We were somewhat misled about language in Amsterdam
It was our 25th anniversary trip – a week in Amsterdam and then a week in Paris. My wife had been to Amsterdam some years before on a business trip; I’d been to neither city.
We arrived early one May morning. It turned out to be Ascension Day, a public holiday in the Netherlands. We’d reserved seats for a shuttle bus, but as we neared the city center, everything looked like an early Sunday morning. Many shops were closed; little traffic was moving on the streets. Our shuttle driver dropped us off across the canal from the hotel; he decided the street wasn’t wide enough to accommodate his (very small) bus.
We had a lot of luggage. I mean, a lot of luggage. Even then, we didn’t really travel; we migrated.
The Hotel Pulitzer was rather famous; it occupied a whole series of canal-fronting houses on the Prinsengracht Canal. Our first trip to our room was easy – we followed the bellman with our luggage. Jet lag prevented us from paying too much attention to our route, except I was vaguely aware that we were walking through a labyrinth of hallways extending across several buildings.
I should have brought string or chalk or something to mark the way, but all we could think about was a nap.
The Prinsengracht Canal; photo via Unsplash.
Neither of us spoke Dutch, but my wife’s experience suggested that knowing the language wasn’t necessary. “Everybody in Amsterdam speaks English,” she said. Friends at work told me the same thing.
What I missed was the context. It was her business associates, and my friends at work, who said everyone spoke English. Everyone did – in the business community. We would quickly learn that, when you’re on a vacation trip, you don’t really come into contact with the business community.
The hotel concierge certainly spoke English, and he spoke it very well. He recommended a restaurant for dinner only a few blocks along the canal. It was called the Café Loreinen and specialized in French and Dutch food. He made reservations for us. Later, we walked through the cool evening, easily found the restaurant, and went in.
We might have been there 10 seconds when we learned that not everyone in Amsterdam speaks English. Certainly, no one in the café did, including the other diners. The menu was in Dutch. Somehow, we ordered, and the meal turned into something delightful, even if we weren’t quite sure what we were eating. But it worked out, and we enjoyed the food. The restaurant enjoyed our credit card.
We soon discovered that it wasn’t only the café where English wasn’t spoken. It was Dutch only at the Amsterdam Museum (but it had a guide printed in English). The Rijksmuseum, with its wonderful art collection, was only marginally better. We communicated in the café by pointing. We found ourselves doing a lot of pointing in the next several days. And taking the short train ride to the Keukenhof Gardens meant navigating the rail station and its chaos. Virtually no English anywhere in the station, so no one could explain why a band of armed Dutch army troops was running in what looked like a chase.
Amsterdam rail station
Late one night, we found a Greek restaurant in the Jordaan, not far from our hotel. The area, now very upscale and gentrified, was then still more of a working-class neighborhood. We walked in, and it was the proverbial movie scene. All conversation stopped, and everyone stared at us. (“Ick! Americans!”) Tourists, apparently, weren’t regular patrons. At least, I hoped that’s what it was. A friendly greeting (in Dutch) from the hostess seemed to dispel suspicions. No one spoke English, and we were soon scanning the Dutch-only menu. But the servers were friendly and gracious. At least, we think they were.
The day of our departure for Paris, the hotel arranged transportation to the rail station. No Dutch soldiers were spotted this time. We were taking the Thalys, the high-speed train to Paris, a three-and-a-half-hour trip with only a stop in Brussels. We did eventually find our car and reserved seats, struggling with our mass of luggage.
I was slightly worried about Paris. “No one speaks English in Paris,” we’d been told, “except Americans.” But I asked myself how bad could it be, after the language surprise of Amsterdam? (The nerve of those Dutch people, speaking Dutch!).
Paris was known, or stereotyped, for surly waiters and disdain for Americans. And our first day in the city, we ran into exactly that. But that’s another story.
Photo by Mark Gunn, Creative Commons, via Flickr. Post by Glynn Young.
See all Words to Travel By posts…
How to Read a Poem uses images like the mouse, the hive, the switch (from the Billy Collins poem)—to guide readers into new ways of understanding poems. Anthology included.
“I require all our incoming poetry students—in the MFA I direct—to buy and read this book.”
—Jeanetta Calhoun Mish
- “No One Speaks English in Paris.” Well, Not Exactly. - January 15, 2026
- Poets and Poems: Linda Nemec Foster and “Bone Country” - January 13, 2026
- Poets and Poems: Erin O’Luanaigh and “Avail” - January 8, 2026
L.L. Barkat says
Oh, goodness. This is a comedy sketch! 🙂 (I can just see the comic book version. 🙂
The migration aside totally made me laugh!
Katie Spivey Brewster says
What a fun read, Glynn. I suppose it is true that time and distance help us look back with humor at our own and other’s foibles;)