FundamentallySound Blog

"Of course, an American is a different type of human than a Dutchman," the colonel said. [...] Instead of armored vehicles, the Dutch drive vehicles that leave them exposed to the people around them. To encourage interaction with local residents, they go bare-headed and are forbidden to wear mirror sunglasses. Making soldiers accessible and vulnerable to their surroundings increases their security, they contend. Making them inaccessible decreases it.

from today's New York Times.

I don't think the world-view of the Dutch is particularly more complex or sophisticated than that of other cultures, but I always had this suspicion, while living in The Netherlands, that they were able to see the obvious more clearly than other cultures, whether it is in their easy acceptance of bicycles as an extraordinarily practical form of transportation or their empathetic and logical approach to gay rights. While Americans tend to bludgeon their way around the globe like a paranoid schizophrenic, the Dutch seem to follow their own way in a brilliantly eccentric yet practical manner.

"We have our own culture. But I think the Americans could have a way of operating with more respect and more understanding toward the population."

They seem to be pretty adept at understatement as well.