The Netherlands is a country known for its religious, ideological and ethnical tolerance. But what is perhaps less known is that it is also a country religiously divided into a northern part dominated by a culture of Calvinism and a southern part, which is predominantly Catholic. Today, when people speak of ‘below the rivers’ they refer to the Catholic provinces and when they talk about ‘above the rivers’ they are pointing to the Calvinist provinces north of the geographical border of the rivers Maas, Waal and Rhine, which roughly run parallel to this historical and cultural border.

When the Netherlands declared independence from Spain in 1579 by the Union of Utrecht and were recognized by the peace agreement with Spain by the signing of the Treaty of Munster in 1648, ‘the Low Lands’ (as the Netherlands is literally translated), did not include the southern provinces. Only with the defeat of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna in 1815 were these provinces included, and not until 1831 when Belgium gained independence were the borders constituted that comprise the Netherlands as we know it. Culturally though, the southern provinces and especially the province of Limburg (the hind leg of the Dutch lion) where I grew up belonged to the Catholic sphere of influence. Even in present day the Netherlands, it makes a huge difference in attitude and perspective on life if you are from above or from below the rivers. (more…)

It wasn’t until I moved to the US that I started drinking coffee regularly and became what they call in the Netherlands a ‘koffieleut’, which translates literally into ‘coffee socialite.’ Although the average European drinks more coffee per year than the average American, the cultural importance and its effects on the average European seems to me smaller than that on the average American. After all, coffee is a cultural obsession in the United States.

Chains with thousands of branches like Dunkin’ Donuts or Starbucks dominate US daily street life. Especially in the morning (90% of coffee consumed in the US is in the morning), millions of white foamy cups with boldly imprinted pink and orange logos bob across the streets in morning rush hour and on the train. Coffee drive-ins are a saving grace for the rushing army of helmeted and tattooed construction workers. During lunch break, men and women in savvy business suits duck into coffee shops. Students chill out from early afternoon till late evening on comfy couches at coffee lounges around campus. Police officers clutch coffee cups while guarding road construction sites on the highway. In short, coffee drinkers in the United States can be found just about anywhere you go.

This mass-psychotic ritual causes Americans to associate Europe above all with cars that oddly do not contain cup holders (to an American this is like selling a car without tires), or with the unbelievably petite cups of coffee European restaurants serve, so small that my father-in-law had to always order two cups of coffee. It is my strongest conviction that the easily agitated and obsessed nature of the ‘New Englander’ can be blamed on the monster-size cups of coffee they consume. Not without reason is the word ‘coffee’ derived from the Arab ‘qahwa’ meaning ‘that which prevents sleep.’ Arabs have cooked coffee beans in boiling water since as far back as the 9th century and drank the stimulating extract as an alternative to the Muslims’ forbidden alcohol. (more…)

An ethnical comparison between NYC and Amsterdam

Post-industrial society and globalisation have always fascinated me, attracted me even. I am probably one of those rare European socialists who see globalisation as the way forward. The ontology of this appeal can probably be found partly in my ‘entartete’ childhood as a Dutchman in Limburg, the most southern province of the Netherlands that distinguishes itself from the rest of the country in that it is largely Catholic and wasn’t part of the original seven provinces of the Dutch Republic. Real Limburgians consider anyone ‘from above the rivers,’the Maas and the Rhine, with a certain animosity. The other part of the ontology can be explained by my 10 years of ‘Limbo’ in Amsterdam. Inhabitants of Amsterdam are very similar to native New Yorkers, they will look upon any one not from their city with a certain derision. In addition, Limburgians are considered half Belgians, which to Dutch people are what mid-Westerners are to non mid-Western Americans. Such plays of fate of a personal history can sometimes create the most random obsessions in a character. Ever since I moved to the US, I immediately noticed how simple it is to feel at ease in New York City if you are used to Amsterdam. The two cities have a remarkably similar atmosphere. As a child of my (post-modern) time of course I never had the feeling of being at home anywhere, but despite this, I feel very quickly at ease in cities where an absolute lack of homogenuity governs. It is therefore that I enjoy to get lost in Bruxelles, but not in Barcelona, that I love NYC but not Antwerp, I do like Marseille, but not the Isle-de-Paris, Amsterdam but not Maastricht.
It is for these and other reasons that a comparison between the old and the new Amsterdam (NYC) so quickly comes to mind. (more…)