Mirre, Kjeld, Nikki and thirteen other young people will play a performance about the Second World War tonight. Normally the Zaankanters invent the stories themselves, but today those of the survivors are being told. Kjeld about one of them: “You would expect her to be a victim, but she is very strong.”
The conversations made a big impression on the young people. “If you read the history books, it’s liberation and everyone is happy,” says 18-year-old Kjeld Reitmaier. He continues: “But that’s not the story. Certainly not in this case.” Kjeld refers to the life of Nanny Peereboom.
The now 82-year-old Nanny Peereboom was born during the war. According to Kjeld, she will be placed with a family in Zaandam. After the war she goes back to her mother. Kjeld: “From her perspective, she was taken away from the family that raised her. By a complete stranger, actually.”
‘Very strong’
The liberation ensures that Peereboom goes back to her mother. There is no more talk about the war. “It was a taboo subject,” Kjeld van Peereboom understands. The description of the event makes a big impression on the 18-year-old. “You would expect her to be a victim, but she is very strong. I noticed that.”
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Mirre van Hemert (16) is also silent about the stories. She herself speaks with a 102-year-old, who tells her about an interrogation. According to Mirre, it is about a woman in a dark room. “Someone was sitting directly opposite tapping with a pen. She had to say something she didn’t want, otherwise her mother would be taken there too.
This story is reenacted by the young people today. Mirre: “We chose the scenes that made an impression. We then try to imitate them as closely as possible.” According to Mirre, these are the stories that people don’t know very well. “I don’t think many young people know what happened,” says the Zaanse. In her own words, she herself thought ‘not much’ during the two minutes of silence. “But now you look differently. Now you know those stories.”
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17-year-old Nikki Riel also experiences the change. “So now if you speak one song of it personally, it gets much closer.” She found these conversations ‘quite intense, but also special’. “I’m glad we were allowed to do this now. It’s still possible now, not later.” She wants to tell the stories well. “You are the representative of their stories.”
Keep talking and remembering
Kjeld also thinks it’s important that everyone keeps talking about it, ‘because that’s how you keep the memory alive.’ Besides talking, commemoration is important to him, but then people have to ‘make the future better’. “I think you really do justice to the stories and to everything that happened during that time by being the change yourself.”
Theater After Dam
On the evening of the National Remembrance Day, theater makers and artists throughout the Netherlands will dedicate themselves at 9 p.m. to provide this day with extra meaning. Every year, more than a hundred performances are played simultaneously, each of which relates to the Second World War in its own way.
Youth performances are an essential part of Theater Na De Dam. Together with theater makers, young people immerse themselves in the history of their neighborhood during the Second World War and interview elderly people from the neighborhood about their memories. They use those conversations as the basis for their performance.
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