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That funny little leaflet
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Table of contents
When I became editor of Folia in 2000, the year of the millennium, I would never have imagined that I would still be glued to my seat at the editor’s desk nearly twenty-five years later. We had only just celebrated Folia’s fiftieth anniversary and no one, at the time, was even considering that ‘that funny little leaflet’, which was the slightly pejorative term some people used to describe the magazine, would live to see its 75th anniversary. That funny little leaflet? Please! We follow all the latest UvA news very closely and are a training ground for the crème de la crème of Dutch journalism. Fortunately, there were enough individuals at the UvA who took a different view of the magazine, such as the former President of the Board Jankarel Gevers, who ideally would have liked a Folia through the letterbox of the Maagdenhuis every day. Alas, that never came to pass. ‘That UvA magazine’ has, however, undergone several transformations since the beginning of the new millennium. The somewhat Latin-heavy title of Folia Civitatis had already given way to the more youthful-sounding name Folia, until shortly after the turn of the century the powers that be decided that the magazine should change from the above into something resembling a tabloid magazine. More column inches were devoted to entertainment and lifestyle and Folia was even transformed into Folia Magazine, with a modern look & feel. That was until it all became far too modern and the name Folia returned to the cover in 2015. However, shortly thereafter, the print media era came to an end and the magazine was consigned to the annals of UvA history for good – until the editorial team decided to put together a good old-fashioned print edition of the Folia one last time. Despite all the outward changes that Folia has undergone over the past 75 years, one issue still remains consistently relevant: the welfare of the now 40,000 UvA students. We have chosen to focus on their welfare – and their associated woes in particular – as the anniversary theme. A selection from this anniversary edition: interviews with the (outgoing) Minister of Education, Culture and Science, Robbert Dijkgraaf, the journalist Gerri Eickhof and the oldest living Folia editor, Bob Dickhout. Columnists Aaf Brandt Corstius speaks about her younger years at Folia, Tobi Lakmaker talks about the University Library and Hicham El Ouahabi speaks about the multitude of aid organisations at the UvA. Professor Damiaan Denys addresses welfare and sports, UvA students speak about cases of climate depression and students who diagnose themselves via TikTok – and much more. The editorial team hope UvA students, members of staff enjoy reading this good old-fashioned issue of Folia. Dirk Wolthekker, Editor-in-chief
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INTERVIE W
The many faces of Robbert Dijkgraaf Scientist, columnist, minister, painter and writer
B AC KG RO U N D
Climate depression: is it real? Eco-anxiety: does it exist? Obsessively checking your ecological footprint, feeling gloomy and powerless. How are you dealing with the fact that humanity is increasingly making the planet sicker?
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Aaf Brandt Corstius
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PHOTO SERIES
COLUMN About her time at Folia: ‘We got to do an enormous amount of work each week under the most luxurious conditions imaginable. From a gritty, smoke-filled editorial office in a dilapidated canal house – oh the glamour!’
Up the barricades Various protests have taken place at and around the UvA. We delved into Folia’s photo archive and found photos of one student protest after another.
Also: Does exercise help you fight your mental
demons? [9] The Maagdenhuis occupation of ‘69 [12] Column by Tobi Lakmaker [8] Selfdiagnosis through social media [17] Interview with the oldest-living Folia editor Bob Dickhout [20] Column by Hicham El Ouahabi [23] NOS grandee Gerri Eickhof about his time at the UvA [34] Francine Oomen helps students survive [26] Column by Han van der Maas … and much more
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FOLIA 75 YE ARS
‘UNIVERSITIES CRAM EVERYTHING INTO A SINGLE YEAR, RESULTING IN STUDENTS BECOMING OVERLOADED’ Robbert Dijkgraaf has been involved with Folia in various capacities for the past twenty years. As an outgoing minister, he is currently making the case in favour of strengthening the mental resilience of students.
by Jim Jansen photography Bob Bronshoff
At the end of the interview, Robbert Dijkgraaf says, ‘No – I certainly don’t intend to lower the bar for students. Certainly not. However, I do want to give them a longer run-up to prepare themselves. The first year is rough for a lot of students, because it’s all new to them and they don’t know their way around. Having some more time could be very helpful’. Dijkgraaf has submitted a proposal for the binding study advice to be amended to a maximum of 30 ECTS in the first year and 60 ECTS in the second year. The response is typical of Robbert Dijkgraaf, who, in addition to being a scientist, is also a columnist, a member of the Board, a television personality, a writer and a painter. He is also the Minister of Education, Culture and Science in the now outgoing Rutte IV government. After his time at secondary school at the Erasmiaans Gymnasium in Rotterdam, he went on to study Physics at Utrecht University. Dijkgraaf obtained his doctorate at the same university and studied painting at the Rietveld Academy in the meantime. In 2005, he became the youngest university professor in the history of the UvA, won the Spinoza Prize – the highest scientific research award for top scientists in the Netherlands – and went on to become the President of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW), a society of outstanding scholars, in 2008. In 2012, he became the director of the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) at Princeton. His appointment and inauguration as Minister of Education, Culture and Science in the Rutter IV government on 10 January 2022 came as
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‘The first year is rough for a lot of students, because it’s all new to them’
a surprise to many. The same government resigned less than 18 months later. During his eighteen-month tenure in The Hague, it became clear that Dijkgraaf was well suited to the ministerial role; he was able to achieve a great deal in this short period of time. As a minister, for example, he was able to free up ten million euros for science communication, shepherd the return of the basic grant through Parliament, make additional investments in higher education worth billions and slow down the Anglicisation of academic education – just to name a few achievements. How do you feel about the Rutte IV government resigning? ‘I think it’s a shame that things went the way they did. At the same time, I would also say that the general election is only a short while away, in November, and the formation process will most likely be a protracted affair. In the meantime, at the Ministry of Education, we will continue to carry on as best we can, to ensure the best education and research. Over the past 18 months, we launched a great many initiatives, made investments, and saw legislation through the Houses of Parliament. It is now up to the parties in the education sector themselves to demonstrate what these investments have the potential to yield. As an outgoing minister, I will continue to support and encourage that endeavour.’
In that context – as a minister, did you ever miss the laboratories and particle accelerators? ‘Naturally I got the itch every now and then. It’s immensely gratifying to ponder the major issues of the cosmos and to carry out research into those issues yourself. However, it is equally fascinating to be able to follow that process vicariously. As a minister, I get to watch from the sidelines. We don’t have to have written the symphony ourselves to be able to listen to it and enjoy it.’ As an outgoing minister, you have been speaking out on behalf of students with mental problems, which are increasingly becoming more common and persistent. ‘The results of the Trimbos Institute study were published this summer, which showed high levels of stress and pressure to perform among young people. This has been the case for years and there is a clear upward trend, which was exacerbated by COVID. The worrying thing, however, is that it has not decreased in line with the absence of COVID.’ Why is that? ‘There is currently a perception that we are responsible for our own success and therefore equally for our own failure. Young people are told that they have an unprecedented number of opportunities – and yet they have no idea how to make good choices. This suggests a degree of malleability, which is something they really suffer from.’ →
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FOLIA 75 YE ARS
DIJKGRAAF AND FOLIA – FIVE SNAPSHOTS
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Columnist In 2006, Robbert Dijkgraaf made his debut on page 3 of the magazine as a columnist. His column alternated with those of Lisa Kuitert and Marcel Roes and he would write about his life as a university professor. A few years later, his column, which alternated with that of Louise Fresco, featured on the back page.
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Member of the board From 2007 until the time he left for Princeton in 2012, Dijkgraaf was a member of the board of Folia Civitatis. From 1948 to 2017, the foundation published a weekly publication, which was initially a newspaper and then became a magazine, which was distributed at all UvA locations every Wednesday. Since 2018, the medium is only available online. Although Dijkgraaf never chaired the board, the editorial team and the other members of the board greatly appreciated his tenure on the board.
Robbert Dijkgraaf Essay Prize In June 2012, the entire board of the Folia Civitatis Foundation bade Dijkgraaf farewell when he became the director of the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) in Princeton. In gratitude for the services rendered, the Robbert Dijkgraaf Essay Prize was established, which is an annual competition in which members of staff, students and alumni are invited to write an essay on a specific theme. The twelfth winner of the prize will be announced on 21 November 2023.
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Science Gala On 26 November 2012, Folia introduced the Science Gala, which was held at the Stadsschouwburg in Amsterdam. The Gala is an evening event during which attendees are brought up to date on all the latest developments in the Amsterdam science community. Robbert Dijkgraaf has attended each and every edition of the Gala and believes it is ‘terrific, important, as well as appropriate that scientists should take the stage once a year at the most glamorous venue in the Netherlands in order to share the latest developments in their field’.
Our man at Princeton On 5 June 2012, Het Parool published a special farewell supplement for Dijkgraaf put together by the editors of Folia Magazine and Het Parool. The late mayor Eberhard van der Laan lauded Dijkgraaf as ‘a tireless advocate of the independence of scientific research, of a playground in which researchers are not required to prove the value of their research to the outside world every five minutes’.
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What can be done about it? ‘When I speak to students these days, I hear two things. On the one hand, they have major concerns about issues such as climate change and housing. However, I also see and sense an energy within them aimed at changing the world and the education system, with more attention devoted to ‘the soft side’ of education, as I like to call it. I don’t mean the credits or the programmes, but rather the culture, the way people interact and the personal support available. It’s about whether they feel good, safe and inclusive and how to deal with the challenges life throws at us. We have to master those life skills, which is something that applies to us all, whether in secondary vocational education or at university.’ What should the university’s role be in all this? ‘This is an issue we speak about a great deal and which is an issue not only at the university but in society as a whole. The issue, in turn, is also impacted by social media. Our society has become a performance society, and believe me, that’s a phenomenon that doesn’t stop having an effect once you leave the lecture theatres of your educational institution. In fact, it might even get worse. The question is whether we, in education, can study or develop ways to cope with this phenomenon and learn skills to deal with it. A university should in actual fact be a decompression chamber that protects and arms students against all kinds of external forms of pressure. It would be good if the education sector were to become a pioneer in this domain and that its work were to gradually trickle back into the rest of society.’ How do you intend to do that? ‘Using a comprehensive approach in which students will be tackling the issue of mental well-being alongside the institutions across the board. When you go off to university, there are really two key issues. First, you need to perform well, as a result of which you obtain your credits and grow into a professional. On the other hand, there’s the Bildung, or general education, aspect, which involves you developing as a person with a range of social skills. Naturally I am intimately familiar with the university here in Amsterdam. At university, you make friends for example by following the same CREA course or by running into one another at the University Sports Centre. If you’re more politically engaged, you might join Asva and if you have literary aspirations you
‘Young people have an unprecedented number of opportunities – and yet no idea how to make good choices’
‘A university should be a decompression chamber that protects and arms the student against outside pressure’ might join the faculty magazine. I believe these types of cross-programme activities are crucial and I regard them as the beginning of the solution. This helps young people become more resilient, due to the fact that they are forced to develop within each of these activities. These two facets – training into a professional and developing into a well-rounded person – are critical. We need work together to find a healthy balance for these two facets.’ That’s easier said than done. ‘The dilemma of being a minister is that I want to encourage the best bottom-up behaviour from the top down. I want students to speak out, after which institutions start organising themselves. This cannot take place by decree of the Ministry or of the Board or the deans: it has to come from the lecture halls.’ A number of universities (of applied sciences) have launched a pilot programme in which the academic year is structured a little differently. Would that potentially be a solution? ‘I would say in a smarter way; shorter and more effective in terms of organisation. Universities tend to shove everything into a single academic year, as a result of which students are practically overloaded. If we want to devote attention to mental welfare, institutions must take a careful look at whether all these things are actually needed. Space can be, and moreover needs to be, freed up and that time can be freed up for their well-being and life skills.’ The re-introduction of the basic grant is surely a feather in your cap in your ministerial career. ‘We genuinely achieved all that in record time. We got the legislation past both Houses within a year and four months. I am incredibly pleased with that because it gives students more financial flexibility.’ Finally, Folia turns seventy-five years old this month. ‘I’ve been a reader, a contributing columnist, I’ve sat on the board of the Folia Civitatis Foundation, I was interviewed countless times, when it was still the magazine – and I attend the Science Gala each year. These days it is a multimedia platform – entirely of its time.’ ↙
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FOLIA 75 YE ARS
TOBI L AKMAKER Who goes to the University Library? Every university library has two types of visitors: passers-by and residents. The situation for residents is often a lot more concerning than for passers-by, who only allow themselves to be confined to the brightly lit silence zones temporarily. Residents, by contrast, choose to do so permanently, which often has little to do with any dedication to their studies. Rather, the outside world actually makes them more anxious than those oppressively quiet places, meaning that before they know it, they become attached to one particular chair and table, from which they will only leave to get a specific type of coffee.
