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...