Sure, I am Always Talkin’ Food, but I teach NT2 (Dutch as a second language) on the side. Mainly to young foreigners who came to Amsterdam for or with love and intend to stay. For privacy reasons the names in these columns are fictitious.
Let’s talk plusquamperfectum, AKA pluperfect.
Most people have been using it intuitively; they just hadn’t been familiar with the term.
Until now.
The second part of the sentence above, is namely set in plusquamperfectum.
A past before the past.
Now you know.
Tonight I’m teaching my advanced students the difference in use of the Dutch imperfectum, perfectum and plusquamperfectum.
When a student nears level B2, grammar gets more complex. More elastic too.
Take plusquamperfectum. The past before the past.
If it had simply been the pre-past, it hadn’t been a problem. It’s the subtleties that make its use opaque. Elastic.
And exactly that is what makes the difference between speaking a language and living that language.
Looking at the past either as a continuum or as a fixed point in time, for instance. You can do that with language. It’s magnificent. But try to catch this in clear and unequivocal rules.
Mere wishful thinking.
And if that wasn’t fuzzy enough, enter the conjunct maar (but).
Adding maar to plusquamperfectum in Dutch is not even about the past before the past anymore, it’s wishful thinking about this pre-past gone by.
It’s about regret.
If only…
Like going back in time in a time travel machine to fix the irreparable, as did Marty McfLy in the film Back to the Future.
Just when I start believing it’s wishful thinking that this phenomenon will ever sink in with my students, Salma from Mexico, the one who wants to learn making jokes in Dutch, hits the nail on the head: ‘Had ik in 2010 maar bitcoin gekocht... En op tijd weer verkocht!’ (If only I had bought bitcoin in 2010… And resold them on time!).
Food lingo
De stroopwafel - syrup waffle
Het chocoladekoekje - chocolate cookie
De (Japanse) pannenkoek - Japanese pancake
Don’t make me regret this
Riding your Swapfiets through the infamous Negen Straatjes in the heart of Amsterdam these post-covid days, you witness a phenomenon beyond your imagination. Endless queues of people waiting patiently on the sidewalk and blocking the narrow streets.
If you see such a queue in Paris, New York or Taipei, you can be sure it consists of locals who are in the know about the quality of the food being sold at the venue they’re waiting in front of so patiently.
Not so in Amsterdam. Here a queue, sometimes stretching until the next canal and beyond, means some kind of edible tourist attraction is being sold there, made primarily for Instagram and TikTok likes. Always a single item - from a stroopwafel decorated with M&M’s, to a chocoladekoekje, loaded fries or a brioche concoction filled to the brim with tofu puff.
If you want to be an Amsterdammer amongst the locals, you will cycle at top speed past these queues, sending haughty glances in the direction of the waiting tourists. You, Amsterdammer, will never stand in line at such addresses. Instead, you head straight to a secret gem.
I’ll let you in on one, if you promise me this: Don’t tell the tourists! And I will know if you did…
Mysterious Kitchen Official, usually to be found on the Saturday Farmers market at the Noordermarkt. You’ll never know what they will sell that particular day. Could be okonomiyaki (Japanse pannenkoek), could be dorayaki balls, nigirimeshi, or something else completely. But it will be Japanese and delicious.