The preconceived opinion.

One of my goals on 43Things is: Stop smoking; and I’m still doing that. I have been quit for 1 Month, 1 Week, 2 Days, 16 hours, 40 minutes and 11 seconds (39 days). I have saved € 50,01 by not smoking 714 cigarettes. I have saved 2 Days, 11 hours and 30 minutes of my life, but who is counting ;-).

The other day a French guy left a comment and in short it came down to this: ‘Doesn’t smoking a joint count as smoking’? I was totally gobsmacked for a moment and then it dawned on me, just because I’m Dutch this guy thinks I’m a pothead. How rude! You will never hear me say that every French tourist is a drugs tourist. Oops, now I’ve said it! Silly me ;-)

But this got me thinking, what other strange preconceived opinions are there about the Dutch.
I know that people think us Dutch:

still walk on wooden shoes or clogs

live in windmills

eat cheese all day

have a private XTC lab in the basement

smoke weed everyday

sell weed on every corner

have tulips everywhere

always go Dutch

can’t cook

are killing people out of mercy, just for kicks (euthanasia).

are rude, annoying because we are very outspoken

are way too liberal about gay marriages, abortions, sex and drugs

In my opinion these things are just what they are: preconceived opinions! To burst the bubble….we have normal shoes, live in houses, eat all sort of things, don’t have XTC labs in out basements, some of us smoke weed, sell weed in coffeeshops, some of us like tulips/others don’t, we can cook, euthanasia is only allowed after careful consideration and there are lots of rules that has to be followed, we are very outspoken and liberal. Wow, I guess some things are true :-)

Some facts about The Netherlands:
Country name:
conventional long form: Kingdom of the Netherlands
conventional short form: Netherlands
local long form: Koninkrijk der Nederlanden
local short form: Nederland
Location: Western Europe, bordering the North Sea, between Belgium and Germany
Capital: Amsterdam
Area - comparative: slightly less than twice the size of New Jersey
Climate: marine; cool summers and mild winters
Population: 16,407,491
Nationality: noun: Dutchman(men), Dutchwoman(women)
adjective: Dutch
Ethnic groups: Dutch 83%, other 17% (of which 9% are non-Western origin mainly Turks, Moroccans, Antilleans, Surinamese, and Indonesians)
Religions: Roman Catholic 31%, Dutch Reformed 13%, Calvinist 7%, Muslim 5.5%, other 2.5%, none 41%
Government type: constitutional monarchy
Executive branch: chief of state: Queen BEATRIX (since 30 April 1980); Heir Apparent WILLEM-ALEXANDER (born 27 April 1967), son of the monarch
head of government: Prime Minister Jan Peter BALKENENDE (since 22 July 2002) and Deputy Prime Ministers Gerrit ZALM (since 27 May 2003) and Laurens Jan BRINKHORST (since 31 March 2005)
cabinet: Council of Ministers appointed by the monarch
elections: none; the monarchy is hereditary; following Second Chamber elections, the leader of the majority party or leader of a majority coalition is usually appointed prime minister by the monarch; vice prime ministers appointed by the monarch
note: there is also a Council of State composed of the monarch, heir apparent, and councilors that provides consultations to the cabinet on legislative and administrative policy