[svandamme]

16. At nearly every meal in Holland you will find a small vicious looking blade with a slit in it. It is called a "kaasschaaf" and is used for taking very thin (the see-through kind) slices of the cheese. Yes, it is indeed an invention made by a Nederlander. Never cut cheese with a knife, you'll make an utter fool of yourself. Another peculiar dinner tool is the "flessenlikker", which literally means "bottle-licker", but which is best translated by "yoghurt-scraper". Note that this tool is not meant to get rid of an itchy back or for your nightly escapades. It's designed to clean out bottles of yoghurt or vla" which is a sort of custard. The Nederlanders wants to use absolutely every millilitre of the yoghurt or 'vla' he bought. He paid for all of it and he'll jolly well eat all of it.

17. At the time of this writing, the Hollandse economy is doing quite well. The Hollanders say that this is the result of extensive negotiating between parties like the unions, the employers and the government. They even have a name for this: The polder model. Foreigners are made to believe that this polder model is the key to a healthy economy and if others should follow this polder model, their economy's will also improve dramatically. This is utter nonsense. Hollanders just love to talk and talk and talk. Calling all this talking negotiations only gives them a sense of doing something useful. Talk is not cheap in Holland.

18. Hollanders like to drown fried potato's in litres of mayonnaise and put it in small paper bags. This is called "een patatje met". One of these bags can sustain life over an indefinite period. Not everyone agrees if it is the sort of life worth living. Some foreigners however are reported to have actually liked eating it.

19. Hollanders have a special and unique service for -mainly- French tourists. As soon as they cross the border between Belgium and Holland, they are welcomed enthusiastically by young men in fast cars. These young people wish to point out to the French tourist where the more interesting touristy places in Holland can be found. Strangely enough they always seem to end up in a coffee shop (see item 20). Funny people those French.

20. There is a fast and guaranteed way of making a complete fool of yourself in Holland: Enter a coffee shop and ask for a cappuccino. Coffee shops do not -remember this- do not sell coffee. You can however get a good number of other stimulating drugs there. For some unknown reason coffee shops are extremely popular with French tourists.

21. A Fries is a semi-detached sort of Nederlander, living in the northof the country in a province all for himself. He is fond of frozen water, Beerenburg (which is a form of euthanasia with alcohol) and continuously pointing out to non-Fries Hollanders that they are -indeed- not Fries. The rest of the Hollanders look upon this behaviour with the good natured ambivalent feelings that parents have for an obstinate child.

22. On the matter of what books to buy before you come to Holland, I can recommend the following: The complete works of William Shakespeare or a leather-bound volume of the Encyclopaedia Britannica (the 1913 copy: Fr to He). In my experience these two books have just about the right weight for clubbing a pushy drug dealer or pimp on the head without leaving any marks. After hitting you might want to drop the book you were carrying at that moment for a more speedy retreat. Bring plenty of books.

23. Do not bother to hire a car. Not only can you steal more bikes than you will need but car-traffic in Holland is not something you will enjoy. In the rest of the world traffic jams are measured in miles or kilometres, Nederlandse traffic jams are measured in weeks. As a matter of fact, the more persistent traffic-jams are well worth a touristic visit. The sight of starving people in an expensive Mercedes can be quite uplifting if you are of a philosophic nature. You may want to bring some pieces of bread with you to throw through open car windows.The resulting fights can often be worth watching.

24. Contrary to popular belief, you may not bring your mother-in-law to Holland for do-it-yourself euthanasia. Tourists are warned not to take these matters into their own hands.

25. Whether you are catholic, Muslim or worshipper of Urrrgl, god of all honest politicians, in Holland you are likely to run into a church, temple or oak-tree-and-virgin of your liking. Hollanders are supposed to be very tolerant of other believes, ways of life and religious convictions. They are not. The only reason for there being so many different churches, sects and cults is the fact that Hollanders disagree on just about anything. A Hollander is always right (see item 6) and anyone who thinks different than him can jolly well bugger off and start his own church.

26. Holland is a kingdom. It has no king but a queen and her husband is no king but a prince. The queen doesn't rule the country well, not much anyway- but she is very good at opening bridges, roads and visiting other countries. She is also very decorative at state banquets. Her son, the crown prince, will be king as soon as she stops queening (nice word eh?). Now his wife won't be a queen but she will be a princess because Nederland is much too small for a king and a queen at the same time. On April the 30th it's Queen's Day, which is not the birthday of the queen, but the birthday of princess Juliana the queen's mother (who used to be the queen). It is no wonder that more and more Nederlanders wish to make Holland a republic. Queen's Day, by the way, has nothingto do with royal festivities. It's just a Hollander's excuse to drink large quantities of alcohol. On Queen's Day Hollanders also sell garbage in the streets.

27. It might be wise to learn how to swim if you visit Holland. No, the dikes will hold, that is not the problem. The huge amount of ditches, moats, canals, rivers and brooks can however lead to mistakes. The shiny nice new asphalt road that you wish to drive your car on during a rainstorm, may in fact not be a road at all.

28. The Hollandse art. Most Nederlandse painters get to be famous only after they have died. That is a very sensible arrangement from the publics point of view. Not only do you get large quantities of paintings -a man has got to eat, right?- but it also makes a nice investment for art-lovers. The painters themselves do not share this view at all but are unable to do anything about it. In at least one case the frustration has led to self-mutilation involving an ear.

29. If one of your Hollandse friends invites you for a birthday party, prepare yourself for a unique experience. Unique, because it can only be compared to taking place on a wooden chair which has a sharp nail driven through the underside of the seat, and not being able to move for a month. More than one foreigner has been driven to the brink of insanity in just one evening. A Hollandse birthday party consists of sitting in a chair, talking to other Hollanders about your work, your car, foreigners and politics. You are expected to leave at 11 pm and you'll gladly do so.

30. Do not get sick in Nederland. Over the last ten years, the famous Hollandse healthcare has been privatised. These days some operations, like open heart surgery, have a waiting list of more than six months. The doctors don't think that is a problem, "More than half of our patients for open heart surgery never even show up anyway" they say. Some Nederlandse patients who have become desperate, move to a country like Mozambique, Iraq or Pakistan where healthcare is infinitely better.

31. Nederlanders leave their curtains open in the evening. This used to be so that the neighbours could always check if your family didn't gamble or drink alcohol. These days it is a precaution against junkies trying to steal the stereo from the family car, parked in front of the house. It has the fortunate side effect that you can watch Hollanders in their natural surroundings, in front of the television, watching soaps.

32. Holland has more cities than only Amsterdam. Like ..erm. ..Well, it has!!

33. Hollandse beer has made quite a reputation for itself over the years. Some people even drink it. Brewing is indeed one of the things Hollanders traditionaly do very well. Holland never used to be a country with anything more interesting to do than to drink oneself blind in new and interesting ways or make paintings. This made the beer industry very popular. Experts claim that once you have drank Hollandse beer like Heineken, Grolsch or Amstel, all other beers taste like the tapwater in a Rotterdam hotel.

34. Hollandse tapwater is safe to drink. This is quite remarkable considering that most drinking water comes from poluted rivers like the Rhine. Plans to improve the quality of the riverwater, so that fish like salmon will return to Hollandse rivers to spawn, can count on strong resistance from the Nederlanders. They don't like the idea of animals having sex in their drinking water.