Anyone who spends enough time in a certain building will over time develop strong opinions about the facilities that are available, including about the lavatories. My favourite loo was on the first floor on the Raadhuisstraat side, given that it was a single lavatory and it was relatively unknown to others. I’d go there for two reasons: to do a number two and to have a cry every now and then.
‘My favourite loo was on the first floor. I’d go there for two reasons: to do a number two and to have a cry every now and then’
Shortly thereafter I passed my thesis and had to leave my quiet sanctuary. Since then I have been roaming the so-called outside world, the world of sound and noise, where I suspect people cry just as loudly. My preference, however, will always go to the PC Hooft building, where no one hears you at all – at least, if you’re in the right loos. ↙
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
For a long time, I was a permanent resident of the PC Hooft building. I found Friday afternoons the most difficult time; the library would often be eerily deserted then. It made me realise that the other visitors had indeed just been waiting for the weekend to begin. Indeed, they were happy to have it start early. In a way, this describes the essence of my time at university: wanting to stay in a place that everyone else is happy to leave, to go somewhere that I never quite understood how to get to.
Shortly before I graduated, I made a crucial error by going to another lavatory, which happened to be in the middle of the library, and doing exactly the same things. I’d been there for some time, when there was a gentle knock on the door. I never found out who the employee in question was, but it must have been someone with a refined sense of tact, because I heard a gentle female voice whisper: ‘I’m really sorry to disturb – but absolutely everyone can hear you’.
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Exercise through sports helps fend off depression, anxiety and schizophrenia. However, excessive exercise can lead to obsessive behaviour and stress. So how do you maintain a healthy balance?
by Wessel Wierda photography Sara Kerklaan
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
Exercise is a type of medicine – with side effects
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moment of nothingness, of clearing your mind. When UvA Artificial Intelligence student Simon Stallinga runs from his home in Haarlem through the Kennemer dunes to the beach, he feels his brain activity drop to zero. The endorphins rush through his body and after a 26-kilometre run he feels a sense of satisfaction and feels at peace. ‘It’s as if my brain has been sorting stuff out and getting organised in the background.’ Stallinga says that exercising keeps him ‘sane’. Mentally fit. Now that the City of Amsterdam has been forced to cut back on mental health treatments and medication against anxiety and depression can cause side-effects and withdrawal symptoms, a renewed focus on sports and exercise could provide a solution.
Collective healthcare costs The scientific evidence is mounting: physical activity could reduce a number of conditions, including depression, schizophrenia and anxiety, problems, which according to the Trimbos Institute, are increasingly becoming common among students. ‘If you need medication, you need medication’, UvA sport psychologist Yannick Balk warns. ‘But exercising more really does lead to people becoming healthier and can reduce collective healthcare costs. This has been scientifically proven and is certainly something to be aware of.’ Balk says this is a major issue in the scientific community. ‘These days people suffering with depression, for example, have access to running or walking coaches and we can actually see that this is actually a very effective form of treatment. People get physical exercise, release stress more easily and feel mentally fitter.’ However, a degree of caution should similarly be exercised because the
Simon Stallinga
sports and exercise treatment equally has certain side-effects on a psychological level. What are they and how can we protect ourselves against them? In other words, how can we get the benefits without incurring the costs?
Obsessive exercise Since the start of this century, fitness has been the most practiced sport in the Netherlands. According to Statistics Netherlands, the number of gyms has continued to rise, as has the popularity of fitness – especially among young people and young adults. ‘However, due to social media, obsessive behaviour is waiting in the wings’, Balk warns. Especially at the gym. De Volkskrant recently published an article about young people, who – encouraged Tom Sloos
by ‘fitfluencers’ on TikTok – slave away every morning trying to improve their bodies. Some of them go on to develop bigorexia, a relatively new disorder that involves those suffering from it wanting to become (often unrealistically) muscular. Doctors and psychiatrists have observed a gradual increase and, as a sports psychologist, it is also a phenomenon that Balk has to deal with. People come to him for help because they have become ‘obsessive about exercising’. ‘The body makes no distinction between physical and mental stress’, Balk says. ‘If you physically push yourself beyond your limits, you will even see your condition deteriorating. So you have to maintain a certain balance.’ How does doing sports and exercising stay a healthy pursuit? Balk believes that it is vital to find out what someone’s motivation is. ‘If people are doing it to gain recognition from others, that’s something to get started on.’ He knows how tempting is can be for power athletes to compare themselves with others and also sees it in judoists, gymnasts and cyclists, given that those sports ‘revolve around body weight to a significant degree.’ ‘But ultimately, recognition has to come from within’, says Balk.
Control, quantification, goals… ‘It might also be a case of someone rigidly clinging to a specific goal’, Balk explains. ‘In such a case, it might be important to make adjustments to the goal.’ UvA student Tom Sloos knows better than anyone what exercise can do for people, given that not too long ago he was still struggling with mental problems and with being overweight. He had been feeling out of sorts and was not exactly sure what he wanted to do with his degree in Business Administration. The decision to start exercising again was a turning point in his life.
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Once he started boxing, he quickly noticed changes for the better: he lost 35 kilos and his entire worldview changed. Sloos says that when people suffer from mental health problems, there is a tendency for them to lock themselves away in their own thoughts. ‘When I started exercising again, I immediately noticed my perception of the world expanding.’
Coaching He jokes that this is not surprising in the least, as if you do get trapped in your own head when you’re boxing ‘you’ll get punched in the nose’. And if someone is still unable to stop worrying, then sport psychologist Balk says this is a sign that their underlying problems are more urgent. Just like Balk, Sloos now tries to coach people, both physically and mentally, in relation to exercise. He recently became a personal trainer and is doing a psychology degree at the UvA to brush up on his knowledge of mental health. How would Sloos coach someone who was exercising obsessively or felt pressure in respect of others? His top tip is for them is to shift the competition with others to a competition with themselves. ‘That was hugely helpful to me. There’s no point in comparing yourself to others.’ Social media Sloos believes that we can continue to appreciate the achievements of others, whether elite athletes or people on social media. ‘This can equally act as a source of motivation.’ UvA philosopher and psychiatrist Damiaan Denys believes that this new relationship with exercise is a prime example of the current zeitgeist. He notes that people want to be in control of their lives and their bodies. ‘And so we use rules and mechanisms to make that happen. But that controllability takes something away from the spontaneity.’
‘Don’t physically push yourself beyond your limits’ He believes that people are going too far: ‘Walking around with technological watches, having to do ten thousand steps, taking in so much protein… It’s bizarre. People will buy an electric bike to go and lose weight at the gym. How idiotic is that? Just don’t buy an electric bike’. Denys believes that people should ask themselves what sports and exercise are actually about. ‘Are they about fulfilling the need for control or about doing something fulfilling and leading a good life?’ He has observed that these days it is mainly the former – which leads to continual stress. ‘For example, if we don’t meet our self-imposed ten thousand steps, see someone prettier than us or identify an abnormality in ourselves that can’t be corrected, which limits the feasibility of our goals.’
Competition or mindfulness Denys feels this is very much reflected in gyms with ‘their instructors, equipment and people who continuously measure and compare’. This was why Rosanne Wollrabe, a UvA Master’s student of Dutch, chose yoga instead of fitness. She goes four times a week.
Rosanne Wollrabe
‘Yoga isn’t competitive – it’s mindfulness’, she says. A form of awareness. ‘Whenever you think: hey, I’m not doing as well as that other person, then that’s actually the reason you’re there. Because that’s exactly what it’s not about.’ Wollrabe believes yoga is in stark contrast to her previous studies. ‘Everyone in Law is always busy trying to be more successful than the rest. It’s highly competitive and similar to a gym – it’s not relaxed at all.’ In addition to her degree, she also teaches Dutch and teaches PE to adults. ‘There were honestly a few fellow students who would look at me as if I’d gone downhill. Whereas I’m just trying to help people improve and get more satisfaction from that than working on De Zuidas.’
Mental problems She gets the most out of yoga: ‘It’s “me time” and something I consciously chose to do, more so than a degree or a job. It makes me feel happy in a way’. Whenever she doesn’t have time to do yoga, ‘my mental health quickly goes downhill’. AI student Stallinga recognises those withdrawal symptoms. When he was injured last year, he was not allowed to exercise for a week. ‘Well, I drove myself crazy. My mind got so clogged up.’ Wollrabe believes that video clips on social media can, to a certain extent, act as a source of motivation. ‘But it’s a fine line. In some ways, it’s also very damaging to your mental health and self-image.’ Stallinga adds that on top of that an awful lot on social media is fake. ‘Fitfluencers will spend a short time doing a very heavy workout and light themselves from above, making the shadows more visible and making them look a hundred times stronger.’ He prefers to going running through the dunes without a phone. No WhatsApp messages or social media: ‘It does wonders for the mind’. ↙
THE OCCUPATION HOUR-BY-HOUR The newspapers, radio and television have devoted a significant amount of attention to the occupation (or ‘liberation’) of the Maagdenhuis. The Folia editorial team have attempted to provide as complete and accurate a picture of all the events as they occurred. Below is a virtually chronological description of the events.
On Friday night, at half past nine on the 16th of May, some four to five hundred students entered and occupied the Maagdenhuis. According to the ASVA, a small group, acting independently, successfully gained access through one of the unbarricaded windows at the rear of the building. They then opened the windows at the front, after which most of the students present in the assembly hall poured in. When the head of the Information Bureau, Mr Ph. Fahrenfort, apprised the Rector Magnificus Mr Belinfante of the situation, it appeared that he had already been notified by a detective present inside the building.
A delegation of the occupiers leaves the Maagdenhuis for a meeting with the university governors mediated by Ed van Thijn (in the front).
The university authorities then consulted with the chief of police to discuss the measures to be taken. A large group of interested parties, including A.J.L. van Dam, the Secretary to the Curatorium and practically the entire staff executive awaited what was to follow, with the ASVA board waiting outside. Johan Middendorp was surprised by the action, but equally said the occupation was understandable, given the reaction of the university administration to the students’ demands, which was met by a response of ‘What a bunch of
weaklings’ by a student from the student society. The activities which had until then been conducted in the assembly hall were subsequently carried on in the Maagdenhuis. Led by Frank Jaap Buijs and Paul Verheij, both former ASVA board members, the occupying students were organised into several details charged with security, meals and cleaning duties. The new faculty magazine ‘De Poorter’ quickly circulated photocopied supplementary bulletins with all the latest news.
Revelations
The students soon gained access to important documents, such as budgets, appointment nominations and cover letters, files and documents relating to the National Intelligence and Security Agency (BVD), which were copied and brought outside using a clothesline. The documents were said to be ‘revealing’ by students in the
know. The students also managed to open the safe. At half past one, four police assault vehicles appeared followed by officers on horseback taking their place in front of the Maagdenhuis, with the Spui being cordoned off with crowd barriers. Rector Magnificus Belinfante read out a brief appeal to the students from the command vehicle: ‘Hello, hello. This is Professor Belinfante, your Rector Magnificus. As you are aware, any occupation of the Maagdenhuis is unacceptable. I therefore request that you leave the building. If you do not, you shall have to bear the consequences’. The appeal was met with loud howls and cheers from the students. Speaking on behalf of the occupying students, Paul Verheij requested that Professor Belinfante enter through the window to speak with the students about their demands, whereupon Commissioner Koppejan responded that the Rector Magnificus had already departed.
The first day of the Maagdenhuis occupation resulted in a tremendous shock early that morning. A VARA journalist received a message by telephone from outside the building that claimed that the ANP telex said the Maagdenhuis occupiers had been issued with an ultimatum that was set to expire at 8 o’clock. The result of this was that, led by Paul Verheij, everyone began making preparations for a siege at 8 o’clock. A number of students left the Maagdenhuis at half past seven, with some three hundred students staying behind. At half past eight, the police began their psychological warfare strategy, regularly having new vans with fresh troops arrive on site. It proved to be an immensely nerve-racking waiting game for the occupying students. At 9 o’clock any concern about a raid subsided, although at that critical moment many students began to lose faith in the occupation. A brainstorming session and a subsequent meeting helped boost morale. The students’ principal hope was that they would be able to gain contact with the outside world. To that end, at 10.30, students began building an air bridge between the assembly hall and the Maagdenhuis. Meanwhile outside the occupation began drawing more attention. Inside, however, the fear began to dissipate. Early that morning, it became known that Commissioner Koppejan had given the CPN councillor Van ‘t Schip assurances that no physical violence would be used for the time being. The police officers were not wearing helmets and were not equipped with assault batons.
