Dear Dutch Language:
As a foreigner to this lovely, cobbled, chilly, dark, and damp country, I was pleasantly surprised by the overwhelming kindheartedness of the people who speak you. In my first days, I remember an interesting and strange word of yours being thrown about on most every occasion: Alstublieft. I wondered what word could hold such importance as to be said in almost every line of conversation; I’m using conversation loosely here since speaking you was not actually an option for me. But as I heard more of this expression, the timing and axiomatic use of your word became a bit confusing. I had found out quickly that this word was translated as the English word for please, but the use of the word was in excess of the much more particular contexts of the English version. Let me expound:
At the kassa of any shop, I would say dank u (dankuwel or bedankt if I was feeling particularly cheerful) to the worker as I tucked away my items and left. To my dank u I would hear an almost automatic alstublieft rather than what any foreigner following a course in your language would expect to hear: graag gedaan. In fact, I would often hear the alstublieft at varying times, sometimes before, but mostly after my dank u. This was very confusing since to an English speaker the please before the thank you makes sense, but the please afterwards is puzzling. And to make matters worse, the alstublieft would regularly be followed by an equally automatic bedankt (alstublieftbedankt) as if the worker had forgotten to say please and then thought s/he’d kill two birds with one stone with a quick pleasethankyou. So, to recap: more often than not, my thank you preceded the worker’s please, which, for all purposes should have been you’re welcome, but was then followed by thank you, tacked on for good measure. Broken down to its smallest parts, my thank you was answered with thank you and a side of alstublieft. What kind of strange linguistic games were you playing here DL?
And then I walked into a bakery. Good lord: tart, taart, pie, vlaai, cake, biscuit, and cookie, I soon found that here and at the meat counter, I’d have bigger vis to fry, as it were, than please. I have since made my peace with alstublieft, and have moved on to serious skepticism about nog. At present, I’m very unhappy about this word’s existence. However, regardless of my struggles with various parts of your vocabulary, I do hope to understand you one day.
Sincerely,
Johanna Wagner, Visiting Lecturer UCM