For years, passers-by in the Breestraat in Koog aan de Zaan invariably looked to the side. There ‘waving grandpa’ Roel Wildschut would be waving, in his doorway or behind the window. He passed away last week at the age of 89. He has made a lot of people happy: “It was a small gesture, but it had an impact on people.”
“People still haven’t forgotten him,” daughter Cora notes. “Sometimes they still wave, although he is no longer there. He was really an icon of Oud-Koog (neighborhood in Koog aan de Zaan, ed.).”
Zwaaiopa came to live on the Breestraat in 2003. Before that he lived on the Loodwitmolenpad, also in Koog aan de Zaan. Cora: “There is no through traffic there. There was really no one walking there. There was life here, with all the traffic, the cyclists and school-age children… he went and stood in the door, chatted and waved with everyone, that’s how it happened .”
Eye in the sail
She continues, looking back fondly: “If he hadn’t waved for a day, people would already be worried. Then we would be called: ‘Is there something wrong with Grandpa? Is he sick?’ He was always watched closely. They counted on him.”
“Occasionally he would spot someone with a flat tire. In his good days he would say: ‘Put it down, when you come back from school it will be fixed again!'”
goodbye
Zwaaiopa left the Breestraat in 2020 to go to the nursing home. That moment did not go unnoticed.
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“That was a great moment,” Cora says. “Hundreds of people on the sidewalk waving him off. I’ll never forget that.” A neighbor who has come walking agrees. “I also waved him goodbye. It’s a shame he’s not there anymore, because the fun is gone here.”