Soon everyone inside was busily engaged in hammering, sawing, typing, painting signs, writing, sifting through the archives, making sandwiches, etc. However, there were a number of problems: a radio battery had run out, meaning the building was without a radio for some time. Under these circumstances, many of the students who had become part of the occupying force more or less inadvertently became occupiers by conviction, particularly when the results of the examination of the archives gradually became public knowledge.
Food supply
New problems soon arose. At 11.35 a.m., it was announced that the occupiers of the assembly hall had found themselves in almost the same position as the occupying students of the Maagdenhuis: the police would no longer allow them to come in or out. The only way out proved to be to the University Library. This immediately presented the problem of the food supply. Students at the Maagdenhuis immediately began rationing the available food. It was the occupation committee’s hope that a large number of students would be among the churchgoers at the service in the Old Lutheran Church the next day, which would provide a way to get food back into the Maagdenhuis. Around noon, the occupiers of the Maagdenhuis addressed the curious crowd that had gathered on the Spui with speeches and music using a large loudspeaker. Humour played a major role in
this interaction. When a bride and groom entered the Begijnhof across the road, the occupiers broke out in a chorus of ‘Lang zullen ze leven’. Following a number of speeches, Huib Riethof broadcast a special request show for the Amsterdam police. In the early afternoon, the food supply turned out not to be as hopeless as it was initially thought to be. Dr Tom de Booij leant out of a window and caught apples that were thrown up to the window one by one, with spectators cheering loudly whenever he caught an apple. A large supply of food to last at least one day was brought in from the University Library, with the supply route running through the assembly hall to the Maagdenhuis via the air bridge. Later that afternoon, there was once again confusion regarding the food supply, given there was a rumour which subsequently gained credence that the police had barricaded the entrance to the University Library. It was later discovered that the police had indeed succeeded in penetrating the building up to the connecting doors. However, the director, Professor Van der Woude, had informed the police that they had to leave the building.
Status quo
That afternoon the curator and Deputy Mayor Dr P.J. Koets again met with Chief Commissioner Jong and Rector Magnificus Belinfante. Dr Koets informed them that the university administration intended to make a detailed statement regarding the future. According to the Deputy Mayor, university
The food committee at work
life would continue as usual ‘so as not to allow the vast majority of our students’ to fall victim to the occupation. He furthermore stated that the police would continue to ensure the building was locked down and that no violence would be used until Sunday. His goal was to ‘maintain the status quo’, with no new students being allowed to enter the building and with the students present being starved into submission. This strategy failed due to the fact that access via the University Library remained open. Students who exited the Maagdenhuis or the assembly hall were taken to the police station where a report was drawn up for a local breach of the peace. Those who left the university building complex through the University Library were able to do so unhindered.
Confidential documents
Over the course of the occupation of the Maagdenhuis, a number of confidential documents found their way into the hand of the students, which they made public and which were distributed in mimeographed or offset form. In one of these documents entitled ‘Assumptions regarding the background to the “unrest” among students’, Pro-rector Wiegersma states do not wish to provide a conclusive theory but rather to provide a discussion piece for the further formulation of opinions. The memorandum begins by stating that the aggression released by the actions is more than simply ‘disorder’ aimed at a system that is not adapted to the zeitgeist and to current student numbers. Professor Wiegersma then discusses the relationship between the input and yield of the energy that the students involved in the actions put into their actions. Very late that night, the academic staff board, following a conversation with Alderman Koets, also wished to speak to the students. They had brought a statement, which they wished to pass on to the students and clarify. The Maagdenhuis occupation council decided to send out two of its people to just outside the windows of the Maagdenhuis under police escort in order to speak to the academic staff, purely aimed at receiving any proposals from the staff. The staff would be able to receive any response by telephone. Because the telephone line had been disconnected, the staff would have to somehow ensure that the connections were re-established. The staff members described the demand of the re-establishment of the telephone lines more or less as blackmail.
At the end of the first day of the occupation, many of the occupying students had the impressions that they had won a decisive battle. As a result of a continuously adequate response to the difficulties that had arisen, the students’ morale was bolstered significantly. This was also largely the result of the students receiving support from all sides, with hundreds of guilders having been raised for the occupiers and housewives coming to the Maagdenhuis with bags of bread and cheese. The students were so confident that they burst out laughing when on the television news Chief Commissioner Jong stated that it was up to the students to decide how long the occupation would last.
Staff
Night fell and day broke once again: the second full day of the occupation. The most essential point of the plenary meeting held at 12 o’clock in the morning was the question that Mr Otten, the Deputy Secretary to the Praesidium, put to the meeting: ‘What are your feelings about the staff going back to work tomorrow (Monday)?’. A heated discussion ensued and the longer the discussion continued, the more facets the problem appeared to have. It was finally decided that the staff would be able to gain access to the assembly hall, where they would be updated on the situation and on the purpose of the occupation. A plenary meeting would subsequently be held in the assembly hall, with a decision to be reached on the state of affairs once everyone returned to work according to the one man, one vote principle. Naturally, this would not be able to entail that a decision could be taken that should go against the intentions of the occupation. Anyone who intended to thwart the intentions of the occupation would be ejected from the Maagdenhuis. Over the course of the afternoon, Mayor Samkalden returned from his holiday, which had barely begun. One hundred and fifty military police officers also arrived on site the reinforce the Amsterdam police. At half past seven, a group of people had lined up intent on attending the church service at the Old Lutheran Church. They were let in through the side door by Paul Verheij, given that the front door had since been shut with a large padlock. The entrance through the University Library was still open. A local ice cream truck meanwhile continued to do very good business.
Press conference
On Sunday evening, the Praesidium and curators gave a press conference at the Bar Americain in the presence of the police authorities. The developments since the occupation on Friday night were set out, insofar as they were not yet common knowledge. Mr Otten, the Deputy Secretary to the Praesidium, said he had learned that the cabinets in the Maagdenhuis had been broken open and that the occupiers had conducted a search for various documents, including personal documentation, in various ways. The measures aimed at hermetically sealing off the Maagdenhuis from the outside world had proved to be ineffective due to the air bridge, however, it was as yet unclear to the university administration what new measures could be taken to counter this. The police had said they could do nothing about the air bridge. Mr Fahrenfort believed that the height of the bridge should not pose an insurmountable obstacle. The staff working at the Maagdenhuis had been instructed not to come in to the Maagdenhuis on Monday morning. The department heads would be convened and temporary accommodation would be sought at which at least some of the regular activities would be able to be continued. The university administration emphasised that this would lead to significant stagnation in the work of the executive apparatus. The students has said they were willing to hold talks, provided that their demands, amounting to the ‘one man, one vote’ system would be met. The university administration was reluctant to give in to this demand, being of the opinion that it had already met all manner of student’ demands and considering the occupation of the Maagdenhuis to be entirely unnecessary. Professor Belinfante stated that the university administration would not be open to negotiation if the students had already determined in advance what the outcome should be. Belinfante regarded the future of the universities to be bleak, reminding those involved that if freedom of speech were no longer possible, fewer and fewer people would be willing to work at the university. Professor Belinfante recalled the war years when he equally refused to give in to threats such as ‘to prevent [something] worse from occurring’. In fact, such a threat had been issued by the students,
The air bridge between the assembly hall and the Maagdenhuis.
who on Monday demanded that he withdraw his statement of negotiations being ‘meaningless’. The Rector Magnificus was of the opinion that he could not retract a scientifically-based opinion under duress. On Sunday night, another meeting between the university administration and the police was set to take place, however nothing could yet be said about any further measures. The police did not consider a measure such as a raid of the Maagdenhuis to be immediately appropriate, given that this would undoubtedly lead to injuries and accidents. The Senate was scheduled to convene on Monday. Some twenty professors and lecturers ‘who likewise wished to have a say in these sorts of matters’ (Professor Wertheim) had already intended to convene a special meeting, when it became known that the Praesidium had already decided to consult with the Senate regarding recent events. A sizeable crowd gathered on the Spui on Sunday evening and the police charged when traffic
came to a standstill. A number of vans carrying military police appeared on the scene. The radio station established by the students inside the Maagdenhuis broadcast a report of the meeting of the occupation council that was being held at the Maagdenhuis at the time. The meeting, which was a most protracted affair, concluded that the occupation council would meet for five minutes every hour with the public. Furthermore, it was decided that a Medical Centre would be established and that a discussion would be held on democratisation at the university and in society. The Pacifist Socialist Party (PSP) and CPN (Communist Party) councillor Van ‘t Schip requested a meeting of the Council Committee for Public Order. The PSP requested that the Mayor not allow (see continuation on p.7) the police to intervene before this issue had been debated in the committee. Deputy Mayor Koets gave assurances that the no intervention would take place on Sunday night. According to our report on the scene ‘who miraculously gained
access to the building’, a number of cameramen from VARA television were convinced of the contrary. Later it was announced that the public order committee would be meeting at nine o’clock on Monday morning. Talks were held at a high level, with the Queen’s Commissioner in Noord-Holland Mr Kranenburg being apprised of the situation by telephone. The Queen’s Commissioner, in turn, contact the Ministry of the Interior and Minister Veringa was likewise informed. According to Han Lammers, significant pressure was exerted on Dr Samkalden and Professor Belinfante by the Labour Party (PvdA) to contact the ‘liberators’ of the Maagdenhuis.
Staff board
The board of the academic staff met with the ASVA board at the Maagdenhuis, communicating what it had shared with Deputy Mayor Koets earlier. The staff board had demanded that the police cordon around the Maagdenhuis be lifted and for the police not to enter the university. The staff were prepared to convey the request to the students for them to leave the Maagdenhuis. The staff did not condone the police
action against the occupation in any way, however, neither did they think that the occupation was an appropriate means. Finally, the staff board believed that the ‘right of participation in decision making for all echelons at all levels’ should be accepted in the way it had been formulated by the administrative structure working group. On the latter point, Johan Middendorp commented that ‘if the Praesidium says that the wording of the working group means the same as what we want, then let them say that’. Professor Wertheim would be deemed acceptable as a mediator if he were to agree to the students demands. In addition to reports about a serious seminar, which was intended to be held on Monday, the mood was palpably very cheerful, with people singing songs they had invented and put words to. Ironical speeches were made to the police officers and crowd outside using the ‘free radio station’ and at half past five in the morning the Ochtendgymnastiek radio programme was broadcast, which drew some 75 early (or late) participants. On Monday morning, a number of staff from the Maagdenhuis set up shop in the former
building of the Royal Dutch Medical Association on the Keizersgracht. The building had been completed the week before following renovations and was to accommodate part of the Department of Dutch Studies. The public order assistance committee convened that morning, chaired by Dr Samkalden, the Mayor, who refused to make any further statements after the meeting. The PSP city councillor Steijger, however, did comment on the meeting at the Maagdenhuis, communicating that the committee had suggested that the university administration enter into talks with the students at the Maagdenhuis. The committee had recommended that force should not be used.
The talks that never were
Following Monday afternoon, Folia are unable to provide very much more copy for print. Hence the very limited follow-up. The Senate meeting supported the wording of the administrative structure working group on the right to participate in decision making. The Senate also believed that an attempt should be made to engage the students in talks as long as possible and not to allow the police to intervene. The Senate did, however, believe that the students’ demands should not be met under duress. Several members of the Senate continued their discussions after the meeting and a large number of them supported the lifting of the police cordon. Professor Wertheim, who had read out the students’ negotiating position (which dated from before the occupation), believed that the university administration should and could have discussed this with the students, although he did not fully support their demands. When asked, he replied that although he was in favour of a revolution under certain circumstances, he did not consider the occupation of the Maagdenhuis to be appropriate, due to the fact that no situation had arisen to justify it. Regarding his mediation efforts, Professor Wertheim said that he did not wish to be referred to as a negotiator, but that he had merely attempted to keep the lines of communication open. Working with Professor Van der Woude, he had arranged a conversation outside the Maagdenhuis between Professor Belinfante and Professor Verburg and Dr Noorman, on the one hand, and three students, including Middendorp, on the other.
The students laid down the following conditions to take part in the meeting: 1. lifting of the police cordon; 2. re-establishment of the phone lines. 3. presence of minute takers; 4. no compromise of the negotiation position. In the words of J. Middendorp: ‘Belinfante can go ahead and see how his office is doing’. The meeting did not take place. The curators wrote the students a letter in which they proposed asking the Parliamentary Standing Committee for Education to issue a binding opinion on the dispute. In the event that the students agreed to this proposal, they would have to leave the Maagdenhuis at 11 o’clock in the evening. The students rejected the proposal on the grounds of not ‘wanting to replace one authority with another’. On Monday evening, the ASVA offices were occupied by a student action group who are against the occupation of the Maagdenhuis.
