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!

Gisteren, inschrijf Ik op gemeente. Yesterday I got registered at the council, at the Dienst Persoons en Geo-informatie office (same road as the Heineken Museum).

It was pretty much a paperwork exercise i.e. I handed over my passport, huurcontract and legalised birth certificate (though you can bring that later, I understand) and they enter all the information into their computer. That’s it. Literally no questions asked.

My BSN should arrive in a few days in the post or I can wait for 3 working days and go to the local town hall to ask for it. I think I will do this as I am keen to get the ball rolling on bank account, health insurance and Chamber of Commerce registration.

They also automatically let the Belastingdienst (tax office) know of your arrival.

Yesterday I also got lost on my bike. I decided to ride from Oost (where I live) to Zuid-Oost. I thought I would check out the notorious Bijlmer area and see if it really was as bad as people make out. I’m not sure I ever really saw the apartments with raised walkways etc. but I did find the Amsterdam Arena which I was really impressed with. I’m a United fan and I would say that the Arena is more impressive than Old Trafford. I’m not sure how old it is but it also has a ton of regular shops and bars in a “boulevard” alongside it.

Getting there took me through a sort of “no mans land” of woods but with excellent bike paths. The only problem is that it leaves you with no points of reference and I got lost on the way back, even at one point going around in a circle with the feeling of being stuck in a maze! Luckily I found a way out eventually, with plenty of bugs trying to enter my eyes, mouth and nose! I forgot that a “wetlands” country like The Netherlands crawls with bugs in the summer, even in centrum as I found out the other day.

And finally today I have finished the Michel Thomas Foundation Course. If you want to learn Dutch then go out and get it, I can’t recommend it enough. No books or pens and paper needed whatsoever. Just listen and repeat. I’m moving onto the Advanced course next.

I prefer to call this post Dutch “Ettiquette” rather than “Manners”, you will soon see why.

Anyway, one of the fascinating things about living or even visiting another country is to see how differently things are done. I’m sure you’ll agree and have experienced it yourself.

So something unique I have seen here is when you go shopping that they will use the divider at the end of the checkout. So as soon as the person before you has payed for their goods then yours will immediately be thrown down the opposite side! If someone were to do this in England then it would be viewed as very rude.

But clearly it is more efficient to do this. In fact, if anything, when you think about it, it actually affords each person more time to do their packing.

Another thing I noticed here is that at least 80% of cyclists stop at the lights, even if there is a clear road ahead! I’m used to “breaking the law” in the UK and ignoring the lights and moving so long as the way is clear. Maybe this happens here in NL because there are so many bikes, or maybe some people get fined? Someone even told me that you could get a 40 Euro fine for not wearing lights on your body at night when out riding but I think this is BS because I’ve seen only a few with these.

Of course, giving a hand signal when on your bike here is normal but that is clearly because it is common sense with so many other bikes around.

While we’re on the subject of bikes, I’ve noticed that motorists go out of their way to give way to cyclists, even if they don’t have to. I’ve been trying to cross the road to the opposite bike lane many times on my bike and had traffic stop before me to let me through, even though they were not obliged to and had a ton of traffic behind them. This is something that you will almost never see back in the UK unless you are on a very quiet back street, never on the main road.

By the way, I have purchased some of these infamous Dutch “drop” flavoured sweets recently. If you look at any supermarket here, half of their sweets section will be dedicated to these! Contrary to what I have heard before, I don’t believe that these are uniquely Dutch, in fact I have tasted this flavour before in the British sweets known as midget gems – the black ones taste exactly the same as drops. And yes, frankly they are awful, I can see why drops usually come in a mixed form e.g. combination wine gum, mint etc., because it seems that very few people are prepared to eat 100% drops continuously!

I also saw something in Albert Heijn that made me laugh. We have in England what we call “licorice allsorts” which are pretty tasty and quite sparing in licorice. Anyway, you can buy them in Albert Heijn but they call them “Engelse Drops”! That made me chuckle!

