February 19, 2012
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Amsterdam, Netherlands
OK, a bit about 2011 still. One of the traditional news items, at some point in December of each year, is the election of the ‘Dutch word of the year’. Typically that’s a new word that was in the news a lot in the past year. Much to the hilarity of quite a lot of my foreign colleagues, the Dutch word of the year from a couple of years ago was ‘swaffelen’, which is a verb. Sometimes also spelled as ‘zwaffelen’, it is something that you better google yourself, but please don’t do so at work because some of the videos you might find are definitely NSFW.
In December last year it was announced that the Dutch word of 2011 was ‘wildbreien’, which can be translated into wild knitting. I know, my reaction was ‘huh?’ as well. I had actually never heard of the word until the announcement in the news. It was explained as well. It’s when people knit something and then attach it to items in the streets. Really? Then it dawned on me… right there, where I always park my bike on Oudezijds Voorburgwal… there is definitely something knitted to the railing next to the canal. And hey… isn’t the bridge over Spiegelgracht, at Prinsengracht a bit colourful? I walked past the bridge today on the way to the swimming pool and had a closer look at its railings. Yes. Wildbreien in practice! Someone has actually been knitting sleeves for the bridge’s railings. I guess people really do have too much time on their hands…
