The new book by Peter Buwalda is out, The Jak Nogthe long -awaited continuation of Otmars Sons. Bee Eva (NPO1) he came to tell about it. A relief: on the second day of the general political considerations, the Primetime talk show spent a substantial part of the broadcasting time on a 1-on-1 conversation with a praised writer. About his work, but also the overall value of art: “If you see how things are going in real life, you can use some good art,” said Buwalda. “There is talk about dezing, but I feel that the value of things will increase. There is something to get that you like to talk about.”
And I had intended not to write about talk shows – the same people, the same conversations every day, is also bored. But that makes it difficult in campaign time, with few innovatives on television: in addition to the eight talk shows, the offer consists mainly of even more chat programs, new seasons of old series, remakes from existing shows and quizzes, false conflict reality and some documentaries. Fortunately the latter were very good this Thursday evening.
Take The music medicine (NPO 2), a documentary by journalist Frénk van der Linden for Max. His mother died of the effects of Alzheimer’s. In her last years she hardly recognized him anymore, but was able to sing ‘Suzanne’ by Herman van Veen. That fact fascinated Van der Linden, just like opera singer Maartje de Lint was grabbed by the fact that elderly people with dementia, who are often lost their memory and speech, can effortlessly sing songs from the past. “If you then hear a song that emotion sticks to, it turns out that it is very well anchored in your memory. Then you get physically and spiritually, you are moving again. Then you will be back,” said De Lint, artistic leader of singing in healthcare.
Ingenious how Van der Linden personal stories about the gravity of dementia (and of life with someone who has dementia), scientific research and singing themselves. Theo has frontotemporal dementia and prefers to play solitaire all day at his computer. On Spotify he only listens to Eel Pop, the music from his youth in Volendam. Tears run down his cheeks all day. He participates in National Research in the Amsterdam UMC, into the effects of music on the demented brain, MRI scans and all. The other story is that of Shirley, care singer in training, and her demented, gentle father Eli, of Moluccan descent: “The land of the nostalgia”. Together they sing and dance in the care home De Dementia for a moment out of sight.
One-per-porch
The episode of Other times (NPO2) This Thursday evening was heartbreaking in a different way. After the proclamation of Suriname’s independence in 1975, 300,000 Surinamese came to the Netherlands. Once in Amsterdam, there was little place for these Surinamese, with a Dutch passport. No Surinamese were allowed to live in eight neighborhoods, because they were not considered ‘resident’, according to Duco Stadig, then secretary of the dome of housing associations. There was therefore a one-per-porch policy in portico houses: a maximum of one ‘ethnic’ family per portico. For example, many Surinamese people ended up in rotten guest houses, while there were entire buildings empty elsewhere in the city. Rather vacancy than abroad, it was sentiment.
In 1977 the existence of this secret policy ended up in the press. After there was a big fuss about it, the city council decided to stop. Unfortunately, the overall tone was already put in the media. They beat the tension, says Ernestine Comvalius, who was committed to the people in the Verrotte Pensions, “by talking as if there was a flood of knife tractors and that kind of strange scum. The moment you actually treat that other group as usual, they were officially Dutch, then you participate in tensions.” Hostility towards people who look different, it seems like a red line in the tense, recent history of our country.