Oh, on the paperwork front, I tried to enquire about health insurance yesterday (the choice is so complicated and the prices so similar anyway, I just went with a recommendation in the end, Zilveren Kruis, if for nothing else the fact they have a lot of information in English). The good news is that it can all be done over the phone. The bad news is that I can’t do anything without the BSN. With registration on Monday, it’s gonna be at least a week till I get it in the post, so annoying! In the UK (a place I’ve never thought of as efficient at all, quite the opposite), a recently arrived immigrant can get their National Insurance number within a day by comparison.

Having found a place to live only recently, I was overdue for buying some basics and left it too late on Saturday evening. Like in the UK many years ago, shops (winkels) here close around 5/6 on Saturday, are completely closed on Sunday and don’t open again till Monday (late Monday often here). I understand why they do it but personally I see no harm in opening shops on Sunday. After all, it only benefits the shopkeepers and everyone else who also has to work has to rush around like crazy on Saturday. Anyway, that’s another subject altogether.

So yesterday I found another supermarket called Vomar. Many tourists think that Albert Heijn is the main supermarket that everyone goes to in Holland. Maybe it is, but it is damn expensive. It reminds me of Waitrose in the UK, a so-called up-market place with high prices that looks very presentable but does not represent value. We (my flatmate and I) are still looking for an Aldi or a Lidl (I personally think these places are too “cheap”, if you see what I mean) but in the meantime I found a place called Vomar. In my view, this is a regular supermarket and I’m going to try to do most of my shopping here from now on. Still, I am yet to find a HUGE supermarket like you get back in the UK. Maybe, living in Oost, I am simply too close to the centre to find such a place. Perhaps you need to be on the Metro line for that? Ik heb geen idee.

So having not had a proper bowl of cereal in a while, I bought myself some and needed the milk to go with it. I surveyed the shelves. Now I already knew that they had something here called “half-volle” which I am guessing means something like semi-skimmed. But I actually prefer my milk to be skimmed.

I saw the regular milk, the half-volle milk and all that was left was a red-labelled milk called “karne melk“. I had no idea what this meant but I bought it.

So I get home and pour the milk into my cereal, it sure doesn’t look like skimmed milk. It looks very thick and I thought perhaps that it was condensed milk. I took a taste and it was rancid! It was as if you had accidentally drank some milk that close to two days old. Only just drinkable but preferably not.

Turns out that karne means “churned”. Basically, this is some kind of intentional sour milk. God only knows why someone would want to drink this stuff?? Maybe it goes well in tea or coffee, that’s my only guess. I did finish my bowl of cereal and it actually wasn’t too bad but I won’t be buying this stuff again, that’s for sure. Yuck!

Today I put out the rubbish (trash). My flatmate and I had no idea how it works here. There are some tiny bins that look like they’d hold no more than a single sack of rubbish??? So I tried it today and basically it uses a kind of single sack one-way rotating thingymijig that I’m guessing leads to some kind of pit below. An ingenious invention that saves space above ground and eliminates the fly infestations you normally get around bins. I wonder if this invention is seen throughout The Netherlands or just where I live? Anyone know?

Yesterday I bought myself a great bike! I’ve been looking for a while now for a bike and have been so far using a rental one that I obtained from Frederic Rent a Bike, on a week’s rental.

So I looked around and found several small independent bike shops and most of them sell exclusively new bikes (look around the streets and hardly any bikes are new at all!) which go for about €350 minimum. Perhaps the odd second hand bike if you’re lucky. Sure you can get yourself a €200 brand new bike made in China but ride on Prinsengracht a few times and you can expect it to fall apart in no time!

So I checked out the stickers on the rear mudguards of other bikes and saw “M. Costa” on a lot of bikes. A little internet work reveals there is a branch near me at Muiderpoort station. I checked it out and for starters there were hundreds of bikes simply there for repair. In the back, they had several hundred more bikes, about half new and half second-hand. Compared to all the other places I had so far seen there was infinitely more choice.