Tear gas
On Monday night going into Tuesday, the police made an attempt to break down the air bridge, with two water cannons being used for that purpose. Four tear gas canisters were thrown into the building. The attempt was only narrowly a success, ending with the bridge crashing down into the street at four o’clock in the morning. In the meantime, the students inside the building had managed to get a wartime transmitter located in the Maagdenhuis operational, after which ‘De Vrije Maagd’ station broadcast communiqués and messages on 225 metre medium wave, including appeals for support to pupils and housewives. According to the channel, five people were injured as a result of the tear gas. At six o’clock a girl suffering from shock was taken to hospital by the Municipal Public Health Service GGD. According to the illegal station, the mood in the building was still buoyant. According to a regularly repeated communiqué, the authorities were suffering from a ‘Maagdenhuis complex’, with ‘gas patriarch’ President-Curator (and Mayor) Samkalden being the foremost sufferer, against whom some more colourful, negative statements were levelled. Despite the resistance from the water cannon, supplementary bulletins of De Poorter could still be smuggled out of the Maagdenhuis through a basket mechanism and distributed in the street, which was largely empty during the early hours of the morning.
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COR ZONNEVELD What’s wrong with numbers? The article in the NRC on 4 July 2023 read ‘Dutch universities should take a step away from international rankings that assess their performance’. These rankings ‘falsely claim to sum up the performance of a university in a single number’. Because how can research, teaching and other core duties be combined ‘into a single number’? The NRC writes that the weighting of the various aspects will always be ‘arbitrary and contentious’. Victory! At last, common sense seems to be gaining to upper hand over neoliberal eructations. But let’s not celebrate prematurely. Measuring performance in research has in the meantime led to a serious field of expertise, namely the field of bibliometrics. In addition to conducting research, the university’s other core duty is to educate and train talented young individuals. Although there is no educational counterpart to bibliometrics, this does not mean that the quantification mania is passing education and teaching by. We have been marking students for their courses since time immemorial. Those figures purport to summarise the student’s academic performance in a single number. Hmm, that sounds familiar. But wasn’t there something wrong with that? I believe that there is a whole host of things wrong with marks and grades. The fundamental problem is that as soon as you start measuring human behaviour, that behaviour will change.
The infamous culture of mediocrity can only exist because we measure academic performance and attach consequences to those measurements. At the other end of the spectrum, we see students whose world literally ends if they get less than an A on an exam. We believe both extremes are undesirable, but they are the inevitable consequences of a marking system.
’The infamous culture of mediocrity can only exist because we measure academic performance’
It is time that insights into university rankings equally extended to our education system. You might very well think that is all nonsense, because we all grew up with marks and grades. And just as a fish cannot imagine what it is like to walk around in the forest and smell the scent of a refreshing summer shower, so too we are incapable of imaging a system without marks or grades.
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
But there is another way of thinking about this issue. Marks may seem objective, but ultimately come down to the judgment of a teacher – and are therefore subjective. If we trust the marks a teacher gives, then why shouldn’t we be able to trust the assessment of ‘this students meets the requirements of the degree programme’? We could save ourselves a lot of hassle and alleviate a lot of stress from the students, whereas the end result would remain virtually the same. ↙
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Illustration Joost Dekkers
Labelling yourself using TikTok These days using TikTok and Instagram to self-diagnose ADHD, autism or depression is a popular trend. But what are the caveats? ‘Anyone can claim that drinking a bottle of gin every day helps manage your ADHD.’ by Sterre van der Hee and Thirza Lont
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
A young man in his twenties – baseball cap, white hoodie – sits in front of the camera, twiddling his thumbs. He says he has ADHD paralysis. His head is bursting with thoughts, but his body is frozen – and all because a delivery man is coming to deliver a parcel later that afternoon. This is so familiar, one astonished viewer comments below the TikTok video. ‘I have that too, but I thought I was just lazy.’ The creator of the video is Connor DeWolfe, an American TikTok star (over five million followers) who makes videos about ADHD and depression. He is not only one: the number of ‘mental health advocates’ on social media such as TikTok and Instagram has increased rapidly in recent years. They describe symptoms and provide tips for depression, OCD, autism, separation anxiety or trauma. There are videos or posts about practically everything – and you needn’t search for very long to find them. Experts likewise say that young people are increasingly making their way to TikTok when suffering from mental health problems, with Dutch TikTok users rising from 0.8 million in 2020 to over 4 million in 2023. Self-diagnosis
is easily done. Kim van Gennip, head of the student psychologist department, has also heard that UvA students increasingly come in to see the student psychologist with their own diagnosis at the ready. ‘However, our student psychologists don’t diagnose; perhaps self-diagnoses are most of a topic of discussion within mental healthcare (GGZ).’ 21-year-old UvA student Sophie Alsbach (Interdisciplinary Social Science) is someone who regularly watches these videos. With good reason: she suspects that she has ADHD, given that both her brother and father have been diagnosed with the condition and
‘If you keep running into the same videos as a result of the algorithm, there is a danger of your ending up in a rabbit hole’
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researchers believe that heredity plays a significant role in ADHD. ‘I recognise certain traits, such as ADHD paralysis’, she says. ‘It means that although people with ADHD want to do something productive, they have no energy to get started on it. I often get completely stuck when I’m studying.’ There are also a lot of memes online about ADHD symptoms, she says, which jokes about extreme procrastination and being in a dream state. It gives her a sense of recognition: she also tends to write her essays at the eleventh hour and her thesis felt like a race against the clock and she can’t concentrate during lectures. She feels a ‘real’ diagnosis is unnecessary. ‘I’ve graduated, so I don’t need the diagnosis to get extra time, for example. Anyway, I wouldn’t want to take any pills.’
Quality mark Claudi Bockting, a Professor of Clinical Psychology in Psychiatry at the Amsterdam UMC, who is also a clinical psychologist and co-director of the Centre for Urban Mental Health, kept a close eye on the increase in online content on mental health with her colleagues in recent years. She observed that young people indeed frequently diagnose themselves. She starts by stating that ‘the great thing about social media is that accounts can easily reach a lot of people and that you can find people who are going through the same thing as you are’.
‘Mental health self-diagnoses are similar to looking up stomach pain on Google: only a GP can tell you whether your suspicions are corrected’
However, Bockting questions where diagnosing yourself is a good idea. For example, there is the issue of whether the information provided by ‘mental health influencers’ is always accurate, she says. ‘There’s no quality mark for or regulation of these accounts. Anyone can easily claim that drinking a bottle of gin every day helps manage ADHD – which, I think, would be a bad idea.’ On top of that, there is the privacy issue. ‘Social media might feel like a safe place – but it isn’t. You have no idea where your personal information and comments
HOW DO YOU KNOW IF YOU CAN TRUST A ‘MENTAL HEALTH INFLUENCER’? Ask yourself these questions: • Does this person have evidence for the claims they are making? • Is the information based on more than just the media creator’s experience? • Does the information match that of other reliable, quality sources? • Is the media creator being paid by external parties?
TIPS AGAINST DIPS Check our video our
will end up. Do you really want your ‘self-diagnosis’ to end up with an American or Chinese tech company? You have no idea what happens to your data.’
Labels and stickers All the posts about mental health has made people more likely to label themselves, says Professor Bockting. This may not be the case for Sophie – as inherited traits have given her a clear reason to start looking – but ultimately many people will be familiar with procrastination. ‘This doesn’t immediately mean that you have ADHD.’ In that respect, mental health self-diagnoses are similar to looking up stomach pain on Google: only a GP who examines you can tell you whether your suspicions are corrected. In addition, studies show that drawing attention to certain issues can be contagious, such as is the case for suicide. ‘If more people come into contact with suicide through social media, we know that a seed is planted in their heads that make the option more top of mind’, Bockting explains. ‘This lowers the threshold to ultimately doing it. This mechanism could similarly be at play in disorders such as ADHD or autism.’
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YOUNG PEOPLE’S MENTAL HEALTH
Algorithms equally play a role with regard to contagion. ‘A depression bubble on TikTok will entail a certain weight and heaviness. Although it may initially be good to meet like-minded people, it shouldn’t drag you down – we call that a negative feedback mechanism. If you keep running into the same videos as a result of the algorithm, there is a danger of your ending up in a rabbit hole.’
‘I learned all kind of things from social media: I thought I was lazy and messy – but now I know that my disorder makes it hard for me to concentrate and get motivated’
Not lazy or messy Anna van ‘t Wout (aged 22, Interdisciplinary Social Sciences) is someone who was not at risk of contagion, given that she was diagnosed with ADHD when she was nine years old, but never knew exactly what it meant or what to do with it. ‘I learned all kind of things from social media: I thought I was lazy and messy – my room was a mess, I handed in my profile coursework six months late – but now I know that my disorder makes it hard for me to concentrate and get motivated. I don’t use it as an excuse, but it has helped me a lot with my self-image.’ Anna says she also learned more about the ‘niche characteristics’ of ADHD. ‘On TikTok, a lot of people with ADHD talk about the problems they have. One time there was a video about emotional dysregulation, which means that you can’t control your emotions properly. You’re more sensitive to that when you have ADHD. I then went on to read some scientific literature on the issue to make sure it wasn’t fake news.’ Anna also learned another important thing through TikTok: that her disorder is not purely negative. ‘When I was nine, ADHD was a problem I had to take medication for to reduce the symptoms. But spectrum disorders are a part of life and they also include some good aspects. For example, I’m super creative and can think out of the box – that’s part of ADHD, too.’
Are you having suicidal thoughts or you are concerned about someone? Talking about suicide helps and can take place anonymously using the chat feature on the 113.nl website or by phone on 113 or 0800 - 0113.
According to the Coronavirus Health Monitor for Young Adults put out by the Municipal Public Health Service (GGD) and RIVM, in 2022, more than half of young adults (16 to 25 years old) in the Netherlands said they suffered from psychological difficulties. Last year, the organisation recruited almost 70,000 young people through social media and offline channels to take part in the survey. Nearly two-thirds of the young adults surveyed said they were lonely, with half of the young people suffering from psychological complaints stating that they had suffered from suicidal thoughts ‘occasionally’ to ‘very often’. These thoughts were more common in women and young adults living alone. One caveat is that young people with poorer mental health may have registered to take part in the study more often. The General Practitioners Practice AUAS/UvA on the Oude Turfmarkt previously stated in Folia that the number of young people between the ages of 18 and 25 with psychological complaints had more than doubled between 2011 and 2021. The total number of patients of the practice, however, remained virtually unchanged. In 2021, general practitioners registered a total of 506 young people with mental health complaints, ranging from anxiety, stress and nervousness to feelings of depression, insomnia, panic attacks and long-term depression. According to the doctors, the increase was not entirely due to the COVID-19 pandemic: in 2019, 478 young people had already come in with mental health problems.
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Our oldest Folia editor looks back
‘STUDENTS WERE ALL DIRT POOR AT THE TIME’
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Bob Dickhout (97) from Amsterdam, who studied at the UvA for eleven years, was one of the first Folia employees. A retrospective. ‘I wasn’t allowed to write pieces – that was only reserved for “educated” people.’ by Sterre van der Hee photography Sara Kerklaan
‘I first went to university in 1945. I had already completed my final exams during the Second World War, but if you wanted to go to university, the Germans would make you sign a declaration of loyalty – I refused to do that. The headmaster at my grammar school came up with a solution at the time: he had me take my final exam again for the subjects that I hadn’t done as my original exam subjects, like German, French, Latin and Greek. That meant I was able to postpone the start of my studies until after the war.’
Meeting at Het Parool ‘I was asked to become a student editor two years after the magazine was founded. It was 1949 and at the time I was chairman of my ASC fraternity and secretary of the Amsterdam Chemical Dispute study association. My job was to ask scientists if they wanted to contribute to Folia, for example, by writing a book review – and I was jolly well up for that. Every week, the editorial staff would meet at a little office on the Prinsengracht to correct the proof, which would have been brought there by someone on their bike, strapped under the bungee cords.’
‘Ultimately, I chose to do chemistry and biochemistry at the UvA. Like a lot of ‘I wasn’t allowed to write very much – students, I lived with my parents and that was reserved for the “educated”. was a member of the Amsterdamsch It was an honour if you were. On one Studenten Corps (ASC) student occasion I was allowed to write a book society), where my friends created the review, about The Mechanization literary and satirical magazine Propria of the World Picture, a book about Cures – and one day that publication physicists and mathematicians – my announced it would be setting up Folia field of expertise. I typed that up on Civitatis. It was going to be a new the typewriter at home, because the publication with announcements for office on the Prinsengracht was much the academic community. Everyone too small. At all events, we would never who was a member of the Asva student have meetings there but rather at Mrs union, which was almost everybody Warendorf’s house, at the time, got the ‘ I also had a lot of who was a former magazine through member of the the letterbox every beautiful girlfriends, editorial staff and week. It was going the wife of the then to include lists of despite that fact that I editor-in-chief of graduates as well as Het Parool. I used notifications about thought I wasn’t much to love having professors who were coffee and cake ill and contributions of looker’ there.’ → from researchers.’
