GO DUTCH! A DIFFERENT KIND OF STORY
Definition of go Dutch in
English:
go Dutch
PHRASE
informal
Share the cost of something, especially a
meal, equally.
Example sentence;
‘I'll pay for it, or we'll go
Dutch, if that offends your sensitivities.’
-Taken from
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/go_dutch-
Venue: Sherbourne Residence, University of Warwick
Occasion: Kitchen Cleaning Day
Time: A week or two before the Summer Term Break of 2014
I made a lot of student friends while cleaning the kitchen at their flats three
hours a day, three days a week. The block where I used to clean has five flats
and each flat has one kitchen. The kitchen is generously spacious enough to fit
all these highly equipped state-of-the-art cooking wares and devices like two
sets of flame-less cooker table top that allows four pots to be placed at one
time with cooking hob so massive that looks like it could suck you straight
into another dimension and a three-tiered oven that can fit one extra-large
Christmas turkey in one go. Each kitchen also has enough built-in cabinets and
drawers to keep all the cooking utensils which are shared by roughly twelve to
fourteen tenants living on each flat.
These students always turned up in my final hour just to
cook their lunch and this happens every time I go to the flat to clean. I
normally will kill my free time after my cleaning job is done or half way done
(since they are chopping up their vegetables and cooking up their meal and
nothing much I can do unless if I want to have my hands burned cleaning the
cooker tops) with having some casual conversation with them, well mostly about
cooking.
One of the students is an undergraduate from The
Hague, Netherlands, with a Dutch surname that has some unique letters with two
dots on top and looks but not pronounced like how I thought it was, most
probably telling me she’s a Dutch native as I couldn’t really notice any Dutch accent
from her every time she speaks English. This was before I know that most Dutch
today speaks fluent English due to the wide English exposition throughout the
mass media in The Netherlands for quite some time. English is also taught to Dutch kids as early as 10 years old.
After a while, I told her I’d offer the whole flat to cook my own
local cuisine for lunch before they’re leaving for the summer term holiday. I
insisted to cook my very own Malaysian Fried Rice using the most accurate
ingredients I could find from the nearest Chinese Groceries Shop in the city
centre, selling all sorts of Asian herbs, spices and condiments.
Later, before we proceed with the plan, she asked who’s
willing to pay for all the cooking expenses and I simply told her to ‘Go
Dutch!’ since she’s a Dutch herself. To my surprise, she replied ‘What’s that
supposed to mean?’. Then I told her ‘I thought Go Dutch! is a common
term where we pay separately for our own meal?’ which means that I’m willing to
pay for the groceries since I’m the one who comes out with the suggestion. I
got a frowned face from her in return. More like a cat with a pair of frowned eyebrows
with wrinkled forehead and whiskers pointing out in different directions
altogether most probably suffering from a cat food poisoning.
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This was the photo taken by one of the student's mother while they're packing up for the holiday in the final two weeks before the term ends. The rest of the flat mates were just busy and only could make it in another photo but of poor quality upload. I'm the one in the middle with the name tag. Try guessing which one is the Dutch student I mentioned in this story. -Photo is of my own personal collection. All copyrights reserved.
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I then realised she wasn’t kidding and was completely
lost in translation with what I thought was one simple tease. I told her just
to forget what has been told and hopefully could find some other time to cook for them before they left for the summer time
term break. Unfortunately, it never happened since everyone was busy with their own plans for the Great British Summer holiday. Well, I just kept my fingers crossed if I happen to clean their flat in the near future.
However, I did spend the final week with helping them with their luggage mostly shopping bags from their London shopping experience even more than the books themselves. I even got tipped a tenner from one of the parents that wanted me to help with her son's luggage. Well, a good tip is hard to find nowadays. More like a good quid though.
However, I did spend the final week with helping them with their luggage mostly shopping bags from their London shopping experience even more than the books themselves. I even got tipped a tenner from one of the parents that wanted me to help with her son's luggage. Well, a good tip is hard to find nowadays. More like a good quid though.
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If you see this lorry wandering around the campus that means the term break is just around the corner and it's going to be a dead campus the next week after.- Photo is of my own personal collection. All copyrights reserved.
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Okay, that’s too much of negative Dutch stereotypes but I think
explains well enough what was going on during our conversation in the kitchen.
Looks like no more Dutch related joke with a Dutch next time around. *'Bayar asing-asing' sounds even better to me.
*'Bayar asing-asing' is a Malay Language equivalent to 'Go Dutch'.
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