Half a dozen years should not (sic!) amount to all that much in change. It really is not enough time for historically sloven and entrenched systems, such as our continental institutions and societies, to effect much in terms of "progress". Of course, there are always the gestures and grand motions, often loudly proclaimed on whatever media happens to be en vogue. Nevertheless, all in all I had reason to expect to find the old continent largely unadulterated. I was wrong, as usually.

The grand foil of the freshly minted year 2007 was, naturally, the continuing enlargement of the European Union: welcome Romani, welcome Bulgar. And the Euro is now a paramount force, provided we forget the natural, British resistance for a moment. In most other political arenas the bedlam of olden days continued unabated and with the customary ignorance of what may happen outside its arena. Even the unemployment figures astound as ever.

However, my somewhat idealistic expectations presumed that there would be one surviving constant: the social environ of our most liberal, our most advertised country: The Netherlands! I could have not been more wrong.

Perchance, when I come again into the "Platte Land" (as J. Brel sung it), I will encounter the friendly, outgoing folks I remember from a decade ago. The people who would rather invite you in, for a cup of coffee with biscuit and a chat, than see a stranger wander by unacknowledged. The Dutch I remember fondly, the same even-keeled folks I so strongly advertised wherever I went.

In Amsterdam, they no longer live. Here, where a bite of arrogance always simmered under the surface, as is wont for any capital city population (visit Paris or London or, worse, New York City, to see what I mean), a cold, obnoxious, and altogether discouraging air seems to be accompanying everyone you meet. Surly pedestrians stare you down, daring you to approach them to ask for directions, or such, just to then march past you without as much as a "Sorry, don't know.."! A certain perverse frost hangs over the city, fueled by what now appears as a public fear of anyone who might be a "buitenlander" - a foreigner. The Dutch are taking their cue from the Germans, of all people!

And that in a country where the census now reports that over thirty percent of the national population is foreign-born.

 

Go figure.