After weeks of struggling, it will finally be winter next week. With a few degrees of frost. How do we get through those harsh conditions? That is a question that Erik van Tilburg (56) and Gijs van de Moosdijk (43) laugh about. They exchanged Brabant for Sweden, where it can currently freeze up to forty degrees. “Do I have any tips? In any case, don’t drink alcohol.”
The Swedish adventure of Erik, born in Helmond, started about two years ago. “I have been a tour guide for many years, especially in Africa. Between the lockdowns during the corona period, I went to Sweden with the camper for the first time. My wife Annemarie and I liked it so much that we moved here with our two children .”
And he has just become an expert in the field of extreme cold. “In the Netherlands I already gave breathing sessions and went swimming regularly in the winter. Here I have combined that: I receive groups of Dutch people who come here to dip in a hole.”
The fact that it is now far, far below zero does not bother him much. “I never actually feel cold anymore. In fact, if I take a hot shower, I quickly find it much too hot. We also deal with it very differently here. For example, the children just play outside during the school break and they want to really don’t wear a hat.”
“As the Swedes say, there is no bad winter weather, only bad clothes.”
And yet he understands that cold-blooded people here look at the weather forecasts with mild fear. “I still come back to the Netherlands regularly. Then I get off the plane at Schiphol, straight into the wet cold. I often find that more annoying than here in Sweden. When it’s -18 here with the sun, it doesn’t feel like that.” a pain.”
But how can we make the best of it? “What I don’t recommend is drinking a lot of alcohol. People here in the north sometimes have a hand in that. What can help, by the way, is a ginger shot. And as the Swedes say: there is no bad winter weather, only bad clothes Although you shouldn’t spoil yourself too much with a warm outfit, because then you can wear less and less.”
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Gijs van de Moosdijk, born in Asten, has been used to the Scandinavian winters for much longer. During an internship abroad twenty years ago, he fell in love with the country and a woman there. And so he stuck. Yet the current temperatures are almost unique even for him. “When I arrived here, it also happened to be 38 degrees below zero. I can’t remember it being this cold since.”
“If you have a breakdown along the road for half an hour at -30, you will be quite frozen.”
Does that have any consequences for daily life there? “Certainly. We get up here around five o’clock to heat the car. Otherwise my wife can’t take it to work. By the way, I’m in the groundwork myself, but that has now come to a complete standstill. The ground is much too hard for those excavators.”
And another exciting expedition is planned for Friday. “Then we will pick up my son from the airport, 45 minutes away. He is returning from a visit to his grandparents in Asten. To be on the safe side, we will take extra warm coats with us and make sure our phones are fully charged. If “If you break down on the road and you stand there for half an hour in -30 degrees, you are quite frozen. It is actually life-threatening.”
