Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Irrational Dislike


I've met two men and one woman over the past six months who've expressed a total and irrational dislike of a nation of peoples.

The first, an older Irishman working for a Dutch bank, hated the English absolutely. The second hated the French, their language, everything about them. The third disliked Americans as a group.

This past Friday I met a very nice man, he was really quite reasonable, who suddenly changed when it came to "the French." He turned his head in disgust, and looked away, as if he couldn't bear to hear it, when I told him, "I always love it in France. It's wonderful there! People are always nice. It's such a beautiful place!"

His wife laughed, shook her head, and warned me, "He hates France, the language, everything."

It seemed unreasonable to hate France. You're bound to encounter weird, shower stall-like toilets in France, but I think they're working on this one over there.

Otherwise, the French have always been fine, to absolutely lovely whenever we've been there. They're almost always courteous, quite often charming people. I think it would be fun to be capable of rattling off a few sentences in fluent French.

Once in a bakery in Aix-en-Provence, I tried ordering nut bread. The woman hesitated, looked at my son, and headed for the ice cream machine. Thankfully my husband wasn't too far away, although I'm sure my son would have liked an ice cream. Nut bread is a delicious luxury. They also sell bread with chunks of lard, which is probably tasty, if you're not vegetarian.

Somehow I was always able to charm the French, and vice-versa. A few times I was even congratulated on the streets while pregnant, or while walking around with my lovely little son. He was an infant or had big blond curly locks at the time, and had a natural ability to charm, at least the French, who seem capable of being charmed.

I have a better understanding of the Irishman's irrational dislike of the English, merely from my basic understanding of the Irish-English conflict.

I haven't spent nearly as much time in England as I have in France, but the English were always perfectly nice, too. I flew into Stansted, went to my hotel, wandered around London, met some nice people for drinks. People everywhere seemed just fine to me. We also went to Bath, Cambridge, Oxford, London another time. All nice places, all nice people. No complaints. There was this strange waitress in a bar when we missed the boat who warned us, "Children suck everything out of you." Otherwise, seamless journeys through England.

Of course, being a tourist, and living someplace are two entirely different experiences.

I ought to keep better tabs of the positive experiences I've had here, of course. It's true. It's too true. They're there. I do have a few quite nice, budding friendships with some wonderful Dutch people, none of whom are native to South Holland. But let's not get glib.

I also have to admit to riding on the train many times uneventfully.

This all harks back to posting everyday, and being subject to time constant, mood, and wavering judgement. If I had any Dutch readers out there, I'm sure they've evaporated.

I've have plenty of encounters with perfectly nice, polite Dutch people in grocery stores, health food stores, pharmacies, etc, etc, all of the time, for years. There are some stores, like the Bijenkorf and other department stores, that I find dismal, but generally, most people in most shops are friendly, congenial, open. I concede. There's a great bakery here I love going to. I was able to tame a nasty woman in another bakery by not going back there for about a year. The bicycle shops are another story. There's a shop that sells delicious chocolates, but the people working there are hopeless. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that they are forced to work overtime without any compensation. After hours they don't get paid, but they have to stay to clean up.

Over the weekend I had a friendly chat with an Australian woman who finds America, and New Yorkers in particular, the worst, most dreadful people of all. Not personally, but as a general rule. We had a nice, warm talk. No bad feelings at all.

It isn't these brief, often pleasant encounters with with people in shops that matter. In this regard, I'm sure being a tourist here is perfect.

The staff at the Boijmans van Beunigen is also always superb. They've gotten to know me by face, and will even permit me to take photos, just as they tell other people that it's not allowed. Becoming a regular has its privileges.

I shouldn't get too wrapped up in this everything is black and terrible routine. Of course. Of course. I have some friends and contacts here and there.

It's odd living on the same street for nine years, and not succeeding in becoming friendly with anyone. There are a few people who will say hello, but that's all. Most of them won't even do that. It seems quite prudish, and unneighborly of them.

I guess when you're faced with store personnel, it's their job to keep you as a customer. Also, I'm quite friendly. When people are nice, I'm nice, too. I'm often friendly, which puts people in a good mood, I think.

Relations with store personnel has nothing to do with substance.

I've encountered people for years at a time, for example, at the schools, and not even succeeded in getting a nod. It seems quite normal to me as an American to start out on the right foot. You create a pleasant, congenial atmosphere with people you see regularly by smiling, and saying, "hi!" I'm more than willing to do the same. But it seems to me that there are vast seas of Dutch people who wouldn't agree with such niceties, and have done away with them altogether. Niceties are an inefficient waste of time to them, it would appear. I've even met people at the school, talked to them briefly, but the next time I see them, they walk right past me, as if they don't know me from Job. Even if I say "hi," or begin looking in their direction, they still keep on walking, looking straight ahead. A few of them have scoffed, or looked at me as if I were a cretin from outer space. It's scary. They're scary.

But, as I've said, to give credit to the few genuine people I've met in the past nine years, they're out there. It can take a long time, a lot of patience, loneliness, pain, and suffering, before they actually cross your path.

Of course I've met enough people who are happy to be here above anyplace else, so it all depends on your experience, your take on it, the people you meet, etc., etc. Getting over "culture shock," can be a long process indeed. When I tell people about my experience they say that it isn't right I don't feel at home here, and that something serious has to be done to rectify my feelings.

That's all for now...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi, it is interesting to read about your experience in Holland and with Dutch people. It is really unexpected thing for me that you feel so much cultural difference over there. I am Russian and I was living in India with my husband for a long time and I really thought that it is so difficult to feel integrated and welcome mostly in Oriental societies. I do not know much about life in Holland, though I am interested to know more... I think it is anyway not so simple to live in any country in the world, which is not your own, requires lot of patience. Wish you good luck and having more sincere friends over there.

Mama Mojo said...

Belated thanks Chitralekha. :-) All best to you.... Thanks for your comment....