FOLIA CIVITATIS VS. PROPRIA CURES The first issue of the ‘smear sheet’ Propria Cures (loosely translated as ‘mind your own business’) was published in 1890. In 1948, Folia Civitatis was conceived as an independent publication for the academic community. In order to save costs, Folia and Propria Cures were combined into a single edition for many years, with the editors required to correct their proofs almost simultaneously. There was a healthy rivalry between the editors of both publication: the Folia editorial staff believed that P.C. should be printed on the back of Folia, whereas P.C. claimed it should be the other way round.
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‘I spent many years at the university. But as I always say: it was good reason to grow very old’
Beefsteak for 1 guilder ‘Students were all dirt poor at the time. There weren’t really any part-time jobs at all. Christmas time was the only time when you might be able to sort the mail at the post office at Central Station. Fortunately, Folia would also include all sorts of little discounts. For example, you’d be able to go and see a film at Kriterion for 15 cents a pop or get cheap seats at the Stadsschouwburg. At the restaurant they’d also always announce 1-guilder meals, such as beefsteak, split-pea soup and vanilla custard.’ ‘It was lovely time, because we weren’t in a rush. That also meant that I could take all sorts of additional courses, like Italian, Spanish, etc., which I did. During the day, I would often have practicals where I’d be working with bacteria that had to be cultured; we’d have ping pong tournaments while we waited. Whenever I wasn’t studying in the evening time, I’d be at the club playing bridge or poker, sometimes until four in the morning. In such cases, my mother would wake me up at half past eleven the next day. It was a time when I also had a lot of beautiful girlfriends, despite that fact that I thought I wasn’t much of looker.’ ‘Naturally, you’d occasionally have to pass some exams. But that was also very different to the way things are now. Often they’d be oral examinations and would take place at the professor’s home. So many things have changed, haven’t they? I also think that students at the student associations used to interact with one another more
pleasantly than they do now. During the initiation period, we’d put the clever boys in their place – the idea was for them to feel inferior – but after three weeks, the serving staff would already call them “sir” and you’d be part of the club through and through.’
‘I worked for the Folia editorial staff for three years. I still have all the pieces I did, because I kept all the editions with my name in the publication details. An instance of vanity, I suppose. At the end of the year, the editors would receive a bound volume as a present. When I was 31, I’d had enough and that’s when I accelerated my studies. After that, I started working as a clinical chemist at various hospitals. From the sidelines, I was able to observe how Folia started having to deal with a lack of funding and how the magazine changed and was published less frequently. These days Folia looks completely different, with a modern website and lots of colour and images. It’s become a lot more interesting. In the past, it was really just a dull magazine.’ ‘I have now been retired for more than thirty years. Physically, I’m a little less capable of course, but other than that I still feel completely compos mentis. I read a lot, go to the Stadsschouwburg and the Concertgebouw and I play golf a few days a week. I also still subscribe to Propria Cures. It’s true, I spent many years at the university. But as I always say: it was good reason to grow very old.’ ↙
THE EDITORIAL TEAM: 1949 VS. 2023
1949 Folia’s editorial staff consisted of an editorial secretary, someone from the university association, two members of the student union Asva (of whom Dickhout was one), a number of alumni, a professor and a university employee. All positions were voluntary, with the exception of that of the editorial secretary. 2023 Folia’s editorial team consists of an editor-inchief-director, an editorial coordinator, editors, a visual editor, trainee editors and (mostly) an intern. Everyone receives remuneration for their work.
O CTOBER 2023
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HICHAM EL OUAHABI University: look at what you’ve got The range of student psychologists, phone lines, online self-help programmes, workshops and training courses to increase the student well-being continues to expand. But the question is whether this actually leads to progress? Student well-being has been in decline for years. Although the initiatives are well-intentioned, they are often inaccessible to students who are already feeling ill at ease. Getting information, sending emails, completing registration procedures and sorting out administrative issues are tasks that can feel like overwhelming barriers, especially when someone is already feeling vulnerable.
Instead of continually launching additional support facilities, the university should adapt and simplify existing structures. In an increasingly flexible world, offering hybrid lectures (both livestream and face-to-face) and more effective distribution of exams would not go amiss. In addition, introducing several timetable-free weeks could have a positive impact on the well-being of students. This could be accompanied by increasing the number of contact hours per week. Rest periods are essential to a healthy balance between study and relaxation. The advantage of these sustainable adjustments is that every student will automatically benefit from them. The benefits for the university include cost savings, improved academic performance and satisfaction.
‘Sometimes reorganising existing elements can be more effective than endlessly expanding various support options’
Sometimes reorganising existing elements can be more effective than endlessly expanding various support options. It’s like redecorating your living room: you can add new stuff and clutter everything up, but sometimes it’s better to rethink and reorganise the stuff and things you already have. The organising guru Marie Kondō would say ‘Does it spark joy?’. And it is precisely that joy that would form the compass with which the university should navigate when it comes to the well-being of its students. ↙
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
Student well-being is of course linked to many other aspects of life, such as personal relationships, home life, financial circumstances and another personal problems. And naturally students also have an individual responsibility when it comes to their well-being and their studies. They need to ask for help when they need it, reflect on their learning process critically and observe positive role models. However, the individual responsibility of students themselves does not absolve the university of its own role in advancing the welfare of its students. The university need not wait for decisions to take place in the political arena, but should take the lead and adapt or simplify existing structures.
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UP THE BAR
Student protests over
Students protesting against the two-phase structure at the Maagdenhuis on 20 November 1980.
On 8 June 2018 the police forcefully clear a tent camp of students protesting against the cutbacks at the UvA.
On 19 June 2020 some 200 to 250 students and aca against inappropriate behaviour at the UvA. They de board, the dean and the diversity officer.
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BARRICADES
otests over the years
Photography Hans Aarsman (1980) Bram de Hollander (1991) Daniël Rommens (2018) Sara Kerklaan (2020) Ruben den Harder (2022)
Students overrun the cordon at the Binnenhof during a demonstration at the Education & Research budget on 12 November 1991.
udents and academic staff gathered to protest the UvA. They demanded the resignation of the UvA fficer.
On Saturday 11 June 2022, students gathered on Dam Square en masse to protest against the compensation for the generation of students who were not entitled to a basic grant.
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Francine Oomen is back with a new book for millennials – alongside a number of survival tips The Hoe overleef ik (How to Survive…) series by children’s author Francine Oomen is back with a new book. This book sees her guiding millennials and Gen-Z through life as an adult. Folia spoke to her about trauma, the importance of intuition and about the main character, Rosa, who is now 25 years old. ‘Rosa contains the most of me – like the low self-esteem I used to have.’ by Irene Schoenmacker photography Gerlinde de Geus
In 2022, a student called Jurriaan posted a clip on TikTok asking: ‘When is Francine Oomen going to drop a book on how to survive life after graduation?’. Jurriaan is one of the many thousands of children who grew up with the extremely popular How to Survive books written by Francine Oomen in the 1990s. In the books, the protagonists Rosa and Jonas would run into all sorts of problems: the first year of secondary school, their first kiss, their parents’ divorce. These familiar situations helped Dutch teenagers navigate the first hurdles in their lives. Jurriaan’s appeal also reached Oomen, who promised to write a new book in the series especially for millennials and Gen-Z. Naturally she made the announcement on TikTok. She asked her fans for input and had planned to go for a drink without about ten of them to discuss the problems of the time. What she hadn’t anticipated was the number of responses she ultimately received: a total of 4,500 emails. And so, in addition to the book, Oomen also decided to do a podcast in which she engaged with
the people who emailed her. On 12 September, the book Hoe overleef ik alles wat ik niemand vertel? (How to survive all the things I don’t tell anyone about?) was published at long last. What went through your head when you saw Jurriaan’s video? ‘I was astonished. I actually thought people would have forgotten about Hoe overleef ik (HOI). I had no idea it was still such a part of this group of young people’s lives. I found it moving. On top of that, it was a funny coincidence. Just that afternoon I was thinking what I should do with my life. I had previously had a number of conversations with young people about their mental health problems and wanted to do something with that. Jurriaan’s post a few hours later was a kind of cosmic sign to really get started. In fact, as I understood later on, this was why he had posted initially. In the sense that he was also momentarily at a loss as to who could help and he thought, oh, maybe Francine Oomen can. The How to Survive books are in the DNA of an entire generation – that’s something I hadn’t realised until that moment.’ →
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You received more than four thousand responses. Were there any common themes? ‘I actually tried to sift them out myself, by using a mood board to pick out the various recurring themes. One of the most important things I identified has to do with the education system. In the Netherlands, and perhaps even worldwide, education is purely focused on cognition. But little attention is devoted to who you are, what you want, how you deal with your emotions, how to set boundaries and set out your needs. As a result, many people get stuck in a rut, become ill, and fall into depression or burnout.’
Francine Oomen (1960) was born in Laren as the eldest of a family of five and moved to Eindhoven when she was six. After her parents’ divorce, she spent her teenage years living with her mother, stepfather, brother and sisters in Groningen. She then returned to Eindhoven, where she graduated from the Academie voor Industriële Vormgeving (currently the Design Academy) in 1983. Her first children’s book was published in 1990, which was Saartje en Tommie op de boerderij (Saartje and Tommie on the farm). In 2008 she wrote a collection of poems for adults entitled Gek van liefde (Crazy about love) and in 2021 she published a graphic novel, Hoe overleven we? (How do we survive?) about intergenerational trauma. In addition to being a writer, Oomen also works as an illustrator. She has previously won the Nederlandse Kinderjury prize on nine occasions, won the Jonge Jury prize six times and won many other awards. In 2015, she was appointed an Officer in the Order of Orange-Nassau.
‘These young people think that there is something wrong with them. They allow themselves to be convinced that they have a disorder, that they need to take medication and this only reinforces the feeling that there is something wrong with them. Depression and burnout doesn’t just come out of the blue. This generation is the first that has had the guts to talk about these issues. In the past, we didn’t talk about mental health problems and everything got kept behind closed doors. In How to survive I always emphasised that talking about things helps. Don’t bottle things up, you’re not on your own: everyone struggles with the same things.’ Are the issues that young people have to deal with these days different from 25 years ago when you first started How to survive (Hoe overleef ik)? ‘No, not necessarily. We all doubt our own abilities and ourselves. Issues such as the right to exist and what we have to do to be loved are issues that affect everyone and have always existed – even in my case.’ ‘If traumatic events aren’t processed, they are passed on. Previous generations went through so much, like the wars, sexual abuse, the oppression of women. Current figures show that one in four
girls has experienced sexual or physical violence before the age of eighteen. For the generations that came before, that figure may have been one hundred per cent. At that time, women were still completely dependent on men and the culture was much more closed off at all events. Dirty laundry was folded up neatly and kept indoors. There is so much frustration among women who were unable to student and get a job and fulfil their potential. My grandmother was one of the first women to go to university to study law. My mother was dismissed when she announced that she was getting married, which was very much the norm at the time. People didn’t speak about what was going on on the inside very much, if at all. And we’re still not taught how do that now. If a young person is suffering from depression, there is a good chance that this is also affecting other family members. In such cases, people say that it’s determined genetically – except it isn’t. There’s trauma in the family that hasn’t been dealt with and the consequences of that are passed on to the next generation. Burnout, which is very common, even in young people, is close to depression in terms of its symptoms.’
