Living the Dutch life...

Coming from a big city could make you feel you being put in a tiny box when getting to Breda at first.

But when you get used to the compact living you realize that Breda has to offer as much as a bigger place in terms of going out. Furthermore, you will discover some advantages of living in such a petite city.

Even when Breda is one of the smallest cities you’ve ever visited (assuming you are not a Dutchman) you will meet people from all over the world when the sun is out and moreover after the sun has set.

As a student in Breda you will visit the weekly French and Hungarian parties or eat at German’ BBQs - all accompanied with lots of beer, wine or typical Dutch shots, of course.

When you ready to move along you will find yourself in Breda’s city centre where you will always be wondering how a small city like this can hold so many people living in it, especially on weekend nights. Having a drink in one of Breda’s many bars and moving along to the next bar you will meet half of the people you know in the city and end up visiting as many bars as possible.

Students can be found nearly every night of the week in Breda. Besides Mondays you can experience life music on Tuesday, school parties on Wednesday, thirsty Thursday also know as student’s night, and the usual going out on weekend nights.

However, the most interesting side of going out in Breda are the many festivals happening in the warmer month. From March till September there are a vast numbers of days where the city is listening to all kinds of music. Here you will experience what is meant by living the Dutch live…

It's not a Love Affair

European Union

There was chuckling to be heard when Mr Wegler entered the room. He is an aged man with horn-rimmed-like glasses and eyebrows sprawled in all directions which might show all the long days and nights he had to work in his earlier times.

Mr. Wegler explains to the students that he is Dutch and retired from his position as a former civil servant, spokesman and adviser of the EU, while he was acting in place of a tutor for an European Policies class at AVANS Hogeschool on September 7^th .The class’ students were expecting a common lecture with distractions of their own thoughts or abusing their pens.

However, when he started explaining his personal background it was clear that he would give the students an individual insight of his experience and attention was put on his words rather than his looks. With his enthusiastic voice and movements it was easy to see that he is proud of his background and experience he gained during working for the EU. He speaks several languages and gave the international students the feeling they had been understood.

Even though the students were aware of the EU's background and its structure it was impressive to hear a voice who has experienced the EU's beginning with only six member states. He also took part in Germany’s reunification and spoke of times when there were only a few journalists at summits. Through illustrating the complexity of the ‘Brussels' kitchen’, Wegler emphasized his statement that the European Union ‘is not a love affair’ with showing that the ‘menu’ always has to be presented by the commission, with 25,000 servants underneath it, in all 24 languages and then has to be reviewed by two other institutions which are located somewhere else. In fact, it is an institution where compromises have to be made transnational, so should it be called the largest democratic polygamy instead?

He finishes with the statement that he would not believe in an “United States of Europe” in the future but he was certain that the European integration is necessary to fight global issues and to confront other big nations. Regardless, the students did not get their answer on how the EU is and will be handling the current recession but everybody could divine that there is a European unity in Brussels.