For more than twenty years, Peter Huiskes (54) and his wife Marjon have wanted to make the crossing from their Zeeland hometown of Biggekerke to Drenthe. Back to the province where Huiskes grew up, to his 80-year-old mother in Gieten and other family and friends who are close to his heart.
In the first years of their house hunting, the couple hardly found work, because jobs in their sector – healthcare – were scarce. Meanwhile, the tight housing market is hindering. “In Drenthe people quickly greet you with ‘moi’ or just ‘good evening’. I miss that,” Huiskes regrets.
Not that he has it bad in Biggekerke, the village west of Middelburg and right next to the well-known Zoutelande. “But Drenthe are a bit more ‘open’, and Zeeland a bit more rigid. I also felt homesick for the North. You keep in touch with the people there, but it still gets watered down. Everyone is going to lead their own life anyway After all, I’m 350 kilometers away.”
Huiskes, born in Zeeuw, chose after his youth in Zuidlaren and Veendam to venture out into the open air and moved to the West, eventually ending up in Zeeland. There he works in care, as a nursing IG. He works 28 hours a week at night, his wife 32 hours. Healthcare is one of their greatest passions. “Take care of other people, I wouldn’t want to miss it.”
Drenthe has always remained in Huiskes’ head. His mother, friends and family live there. “We consciously opted for a rented house in Zeeland, because it would then be easier for us to go to the North. But that did not work out. First because there was almost no work in the care sector. Now there is work to be found; you can really getting started. But at the moment there is no housing available, and it is too expensive. You do not qualify for social housing, and private rent is too expensive for us with our two dogs. So you want to, and we don’t make a lot of demands, but it’s not possible.”
In the meantime, Huiskes continues to hope that a spot will become available. “Time is running out a bit. In the past twenty years I was not able to spend enough time with my mother, traveling costs a lot of you. But the mentality, togetherness, nature, the family and the grandchildren who now live far away, that we all miss because we are not in the area, so you keep hoping, but whether it will happen, that is the question.”