I'm from The Netherlands.
Note, 'The Netherlands' is not the same as 'Holland', which is a common misconception. 'Holland' is the name of the coastal western region only, which is the most populated region, 'The Netherlands' the name of the country. All the big cities are there, including Amsterdam. Personally I'm also from Holland, I live in Rotterdam.
Good
- We have a distinct, unique landscape. Everything you see in our country is man-made, there's almost nothing purely natural. Even nature itself. This gives a certain beauty which you can't find anywhere else in the world. Originally, most of our country was actually a giant marsh-land. Also, the land is also maintained by 'us'. If the Dutch would do nothing to control the land and the water and wouldn't keep the forces of nature in check, almost half our country would be flooded because it is below sea-level. The uniqueness extends to the cities. Dutch cities are very recognisable, generally very delicate and almost 'romantic' in style.
- As a people, Dutch are probably one of the most lenient and laid-back people in the world. Everything goes in The Netherlands. There isn't much that's illegal, and everybody is allowed to be what they want, do what they want and live how they want. There's basically no taboos, nobody looks down upon someone for having a certain livestyle. Everyone is welcome, everyone is able to have their own culture's traditions and every culture is given room to celebrate their own traditions.
- Being a very wealthy country, our standards for 'poverty' are still way higher than most of the rest of the world and with a regular salary one could live like kings in a lot of places around the world. Nobody really has to live on the streets and sleep under bridges ifthey really don't want to. There's food and shelter for everyone. There's help for everyone. The Netherlands has one of the most advanced systems of social security and insurance and the like in the world. Also, because of this prosperity, we have an extremely efficient and well maintained infrastructure. Lastly, our country also looks like it's wealthy and prosperous, because it's clean and tidy. There isn't much vandalism (objects get repaired fast anyway) or litter to be found. Whenever I've been abroad, I always notice how clean it is here.
Bad
- We're too soft, we should be more proud of our own heritage. Because everything goes, Dutch people seem to be fine with whatever happens fairly quickly. This also leads to low punishments or prison sentences for crimes. Luckily, crime's low but still. Personally I feel we let other culture's traditions, not that they're 'bad', cloud or even drown out our own too easily. We're too eager to make 'outsiders' feel comfortable for our own good and the government in particular too easily 'apologises' (for whatever) to other countries when really nothing happened and lets others lead or dictate us just to make those others feel better. Basically, we're door-mats.
- It's very crowded. As the most densely populated developed country in the world (mini-states like Monaco not counted), everybody almost literally lives on top of everybody. Prices for land are extreme, because there barely is any. For the price of this rowhouse I'm in right now, which isn't very big compared to houses elsewhere, one could buy a big villa somewhere else in the world. Cities are crowded, and the older ones aren't really made for such crowds. You can't really go anywhere and expect to be alone. There's always people. Always. Even if you go to a secluded forest somewhere in the middle of nowhere, there someone who had the same idea.
- Leadership and management is often incompetent. Decision-making sometimes takes decades and they finally made a decision, it's the wrong one. To make it worse, that wrong decision was also more often than not blatently obvious to the general public. We like to make fun of our neighbours because they took almost two years to form a government; we had to vote a dozen times in the last decade because ours can't last a full term for once.
Nem said:
(..) The bad:
- No pizza hut!
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There is Pizza Hut in the Netherlands
.