The memorial on Amsterdam’s Veemkade with always fresh flowers and a few lights commemorates the terrible event on the night of October 14 to 15, 2023. The night in which 29-year-old Sam drowned in the IJ. After a night out with friends at the Skatecafé in Noord, Sam went missing. Family, friends and the police launched a large-scale search and distributed photos of him around the city.
Traumatic
“There were an awful lot of people in Amsterdam who searched,” says his younger sister Soesja van Grondelle. She found writing about these uncertain few days the most difficult part of the entire book. “Because it was traumatic. I felt so bad that he was alone and that he would suffer and I wasn’t with him to go through this together.”
A few days later, Sam’s body was found in the IJ. A year after his death, Soesja started a vlog on Instagram and TikTok about grieving, to which thousands of fellow sufferers responded. Now there is a book: Sam, I’ll take you with me, continue living after my brother’s death. “I am now 29 myself, I find that very complicated. Sometimes I tell myself that he will just get older, that is more pleasant for myself.