I really wanted to get myself a nice classic Dutch Batavus (stressed second syllable, it turns out), having rode one a couple of times on rental previously. But I prefer a smaller frame bike with a lower seat and these were few and far between generally. In the end, I got myself a nice Dutch bike (I think). I can see that it is a few years old but clearly a strong bike, it has a nice low seat and after giving it a test ride (hand over your passport when you borrow the bike) I fell in love with it. It rides even better than the Batavuses I have rode so far. I can really lean into the corners and can feel the advantage of the low centre of gravity. Bought myself a lock and a new set of bungees too. The bike itself was €190 but so long as I lock it up well, this baby should last me for a few years I hope. I could have bought for cheaper privately, but I need this bike now and I have confidence that this bike has been set up properly (private sales always need some work and I don’t even have a set of tools yet) and it comes with a 3 month guarantee.

I’m only a few minutes away from this part of town and the other thing I noticed about this place is that there is a huge market here! I’ve since noticed that the “Dappermarkt” is actually rated as one of the best open air markets not just in The Netherlands but also in the world! This market is bloody huge and you can get all sorts of things here from bikes to fish to textiles to clothes and more. Personally I think it is good but not great, but there is no doubt that this market and the surrounding shops are damn handy!

Anyway, here’s some pics. The first is my Batavus hire bike that I have now returned. A great ride. The second is my new Rivel bike, the third and fourth are the view from the top of the bike park at Central Station! The last is a rider’s view as I depart from home.

Something I knew about before landing here was that you can get Dutch
subtitles on TV by simply going to text 888 (ondertitels). It’s intended
for the hard of hearing but I find them really handy to decipher
conversations.

On the other hand, all the English language broadcasts already have Dutch
subtitles and this is also great for learning, as you know I have been
using this technique already, before I had even arrived here.

Where I live we have cable and get a ton of Dutch channels, the odd French
or German channel and even BBC1! I’m not sure if that’s a good or a bad
thing for me! I was thinking of investing in a proxy service anyway in
order to obtain BBC via iplayer (normally not accessible outside the UK).

I didn’t want to reveal too much earlier, because you never know how things might turn out. But on the accommodation front, I am definitely one-up!

Yesterday I paid my first month’s deposit and first month’s rent and got myself a huurcontract” and set of keys.

Earlier in the day, I had my first viewing which was for a room in an apartment in Amsterdam-Noord. I thought I would be sharing one room of four and sharing with the landlord and a few others in a similar situation as myself. But it turned out to be more of a lodger type tenancy, in a Dutch-Maroc family who were very nice indeed but, besides the fact that I speak little Dutch and they little English (making it difficult to communicate as fellow householders), I felt it just wasn’t for me to suddenly be a part of someone else’s family life, even if they were so kind enough to take me “under their wing”, so to speak.

I left there late and made my way furiously on bike to an apartment near Diemen and just inside the “ring” (ringweg is an orbital road going around Amsterdam centrum). This place I found much better, sharing with a couple of other guys of similar age. Both the area and the apartment are much nicer. And the place is far cheaper than the other one too! Sure, it’s a little further out, but Central Station is a mere 20 minutes away by bike, a nice ride that I have already done many times on this hired bike of mine.

Today I also picked up some basics like bedding (I had no pillow last night, except for a pillow case stuffed with clothes!!) and looked around some bike shops. Basically I need a bike and I’d prefer to get something of Dutch quality that was made to pound around the bumpy Dutch roads without easily falling apart. And yet I don’t want to fork out €400 on a new bike that might attract thieves (although I found out today that insurance is a mere €30 per year).

It looks like you can get a brand new bike for €120 or so but it won’t be Dutch, more likely Chinese. For the same price, you can get a second hand Dutch bike. The problem I’ve found is that hardly any bike shops have second hand bikes. Most of them are new. And yet if you look around the streets, nearly all the bikes are old!

