Read Online 1995 - The UnDutchables by Colin White, Laurie Boucke - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Colin White, Laurie Boucke
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to expect when dealing with calls to or from a business, public office, etc…If you try to obtain a piece of information, you get passed from one number to another. After four or five frustrating calls, each time repeating your name and request, you are fortunate if you reach the correct office.
To add to the inbred paranoia, the national telephone service (PTT) intends to implement a more efficient system of informing subscribers about the possibility of ‘eavesdropping.’ Telephone directories, price lists, etc., would advise the general public that their calls can be ‘bugged.’ Car phone services, which are particularly prone to frequent, undetectable ‘bugging,’ may be modified to include a prerecorded warning at the start of every incoming call. George Orwell would love it.
If you do not know the toadstool ( toestel or extension number) or department ( afdeling ), it will be necessary to explain in great detail to the switchboard operator why you are calling, and why you are calling THEM. Just as you reach the interesting part of your lengthy explanation, the operator, not knowing what on earth you are talking about, will either:
cut you off, or
connect you to a toadstool, seemingly selected at random. When someone answers, you must begin your explanation all over again…and again…and again…
When you ring the police, expect to have a long wait until someone replies. Offer the burglar or murderer in your home a cup of coffee to stall him while you wait for the police to answer your call.
In order to lessen the trauma of the general population over their phobia, plush public telephone booths are placed at convenient locations throughout the country. These structures are not so much provided for the purpose of making telephone calls, but for the therapeutic exercise of ‘hypervandalism.’ By daylight, the telephone directory (if it has not been stolen or otherwise removed) can be destroyed and replaced with graffiti—written and sprayed from floor to roof, inside and out. When darkness descends and the general public has had time to read the graffiti, all windows and other breakable components (including the apparatus itself) can be destroyed. On weekends, the booth can be set on fire.
Chapter 11
THE NATIONAL PASSION
The (Dutch) urge to be original often leads to utter nonsense …
—Han Lammers, Queen’s Commissioner for Flevoland Province
The Dutch love to devote time to a ‘good cause.’ They express their devotion in the form of demonstrations, riots, debate, discussions and the inevitable collections. The common denominator is PROTEST.
When these gentle pacifists are inconvenienced or their egos ruffled, they instinctively resort to aggression and/or violence of tongue and word. (They rarely resort to acts of physical violence as such behaviour is abhorred by the population as a whole.) They get their way—more so than any other nation. But it’s never enough for them. They always find more to COMPLAIN and PROTEST about. This perpetual cycle of confrontation and inherent change has been instrumental in reducing excesses of the wealthy and powerful. Consequently, class distinction is minimal. The philosophy would appear to be:
We hate anybody telling us what to do.
Speak out! (At times the Government and law enforcement agencies are paralysed by the thought: ‘People would not stand for it.’)
Defy defiance.
Defiance is found even in the isolated areas where rigid rules and strict moral discipline reign. In 1971 in the ultra-conservative village of Staphorst, where polio vaccination was always strongly advised against by the local church authorities, most parents had their children inoculated during a polio epidemic.
A favourite method of self-expression is the use of ‘profound’ slogans and/or maxims. These are often presented in the form of pathetically unsubtle jingles, such as ‘ GEEN WONING, GEEN KRONING ’ (no housing, no coronation) on the occasion of the crowning of Queen
To add to the inbred paranoia, the national telephone service (PTT) intends to implement a more efficient system of informing subscribers about the possibility of ‘eavesdropping.’ Telephone directories, price lists, etc., would advise the general public that their calls can be ‘bugged.’ Car phone services, which are particularly prone to frequent, undetectable ‘bugging,’ may be modified to include a prerecorded warning at the start of every incoming call. George Orwell would love it.
If you do not know the toadstool ( toestel or extension number) or department ( afdeling ), it will be necessary to explain in great detail to the switchboard operator why you are calling, and why you are calling THEM. Just as you reach the interesting part of your lengthy explanation, the operator, not knowing what on earth you are talking about, will either:
cut you off, or
connect you to a toadstool, seemingly selected at random. When someone answers, you must begin your explanation all over again…and again…and again…
When you ring the police, expect to have a long wait until someone replies. Offer the burglar or murderer in your home a cup of coffee to stall him while you wait for the police to answer your call.
In order to lessen the trauma of the general population over their phobia, plush public telephone booths are placed at convenient locations throughout the country. These structures are not so much provided for the purpose of making telephone calls, but for the therapeutic exercise of ‘hypervandalism.’ By daylight, the telephone directory (if it has not been stolen or otherwise removed) can be destroyed and replaced with graffiti—written and sprayed from floor to roof, inside and out. When darkness descends and the general public has had time to read the graffiti, all windows and other breakable components (including the apparatus itself) can be destroyed. On weekends, the booth can be set on fire.
Chapter 11
THE NATIONAL PASSION
The (Dutch) urge to be original often leads to utter nonsense …
—Han Lammers, Queen’s Commissioner for Flevoland Province
The Dutch love to devote time to a ‘good cause.’ They express their devotion in the form of demonstrations, riots, debate, discussions and the inevitable collections. The common denominator is PROTEST.
When these gentle pacifists are inconvenienced or their egos ruffled, they instinctively resort to aggression and/or violence of tongue and word. (They rarely resort to acts of physical violence as such behaviour is abhorred by the population as a whole.) They get their way—more so than any other nation. But it’s never enough for them. They always find more to COMPLAIN and PROTEST about. This perpetual cycle of confrontation and inherent change has been instrumental in reducing excesses of the wealthy and powerful. Consequently, class distinction is minimal. The philosophy would appear to be:
We hate anybody telling us what to do.
Speak out! (At times the Government and law enforcement agencies are paralysed by the thought: ‘People would not stand for it.’)
Defy defiance.
Defiance is found even in the isolated areas where rigid rules and strict moral discipline reign. In 1971 in the ultra-conservative village of Staphorst, where polio vaccination was always strongly advised against by the local church authorities, most parents had their children inoculated during a polio epidemic.
A favourite method of self-expression is the use of ‘profound’ slogans and/or maxims. These are often presented in the form of pathetically unsubtle jingles, such as ‘ GEEN WONING, GEEN KRONING ’ (no housing, no coronation) on the occasion of the crowning of Queen
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