Moving out of Amsterdam and the Netherlands
We were very happy with our house in the outskirts of Amsterdam, but it also had a negative side. Airplanes for Schiphol airport passed close to our house. We knew this of course when we bought the house however we could not predict the increase in the number of flights through the years. Around 1995 every 2 minutes a plane passed by with so much noise that one could not understand what people were saying by telephone. Besides that, possibly due to the pollution of the airplanes, Irmtraud had much more problems of allergy than before. Another change that had occurred was that the parents of the family who lived next door moved away, leaving in the house two sons of around 25 years old. They regularly made parties which disturbed us a lot. Given this new situation we decided to look for another place to live without so much noise and if possibly much cheaper so that we would have money to go regularly to the Canary Islands where Irmtraud never had health problems.
We found such a place outside Amsterdam, in Amstelveen. We bought a flat at the 9th floor with a nice view and no problem of airplanes.
The flat was not as elegant as our prior house but pleasant to live in. Irmtraud decorated the flat in a nice way and we had a beautiful view at a garden downstairs with a lot of wild flowers. |
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We entered in a community
The flat was built in 1964 and many people lived there from the beginning, more than 20 years.This means that many of them were above 60 years old. All had bought their flat and there was a commission that organized the financial affairs of the community of owners. So we started in a community where the people knew each other for many years. This was very different from where we lived before. Going up and down in the elevator we got to know quickly most of the people of the community. Let me mention some of the most memorable people that were living there.
On the lowest two floors two Indonesian families lived. They were often sitting on a couch in the entrance hall to talk with each other. They called this the Indonesian couch. When they heart that my mother was born in Indonesia they immediately allowed us to sit with them on the couch. They were very nice.
One floor higher lived an older couple that complained about everything all the time and therefore they were not very popular in the community, to say the least. The same was true for a family which was seen as lower class because the man was selling goods on the market.
In the top floor a former violist of the “Concertgebouw orchestra” was living with his wife. The man was a very colorful person with lots of stories but not very gifted as chairman of the management commission of the community.
On the floor we lived there were an aged homosexual couple, an older woman alone and an architect who had been chairman of the commission before and had received so many complaints at that time that he did not want to be involved anymore in any community activities.
One of the sources of the problems was a former bookkeeper who complained always about the way the commission managed the financial affairs of the community.
I have to mention one other special person. This was a women, 90 years old, from Surinam who came to the Netherlands after her son was murdered with 15 other people by the militaries in that country.
Of course I can´t mention all people who lived there but you see it was a very colorful community with its positive and negative aspects. All was very new for us.
The flat was built in 1964 and many people lived there from the beginning, more than 20 years.This means that many of them were above 60 years old. All had bought their flat and there was a commission that organized the financial affairs of the community of owners. So we started in a community where the people knew each other for many years. This was very different from where we lived before. Going up and down in the elevator we got to know quickly most of the people of the community. Let me mention some of the most memorable people that were living there.
On the lowest two floors two Indonesian families lived. They were often sitting on a couch in the entrance hall to talk with each other. They called this the Indonesian couch. When they heart that my mother was born in Indonesia they immediately allowed us to sit with them on the couch. They were very nice.
One floor higher lived an older couple that complained about everything all the time and therefore they were not very popular in the community, to say the least. The same was true for a family which was seen as lower class because the man was selling goods on the market.
In the top floor a former violist of the “Concertgebouw orchestra” was living with his wife. The man was a very colorful person with lots of stories but not very gifted as chairman of the management commission of the community.
On the floor we lived there were an aged homosexual couple, an older woman alone and an architect who had been chairman of the commission before and had received so many complaints at that time that he did not want to be involved anymore in any community activities.
One of the sources of the problems was a former bookkeeper who complained always about the way the commission managed the financial affairs of the community.
I have to mention one other special person. This was a women, 90 years old, from Surinam who came to the Netherlands after her son was murdered with 15 other people by the militaries in that country.
Of course I can´t mention all people who lived there but you see it was a very colorful community with its positive and negative aspects. All was very new for us.
The flower garden around the flats
My role in the community
Soon after we moved to the new flat there was a meeting of the community chaired by the violist, the chairman of the commission. The meeting started at 20pm and at 24pm the meeting was still not finished. The chairman told all kinds of stories but was heavily criticized by the bookkeeper for his financial approach which was formulated by the financial agency who managed the finances for the community. Most people did not understand the complaints of the bookkeeper and did not like his disturbing actions. I saw what happened and thought that this would go wrong and that happened indeed.
In the next meeting the chairman resigned, like many before him, and nobody wanted to take over his task. Given this situation I thought that I could help them because I was new, I had so far no problems with nobody and it would not cost me too much time with proper assistance.