So I’m still looking for a good place to buy a bike because I really don’t want to buy new. I’ve looked at the stickers on the rear mudguards of other bikes and it looks like a very popular place is “M. Costa” or “Costa Rijwielhandel”. Seems like there are a few branches so I will check these out tomorrow I think. This hire bike I have needs to go back on Monday.

Oh yeah, I’ve had some weird shopping incidents today and yesterday. Until now, I’ve interacted well with Dutch shopkeepers, asked about product and discussed other things in half-Dutch, half-English. With zero pressure, everything went fine.

But last night I went to the local Albert Heijn at around 9pm and picked up a handful of things. Waiting in the only queue with closing time approaching and a gaggle of people behind me, I noticed the chap in front of me say “sorry” as he handed over a 10 Euro note after the girl at the checkout had asked for as small change as possible. I could smell a storm coming!

I myself handed over a 20 Euro note. There was a really strange and uncomfortable silence as I just sorta shrugged! Then just mumbled something in English because I didn’t know the Dutch. There was some weird communication and finally she and the guy behind me directed me to the cigarette counter where I was able to get change. It was all a bit weird and left me feeling embarrassed. I don’t really know why. I kinda feel ashamed to resort to speaking English in a foreign country. I’m not sure why because I know there are plenty of English and Americans and other nationalities here who speak not one word of Dutch, unashamedly.

So today I go to a shop (textile-something) and buy some basic bedding. I see the woman in front of me fishing out a load of coins and I sense the same thing about to happen again (coincidence or does this always happen in Dutch shops? Surely the fact that the Geldautomaats here always spit out fifties just does not help!!!). My total comes to just shy of 20 Euros so I whip out a fifty, sensing that this is the perfect opportunity to get rid of one of these (I did have a 20 in my pocket).

When the checkout girl sees this fifty in my hand, she seems to have a look almost of digust! So I tell her, “Ik heb geen andere geld” (not so perfect Dutch for “I have no other money”). That weird few seconds of uncomfortable “nothing” happen again – an impasse. So I suggest “Ik heb PIN…er Mastercard”. So we try out two of my Mastercard credit cards. Remember that these are internationally recognised cards that work all over the world. But guess what, not in this national chain of Dutch shops! Incidentally, I had a similar problem with my VISA debit and my flatmate with his VISA too.

In the end, she took my fifty (turns out she did have change) and gave me my due change.

I definitely want to have more confidence in such sitatuations so I’m going to step up my Dutch studies some more in the next few days.

Oh, look out for photos in my future posts. I realise they have been few and far between since the start of this blog and non-existant since I arrived here but that is soon to change!

So I landed here 2 days ago and checked into the Stayokay Stadsdoelen on Kloveniersburgwal. Interestingly enough, this is close to Niewmarkt, an area of centrum that I have never spent much time in and to my surprise found to be as lively as, say, Leidseplein. And copious amounts of coffeeshops too which is annoying for me because I can’t smoke for a month as I’ve mentioned earlier. I can smell weed literally everywhere I walk, it makes me cry!

Anyway, I spent the last few weeks in London really busy, trying to sort out stuff I should have done ages ago but had left to the last minute. I also threw out a ton of stuff – such a move like this makes you realise just which material possessions you “need” and which you don’t. Needless to say, you don’t really need much. The rest of it went into a storage facility and I’m yet to decide how to move this stuff to Amsterdam: either with regular flights back and taking home the permitted 30kg each time or getting it shipped….probably the latter but not for a while.

With only 9 hours total sleep in my last 3 days in London, I felt “stoned” and out of my head, and also a little homesick. Bizarre. And minus the normal excitement of looking forward to 3 days stoned off my tits in Amsterdam.

But anyway, since landing and seeing Amsterdam completely unstoned for once, I have a new appreciation for it. Everything here as we know is much more relaxed. Maybe it’s because it’s totally different to London, but I really enjoy the way of life here and see it as superior.

