, and some other blah blah bullshit. I will, along this blog, simply prove to you that they simply are rude. Not because they are bad people or anything like that, but just because they have been raised like that, caring about themselves, and only themselves.
I first thought that I was just being too French - yes, we are indeed pretentious bastards with a high image of ourselves and we think the world owes us, but hey, we invented paid holidays, so please show a bit of respect next time you go camping in Ardeche, because it is, after all, a bit because of us ;-) -.
Anyway, I thought therefore that I was being too French, and I had always been told that people from the north of Europe were a bit colder people (and all the clichés coming with it). But after I spoke with many foreigners, other French of course, English, Scottish, German (yes dude, even Germans think you are rude! can you imagine that?) I understood that was a general consensus between foreigners living in this country.
I know what most people would think, "Holland, like it or leave it" (yeah, we had a few funny guys like this in France too), and that's my problem, I actually like the Netherlands, believe me or not, I actually even like how Ducth people, probably thanks to this directness, are entrepreneurial, I even like most Dutch people I came to know. But still put them together, and they can be so "antisociaal".
So I decided to fight rather than fly, and to try to educate Dutch people to basic good manners as they exist in the rest of the world...
Here come the real disclaimer part
First of all, if you are Dutch, I invite you to read further, if you feel offended by what you read, please, READ EVEN FURTHER, because then you probably are the right target for this piece of crap I am writing.
Indeed, most of what you are going to read here could be applied to most big cities in the world, but as I wrote before, everybody seems to agree that this is particularly true in the Netherlands. I am not trying to be mean here, nor to discredit Dutch people - although you might feel some frustration sometimes - I am indeed genuinely trying to help Dutch people to give a better image of themselves to foreigners (which could start by stopping the hypocrisy being drug traffics and prostitution, but that's probably a whole topic in itself, and one I am not expert in).
If you are a foreigner and you want to share your frustration, feel free to do so.
If you are Dutch and you want to insult me, well, feel free to do so, it can be very liberating sometimes :-).
And if you really think what I am writing here is complete bullshit, please prove it to me everyday, I would love to walk among nice and polite people!
In any cases, just enjoy the reading!
I wanted to write a blog for a long time now, being a ITer, I was mainly targeting a technical blog, but there are already so many around, most of them much better than what I could produce. So the idea came to me a little while ago, having started a new job I now have to commute by train again (which I hadn't have to do in the last 3 years or so), that's when it became obvious to me, I had to write about people's everyday incivilities.... Why would I care? Well, let's call it a therapy, and let's say it prevents me from tearing all my hair apart in frustration and will hopefully save me from an anus cancer in twenty years...
but why the Dutch?
That's indeed a very good question, being French, protocol, manners and politeness are concepts that I highly value. If you have ever lived in the Netherlands, you have probably been told that Dutch are directs, franks, and some other blah blah bullshit. I will, along this blog, simply prove to you that they simply are rude. Not because they are bad people or anything like that, but just because they have been raised like that, caring about themselves, and only themselves.
I first thought that I was just being too French - yes, we are indeed pretentious bastards with a high image of ourselves and we think the world owes us, but hey, we invented paid holidays, so please show a bit of respect next time you go camping in Ardeche, because it is, after all, a bit because of us ;-) -.
Anyway, I thought therefore that I was being too French, and I had always been told that people from the north of Europe were a bit colder people (and all the clichés coming with it). But after I spoke with many foreigners, other French of course, English, Scottish, German (yes dude, even Germans think you are rude! can you imagine that?) I understood that was a general consensus between foreigners living in this country.
I know what most people would think, "Holland, like it or leave it" (yeah, we had a few funny guys like this in France too), and that's my problem, I actually like the Netherlands, believe me or not, I actually even like how Ducth people, probably thanks to this directness, are entrepreneurial, I even like most Dutch people I came to know. But still put them together, and they can be so "antisociaal".
So I decided to fight rather than fly, and to try to educate Dutch people to basic good manners as they exist in the rest of the world...
Here come the real disclaimer part
First of all, if you are Dutch, I invite you to read further, if you feel offended by what you read, please, READ EVEN FURTHER, because then you probably are the right target for this piece of crap I am writing.
Indeed, most of what you are going to read here could be applied to most big cities in the world, but as I wrote before, everybody seems to agree that this is particularly true in the Netherlands. I am not trying to be mean here, nor to discredit Dutch people - although you might feel some frustration sometimes - I am indeed genuinely trying to help Dutch people to give a better image of themselves to foreigners (which could start by stopping the hypocrisy being drug traffics and prostitution, but that's probably a whole topic in itself, and one I am not expert in).
If you are a foreigner and you want to share your frustration, feel free to do so.
If you are Dutch and you want to insult me, well, feel free to do so, it can be very liberating sometimes :-).
And if you really think what I am writing here is complete bullshit, please prove it to me everyday, I would love to walk among nice and polite people!
In any cases, just enjoy the reading!
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