In two weeks, I will be moving to Eindhoven. At that point I will have lived in Maastricht for about six years, and will have wanted to leave Maastricht for about five and a half years. I write this not as a hit piece on Maastricht itself, but more as a reflection on what it is about me that hasn’t fit with the city.
For context, I moved here in July of 2020 from Oxford with my partner who is Dutch, more specifically Limburgs, and the reason I am here (if you know her, you’ll understand that’s a pretty good reason). Oxford is a very multicultural city with close ties to London, meaning you have access to a global variety of food, music and entertainment while being surrounded by an overwhelming number of pubs – basically perfection.
Comparatively, while Maastricht is certainly not a totally isolated hub, I have found it hard living here. The travel connections to the UK are not easy, the presence of the dialect complicates learning Dutch and once a year the city is taken over by the most aggressively awful music ever conceived, in the form of carnaval. I know that last reason will upset some people, but my hatred of carnaval is a hill I will happily die on, especially because death would guarantee that I never have to hear carnavals’ “music” again – unless, of course, hell is real.
Ultimately, I feel less myself living here. I am a very talkative person (a fact that anyone who has encountered me for more than five minutes can vouch for), which means that at times, not being able to express my ideas and feelings in a second language has shaken my sense of self. Similarly, the more you become defined by your nationality, the less you become defined by the deeper aspects of your character, while in areas of greater diversity your nationality is less relevant.
These compatibility issues have left me with the question am I not happy living in Maastricht, or am I not happy living in the Netherlands? So, like a good scientist I have decided to test this question by moving to Eindhoven to see how many of my issues are Limburg exclusives.
Perhaps Eindhoven will be a city I want to stay in, but at the very least, I’ll finally be free from carnaval… oh shit, wait a minute?!
Tom Smejka, until recently lecturer at the faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience