French or Dutch — Why I chose to Learn French in Amsterdam

At the age of 34, I decided to learn French, from scratch. It did cross my mind if I would ever become decently fluent, starting a relatively difficult language, in my mid-30’s.

French culture intrigues me, and this wasn’t always the case. My interest in the French culture didn’t start until I started visiting Paris more often, now that I live in Amsterdam — a city only 3 hours away from Paris by train. Two years ago, I moved from New York City to Amsterdam, and have since visited Paris from time to time. Before that, I’ve only visited Paris once, in my early 20’s, and unlike most Americans and most women, I wasn’t enchanted with Paris. I thought the city was dirty, and the people unfriendly.

When I first moved, a Dutch boyfriend took me to Paris for 4 days and tasted a series of Michelin star restaurants (most Dutch boyfriends aren’t likely to do this. This lovely and poor soul suffered from a mild mental condition, we later learned). It was then, that I found Paris lovely and romantic, and since then have gone to Paris occasionally, for a few days or a week, mostly by myself.

Then Paris started to change on me. I liked being in Paris — I liked the liveliness, the subtlety in the French culture, the way French interacts with each other. And — French food taste so much better in your 30’s than in your 20’s.

Strolling through Paris on a Friday or Saturday night, I always feel an intense liveliness in the way people engage with each other, sitting outside of cute, romantic Parisian cafés. I wanted to be one of them. There is something about the vibe in these French conversations I cannot describe — the way they connect with each other, or rather, the way I perceive them interacting with each other, since I can’t understand a word of what they say.

I moved to Amsterdam 2 years ago, partly because I wanted to leave New York City, a place I couldn’t make home after 6 years, and partly because I’ve discovered Amsterdam — an easy and comfortable European city for expatriates to live in. Unlike most other European cities besides London, living in Amsterdam does not require you to speak a foreign language. Many expatriates have resided in Amsterdam for 10 years or more without learning Dutch. There are inhabitants from 176 nationalities, in this vibrant and international city.

Almost all Dutch people in Amsterdam speak brilliant English — so brilliant that I’d say it is the best English spoken outside of the UK and North America. I’ve rarely come across a Dutch person in Amsterdam who isn’t fluent in English (it is, however, different outside of Amsterdam, and other parts of the Netherlands), and with some basic Dutch from the 2 courses I took, and a few words that I’ve picked up along the way, I have gotten by very well.

My decision to learn a new language was inspired by this American girl at a Christmas dinner, who came to Amsterdam and just “picked up” the language. A few years after she moved here, she got so good at Dutch and became a translator. She now translates official government related work. I felt slightly embarrassed, having spoken English for 21 years, and still have not translated anything from Chinese (my mother tongue) to English.

It’s also unusual for Americans and Anglo-Saxons to just “pick up” Dutch like that, since everyone in Amsterdam speaks to you in fluent English , and Dutch is a difficult language to master. She is now on her third and fourth language — Spanish and French, which will soon be added to her language repertoire. Meeting her inspired me to learn another language, and made me introspect on my own language journey.

Having learned English well opened up my world and has completely changed me. I went to America for school at the age of 13. Though my home and family were always Taiwan, I was immersed in the American English every single day, 24/7, except for holidays, when I returned to Taiwan. If I had to pinpoint a time that I became fluent, I would say it was year 15 — thats right, 15 years after I started learning English.

At year 10, I was speaking English every day, and even got a college diploma in Communication in an American University. I could get by with no problem and spoke English all the time, everyday, but I still felt I expressed differently than real Americans. I felt a barrier connecting with Americans.

Around year 15, is when I consider myself fluent. When I mean fluent, I don’t mean just getting by and using the language. I mean the native fluency to actually understand people beneath the language spoken, to express deeper, complex thoughts, thought processes, and feelings in that language. To be fluent, requires the subtle meaning of words and expressions in different contexts.

It isn’t just the language that makes one fluent — it is the mentality.

To really know, communicate, and understand people on a deeper level in a different language, requires years of mastering that language. It requires understanding of the complex culture laying behind that language.

I realize I probably have a much higher standard of fluency than most people and most language proficiency tests. But by virtue of living in America, I have achieved this fluency, and I should be particular here — I achieved fluency in American English. I would have a hard time understanding a British person well, although they too, speak English. There will be no problem for me to understanding the literally meaning of their words, but I would always be unsure of what they really mean.

