My Dutch Dream

Today I got my BSN (burgerservicenummer). Interestingly, nearly all Dutch people still call it the SOFI nummer (old name). Some people don’t have a clue what I mean when I say BSN. So you’re best off just referring to it as a SOFI.

I haven’t yet received my letter in the post confirming my registration from the gemeente. Instead I went to the local town hall (stadsdeelhuis) to get my BSN. I had to wait a whole hour just to see someone which struck me as unusually inefficient for The Netherlands. I paid €11.50 for some kind of offical print out.

My Dutch is heavily mistake-laden and poor, but it is quite good for practical situations. I spoke completely in Dutch at the town hall and was pretty well understood. I explained that I had registered on Monday and was here to collect my BSN etc. More on this language stuff in a minute.

Then I popped over to the ABN Amro bank to ask for a bank account (Ik wil graag een betaalrekening openen). I have an appointment (afsprak) for Tuesday next week. I heard good things about ABN (specifically, their English support) but have been looking at the deal that ING have on their website. Hopefully, ABN can match up to ING in this respect.

I also made a quick bike trip to the Kamer van Koophandel to ask a few questions and get some forms. They say I’ll have to make an appointment on Monday and I should see them quite quickly. I was pretty amazed that the guy knew about 100% internet businesses. From another Dutch businessman I know, the KvK are supposed to be very helpful and my experience today backed that up. In England, there is also a Chamber of Commerce and, whilst you are not obliged to register with them (we have much LESS regulation), they do not provide any real help whatsoever to the small businessman. They’re more of a faceless public body serving nobody.

I explained to them that I had my “SOFI nummer”. The guy specifically explained that I must have registered my address or something or other. I’m really not sure what he meant by that – I’ve registered with the council and at the DPG which is where every new person in Amsterdam goes to. I did notice that my printout from the town hall today reads “geen actuele gegevens opgenomen over het verblijfsrecht” (no current data on residence), so I think I’m going to wait for my real confirmation of registration to come in the post. Surely this will be good enough for the KvK.

With so many mini-hurdles to jump over, it’s easy to drop your head and think “the dream won’t happen”. But I know from experience that I just need to keep chipping away. It WILL all happen. It WILL all fall into place if I want it. At least I don’t have to do too much waiting anymore and things are now happening much more quickly.

Mijn Nederlands Is Niet Heel Goed…Mischien…Of Niet?

I had a recent resurgence in learning of late. I finished that Michel Thomas Foundation course and then have now got myself maybe 20% of the way through the Advanced course.

So where am I now?

I’m using my Dutch all the time out in public. I personally think its a total myth that when foreigners try out their Dutch that they are always met with a response in English. My accent is far from perfect and I’m absolutely certain that locals know I am not Dutch and am learning. And yet every time they are responding in Dutch up until the point that I need to resort to English.

I’m still finding it really hard to understand people’s replies though. I can make myself quite easily understood but I struggle to decipher what seems like a stream of mumbling. Same thing happens when I watch Dutch TV. I know that as my vocabulary increases that the sentences I hear will make much more sense. But I sometimes hear a sentence and quickly look at the subtitle (both in Dutch) and there are many words in the text that I recognise but when spoken colloquially I cannot identify them. Hopefully I will soon get better at this.

So for the moment, I know a handful of useful verbs. I’m quite comfortable with the similar-to-German sentence construction (often shoving the verb to the end of the sentence). My vocab is getting better all the time (I jot down anything new that I spot while watching TV, this is really useful).

Basically, I’m trying to improve my skills as much as possible so that come Septemberish, I can enroll on a language course at Universiteit van Amsterdam. Well, anyone can enroll actually – but if I learn as much as possible beforehand then I can go in at a pre-intermediate level or better, rather than going in as a total beginner (they teach at around 7 different levels or so).

So my language learning to-do list is as follows:

• Finish Michel Thomas Dutch Advanced (if you want to learn Dutch, GET THIS NOW).
• Keep assembling a list of colloquial words, based on new words spotted while watching TV (English language programs with Dutch subtitles). For example, I collected a ton of them while watching Goodfellas the other day – words such as “smeerlap” and “eikel” – but seriously, I’m also learning a ton of useful, everyday, colloquial words. No delays in using a dictionary like you would with Dutch TV. I’m using mnemosyne to record them (free flashcards software).
• Do the L-R exercise I spoke of earlier. I reckon I am ready for it now. I must know something like 200-300 words I reckon.
• Read a textbook and do all the exercises. As mundane as I find this, it will probably help consolidate everything I have learned so far.

By the way, I just recorded a webcam video blog but the stupid Youtube browser software crashed and lost the recording I’ll do another one later. I especially am long overdue showing a friend of mine, Brian, my live Dutch on video! I promise, it won’t be too long now!