My suggestion was of course very positively received and I chose as my assistant in the commission the bookkeeper whom the people did not like because of his complaints, but I had seen that his complaints were justified. For him it was a form of recognition. We worked very well together. He was very qualified for the job although he was already more than 70 years old. First of all, he controlled the finances of the community and detected an unjustified cost declaration for renovation of the heating system. This declaration was accepted by the financial agency. We claimed that 36.000 euros had to be paid back into the account of the community. Because our claim was justified we got that money. Later we also prevented another extra costs of 60.000 euros for work that was planned but did not had to be done. Both successes were mainly realized by the work of my colleague in the commission.
My contribution was that we could report about these successes in the next meeting of the community. I managed to reduce the meeting to one and an half hour, so that we had time for a free drink at the cost of the commission. The atmosphere in the house became immediately much better.
During the five years that we have lived in the flat there were no problems anymore. The finances were well organized and we built up a reserve for the necessary maintenance. As I have illustrated the main change was that the person who complained about the finances was now responsible for them as a member of the commission and thanks to that change all went well. All this did not cost me much time, so I could also realize our other dream.
Soon after we moved to the new flat there was a meeting of the community chaired by the violist, the chairman of the commission. The meeting started at 20pm and at 24pm the meeting was still not finished. The chairman told all kinds of stories but was heavily criticized by the bookkeeper for his financial approach which was formulated by the financial agency who managed the finances for the community. Most people did not understand the complaints of the bookkeeper and did not like his disturbing actions. I saw what happened and thought that this would go wrong and that happened indeed.
In the next meeting the chairman resigned, like many before him, and nobody wanted to take over his task. Given this situation I thought that I could help them because I was new, I had so far no problems with nobody and it would not cost me too much time with proper assistance.
My suggestion was of course very positively received and I chose as my assistant in the commission the bookkeeper whom the people did not like because of his complaints, but I had seen that his complaints were justified. For him it was a form of recognition. We worked very well together. He was very qualified for the job although he was already more than 70 years old. First of all, he controlled the finances of the community and detected an unjustified cost declaration for renovation of the heating system. This declaration was accepted by the financial agency. We claimed that 36.000 euros had to be paid back into the account of the community. Because our claim was justified we got that money. Later we also prevented another extra costs of 60.000 euros for work that was planned but did not had to be done. Both successes were mainly realized by the work of my colleague in the commission.
My contribution was that we could report about these successes in the next meeting of the community. I managed to reduce the meeting to one and an half hour, so that we had time for a free drink at the cost of the commission. The atmosphere in the house became immediately much better.
During the five years that we have lived in the flat there were no problems anymore. The finances were well organized and we built up a reserve for the necessary maintenance. As I have illustrated the main change was that the person who complained about the finances was now responsible for them as a member of the commission and thanks to that change all went well. All this did not cost me much time, so I could also realize our other dream.
Realizing a life outside the Netherlands
As I mentioned before we were looking for a possibility to go to a Canarian island in the periods that Irmtraud had problems with allergy and other times when Willem did not have to teach. Now that we lived in a cheaper house, we had money left to buy a simple flat at Tenerife for this purpose. Attached is the video that I made of this apartment. It was very elementary with one living room and a small kitchen below and upstairs a sleeping room and a bathroom. Thanks to the nice decoration of the flat by Irmtraud and the fact that I added pleasant music to the video, it looks like a very special place.
The only costs we made, except for buying the apartment, was for a small cupboard where we could store our personal belongings and that could be used as a desk as well for writing. Most of the time this flat was rent to other people. Therefore we had no further expenses and even earned money for our own holidays there. We enjoyed very much our visits to Tenerife and were thinking of moving there later when we would stop with working. But life always comes with surprises.
As I mentioned before we were looking for a possibility to go to a Canarian island in the periods that Irmtraud had problems with allergy and other times when Willem did not have to teach. Now that we lived in a cheaper house, we had money left to buy a simple flat at Tenerife for this purpose. Attached is the video that I made of this apartment. It was very elementary with one living room and a small kitchen below and upstairs a sleeping room and a bathroom. Thanks to the nice decoration of the flat by Irmtraud and the fact that I added pleasant music to the video, it looks like a very special place.
The only costs we made, except for buying the apartment, was for a small cupboard where we could store our personal belongings and that could be used as a desk as well for writing. Most of the time this flat was rent to other people. Therefore we had no further expenses and even earned money for our own holidays there. We enjoyed very much our visits to Tenerife and were thinking of moving there later when we would stop with working. But life always comes with surprises.
The only costs we made, except for buying the apartment, was for a small cupboard where we could store our personal belongings and that could be used as a desk as well for writing. Most of the time this flat was rent to other people. Therefore we had no further expenses and even earned money for our own holidays there. We enjoyed very much our visits to Tenerife and were thinking of moving there later when we would stop with working. But life always comes with surprises.