The shyness of Tom Egbers, which has never completely disappeared, shines every week as a floodlight on the conversations he has in his travel series, but before I could drink myself Toms Scotland I had to first Buitenhof Looking back† Joris Luyendijk was a guest there on Sunday to talk about The Seven Checkmarkshis book on privilege. Buitenhof had organized a special session in which not only interviewer Twan Huys would put Luyendijk to the test, but also Sylvana Simons and Neelie Kroes (both actually guests for something else) had joined.
It became a mess that in itself was instructive, but which did not make a person happy. Kroes, who said he had not read the book, attacked Luyendijk hard on an incorrect statement about her origin somewhere in the text, a robbery where the spectacular Buitenhofeditors hadn’t prepared him for it. He made excuses (later I read that he based himself partly on a piece in Fidelity) and Kroes lost himself in empty quips: “If I want to read a book, I’ll read a decent book.” You would almost think that the VVD member wanted to prevent the conversation from turning to privileges or inequality.
Simons wanted to discuss this and was not the first to emphasize that the insights that Luyendijk had gained in recent years had already been shared endlessly by others. The problem with all those privileged white men, she rightly said, was that they don’t accept things until they experience them themselves, not when people from other groups tell them. Meanwhile, Luyendijk had casually remarked that a privileged white man like Twan Huys was “less suitable” as an interviewer. Huys appeared to have stepped on his tick. He began to explain his own suitability, not realizing that he was confirming what he was trying to deny.
Ash-gray suburb
All the checks had disappeared behind the horizon when Tom Egbers a few hours later was talking to a woman in an ashen suburb of Dundee. The woman, who claims to be an ex-addict, had approached Egbers because she wanted to take over the bright blue old-timer in which he drives for the program. A moment later she pointed high in the direction of one of the flats: “See where that rug is hanging outside? I live there.” Her finger moved slightly to the side. “And from there I saw a woman jump down.” She turned to another flat: “And from there a man.”
Last week there were in the first episode of the lovingly directed by Finbarr Wilbrink Toms Scotland (NTR) many picturesque Scots, such as an old fisherman who, complaining about the EU, took the Dutchman in his boat and said: “It’s all sea, but it’s not all fish.” In part two there was only decay. In Glasgow – where the flats turned out to be even grayer than in Dundee – there are neighborhoods where the life expectancy of men does not exceed 56. People with a profession, money or both have been encouraged to leave the city decades ago.
Egbers had the most beautiful encounter in a soup kitchen in Dundee, where a young homeless person said he was 24 and he said: “You’re my son’s age.” That observation resonated throughout the subsequent conversation, which was conducted by Egbers with a fatherly gentleness. The boy turned out to be a lost math student who quickly panicked from people. “Has life been unfair to you?” asked Egbers. The boy was silent, stirring his food and saying that he used to always blame his parents.
A little hoarsely, Egbers began to encourage him: “You should be able to achieve something.” And then: “You will succeed, eventually.” You don’t have to count Tom Egbers’ check marks to see how he sympathizes with the people he meets.