The other good thing I’m enjoying is the exposure to the Dutch language. Obviously, everywhere I look I see Dutch writing and hear spoken Dutch. I’ve also practiced my Dutch with nearly every Dutch person I’ve met (e.g. in shops) so far. And all of them have been happy to speak in this combination of basic Dutch and then sprinkles of English when I clearly don’t understand them!

So I highly recommend Michel Thomas Dutch. It has really helped me a lot. Not the Introductory course (it’s too short) but the Foundation course. The Foundation actually contains the Intro one anyway and then has 4 times as much learning overall. I’ve only completed 7 out of 8 sections but it has helped me immensely. I have the Advanced course in my bag too and haven’t yet gotten around to listening to it. No books at all!

So far I’ve been staying at the Stayokay. The 20-bed dorm resembles a penitentiary when you first see it but it hasn’t been too bad overall. My first day here I spent buying a dictionary, getting a phone, hiring a bike, making an appointment at the gemeente etc. All the things I needed to do before even looking. The next day I contacted several people on Kamernet but most of them by email (only about a quarter leave their mobile phone number).

Today I viewed a couple of places to live. Touch wood, I don’t want to give too many details at this stage, call me superstitious. But I’m hoping to finalise things very, very soon. I have my appointment at the gemeente in two weeks so all should be good by then, Ik hoop.

I haven’t written in a couple of months and have been meaning to give you all an update, especially as one reader kindly pointed out to me recently The good news is that I’m off to Amsterdam in 3 weeks and things are more or less going my way. I won’t deny that I have had doubts and at times my emotions have gone from sky high and full of hope, to very low and not believing it is possible. But at the end of the day, I must give this my best shot and believe that everything will be OK because life is too short to delay this anymore. So here we go:

Language – I know that you don’t really need to know any Dutch to live in Holland, let alone Amsterdam. But I would be more confident if I knew more. Work and other things are a big distraction at the moment but I have pledged to get through my Dutch learning audios, books and a few other tasks I have set myself – starting from tomorrow. Better late than never I suppose. Having said that, my hours of watching TV series with Dutch subtitles has really helped me. I do understand a lot of written Dutch now, I just suck at formulating my own sentences from scratch. Zeker, Ik verstan een klein beetje! Beter dan niks, hé?

Money – looking back to a little over 2 months ago, things are going OK on the money front. Lately I have not been working as much as I should have done. It is just so hard to motivate yourself compared to working in an organisation and having a boss. Nevertheless, I have one source of income that is making me about $1,200 a month which is around €850. I also have a few other bits and pieces coming in from other sources which probably takes it up to €1,000 a month all in all. What I really need to work on at the moment is diversification because if that primary source dried up I would be “up the creek without a paddle”! Savings-wise I don’t have a huge amount but it should be enough for a deposit and upfront rent on a room. I will be initially drawing money from my UK bank account and I am also taking two prepaid Mastercards with me, just in case.

Clutter – I have thrown out a serious amount of crap! When you know that you are shortly going to emigrate and cannot take everything with you and it is costly to ship things then it becomes so easy to discriminate between what you really need and what you don’t! I have thrown out nearly everything and I have rented a self-storage unit to store the few boxes of things that I do want to keep (mainly documents and mementos) – I will be back for them later while I make the initial trip over with a suitcase or two (I think I’m limited to 20kg or so on the flight).

Business – Holland is full of bureaucracy like you would not imagine. The UK is a much easier place to do anything by comparison. I really think this is holding the Dutch back from achieving much more, their choice I suppose. Having looked at all the options, my best bet is to run a regular one man freelancing company. Basically, you must go to the local Chamber of Commerce (KvK) and register and have what is hopefully a formality of an interview. I may also hire an accountant to help me with my tax return.