‘Young people are convinced that they have a disorder’ The title of the new book is: How to survive all the things I don’t tell anyone about. It’s a lot less specific than ‘How to survive puberty’ or ‘How to survive my friendships’. ‘The book is about what happens when you keep things secret, when you have to or choose to solve the issues that happen to you on your own. It’s about separation and connection. The first thought that occurred to me when I read the 4,500 emails people sent me was:
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do your parents and your friends know this is going on in your life? Trauma, which has increasingly become clear from studies done in recent years, occurs when someone experiences something bad on their own. If you’ve experienced something unpleasant and are not on your own, it usually leaves few traces. But if you don’t get support or are afraid to or can’t talk about it, then unpleasant events can have lifelong consequences. “Talk about it” isn’t a meaningless expression – connecting with others is essential. The loneliness, the suicides, the cases of depression among young people are related to loneliness, not being able to express feelings or being afraid to, coupled with shame and fear.’ What’s your relationship with Rosa, the main protagonist of this book, like after so many years? ‘I have been following Rosa since she was eleven. She’s 25 years old now and has been through a lot. All the characters are character studies and there’s a piece of myself in each of them. Rosa is most similar to me, for example, in terms of her low self-esteem and the consequences that has. That feeling of being on your own. My parents got divorced when I was twelve. They went through some things and developed survival strategies, like everyone does, and, as a child, that’s something you pick up. Whenever she’s having a tough time, Rosa withdraws and closes herself off; as a child, she learned that she only had herself to rely on. That’s the starting point of the book. Rosa is alone and unhappy. I’m all too familiar with her survival mode. It took me many years of therapy to do things differently.’ What has writing the book and doing the podcast done for you? Have they changed your perception of this generation? ‘As a teenager, I always thought that I was having a really hard time. But actually, things can be a lot more difficult once you’re in your twenties. You’re not able to fall back on the safety of your family, all of a sudden you have to go it alone: those are the years in which you’re working on creating your own nest.’ ‘As part of this project, I’ve spoken to a lot of young people and read thousands of emails. I feel that the education system, the failing role of the healthcare system and the pharmaceutical industry play a significant role within this problem. In my podcast, I ask listeners to think about a new subject to be taught at school, starting in primary school, in which you learn more about yourself, about who you are and what you want. It’s about self-knowledge. About how to deal with your needs, boundaries, feelings, emotions, yourself and each other. It’s about communication. A kind of toolbox for life. People really respond to that. People from all kinds of disciplines agree that there is a significant demand for that and have offered to contribute ideas. I hope to be able to provide
an impetus and contribution to the development of such a subject. I believe that it might be able to contribute a great deal in a lot of different areas in the short and long term. Both in the area of personal well-being, but equally in economic terms. At university, on average, only one in five makes it to the end of the academic year. Why is that? Many students run aground, suffer from mental health problems, are very stressed and have significant student debt. They have the cognitive knowledge, but don’t have a toolbox for themselves and their lives.’
‘It took me many years of therapy to do things differently’ You provide a list of tips in each book, as well as in your podcast. What is the best advice you have been given that has helped you in your own life? ‘Actually, I’ve never been given very much advice – or not listened to it, at least. Haha. Being a stubborn, self-made individual. I follow my heart and intuition as much as possible. Intellect and reason provide the practical interpretation. Your intuition has all the answers, but following your intuition does have consequences, because you will sometimes have to make decisions that might cause inconvenience or disappoint people. However, as I always say: it’s better to turn halfway than to persevere in error.’ ↙
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CAN CLIMATE CHANGE MAKE YOU DEPRESSED? Anxiety, sadness and powerlessness: young people increasingly appear to be experiencing feelings of depression in relation to climate change. The term ‘eco-anxiety’ is becoming increasingly common – but what actually does it mean? And does it make sense for people to be diagnosed with this condition? ‘Everyone has climate change anxiety. Anyone who does not feel anxious is still in denial.’ by Sija van den Beukel
Illustration Joost Dekkers
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By her own account, Elvire Rikkert (20, Future Planet Studies) suffered from climate depression for two years. She can still vividly recall the day that her climate change concerns became serious: it was 15 March 2019, the day one million young people worldwide held a protest against climate change. Rikkert turned sixteen that day and joined the Youth for Climate Luxembourg activist group. Rikkert describes her climate depression as obsessive behaviour that she was forced to deal with on a daily basis. Every day she would calculate how to reduce her own ecological footprint as much as possible. ‘I’d very much focus on what I was eating, how I got around and would buy everything second-hand.’ At her lowest point, Rikkert even stopped setting an alarm clock because her alarm used electricity. ‘That’s when you end up in a negative spiral. After a year I came to the conclusion that the very best thing you can do for the climate is not to exist anymore.’ Rikkert believes that the depression came from a feeling of sorrow for the planet, for biodiversity and for animals. ‘It’s a feeling of powerlessness.’ Bruno Bettega Pergher (32), a Chemistry PhD candidate, is familiar with that feeling of powerlessness. ‘You mourn the things that have already been lost, like animal and plant species, human lives and the living conditions of people in large parts of the world.’ To some extent, Pergher feels he would call the mental state he was is for a number of months depression – it was worse than ‘just’ worrying – but, for him, it did not lead to inactivity for a long period of time. In his case, the gloom began four years ago when he first started his PhD in chemistry. Pergher wanted to understand what sustainability actually meant and began reading more and more about it. ‘What I was reading was very depressing, to say the least. At first I began feeling very low coupled with a sense of despair. I realised: we are really fucked – so why isn’t anything happening?’ Not long after, he joined the Extinction Rebellion (XR) climate change protests. Four stages Sandra van der Meer (25, Forensic Sciences) has seen a lot of students going through a similar process as Pergher. Van der Meer was a member of the board of the Jonge Klimaatbeweging (Young Climate Movement) in the past year. ‘First people start reading more about climate change and they often attempt to reduce their own footprint. But at a certain point you just hit a brick wall’, says Van der Meer. ‘For example, when you read a newspaper article about Elon Musk flying to the moon, you realise that individual action is negligible.’ In the third stage, some students will join activist groups. ‘Unfortunately, I also see a fourth stage, in which students become so actively involved in climate change movements that they end up having burnout
or becoming depressed. They then stop engaging in activism for a few years.’ Van der Meer has seen several people in her immediate circle who no longer function in everyday life due to their serious concerns about climate change. ‘At first it wasn’t taken very seriously among their peers, but now people are increasingly calling in “climate depression”.’ Avoiding a therapist And yet student suffering from climate change-related issues are not seeking out the UvA’s student GPs. Inquiries show that in the past three and a half years, only two students consulted the GP practice with excessive worries, concerns and anxiety about climate change. The UvA’s student psychologists have the impression that this ‘occasionally’ occurs among students, but that it is not a salient issue or highly prevalent issue. None of the students that Folia spoke to had sought help from a climate psychologist, more often consulting friends and like-minded people for advice. Activist groups such as XR occasionally organise group sessions led by a psychologist. ‘For me, getting out of it was really a collective process’, says Pergher. ‘If I’d have had to do it on my own, I wouldn’t have succeeded so easily. Communities are crucial to avoiding getting bogged down in despair.’
‘Every day I calculated how to reduce my ecological footprint as much as possible’ Rikkert’s turning point proved to be when she decided to study Future Planet Studies in Amsterdam; she put her activist life on the back burner. ‘You can’t do a programme in climate studies and also constantly be working on climate change in your spare time – it’s too tiring.’ A media-friendly term Can concerns about climate change indeed become so intense that they lead to depression? Any relevant research is still in its infancy and there are no clinical psychologists working on that issue at the UvA. This is unsurprising, says mental healthcare psychologist Sara Helmink, who is also the founder of the national climate psychology foundation. ‘Climate depression is a term that originated in the media. It’s a media-friendly term that has no scientific substantiation. The questionnaires that exist make no distinction between climate change anxiety and climate depression.’ →
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‘EVERYONE HAS
getting stuck in your own mind, whereas This does not alter the fact that there CLIMATE CHANGE ANXIETY’ climate depression is much more about are people who consult climate psychoStudents are in the age group that the world around you’. logists and say that they are struggling is most concerned about climate Hickman argues against diagnosis for the psychologically, Helmink qualifies. ‘I change. Worldwide 59 per cent of same reason, saying: ‘Climate anxiety is believe recognition and support are very young people aged between 16-25 not a personal problem, it’s a collective important in this regard. In my view, years old has serious concerns, as is issue. It would mean diagnosing the entire psychologists should be more aware of shown by the first large-scale study world’. this.’ conducted by researcher Caroline Helmink and Van der Stel are not in Emeritus Professor of Mental Healthcare Hickman in 2021. As part of the favour of official diagnosis due to the Jaap van der Stel believe that the term study, Hickman interviewed 10,000 lack of scientific evidence. Van der Stel: ‘climate depression’ (Dutch: klimaatyoung people from 10 countries, ‘Moreover, there are already enough depressie) is a poor translation of the ranging from the Philippines to the categories such as “clinical depression” American term ‘eco-anxiety’. In the US, United Kingdom, of whom 45 per or “anxiety disorder” that can accurately people don’t use the term eco-anxiety cent indicated that climate change describe people’s condition’. disorder – it’s a major difference. Anxiety affected their daily lives. is a ‘normal’ emotion, so is feeling low. Sustainable activism However, an anxiety disorder means that it Hickman emphasises that students who lasts longer, that it has a harmful impact experience climate anxiety are anything but sick. ‘I always say: on your daily life and that changes are occurring in your brain. you’re not crazy, these feelings are perfectly logical. Climate That is why Helmink and Van der Stel prefer to refer to a anxiety is a healthy response to the threat of climate change. I “significant and persistent sense of concern or gloom due to would even go so far as to say that people who are not worried the climate crisis”. ‘This matches what climate psychologists are unhealthy. Don’t they see the danger? I’m more worried are saying: “climate depression or eco anxiety is a normal about the mental health of people who aren’t concerned.’ response to an abnormal situation”.’ But what can someone do to fight climate depression? Van der Stel considers the likelihood that someone ends up Hickman believes that the solution ultimately lies in action suffering from clinical depression solely due to concerns about against climate change. ‘Only then will the concerns abate. climate change to be fairly low. ‘Often clinical depression is Moreover, taking action in itself makes you a lot less afraid.’ a combination of psychological, social, physical or medical factors.’ The role of the UvA Van der Stel believes that concerns related to climate change The betrayal of the powers that be According to British psychotherapist Caroline Hickman, climate – as is the case with other mental health issues – should be a key area of focus at the UvA. ‘Raise the issue with student change can indeed lead to clinical depression. Last summer, psychologists and the student councils.’ In addition the UvA she visited the Amsterdam Artis Zoo to speak on eco-anxiety should set a good example. in young people. Hickman Hickman: ‘Incorporate education has been conducting research on climate change into the worldwide into emotional entire curriculum, switch to a responses to climate change sustainable bank and stop any for the past ten years and is partnerships with the fossil fuel a renowned researcher in her industry’. field. ‘Anxiety is often the first Rikkert feels that although there emotion, followed by anger and is education about climate denial. And once you realise change it could be more solution based. ‘In the first six months that climate change is real, you might feel depressed’, she says, speaking on the phone. ‘As well as experience despair and of my programme, the message was: we can’t solve the issue of climate change. It’s like telling a medical student that powerlessness – absolutely.’ patients can’t be cured.’ Hickman agrees that naturally multiple factors are at play in relation to clinical depression. ‘It’s a misconception that Finding a healthier balance climate change is the sole cause of climate depression. It is So how are things these days? Pergher is able to keep his also caused by seeing others fail to take action, which is what emotions in balance more effectively these days. ‘Every now scares people the most.’ and then I’m still overwhelmed by emotion, but I’m more of a believer in taking action now. I can’t afford to feel those very Official diagnosis heavy emotions all the time – I’d go crazy.’ Psychologists are currently debating whether ‘climate Rikkert also thinks there is little chance that she would fall back depression’ should become an official diagnosis, which into a depressive episode. ‘I really have learned that what I do could give people the recognition of the emotions they as a person has very little impact on a large scale. And if that are experiencing. UvA student Rikkert thinks there may be makes me deeply unhappy, it’s just not worth it.’ ↙ something in that: ‘I think that depression is mainly about
‘In the first six months the message was: we can’t solve the issue of climate change’
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CAMPUS QUARTET What are UvA students wearing?
Cargo pants are back. Baggy combat trousers with large side pockets are popping up again all around the Roeterseiland Campus. ‘They’re comfortable and they feel a bit freer.’ by Sara Kerklaan & Sija van den Beukel
CARGO
CARGO PANTS
TS PAN O G CAR Luka A l o is Kyra
Ye
uel man
Alois Kyra
PANTS
Luka Yeman uel
ANTS CARGO P Alois Kyra
Alois (19, Business Analytics) came across the trousers during an afternoon of shopping in Italy. ‘I like the colour, which you don’t see very often.’ The pockets also come in handy. ‘Headphones, keys – I actually tend to put everything in those pockets.’ He thinks he paid between 40 and 50 euros for them. ‘I prefer to buy more expensive clothes that last longer. I’m not a fan of second hand.
Luka Yemanuel
Alois Kyra
Luka l Yemanue
Luka (18, Media and Culture) got his trousers for 3 euros in a second-hand store in Ireland. He loves the way the trousers fit over his shoes. ‘And the pockets are useful.’ He often wears wide trousers with something tight on top. He drew the print on his sweater himself. ‘I often draw nude models and also sculpt them in clay.’
Kyra (22, Psychobiology) bought her pair online. She didn’t have to give it much thought. ‘I like wide trousers and they were on sale and I liked them.’ Her style? After some hesitation: ‘Vintage and baggy.’ Why baggy? ‘They’re comfortable and they feel a bit freer.’