British English is full of implications, which differ from American ones. To understand the implications behind words, is part of learning a language. Living in a world with people different from you, you are forced to introspect and learn about yourself. One lesson I learned living in Amsterdam, is that I am more American than anything.

In Chinese, feelings and emotions aren’t often expressed explicitly. It wasn’t until 10 years into learning English, that I started labeling my emotions. At first, I was so doubtful if I used the wrong words to describe my feelings, since I never learned to label what I felt inside.

Certain ways of being in a language don’t always exist with another language, since a particular set of culture is tied into a language. You grow new parts of yourself by learning a new language. Like how the Chinese language is limited in expressing personal emotions explicitly, I grew a new pair of wings by learning to express what’s inside of me.

Living in Amsterdam, you would think that my natural inclination for a foreign language would be Dutch. Unfortunately, the Dutch language doesn’t fascinate me so much.

Dutch is a direct and practical language, “a language to solve problems,” an expat friend says. Dutch has much less subtlety and nuances, compare with other languages. In Dutch, what it says is exactly what it means. You can take what people say literally — there aren’t a lot of implications with what a Dutch person tells you. Often, I am struck by a remark a Dutch person made, thinking what on earth they must be implying.

Once, I called the bike shop, and something was off with the telephone, so the person on the other side of the phone could not hear me, while I could hear them. I called three times, but the same problem continued. At the end, he said, “You really should stop calling, because I can’t hear you. You should just come to the shop,” then hung up on me. I hung up wondering if he was mad at me for calling so many time, but he wasn’t. I went to the bike shop and he was nice. I later learned that the Dutch really aren’t implying anything more than exactly what they say and what they think — they are just straightforward and direct. They don’t mean to be rude, while it may seem so.

Another reason why I put off learning Dutch (until I take my civic integration exam, which requires Dutch competency at a very basic A2 level), is that there aren’t that many places to speak Dutch. Dutch is spoken by around 24 million people around the globe as a first language, and around 5 million as a second language. It’s the official language in the Netherlands and the Northern parts of Belgium. It is a national language, among other languages spoken, in Surinam, Aruba, Curacao, and Sint Maarten, Dutch as a

French, on the other hand, is the official language of 29 countries, across multiple continents. It is one of the largest spoken language in the European Union, and it’s estimated that there are 235 million fluent French speakers around the world, and 77 to 110 million people who speak it as a second language. Not that I will visit many of these countries or ever live in them, since most are in Africa, but France alone, wins this vote.

Most Dutchies in Amsterdam speak really good English, but most Parisians speak terrible English. Although things are changing with the younger generation in France, I think French would be more useful than Dutch. French is also the language of literature, romance, philosophy, and reasoning, which is a whole other world of oyster.

Though I don’t speak Dutch, two years of immersing in the Dutch culture is enough time to make some general observations. Dutch is an interesting and strange language — It’s a Germanic language between English and German, with more similarities to German.

Speaking Dutch is like speaking baby Germany — words in German are super long, grammar structures are very strict. Dutch words are much shorter, and Dutch people are sloppy with their grammar (The Dutch are much less strict with their rules than Germans and the Belgians). Sentence structures in German and Dutch are very similar. For example, the verb in a sentence, almost always goes to the end of the phrase. If you think about it, it is quite strange to speak this way, since the verb in a sentence is one of the most important word. Without hearing the verb in a phrase, you would be missing a big part of the context. So, listening to the entire sentence is essential in these two languages — you can’t just cut people off when they are speaking, because you won’t understand them until you hear the last word. The language structure, tells you that the completion of things, from start to finish, is a very important idea in the Germanic culture.

Both German and Dutch have very interesting and funny words we just don’t have in English, like gezzelig, a word you hear all the time in the Netherlands, meaning the feeling of warm, quaint coziness you have with friends and family, or Schadenfreude (German), which means the pleasure derived from other people’s pain or failures.

Sometimes, I think about these words that exist in one language but not the other, and how we must be missing out ways to express ourselves, without knowing all these languages.

It’s funny that the Dutch people, being next to France, interact in an entirely different manner than the French.

