This text was written on Sunday afternoon, a few hours before the first exit polls of the results at the German elections that it has been around here now. The Netherlands has become a country that turned in, except for Hungary after the sadest -looking brother of the large European family, but we do look at the world around us with open suspicion. I grew up not far from the border, but we were never concerned with the Wahl. The politics there was, if possible, even more boring and more solid than with us. We are now very interested. Perhaps we better understand the accident at home by studying the behavior at the neighbors.
Of course it is not going to be better than expected, but officially I still touch in the dark. Very nice, because the first interpretation is, you now know everything, never the best.
Yesterday we cycled through the city of Amsterdam in wonderful ignorance. The terraces were full, there were two wanderers packed in sleeping bags for the Jumbo. People with Ukrainian flags met us on the cycle path. They came back from a three -year war commemoration where they were addressed by Jan Paternotte and Ruben Brekelmans. I don’t know what that does with trusting a happy ending, but they didn’t wave their flags less.
“Why do people do so angry with them?” Asked Lucie van Roosmalen (9).
“Because they cycle on the wrong side of the road,” I answered. You cannot defy the Dutchman than to break the rules.
That, or with a traffic jam or train delay or the inheritance tax.
In the meantime, the Germans are not as far away as we, in the political debates, have each other expressed, there is still a certain level. Politics is not yet completely next to us. Reassuring: whatever the result, the dreaded AfD does not come in the government. Alice Weidel is certainly none Bundeskanzlerinour Eastern neighbors are not yet saddled with ministers who do not know that the President of Ukraine has been democratically elected, who like to see children climb on a fatbike without a helmet, say that nitrogen does not exist or who see a revenue model for the Fatherland in relief supplies.
Anyway, that was yesterday. Today everything is different, I am hopeful that I am the first with a pathetic piece.
Marcel van Roosmalen writes a column on Monday and Thursday.