Though I have been living in Holland for three years, I am still occasionally shocked by the relatively slow pace. The most recent one was during the movie The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. As a big fan of the Lord of the Rings, I had to see this movie, so I went to the cinema. There was a scene in the movie where Azog, one of the main villains, was chasing the dwarves. The moment Azog almost caught the dwarves, the big screen went black all of sudden. I thought something was wrong with the projector, but people around me stood up and walked out, unsurprised. Manifestly, this was normal to them. Apparently, even the movies are interrupted with a break in the Netherlands. I have asked many foreign friends whether they also have a break during the movie, but this is not the case in Vietnam, Indonesia, Germany, Spain, or the Czech Republic. It is clearly one of those uniquely Dutch things, contributing to the slow and enjoyable life here.
Yue Han, Chinese PhD student at the Laboratory of Virology
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