The Plan – The plan is to land and look for accommodation from day one. Without a place to stay and a “huurcontract”, you can’t register with the council (inschrijven met gemeente), get a BSN (like a social security no.), work or get health insurance. I’m going to be looking for a room (“kamer”) immediately – it will save me some money and also help establish a new social life, besides I’m fed up of living on my own as I do at the moment, especially now that I don’t work in a regular office. I’ll use sites like Kamernet mostly. I’ll stay for as long as it takes to sort this out but hopefully I can wrap it up within a week or two. I think the business registration should be smooth going. My only other consideration is for my medical care. I am currently under ongoing “surveillance” for a medical condition and I need to register with a doctor (huisart) and get referred to one of Amsterdam’s two main hospitals as soon as I have my medical insurance. I’m sure this will all happen in good time but it’s still a concern of mine and will be until it is resolved because it is a potential “show stopper”. I know, I should have more belief and quit being pessimistic!!!

Well that’s that – just 3 weeks to go. Oh, one more thing. Due to this medical condition, it’s a long story that I won’t bore you with but basically I cannot smoke any weed for a month after arriving!! How bloody annoying is that! I have never even been for 24 hours without being stoned in Amsterdam and suddenly I will need to be sober for 30 times as long!! Give me strength!

I have been watching a lot of TV and movies recently to improve my Dutch. “How does that work?” – you may be asking.

Well what I normally do is watch English language TV series like 24, Lost and Prison Break. I download the subtitles from NLOndertitels and this is great for improving my grammar and vocabulary. I even keep a pad handy for jotting down new words. Plus these programs feature a lot of everyday spoken commands and responses so I think this will help me with regular communication.

Much harder to get hold of are Dutch language films. But I have recently found myself a very good source and have been watching a few. Actually, the Dutch movie industry is pretty lacking and does not produce many films at all. In contrast, the Belgian movie industry releases a lot of Flemish movies and TV programs. Now of course they speak a little different to the Dutch and I do find it harder to understand them but this is still a worthwhile exercise – of course I switch the English subtitles on.

Buitenspel

The first movie I watched was Buitenspel (literally means “offside”). This is a movie about a kid, Gilles, and his relationship with his father. The kid is a pretty good striker in his youth team and he wants to make it to the top, to play for the “Rode Duivels” i.e. the Belgian national team.

For some reason I thought that the “Rode Duivels” were Antwerp maybe and it took me a while to realise it was the national team! Anyway, this is a great movie, I enjoyed it a lot. It is not really about the football but if you are a football fan then there are some interesting aspects to the film that only a fan would recognise.

By the way, I tried watching this with both English and Dutch subtitles at the same time. It was bloody difficult, I’m telling you! What I might do is to watch it again but with only Dutch subtitles so I can practice my speaking and listening. And with the original understanding of the film already in my brain, maybe it will help me to make a natural assimilation of the language.

One of the main characters is the father figure who is played by Pieter Van Hees. I did not know this at the time but I believe that he is actually a pretty famous Flemish actor. The mother figure in the film is played by Joke Devynck. I’ve gotta say that she is one amazing hottie! If you like your MILFs (and I normally don’t) then you will want to check her out!

De Hel van Tanger

The second film I watched was De Hel van Tanger. Anyone can easily guess what the title means and judging by the DVD cover I figured that this would be one of those “banged up abroad” type films.

Anyway, it is loosely based on a real event – I don’t want to reveal too much about the film but it is amazing! I cannot believe what this guy went through it is quite unbelievable. It is sometimes compared to Midnight Express but I have not seen the latter film so I cannot comment. All I can say is that De Hel van Tanger is a damn good film in its own right. For example, at one point I had the tears in my eyes, that’s how moving this film was!

Oh and here’s the weird thing – Pieter Van Hees was the main star in De Hel van Tanger! I did not even realise this until halfway through the film beacuse because he looked totally different. I heard his signature gravel-like voice and had a moment of deja-vu!

I highly suggest you check out the Flemish film industry. I am looking forward to watching more films. One I am halfway through at the moment (I had to stop watching because I was so damn tired!) is BenX – this is very, very off the wall but intriguing.

Have you seen any good Dutch language films lately? Please leave a comment if you have!