Gezellig

You've probably heard this word before. Maybe? Maybe not. I heard it MANY TIMES in my intro to Dutch course in January. It is both the classic example of an untranslatable word and the classic word used to "encompass Dutch culture." The Wikipedia article "Words hardest to translate" says "literally, it means cozy, quaint, or nice, but can also connote time spent with loved ones, seeing a friend after a long absence, or general togetherness.” It's also supposedly one of those you-know-it-when-you-see-it things.

So I guess I'll try to tell you What Gezellig Means to Me, or at least some of what it means. I'm no expert yet, but I'll give it a shot.

A few girls from my History class invited me to come over for "dinner" on Monday after class. I say "dinner" because saying I was there for a meal hardly tells the whole story.

Class got out mid-afternoon, and we made it to their house by maybe 4:00 (actually, 16:00. I'm still getting used to that way of telling time). We spent the first hour hour or so drinking tea, eating cookies, and talking about Dutch & American holidays. No TV on, no background noise, and the hottest cup of cinnamon tea in my hand that I've ever held. Mmmm.

At maybe 5:30, someone said, "What do you want for dinner?" We still had to go to the store to get what we wanted to eat. We walked to Albert Heijn (sadly it was raining) and spent time in the store with everyone else on the west side of Amsterdam. If I haven't already said it, the Dutch go to the grocery store more often than we do. In fact, just about every day. But they don't have the (convenient? monstrously huge?) Costcos and Meijers that the U.S. does.

We decided on tacos for dinner! My Dutch History friends were surprised to hear that in America, we eat tacos, pasta, potatoes and chicken...basically a mix of foods from everywhere, just like they do!

(I still haven't gotten over the fact that I'M the exchange student here. For all the moments that I ask about Dutch life, they ask me questions about mine.)

Before making the tacos when we got back, we made dessert. It was supposed to be a tart/pie/thing that would chill in the fridge for a few hours, but a few packages got mixed up and the instant mix didn't turn out too well. Powdered tart mix + melted butter for the crust = the weirdest smell I have ever smelled. Some sort of strange chemical reaction going on there. We tried.

Forgetting dessert, we made the tacos. Then, the four of us went and SAT AT THE TABLE to eat dinner (sadly, something we hardly ever do at my house in GR. We always sit on the couch). There were some atmospheric yet slightly hazardous candles decorating the table. After dinner was over, we drank --you guessed it-- more tea.

Then finally we watched a Dutch movie, Alles is Liefde (while drinking tea. Seriously, I thought Dutch people liked coffee???). Alles is Liefe = Everything is love, all is love, love is all, something close to that. Think Dutch romantic comedy. It was really cute! I'm currently on a quest to find it in a North American DVD format. No luck yet, so if any of you see it, let me know!

So, seven hours later, "dinner" was over. And I can say that the evening felt gezellig to me. It was cozy and nice, but more than that it was...slower. More relaxed. Somewhat simpler than the fast-paced American life I'm used to. I like the gezellig feeling. I think I (you, we, non-Dutch, whoever) have something to learn from the gezellig attitude towards life.

And yet...I don't think you have to go all the way across the Atlantic to find people who enjoy life, either. I think of gezellig and I think of two nights ago, yes, but I also think of drinking coffee at Starbucks after church on Sundays. I think of eating at a Thai restaurant with a friend I haven't seen since summer. It's not that Americans don't know how to have a cozy, relaxing, nice time. Maybe we just don't know what to call it, or don't do it often enough.

Sorry that you had to read through all that philosophical-ness! The stoopwafels are getting to my head. Either that or I've watched too much "bobsleighing" on EuroSport. Side note on the Olympics: I have not heard a word about Sven after his latest mishap. Maybe everyone is too embarrassed to talk about it? Or they are all thinking about their collapsed government? I will try to find out.