Yemanuel (23, Sociology) got his cargo pants from a girlfriend. To him, clothing is a form of self-expression: ‘In the past I used to wear clothes to fit in, but these days I wear clothes I like more’. Clothes are also a hobby – he has a second-hand clothes shop on Vinted. ‘That’s why I don’t have a huge wardrobe. If I don’t wear it, I’ll sell it on. MORE FASHION?
Check our Insta
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FROM AN ANTIINTELLECTUAL ENVIRONMENT TO THE NEWS DESK by Dan Afrifa
photography Sara Kerklaan
As
a figurehead of NOS Journaal news broadcasting, Gerri Eickhof (65) has broadcast reports from countless pavements and squares, never forgetting that his life story has its roots in the rough streets of Amsterdam Noord. Born to a Dutch mother and a Surinamese father, Eickhof often faced racism early on in life. He found peace at grammar school and, later on, at the UvA.
Fortunately, racism was not ubiquitous, although Eickhof was accompanied by peers to and from primary school every day who would hurl racist abuse at him, as well as dirt and pebbles – but his teachers saw something more in him. They rewarded his hard work and diligence with a (gymnasium) grammar school recommendation. But because there was no gymnasium grammar school in the area, Eickhof chose to go to atheneum grammar school at the Waterlant College in Amsterdam Noord. ‘My mother worried that it might be too difficult for me and suggested that I go to a technical college or to junior general secondary education (MAVO). In the end, I simply successfully took the entrance exam for the atheneum grammar school.’ The bully disappeared at secondary school and Eickhof was given the freedom to develop further. Inspired by a geography teacher with expertise in anthropology, he embarked on an adventure in anthropology at the University of Amsterdam six years later, between 1976 and 1983. What was it like for Eickhof to study at the UvA at that time, as a first-generation student and a student of colour? Eickhof looks back on his thesis supervisor and the squat across from the Bungehuis where he lived with a hundred others. These days he lives in the centre of Amsterdam, where he welcomes the sunlight, the bustle of tourists and other memories into his home. With an ironic smile playing on his face, Eickhof, himself a lapsed erstwhile churchgoer, tells us the story of his very first lecture, in which a lecturer recommended that anyone who believed in God was better off picking another programme. He enthusiastically continues taking us through his time at university.
You described your childhood background as an anti-intellectual environment. How did the people around you react to your choice of degree programme? ‘They had no idea what anthropology was, but they loved it. “He might not be good with his hands, but our bright boy is going to university” is what people in my neighbourhood were saying. Although that isn’t quite right. I might not be very fast with my hands, but I can spot weld and fix a puncture in record time. That said, I’m not very good at painting.’ As a first-generation student, did you have any idea what kind of world you would be entering? ‘Well, on the induction day, I ended up in a group of Hilversum types who all signed up for the student association (het Corps) during the break. I asked the supervisor what sort of choir [Dutch pronunciation identical to “Corps”] they were joining. They didn’t seem to be that musically gifted to me. Speaking of student association: I founded an African student association with a number of fellow students, to be able to have a fun student life without having to deny who we are all the time. ‘I don’t think I would have joined. The ‘us-and-them’ mindset isn’t part of my core principles – I feel like a belong everywhere. Being a mix, I don’t belong to any one specific group, either genetically or culturally. That said, I’ve always found it easier to get to know or make friends with people who are also of mixed descent.’
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During your studies you also developed a good relationship with your thesis supervisor. ‘I wanted to do research into the position of black people on the South Side of Chicago as part of my thesis. The UvA felt it could not provide the necessary supervision and suggested that I approach Frank Bovenkerk, who was a Professor of Anthropology at Utrecht University and who subsequently became my supervisor, although I remained enrolled at the UvA. Bovenkerk has just written a book entitled “Omdat zij anders zijn” (Because they are different), which was about a number of issues, including discrimination on the job market and black boys who would be refused entry to discotheques. At the time, it was an eye-opener for a lot of people who had never experienced discrimination first hand. My research in Chicago ultimately did not go ahead, but through Bovenkerk I was able to do research at the University of Bradford into the arrival of migrants in various districts.’
‘My mother hated the fact that I was leaving home, but was okay with me going to live in squat’ In 2020, you submitted 35 personal experiences of racism to your coordinator at the NOS to demonstrate how much issues related to racism had affected you personally and how you wanted to avoid them. These ranged from being falsely accused of theft to xenophobic people in the street refusing to be interviewed by you. Would you be able to draw up a list like that for your time at the UvA? ‘Well, that list would only include one incident. It was when I went to the anthropology library for the first time, to get a book that wasn’t allowed to be taken out. I spent twenty minutes reading when all of a sudden two massive guys came up next to me, asking me what I was doing, if I minded coming with them – despite the fact that I had my student ID card. The security guards interrogated me until a member of staff whom I knew came into the room and said: “What kind of bullsh*t is this? Have you gone completely mad?”. I tried to do another hour of reading after that. After that, I would always go to the Tropical Institute where they often would have the same books as the anthropology library whenever I would need one of those books again.’
‘There were a couple of students at the library at the time who knew me and said or did nothing. Years later I came across one of them who accosted me and said: “You’re Gerri Eickhof from the NOS, aren’t you? You were at the anthropology programme, right? We were in the same year”. I replied: “Yup – I’m Gerri Eickhof and I did study anthropology, but, with the best will in the world, I honestly can’t remember who you are”.’ Was that your revenge? Didn’t you feel the need to talk? ‘Yes and yes.’ The UvA has had Diversity Officers in place for a number of years whose job, among other things, is to increase social safety and inclusiveness at the university. Do you have any memories of deliberate policies aimed at diversity? ‘There used to be money pots for poor students or for assistance with housing problems, but there wasn’t any specific support for if you felt discriminated against or if you had any complaints about the curriculum – if only there had been. There was a lot of teaching from a very Marxist point of view. I remember a general lecture held by a retired anthropologist who spoke with adulation about the Chinese people being firmly behind Mao Zedong. I asked the audacious question whether that might be because all his opponents had been eliminated. That got me into trouble with the organisers during the break.’
‘I don’t belong to any specific group, either genetically or culturally’ You’ve mentioned that you suffer from melancholia once a year, when you get in your car and drive to your birthplace in Amsterdam Noord, to recall that you also made it through that period in your life. How did you deal with that as a student? ‘I had a dog at our squat across from the Bungehuis, which helped. I ended up there thanks to a friend from Limburg who was a fellow student. He asked me to join in on squatting a large building in the centre. I had just finished my first year at the university and was ready to spread my wings. My mother hated the fact that I was leaving home, but she was okay with me going to live in squat, which was very normal at the time.’
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What are your fondest memories about your life as a squatter? ‘We used to fit new pipes and install power lines for water and electricity ourselves. I was responsible for connecting the wires to the fuse box. I’d tie the wires together, screw in the fuses and muster the courage to flip the switch – all the while wearing rubber boots and gloves. And then I’d wait, my heart pounding in my chest. But luckily nothing happened. The lights came on in one of the rooms. And when I tested the switches in the whole building, the lights came on everywhere. I had a little moment of joy when I went into my own room, hooked up the record player and the music started playing.’ ‘And then there were the endless meetings, sometimes with fifty people at a time, about supporting other squats, negotiations with the City authorities and strategy. And when it was announced that Beatrix was going to be Queen and was going to be crowned at the Palace on Dam Square, we heard that the City was going to be purchasing our building, which was nearby, and turn it into residential units and that us squatters would have to leave – but with the option of returning or being offered housing elsewhere. I always still suspect that the purchase was intended to keep us quiet.’ Would you want to be student in this day and age? ‘Yeah – although I would have had to work a lot harder. These days you have to get your degree in about four years. In my day, the average time in which people completed their degrees was about ten years. I did it in 6.5 years; it only took me six months longer.’ How did your time at the UvA prepare you for your career? ‘In my opinion, anthropology is the academic subject that is closest to journalism. And at the university you come into contact with an entire melting pot worth of people. That’s something you come across within an editorial team to a certain extent, but especially in your work as a reporter. Frank Bovenkerk also taught me that it’s crucial to be able to present research results in such a way that even non-experts can understand them. So in a sense he taught me how to work for a larger audience.’ Would 1976 Gerri be proud of today’s Gerri? ‘He’d feel that it all turned out all right. What would I say to him? If you pay attention in life, you’ll be fine.’ ↙
‘At the university you come into contact with an entire melting pot worth of people’
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CLUB LOFI
A’DAM TOREN
From indoor raves to intimate community gatherings in the courtyard: Club Lofi is everything you’d expect from a new underground club in Amsterdam. Raw, unpolished – and a bit intense. If you like a (hardcore) party, then Lofi is the place for you.
STR AAT MUSEUM This hidden gem among the museums of Amsterdam is located in an old shipyard. The cavernous hangar resembles a psychedelic daydream, with brightly coloured graffiti and street art everywhere the eye can see. The collection is always changing, meaning that there always plenty to discover year round.
Iconic, imposing and impressive: the A’dam Tower has become a symbol of the city in recent years. Have a party with a view of old Amsterdam, experience the underground party scene, play VR games or go for a ride on the highest swing in Europe.
THUISHAVEN The city’s free port: the Thuishaven festival site is a household name for students. It’s one of the few place that organises parties all year round – from techno and dance hall parties to pop and Dutch hop.
SPUI25 SPUI25 offers a range of fascinating lectures, book reviews and discussion evenings every month – for free (!). It makes for a nice change for literary and social activist UvA students, who sometimes want to learn about and discuss other issues than the material in their course books.
WATERKANT It’s one of those place you just have to know is there: the Surinamese Waterkant bar is hidden under a car park and tucked behind a bus and petrol station. It’s a great place to go dancing to African and Surinamese music until the early hours.
VAN STAPELE KOEKMAKERIJ If you like biscuits, then this is the place to go. The dark chocolate biscuit with a white chocolate filling is worth the often (very) long queues.
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PLLEK The No 1 city beach in Amsterdam, on the IJ in Noord. There’s drinks, there’s food, and sometimes the beach is transformed into an open air cinema or makeshift dance floor. Yoga classes? Art exhibitions? Breathing workshops? Pllek does it all.
There’s so much to see and so much to do in Amsterdam. But where is actually the place to be? Folia editor Wessel Wierda has provided recommendations for ten places you absolutely need to visit this academic year.
by Wessel Wierda
Folia has FOMO Ten places in Amsterdam you must have visited
BAR BUKOWSKI BAR DO If you want the best cocktails in Amsterdam, then Bar Do on the Vijzelgracht is the place to go. Located in the city centre, Bar Do does the best versions of the Pornstar and Espresso Martinis – at least, according to students.
Bar Bukowski is situated near Roeterseiland and was indeed named after the German writer and poet, who was also partial to a drink or two. On weekends, it’s a great place to sing your heart to nostalgic pop music and pub classics until well after midnight.
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HAN VAN DER MAAS The apparent paradoxes of student well-being You’re young and clever, you’re studying at one of the best universities in one of the most charming cities in liberal Europe, and yet... you are unhappy. You might just have gone through a break up, or maybe you’re ill or your lease is up, or maybe you’ve failed an exam again – all of which gives you licence to be unhappy. However, according to the literature on subjective well-being (30,000 articles in the year 2022), well-being is not always related to objectives issues. In the 1970s, women in the United States reported a significantly greater degree of happiness than men. Since that time, the position of women has objectively improves, however their ‘happiness’ has decreased, occasionally to below the level of that of men. Women also report more serious mental health problems and make more suicide attempts than men, despite the fact that suicide mortality among men is two to four times higher than in women. The Easterlin paradox is equally perplexing: within a country, wealth is correlated with happiness, however it is not between countries. As countries become more prosperous they do not demonstrate an increase in their general level of happiness. There are many more such paradoxes or actually counter-intuitive results around. For example, many choices often make people unhappy and they overestimate the duration of the impact of positive
(winning the lottery) and negative events (the end of a relationship). According to the happiness paradox, the explicit pursuit of happiness in fact leads to less happiness. A great many of these paradoxes are reflected in student well-being. Not only is there very little time for idleness, doing nothing is no longer an option. Life must be lived to the fullest and what qualifies as the fullest is determined by social media. It is quite conceivable that students in the 1970s, just like women in the USA, were objectively worse off and yet nevertheless reported a greater degree of happiness. The data on student well-being is notoriously unreliable. There is a dearth of truly representative data. Nor are we sure whether student well-being has in fact declined, although this is not unlikely. There are far more female students than 75 years ago and sexual violence is an objective reason for a lower degree of well-being. Female students are disproportionately likely to be the victims of sexual violence. I applaud the recently published Student Pact on sexual harassment and sexual violence. I believe one of the best suggestions is the rule: ‘It’s either a clear Yes – or nothing’. The paradoxes of subjective well-being are no excuse to combat objective causes of decreased well-being. ↙
‘It is quite conceivable that students in the 1970s were objectively worse off and yet nevertheless reported a greater degree of happiness’
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
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When your country is burning and you’re not there by Céline Zahno illustration Joost Dekkers
Imagine something terribly happens in your village or city. But you are not there: you are at university in Amsterdam thousands of kilometres away. This is the reality for a lot of international UvA students, which is often overlooked. How do they cope with this?
