Foreigners should always be armed with enough Dutch to defend themselves in a shouting match with a native. This week we consider words that can come in handy during bouts of road-rage.
Last week, on a dark bicycle path, I almost collided head-on with a strange teardrop-shaped vehicle: it was a ‘ligfiets‘, or velomobile, those strange looking ‘lay-down’ bikes covered in a plastic shell. “Sorry!” I said, because it was my fault. “Paardenlul!” (horse’s dick), a voice shouted from within the plastic teardrop… and then we both went our own ways. Though somewhat unusual, “paardenlul” is a name frequently used in Dutch traffic communication. However, more conventional and widespread are, for example, ‘eikel‘ (dickhead) and ‘klootzak‘, the latter literally meaning ‘scrotum’, although in everyday use it’s closer to the UK/US meaning of ‘asshole’. If, for instance, Beavis and Butthead were Dutch, they might say:
“Beavis, je bent een eikel.” (Beavis, you’re a dickhead.)
“Houd je bek, Butthead, voordat ik je in de kloten schop!” (Shut up, Butthead, before I kick you in the balls!)
Of course, progressive Dutch society didn’t leave ladies caught in traffic conflicts unattended to. A woman complained recently in a letter to the Volkskrant newspaper that while riding her bicycle in Amsterdam she was called a “domme trut” (stupid bitch) by a rather respectable looking gentleman. In modern language, ‘stomme doos‘ (stupid woman) and ‘oude muts‘ (old cap) are considered somewhat milder terms of abuse for females. However, according to the Van Dale dictionary, ‘doos‘ (a box, literally) and ‘muts‘ can mean the same as ‘teef‘, ‘trut‘ or ‘hoer’ (all meaning a prostitute), so, my fellow foreigners, be careful using them.
Last week, on a dark bicycle path, I almost collided head-on with a strange teardrop-shaped vehicle: it was a ‘ligfiets‘, or velomobile, those strange looking ‘lay-down’ bikes covered in a plastic shell. “Sorry!” I said, because it was my fault. “Paardenlul!” (horse’s dick), a voice shouted from within the plastic teardrop… and then we both went our own ways. Though somewhat unusual, “paardenlul” is a name frequently used in Dutch traffic communication. However, more conventional and widespread are, for example, ‘eikel‘ (dickhead) and ‘klootzak‘, the latter literally meaning ‘scrotum’, although in everyday use it’s closer to the UK/US meaning of ‘asshole’. If, for instance, Beavis and Butthead were Dutch, they might say:
“Beavis, je bent een eikel.” (Beavis, you’re a dickhead.)
“Houd je bek, Butthead, voordat ik je in de kloten schop!” (Shut up, Butthead, before I kick you in the balls!)
Of course, progressive Dutch society didn’t leave ladies caught in traffic conflicts unattended to. A woman complained recently in a letter to the Volkskrant newspaper that while riding her bicycle in Amsterdam she was called a “domme trut” (stupid bitch) by a rather respectable looking gentleman. In modern language, ‘stomme doos‘ (stupid woman) and ‘oude muts‘ (old cap) are considered somewhat milder terms of abuse for females. However, according to the Van Dale dictionary, ‘doos‘ (a box, literally) and ‘muts‘ can mean the same as ‘teef‘, ‘trut‘ or ‘hoer’ (all meaning a prostitute), so, my fellow foreigners, be careful using them.
Comments are closed.