Last night, I picked up an order from a restaurant to take home. While waiting for my food in the restaurant, I couldn’t help noticing the people. There isn’t too much noise for a restaurant — people take turns to speak with one another, and they wait for each other to speak without too much interruptions. You don’t see the Dutch gesturing too much with their body language the way they do in France, or in the Latin culture — the way people speak or do anything in the Netherlands, is much more controlled, and less spontaneous. People sit further away from each other than they would in Paris. They have a much bigger bubble of personal space.

Generally speaking, the Dutch behave in a planned and structured manner. Meetings, appointments, and even a casual coffee between two friends, are often planned ahead of time — by weeks, or months. In Germanic cultures, planning and punctuality is essential, interruptions and spontaneity are not common. To be too spontaneous, offset the Dutch mindset a little; to cancel a meeting last minute, is something the Dutch and German culture frown upon.

It’s always interesting to watch different nationality of people interact with each other, and how they speak. Different nationalities vary in loudness. Spanish and Chinese people can be really loud, I’ve noticed. The Spaniards talk a lot and have a hard time keeping their mouth shut. The Chinese sound like they are fighting with each other, even though they are actually being polite to each other. The Dutch, are mediocre in their loudness, and aren’t excessive with expressions, or the amount of things they say. They typically keep things short and to the point. It’s not common for them to show much emotions, and they appear to be tough and confident (while I’ve been told they are soft at their core). They are also really, really tall — tallest in the world, with men averaging at 185 centimeters (6 feet), and women averaging at 170cm (5 feet 6 inches).

I don’t notice any of these things with the French. The French are not tall in European standards to begin with, and they are often darker in complexion. I’ve never noticed a group of French raising their voices in public places, but they gesture more with their body language, and intrude in each other’s space more often. Even in a crowded restaurants or cafes in Paris, the noise level is quite low. Over many conversation next to me in a café in Paris, I sense subtle feelings and thoughts exchanged, although I have no idea what they were saying. But, the sound of this language, or the associations of all the beautiful things that come with this language, make me really want to know.

Everyone knows that everything French has a sophistication to it. After visiting France a few times, I really came to experience how refined everything is, at least in Paris. Everything is beautiful, everything looks exquisite and tastes great. The overall feeing, aesthetic of anything you come across, is beautiful, sophisticated, and refined.

Everything Dutch is not nearly the same. Most things you see in Amsterdam or the Netherlands serve a purpose. Everything you see in the public spaces has its use. A Dutch person’s house, is mostly minimalistic, organized, and everything that occupy a space has a purpose — there isn’t much space for junk. Something like the Roman Colosseum, or a ruin, is something you are not likely to see in the Netherlands, because it would just be too impractical for the Dutch to occupy a space that large.

The Netherlands developed from a farming society. To battle with water, the Dutch had to cooperate with one another, and a sense of community developed in the Dutch society. Dutch people, generally speaking, are very practical and to the point. They dont fuss very much, and often want to resolve the issues at hand. Emotional intelligence isn’t fostered much in their education and the culture.

Although I appreciate the directness and the practicality of the Dutch, I noticed that the Dutch tend not to speak about their feelings, manage their emotions, let alone sorting out things with another person. (This realization, came with some horrifying dating stories with some really handsome, tall Dutch men). Of course, this does not speak for every Dutch person.

The French seem to be quick, witty, sarcastic, romantic, multi-faceted, and perhaps too much for their own good. Everything French, is feelings abundant, from people, architecture, to food.

In Paris, everything you eat is delicious — I mean, everything. Some things actually created taste bud explosion in my mouth, contrasting to how everything tastes in the Netherlands, which tend to be quite blend. A few Dutchies have said to me, that they think food does not have to be delicious or good, as long as they serve the purpose of fueling you to work… so, the Dutch, are still quite practical when it comes to food, and definitely not on par with the French.

I’ve always been a thinker, overanalyzing everything, and the French are known to be thinkers and philosophers. The Second Sex, the touchstone of feminism, was originally written in French — a book I’ve always wanted to read but have not gotten to. Of course, it would not be my aim to read this book in French just yet.

So, after sorting through all these reasons, and researching on French schools in Amsterdam, I’ve decided to take the beginner French course at L’ecole de Francais — the school of French — on the Keizergrancht (Caeser’s canal), just a few minutes bike ride away from my apartment.