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
Sofiia Bezuhla from Ukraine doesn’t get homesick. After all, she no longer has a home she can be homesick for. ‘My city was bombed, everything has been destroyed and everyone has left.’ Since Russia invaded Ukraine, the 21-year-old economics student has only been back to her home town of Kharkiv for about forty minutes to provide humanitarian aid. ‘Now Amsterdam is my home away from home.’ Sofiya Tryzub-Cook is also from Ukraine; she was in her second year of Politics, Psychology, Law & Economics (PPLE) during the invasion. Until then, that was the only home she could return to. ‘My parents live in China and given that China was completely locked down during
COVID, my Ukrainian relatives were the only part of my family that I could visit. It felt like I didn’t belong anywhere. But luckily I had good friends around who supported me.’ It is sometimes difficult for Dutch UvA students to imagine what it’s like to be at university in Amsterdam when you come from another country. Especially if that country is faced with major problems such as a war or a natural disaster. This article attempts to show how complicated it is for some students to be here, far away from their friends and family, when a catastrophe has taken place. How do they manage to keep going?
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‘I didn’t really go in to the university for three whole months. I’d only study for exams on the nights before’ As Eren Konyar (they/them), a third-year PPLE Bachelor’s students from Turkey, found out, you can’t always count on getting support. They felt less supported by their immediate environment when the Turkey-Syria earthquake took place last February and not many people appeared to notice their problems: ‘I was very depressed for two weeks, but very few people offered to help. I just had to get on with my life’. This sorrow, which is difficult for outsiders to understand, can often disappear under the radar within the mix of all the various nationalities that make up the UvA. At present, 34 per cent of the total of 42,171 UvA students come from abroad – twice as many as five years ago – and come from more than a hundred different countries. That means that their lives are similarly determined by aspects such as the geopolitical situation of their home country or the policies of their government. Social support Eren was relieved to find at all their Turkish relatives were all right, but when they saw that so many people were dying and that most of the aid was coming from the people of Istanbul instead of from the government, they were ‘hugely disappointed’ in their government. At the same time, Eren was upset about the responses they received from those around them. ‘People sometimes find it difficult to empathise with all the different events that are taking place. So a lot of people expected me to just get on with my life.’
Eren found the period following the earthquake to be difficult. It was the little things, such as people not asking about their family or their boyfriend expecting them to get over the disaster after a few days, which made them feel closer to their Turkish friends in Amsterdam. ‘Sometimes my Turkish friends are my only refuge and I’ll only speak Turkish for a whole day. I’ll go to the Turkish supermarket, I’ll meet up with Turkish friends and call my mother.’ Ceren Abacioglu is a postdoctoral research at the Department of Psychology at the UvA and carries out research in to cultures and barriers that people might
experience. ‘Studies show that social support can help alleviate the stress that someone experiences when adapting to a new culture.’ She believes that these adjustments will be even more difficult for international students if something bad happens in their home country. ‘At such a time, your heart and your head will be in another country and so international students can feel very isolated in the Netherlands when they are unable to share their grief with the people around them. In such cases, it can be beneficial to meet others who are going through the same thing and it is normal for them to group together.’ ‘What’s important is that people try’ Sofiya has had different experiences to Eren. She has a lot of appreciation for her Dutch friends and friends from other countries who have read up on the events and helped her through the initial shock. ‘Whether it was showing up at protests or reading the news regularly – what’s important is that people are trying.’
‘I was very depressed for two weeks, but very few people offered to help. I just had to get on with my life’ Something that she sometimes found frustrating what that her nationality all of a sudden played a more important role – and not only in a positive sense. ‘People often treated me like I was made of fragile glass, which is funny on the one hand, but equally I also think that people just didn’t really know how to act.’ Comfort in communities Something that helped Sofiya cope with these events was to help out herself. ‘It was difficult at first: you feel out of place because of what is happening in your own country,
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whereas you live a safe live in Amsterdam. At the same time, volunteering did also help because I could focus my attention elsewhere.’ Sofiia Bezuhla started setting up the NGO UAID, a non-profit humanitarian aid organisation in Ukraine, ten days after the invasion began, because she wanted to do something to help. At the same time, these ten days were the worst time she had ever been through. Her mother was unable to leave her hometown of Kharkiv while it was being bombed. ‘My boyfriend and I watched all the events unfold and would call up my mother whenever anything happened. At that point, my life and things like university weren’t very important to me. I tried to support people and I understood that humanitarian aid from the Netherlands was the most effective thing I could do, given that all the supply chains had been destroyed.’ She says UAID also helped other students affected by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. ‘We supported one another. It quickly became a close-knit community and we helped each other in terms of our mental health. I now count these people as some of my best friends.’ Eren was also involved in relief efforts and organised a bake sale immediately after the earthquake in Turkey to collect donations for the affected areas. Although ‘a lot of great people helped out’, it was equally exhausting for those involved: ‘All of the initiative had to come from people who were already burned out by the earthquake. I was shattered but also had to do a full-time degree programme on top of that’. How the UvA can help Sofiia spent a lot of time and energy on setting up and managing an entire NGO. ‘I didn’t really go in to the university for three whole months. I’d only study for exams on the nights before.’ Fortunately, the Faculty of Economics and Business cancelled the midterm exams for Ukrainians that were scheduled shortly after the start of the invasion. ‘That was enormously helpful.’
What is the university’s role in relation to disasters? How can lecturers help and what policies are in place? ‘In general, our study advisers and student psychologists are on hand to provide a sympathetic ear after any shocking events and they can also refer students to other practical forms of assistance’, says a spokesperson for the UvA. In addition, the Profiling Fund can provide students who have incurred delays in their studies due to disasters with financial assistance. It has also been decided that Ukrainian students who started their degree programme last year will pay the tuition fees that applies to European students instead of the much higher institutional rate.
The university aims to set up communal spaces for students and members of staff who have been affected by shocking events. Immediately after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, several gatherings well held within the various faculties. ‘Students and members of staff were given the opportunity to express and share their concerns and their feelings’, says the spokesperson. Following the Turkey and Syria earthquake, the UvA ‘set up a number of heart-warming initiatives aimed at supporting students and staff members with family members in the region’, including fundraising campaigns and gatherings to discuss the events. ‘A lot also takes place during lectures, where lecturers will take the time to reflect on the disaster or emergency that has taken place.’
‘People often treated me like I was made of fragile glass, but I think that people just didn’t really know how to act’ Eren remembers that their friend had to return to Turkey because she had lost friends in the earthquake disaster. ‘The UvA did not relax its attendance requirement, so I didn’t even try to get an exemption.’ Fortunately, in general, the teaching staff were understanding and flexible with deadlines, says Eren. ‘A problem shared is a problem halved’ Ceren Abacioglu believes it is vital that the UvA, which is frequently the direct point of contact for international students, should recognise such difficult situations. ‘These students need to be informed about the support and assistance available and where they can find like-minded people.’ This is especially crucial for those who do not yet have a large social circle in Amsterdam.
Sofiya echoes Abacioglu’s concerns about how difficult it can be to have a social life when so much is happening back home. ‘At a social level, I withdrew to a certain degree for at least the first four months. I did speak to the good friends that I had.’ She hopes that everyone who goes through something like this has a network to fall back on or is able to find one, for example through volunteering. Because, Abacioglu says, quoting the old proverb: ‘A problem shared is a problem halved’. ↙
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A AF BR ANDT CORSTIUS How working at Folia ruined us for life The people I worked with at Folia – many of whom became, and have remained, good friends – always say to each other that working at Folia ruined other jobs for us for life. Certainly this was the case in the late 90s, when the UvA coffers were still overflowing and it was quite common at the editorial office to say something like ‘the three of us have to go to New York for an important interview’ and we had an entire newspaper at our disposal and got to do an enormous amount of work every week. Under the most luxurious circumstances imaginable. From a gritty, smoke-filled editorial office in a dilapidated canal house – oh the glamour! For most of us it was our first job, especially for those of us who started as an apprentice editor (which was a paid position!). At the time, you think it’s the most normal thing in the world to have really fun colleagues, with whom you always work ‘overtime’ (i.e. dinner in the Utrechtsestraat, at the company’s expense) the night before a deadline, for meetings always to be a silly affair (that one colleague who put ‘students who kill other students’ on a list of ideas, without even knowing whether that had every happened), to have a paid twelve-week holiday, for drinks parties to go completely off the rails, and then to casually move on from that job to some job at one of the national broadsheets.
Yup – we thought it was all perfectly normal. Including that we got to sleep in. And were allowed to come and go as we pleased. As long as we submitted good articles or pieces – and produced a reasonable amount of text, at any rate. The next job I had, at a glossy fashion magazine, was the exact opposite of Folia. My comings and goings were very much monitored, one step shy of having to clock in and out. And I wasn’t supposed to type the extraordinary amounts of words that I was used to submitting at Folia, because it was a monthly magazine and there was little room for text due to the enormous number of photographs. In the time thereafter, I equally never had a permanent job again in which I was given so much trust, freedom and flexibility to do what I wanted and what I was good at. Maybe it had to do with Sjaak Priester, who was the editor-inchief during my time at Folia, maybe it was the relaxed, university setting, or maybe it was 90s. At any rate, that job spoiled me for life. The only solution turned out to be life as a freelancer. But that means that you don’t get to have silly meetings and pull half-drunk all-nighters. Well, I guess you can do the latter – but not with a group of the funniest people in Amsterdam.
‘That job spoiled me for life. The only solution turned out to be life as a freelancer’
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
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My ultimate comfort food is a big plate of pasta with a red sauce and smothered with cheese. This recipe is perfect for when you have people round (because it’s vegetarian and is really to veganise*). Make a big batch while you’re at it, because you can keep the sauce for at least three months in the freezer.
CONCHIGLIONI WITH MUSHROOM CHIANTI RAGÙ
Illustration Sija van den Beukel
Serves four: 400 g of mushrooms, cut into small pieces 200 g of oyster mushrooms, cut into small pieces 4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped 1 onion, finely chopped 2 talks of celery, finely diced 1 carrot, finely diced 1 red pepper, sliced into rings 70 g of tomato paste 200 ml of Chianti, or a similar red wine 800 g of chopped tomatoes 1 tsp of sugar 4 sprigs of fresh thyme 2 bay leaves 100 ml of water 100 ml of single cream 30 g of Parmesan cheese, plus a little extra to garnish when serving 500 g of conchiglioni pasta, easy to substitute with another pasta, such as a tubular or ribbon pasta olive oil for frying pepper, salt* Vegan: substitute the single cream with soy cream and the Parmesan cheese with nutritional yeast flakes.
PIEN IN THE MOOD FOR FOOD
by Pien Wekking
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Heat a dash of olive oil in a large pan and fry the mushrooms and oyster mushrooms until golden brown. This takes about 5 minutes.
Remove the mushrooms from the pan and set aside. Add a little olive oil to the pan and fry the onion and garlic. Then add the celery, carrot and red pepper to the pan and fry until the carrot has softened. Then add the tomato paste and allow to brown a little.
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Add the mushrooms to the onion mixture, alongside the red wine, chopped tomatoes, sugar, fresh thyme, bay leaves and water. Leave the ragù to simmer gently for at least 30 minutes to allow the sauce to thicken. Add the cream last and leave to heat through for a few minutes.
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Once the sauce is (nearly) finished, cook the pasta according to the instructions on the packaging. Drain the pasta.
Divide the pasta between the plates. Top with the ragù and garnish with a little extra Parmesan cheese.
MORE PIEN?
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The level of difficulty of this sudoku puzzle is intermediate.
This issue includes contributions from Dan Afrifa Aaf Brandt Corstius Hicham El Ouahabi Jim Jansen Tobi Lakmaker Thirza Lont Han van der Maas Pien Wekking Céline Zahno Cor Zonneveld Cover Typex
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Advertising Bureau van Vliet
The puzzle can be solved in four moves.
ABOUT THE COVER On the back cover you will find several former UvA graduates and former Foliants: Theo van Gogh, Annemarie Grewel, Humberto Tan, Paulien Cornelisse, Connie Palmen, Freek de Jonge, Fokke, Sylvia Witteman, Midas Dekkers, Aaf Brandt Corstius. Do you see them all?
This special anniversary issue of Folia was made possible in part through a grant from the Amsterdam University Fund.
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