A citizen of somewhere

I am probably the kind of person Theresa May referred to when she talked about “the citizens of nowhere” in a speech. “If you believe you’re a citizen of the world, you’re a citizen of nowhere. You don’t understand what the very word ‘citizenship’ means”, she said.

After more than two decades in London, I find myself thinking about that here in The Hague. I’d like to think I did not leave London because I am tired of life. On the contrary, I left (for a while at least) because it’s been bugging me for some time.: Where would I like to spend the second half of my life?

And some of the chief considerations are to be in a place where you feel part of the social fabric of a place, to contribute outside just doing your job and feel that you belong. The irony is that, on some level, I felt like I belonged in London for a long time. And many Brits living outside of London, experience it as a strange and foreign presence. It is a city for citizens of nowhere.

So why the dissatisfaction? It’s best to explain that by way of a contrast with what I have experienced about the Dutch so far. The Dutch, contrary to my expectations of rudeness, have been super friendly and helpful. Perhaps I confused directness and reluctance to sugarcoat opinions with being rude.

But London is not unfriendly either. It is much more friendly than Paris. But here, the confusion of two concepts is again at play. London just cares less. London’s famous tolerance is to a considerable extent — indifference. That makes feeling you belong in London a bit cheap, and not altogether that significant.

When I was younger, I loved browsing my sister’s Cosmopolitan magazine. I found all the beautiful women and liberated talk about sex and pleasure intriguing. But one word of Cosmopolitan wisdom struck a chord. An article about friendship boldly proclaimed: “In the future, friends will be the new family”.

Now that I am older, I still think friends can be like family. But I am less inclined to think that they can easily replace it. Last night I saw Jan Karel, an old friend for the first time in years. Two thoughts struck me. One is that friendships are like language. They are much easier to forge into something deep and meaningful when you acquire them in your youth.

Jan’s description of the Netherlands helped me understand some of the irony and nuance of the Dutch I had observed but not articulated yet. The Netherlands didn’t really have a mask mandate during Covid. It had some of the lightest lockdowns, and yet there were big protests against the measures imposed because the indignant said it was an imposition on the cherished Dutch value of personal choice.

The Netherlands is famously the place where prostitution and drug use are tolerated, underlining the point. However, in many ways the Netherlands is also a far more controlling society than Britain. Here, as a new arrival, many things cannot be done, including getting a mobile number and a Dutch bank account, without a citizen’s identity number. The UK, like most anglophone countries, does not even have such a thing as an identity number.

Without a Dutch mobile, most Dutch online services cannot be registered for, including the Internet. And without a Dutch bank account you can’t pay at most shops, because the Dutch have their own payments network, IDEAL, and having a card that uses Mastercard and Visa does not work.

Here home-schooling is verboten, and you cannot teach your own kid to swim at the local pool. They must do a government-initiated swimming program and get accreditation before they can access pools. Like in the UK, you cannot simply take your kids out of school without permission. But here, the difference is huge in monitoring and enforcement. If you did and tried to fly to South Africa for a holiday, the immigration officials at the airport would ask you for proof that the school gave permission.

You are left with a pervasive sense that the Dutch state and society are keeping an eye on your affairs. A couple of days after we arrived, we received a “Buurt Kadoos”, a welcoming box with information about and discounts from businesses in the area. Who told them we were new to the area and where we lived?

A citizen’s ID registration required consultation between two officials. Emiel has Ruth’s surname as a second name. In the Netherlands, surnames are protected, and this is not allowed. An official provided the verdict. Since the UK allows this, they would have to make an exception for us.

One other notable thing is how clean the streets are here compared to London. And if you litter, you will get told off. To properly dispose of rubbish, it must be separated in four ways and deposited in the appropriate bins located in the neighbourhood. Between 7 am and 10 pm that is, and not if the bin is already full, and if you don’t follow those rules menacing messages on the bins inform you that you will be punished severely.

Jan says that the Dutch don’t like when you point out how controlling a society it seems to be to outsiders. It offends their sensibility of how they value personal autonomy.

Anglophones may never grasp something important about all of these things, even if they are a pain or a sign of a “nanny state”. They are also things that make you feel like you are part of a society - and one that cares. A bit like parents.

This is a society where every first of the month, alarms are sounded across the Netherlands for testing. Alarms that warn citizens that a dyke has been breached. In such a place, there must always be a sense that you are a part of something bigger.

We did not come here because we thought this was an end destination or expected to belong. It was more out of a sense of adventure and a feeling that it would be good to get off the British Isles for a while. Perhaps a good thing then, because Jan adds, the Dutch will never truly accept you as one of their own if you are not born here.