There are some 2,375 students studying the Dutch language and literature at German universities compared with just 1,600 in the Netherlands, Trouw reports on Wednesday.

‘Gazprom and Gasunie are working on a joint pipeline. They are crying out for people who speak Dutch and Russian,’ says student Denis Kuznetsov. ‘The great thing about studying Dutch is that my friends think it sounds so exotic,’ says classmate Yvonne Borchert in Berlin.
But lecturer Ute Schürings says many students have a utopian image of the Netherlands. ‘They think it is a great country where everyone is really nice, tolerant and easy to get along with.’
And student Stephanie Heilmann has her sights set elsewhere. Her thesis is about German labourers in 19th century Suriname. ‘It is so beautiful there and they speak such charming Dutch,’ she says.