If only he were Sinterklaas. “Preferably all year round. Every day,” muses Viggo Waas. “Isn’t there anything more fun than making children happy?” I would like to make it my profession.” That does mean that you have to live like a saint, we tell him. “That may be asking too much.”
Feel free to call Viggo Waas a colleague of Sinterklaas. As an acclaimed Johan Cruijff impersonator, he has a bond with Spain. As a comedian of the group Niet Uit Het Raam (NUHR), he also has many similarities with the good saint: don’t they both hold a mirror up to their audience? And don’t they both offer their audience ‘a wonderful evening’? Well, with those arguments, he would like to think about suitable gifts for leading figures from The Hague in the role of Saint Viggo.
When we talk about Christmas Eve, memories immediately come to mind of the fifth of December parties with the Waas family in his younger years. “Our parents always showered my brother and me with love. On Christmas Eve you saw this reflected in the mountain of presents we received. My father and mother were both in education and knew how to stimulate children. So there was rarely a critical note in our Christmas poems. No, their catch-evening rhymes were always full of compliments and encouraging nudges.”
Sticking and fiddling
Yet there is also a small shadow hanging over his memories of sin: “I have always hated surprises. That sticking and fiddling! I’m just not good at all that tinkering. That’s why I usually made it easy by hiding my presents in a gingerbread. They took it for granted at home that it often became a mess when unpacking.”
As a language lover, he managed to write poems, but he did not do it wholeheartedly. “I thought it was just a lot of hassle for a few minutes of fun.” He talks about the package poetry he later wrote for his wife and children: “If you had done your best and put the most beautiful words on paper, it would have been rushed.” and read sloppily. Logical, because they wanted to unwrap their gift as quickly as possible.”
The best gift he received from the steamboat as a child was a race track. “I was about eight years old and had my doubts about the story about Sinterklaas. Could that be true, with mold on the roof? And all those parcels down the chimney? But I quickly threw that hesitation overboard when I saw the packages in the room at our house on December 5. I knew: that race track might be one of those on my wish list. At that moment I just wanted to believe. Precisely because that race track was at stake.”
Gift already arrived
It turned out well: he got the race track. “I put it together with my brother. We lay like two Maxjes Verstappen on the floor of my bedroom, where it was Zandvoort that evening. I repressed it, but I suspect my brother won that first race. He’s more technical than me. Fortunately, I can play football a little better than him.”
His wish list is short this year. “I already received my gift. My health is back.” In March 2021, he suffered a cerebral infarction after an evening of exercise. The recovery took months of rehabilitation and exercise, but it turned out fine: he is even back on stage with his friend Peter Heerschop.
Yet it has changed him, he says. “I have become more selective with my time. I don’t say yes to everything anymore. Previously, they only had to call to make sure I was coming. Here an evening of joking at a club of car dealers, there a Cruijff imitation for an entrepreneurial club. All nice. I didn’t want to miss anything. Now that I have faced the end, I realize that time is my greatest gift. I want to be economical with that.”
Who gets what from Viggo?
For an imaginary gift-giving evening, Viggo Waas, in his role as Sinterklaas, has brought a bag full of presents. Want to unpack together?
A helmet for Thierry Baudet
Sinterklaas has packed a helmet for Thierry Baudet. The leader of Forum for Democracy could use this after he was hit with an umbrella during a lecture and also with a beer bottle just before the elections. “I’m not a fan of Thierry, but of course it goes too far to attack him,” says Saint Viggo. “There is also a risk to that blow, because before you know it it will earn him sympathy from people who think he is pathetic. That’s why a helmet, to protect him.”
A water cannon to the A12
Sint Viggo sympathizes with the demonstrators who campaign for a greener society on the A12 near The Hague. “You’d have to be crazy not to see that the climate is going in the wrong direction. That’s why I support them.” So he arranges a big gift for the activists: “I order a water cannon for them, so that they can spray back when the police attack them with water. Then it’s a draw.”
Mirror to The Hague
Watch out, now a fragile gift comes out of the bag: a huge mirror. “It is for the party leaders in The Hague. It is an aid in the formation negotiations on the way to a new cabinet. Before you know it, they forget what they promised their voters. And that they should be there for the people who trusted them. I hope they continue to think about that and that they can continue to look themselves honestly in the mirror during those discussions.”
Money box for the king
Times are going to be tough for the king, it seems. Financially then. A majority in Parliament believes that Willem-Alexander should pay taxes. Saint Viggo has to smile about it. He is not afraid to help the head of state by giving him a piggy bank as a gift. “It is a symbolic gift, which represents a budget management course at Nibud. They have useful tips for all households that have to watch their money.”
Presentation Something beautiful is about to happen
In Something beautiful is going to happen Viggo Waas and Peter Heerschop try to bring together everything they are and have done together. NUHR dialogues, Waiting For Godot and their shared fascination with top sport are discussed. They deal with Viggo’s cerebral infarction together. What does that mean for them? They seek the secret of ‘The Holy Grail of Friendship’. And that in a program about life and its passing. Can be seen on December 8 in the Stadsschouwburg in Haarlem and from January 3 to 6 in De Kleine Komedie in Amsterdam.