Imagine this! As a kid, you’re taught that the Dutch language is needed to survive beyond your island. You grow up thinking that this particular language is even needed to survive in the big world!

In classrooms, they discourage you from speaking your native language. So you continue conversations with your peers on the playground. Until you hear the teacher say: “Hey little ones, it’s better to speak Dutch. You can speak your language at home.” So you adhere to this: “Yes, teacher!”

After the lunch break, you rush back to your class. You notice the small hole in your desk and wonder why it’s there. Your teacher explains that, back in the day, they used to write with ink and that the hole was for ‘het inktpotje’.

Although it’s the year 2000, your schoolbooks are outdated. You struggle to comprehend the learning material. Nevertheless, your parents do whatever it takes for you to master this superior language.

When you finally migrate to the low-laying promised land, the people make fun of your accent. “Where are you from?” they ask. “Aruba” you reply proudly with a big smile. Only to learn that the majority of them have no idea where that is.

You explain to them that Aruba is part of the Dutch Caribbean islands. “Oh! Yes! Now I remember. The ABC-islands?” they ask. Kind of… you think. There are more islands, but you decide to leave that part out. Instead, you say: “It’s the same size as the Dutch island of Texel.” They laugh. “Well, that’s a small island.” You smile.

Your new teachers make fun of you as well. You speak old Dutch, just like they used to, back in the day. “We don’t say ‘baden’ anymore, we say ‘douchen’” they explain.

They advise you to attend a Dutch language school before proceeding with your education. You’ll never follow this advice, instead, you surround yourself with great Dutch-speaking people.

Slowly but surely, your native language becomes foreign to you, while code-switching becomes a reality. Finally, you feel like you’ve mastered the language!

You make writing part of your profession. You train yourself to look up the rules of the specific language because you know its depths and complexities. Yet, people still doubt your writing skills and knowledge. You feel like you’re never good enough.

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This was my reality growing up on the small island of Aruba. Not all school tables were way outdated, but most of them were. And not all schools were this strict on speaking the Dutch language, but mine was.

25 years later, I read in news articles, research papers and political debates how to go about strengthening the Dutch language in some of these islands. This is a reoccuring theme, year after year. The educational system on these islands never seems to be up to standards. I can imagine why.

Dit stuk was eerder een LInkedIn-post op de pagina van Tiarra Simon