If you don’t have a bike – you can’t try to be a Dutch

Hello! My name is Ana and as a part of my Erasmus exchange I went to Breda in the South of the Netherlands next to the border with Belgium.

When I needed to decide, where to go for my Erasmus exchange, my first option wasn’t the Netherlands. I really wanted to visit Belgium, but unfortunately, my school doesn’t have a contract with Belgium. So my dreams to go there were over. So I needed to find a new destination, where to spend my Erasmus exchange. My second option was the Netherlands. I fell in love with the University, the program they provide and all the activities you can do besides studying. But that wasn’t the only thing I fell in love with. I started my research about Dutch people, their culture, lifestyle, how they spend vacations, what they love to do in free time, politics, system… I send my application to the University, waiting for a few days and finally I got accepted.

NHTV is an international higher education institution with about 7,700 students from over 60 countries. It is situated in the south of the Netherlands, in the city of Breda, only 100 km from both Amsterdam and Brussels. Breda is a historical city with some180,000 inhabitants. Approx. 20,000 young people are studying in Breda. NHTV was founded in 1966 as an institute offering management programmes in tourism and leisure and in this field, it is the largest and leading education institution in the world. Today NHTV offers professional and academic bachelor’s and master’s programmes in the disciplines of Games & Media, Hotel, Facility, Logistics, Built Environment and Tourism & Leisure.

NHTV is not an easy faculty so one must be prepared to study, do homework and work in groups with people you have never met.



Picture: University NHTV

LOCAL CULTURE AND HABITS

The Netherlands provide their nation with equality. We can see a lot of different cultures, people mixed together creating a big nation. When you are walking around the city you can see diverse nationalities, people working in stores when they have 12 years, women wearing burkas at their work… Living in the Netherlands is so different than living in Slovenia – if we only compare a few things: in the Netherlands they open their shops and stores after 9 a.m., they work a long time, Dutch people insure themselves too much, they love sports (squash and each of them has a bike at home). I have never seen a more diverse country. Every day I was fascinated how they enjoy riding a bike even if it was raining on snowing: they just don’t care about weather conditions.


ACTIVITIES AND NIGHT LIFE

We all know the city Amsterdam which is famous with its night life and activities. Me and my friends decided to go for a night partying in Amsterdam. Imagine; walking around the city and every time you want to go somewhere you need to pay a big entrance or there were a lot of people waiting in line to come in. After searching the right place to party for an hour, we found it and I can say that was one of my best nights outside: the atmosphere was excellent, people were nice and crazy, the music was different and really good, the only problem were the prices of alcohol (which are really high comparing to Slovenia or other cheaper countries). If you love to go to festivals, than the Netherlands is the right place for you. I went on two biggest Festivals happening in Amsterdam in Eindhoven (Vilhalla and Awakenings). I have never been on such a big festival, where there was 25,000 people on 8 stages with music for everyone, and again the atmosphere, meeting new people, having fun, see all your favourite DJ’s…

There are some parties happening in Breda as well, but they are smaller than those festivals. In the city centre, there were 8 pubs, where parties were happening a few times per week (from Tuesday to Saturday) and it was crazy. Sometimes we didn’t like the bars where they had only Dutch music (which is okay, but listening to that kind of music for 6 hours, four times a week it’s just not possible. After turning 21 it was possible for me to go to the Bar, where music was nicer, drinks still too expensive for us, but it was much better than the pub, with just Dutch music.



TRANSPORT

Transport in the Netherlands is smooth and really expensive. Imagine paying 44€ both ways to go from Breda to Amsterdam? For us students that is too much, but we found a solution about that as well: some Dutch students created websites on Facebook, where you write how many tickets you need, than create a group for 10 tickets (10 tickets means 70€) and then each one pays you 7€ for one tickets both ways. That was the cheapest ways to travel around the Netherlands. They are really strict about the tickets and hour. If you don’t have it or you forgot to buy another thing as a part of a ticket, you will get a ticket for that and it’s not cheap.



RULES

There are some rules, which I think I won’t understand for the whole life, but it’s kind of funny and interesting how they think differently about the things than we do.

At first, when I arrived to the Netherlands I was shocked with the rules they have. I have never seen a street that is divided for cars and bikers. In Slovenia, bikers don’t have their own road for cycling, especially not like here. And we don’t obey rules as they do it here.

At first, when I arrived to the Netherlands, I was watching their houses and was surprise a little bit how all the houses are the same and so close to each other. Then I found out, that here in the Netherlands there is a special rule, where houses must be built equally. I was shocked! If you are driving through Slovenia, you can see red, blue, yellow houses in different shapes and styles which can be a little unstylish, but there is no rule in Slovenia, how your house should look like. I think that Dutch people don’t complain about how their houses will look like and having the same type of houses shows us, that they try to make equality for all people.

The use of the number 1312 is illegal. At first, I thought, maybe this is connected with their history, maybe something happened and that’s why they don’t want to talk about it or show it. But no, this numbers are short for letter ACAB, which means: all cops are bastards. Again I associate it with my culture and I know, that I had seen a lot of people wearing pullovers, T-shirts, leaving comments with those letters… but to make a rule, which is saying that these numbers and letters are forbidden and that cops have a right to arrest you I was really shocked. Well I’m not sure if I’m really shocked or surprised or maybe confused about it, it’s just that I see how the Dutch government takes care for each type of profession and to make such a rule, where the numbers 1312 and letters ACAB are illegal because it’s not human to call all cops bastards...


DISCOVERING THE NETHERLANDS

As a part of my course in NHTV, we had an opportunity to buy trips and to see the Netherlands. We went to see the Windmills, the capital Amsterdam, the second biggest city Rotterdam, see the magical tulips, went to see how Dutch people created their country, travel to see how they made their special cheese and their shoes from wood and tried to make one by ourselves as well. We had some problems with the weather (which is nothing new, because the Netherlands is famous about its weather: raining a lot, at winter time days start at 9.20 a.m. and night comes at 16.40, there isn’t a lot of sunshine through the day – sometimes the sun doesn’t come for a few days or a whole week… But the Dutch just don’t care about the weather, if it’s raining or snowing they will drive their bike in any condition. The thing I missed while staying there was the woods and some hills and mountains. Dutch people have their nature and woods but its 122% different than here in Slovenia. Everything is flat, no hills where you can go crazy downhill with your bike, or just go hiking…

Overall, my Dutch experience was one of the best, I wouldn’t change anything – maybe just stay there a few more days and bring all my new Erasmus friends here to Slovenia. I can’t wait for new experiences, meet more new people and I would recommend the Erasmus experience to everyone. Kdor ne gre, zamudi!

Ana Jeler