BN’er

BN’er stands for Bekende Nederlander, or famous Dutch person. It is the title given to a host of soap stars, entertainers and other personalities who fill the gossip columns and turn out in droves to film premieres.Top ranked BN’ers include football wife Estelle Gullit, anti-wrinkle queen Vanessa and tv show host Paul de Leeuw. The quickest way to become a minor BN’er is to date a former soap opera star.

Bob

The Bob is the person who sticks to one beer and drives everybody home from wherever they have been partying. It is widely assumed that Bob stands for Bewust Onbeschonken Bestuurder (which literally translates as ‘deliberately not drunk driver’) but it doesn’t. In fact, Bob was simply a name originally used in a Belgian anti drink-driving campaign. Unlike a lot of Dutch road safety efforts, Bob has been a success and the word has entered into everyday use in both
the Netherlands and Belgium.

DigiD

DigiD stands for digital identity, an official log-in code which gives you access to all sorts of online government services. The code acts as a sort of digital signature on transactions which involve either money or confidential documents. For example, people who do their tax returns by internet need a DigiD to prove they are who they claim to be.

IND

The Immigratie- en Naturalisatiedienst (immigration and naturalisation service) is responsible for the implementation of Dutch immigration policy. This means that the IND assesses all applications by foreign nationals who wish to stay in the Netherlands or become nationals. A complicated and difficult job – and one which is very politically sensitive. Often under fire for red tape, the IND has made great strides in making its website user-friendly.

OZB

Onroerendezaakbelasting (property tax) is levied by local councils on all residential and business premises and is paid by the owners rather than users of a property. The amount is based on the value of the property in line with the wet waardering onroerende zaken (property valuation law) which is known as the ‘WOZ value’. Local councils are free to set the tax rate themselves. The money raised by the OZB accounts for some 8% of local authority spending.

Swaffelen

Swaffelen, a new word meaning to deliberately tap male genitalia against an object, has been voted Word of the Year in the annual vote held by language lobby group Onze Taal and the Van Dale dictionary makers. Second in the internet poll was wiiën (to play games with a Wii computer) and third was bankendomino (a string of bankruptcies among banks).

VWO

VWO (voorbereidend wetenschappelijk onderwijs) is the highest level of Dutch secondary education and is followed by some 15% of all pupils. A VWO education takes six years, with pupils specialising in the arts or sciences after three. There are two streams: atheneum or gymasium. Gymnasium pupils take Latin and Greek in addition to the 14 or so other VWO subjects on the curriculum.

Vinex

Drive past a massive new housing estate on the outskirts of a city and the chances are you are passing a Vinexlocatie. The name comes from a 1993 government report entitled Vierde nota ruimtelijke ordening extra (supplement to the fourth white paper on spatial planning) which led to a government agreement to foster the building of 634,800 new homes by 2015. Vinex locations are often criticised for their uniformity and the lack of basic facilities such as shops.