I have a feeling that everybody knows that next week in Ohrid, the faraway sister-city of onze lieve Katwijk, a very interesting ceremony will take place. The local dignitaries, the envoy of Hare Majesteit, various officials and a bunch of Dutch entrepreneurs will attend the public opening of a monument erected in honor of Cornelis Johannes George Spoelstra who is better known as A. den Doolaard, a left-wing poet, novelist and journalist. The location, a small square, will also carry his name: Den Dolard Plein (Ploshtad Den Dolard). His daughters and grand-children will be there too. That is it.

(Left: A.den Doolaard in his study) You might, you just might be interested why I also have a feeling that nobody actually knows why the people of Ohrid decided to bestow on the memory of A. den Dolard this particular honor. Ages ago I have signed a single-handed proposal (via the Yugoslav National Tourist Office, YNTO) to the Chancery of Decorations of SFR Yugoslavia that the Presidency decorates A. den Dolard (he was still alive though ailing) for his contribution in building better understanding between the two countries. (To be precise one more name, the then director of Holland International, was also extended.) That fact and my latter direct and witnessed intervention with Mr. Kiro Gligorov (the then emerging president of independent Macedonia) to decorate A. den Dolard in a complex effort to liven-up Dutch-Macedonian ties is, in my view, good enough excuse to come out with this text.

Nothing happened: Yugoslavia was falling apart, Macedonia had not yet established ordains and A.den Dolard died at 95 on 26 June 1994 in Hoenderloo. When one feels indebted one needs to pay right away, otherwise rent blows the original claim out of all proportions. Here is why I think so.

(left: the very modest grave of Den Doolaard in Zuid Holland) LeftOhrid has been where it is since the beginning of our days. In 1934 - the year of the Night of the Long Knives when the SS slaughtered the top the SPDA , when bank-robbers Bonny and Clyde fell in the police trap, when Paul fon Hindenburg died and Adolf Hitler took over - Den Dolard published the novel "Orient Express", his fifth. Its plot is all about the preparations and the aftermath of the Ilinden uprising of 1903. He listened (not very carefully and not always from the original sources) about events which happened 30 years earlier. He produced a story which is what it is for Dutch letters: more than journalism less than fully developed literature. Two novels and five years latter, right about the time I was born, he produced "The Wedding of the Seven Gypsies" (De Bruiloft der Zeven Zigeuners). That particular novel (never gathered the stamina to essay reading it) is practically all or the most one gets from Ohrid of 70 years ago as seen by this author. There is this guy Branko who writes in his blog that he could not bear more than two pages of that book although his dad had kept it for 18 years to present Der Zigeuners as a special gift! It is unreadable. Much latter, in 1956, he produced The Land Behind God's Back (Het Land Achter God's Rug) which is yet another flop. But by then he knew he was better journalist than novelist.

It is evident that neither the Dutch public nor the reviewers (Menno ter Braak found him shallow) embraced Den Dolard as a novelist. His work was inferior to Hendrik Marsman. But he was a hell of a popular reporter a fact which has nothing to do with this piece. It took long 30-35 years or so after his novels appeared that the first summer-long charter operations to Ohrid were offered to this choosy tourist market. The interest in Ohrid was initiated only after his books were placed on the obligatory reading-list for elementary schools. THAT FACT not content of the novels placed Ohrid on the map. The kids had to read a title during the summer holiday and produce a homework which here is often presented in a form of a scrap-book with cut-outs from the region, photos of folk costumes, instruments, the nature, whatever. Parents and grandparents help their kids or grand-children with these tasks irrelevant what title they decide to review. The first to see a commercial potential with the new destination were the directors of HotelPlan from Rijswijk and Phoenix from Schiedam. The YNTO in Amsterdam and JAT (Yugoslav Airlines) were very much involved with financial (promotion and study trips) all-round support.

In short, A. den Dolard could have been even totally off the mark and the people would have gone there to collect elements for the summer homework in situ. If not, the reviews would include strange elements of his biography (he was friend with Albert Kuyle, the leader of the New Society, poor catholic writer, a fascist and a rabid antti-semite. He tried to make Yugoslavia really, as he said, his "second fatherland" and settled out there (nowhere close to Ohrid or macedonia) for two years 1952-1953 but could not endure the pressure. I know it it was awful: my parents were in the notorious prison of Goli Otok. So he returned here but did visit Yugoslavia and publish crappy books bringing Tito (for whatever reason) in some of their titles. He also wrote tourist guidebooks about Greece and other places.

[L] And now we have this Peter J. Bosse (left, during a conference in Maastricht, promoting macedonian wines) throwing his bluff, with the help of the Dutch Embassy, around Macedonia. I have rarely seen so much arrogance and ignorance coupled behind a diplomatic office as with the Dutch embassy in Skopje. The worst aspect of this sorrow situation is that nobody gives a damn about it. Once I tried to point to De Hoop-Sheffer (in public) but to no avail. People feel that they hold the master-keys to every single fund available for projects in Macedonia. They influence the allocation of the funds at will. While in Skopje I could not come close to an appointment with anybody, not to speak of to have a chance to meet either the ambassador or the DCM. Shocking. Can you imagine how frustrated are those who cannot fly the next day to at least complain at a press-conference to the minister or the next in command or the press.

Van Ardene's staff has to make transparent the data for supported projects. Now Ontwikeling-Samenwerking (according the mickey-mouse KvK) subsidizes with Dutch moneys macedonian tourist promotion. Do you know what does that mean? This "eere-beeld" may be a part of that "project".

I am afraid that the citizens of Ohrid will be very much surprised when they find out this monument honors somebody who took them for Bulgarians as late as 1939 and who stuck to such a judgement until his dying day in 1994. Do not forget the Roma or the Gypsies or the Zigeuners from Ohrid: they may be the very first to scream abuse. Furthermore: where in Katwijk or Rotterdam, not to speak of Den Haag is the A.denDoolaard Plein? Not worthy of recognition? Or just yet another victim of the dictum:"It is very hard to become a bishop in one's own village". Everybody knows every little mistake you have made.

So. A medal for A. den Doolaard albeit Cornelis Johannes George Spoelstra would have been completely different story. But then, it is too late now. And not all of us are as farsighted as others.

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