Mulling over Dwelling - Homecoming and How!? Part 2

I remember the first ever house viewing appointment. It was Dutch weather at its best – a grey sky with whiny clouds that sent forth a continuous cold shower. While the husband happily chilled in warm Spain, my daughter and I bundled in jackets and coats, trudged along the wet pathway. We were trying to find a house in a neighborhood full of clones.

Finally, we came to the ancient (antique!) door just ahead of the scheduled time. On ringing the bell, the real estate agent opened the door. “You are too early. Ring again in 23 seconds,” he said in a gruff voice before closing the door on my face. After exactly 23 seconds, he pulled the door open and ushered us into a long, dark passageway, brightened by two naked zero-watt bulbs.

Picture courtesy: Google Baba

And that in my experience is the normal trait - love for punctuality and passages. In my observation, never are two neighborhoods similar, but every house in one is identical. The floor plan, built-area, doors and sometimes even the taps and utilities! Unless of course one gives up an arm and a leg for a house and then decides to forego another arm to renovate it.

Pics in collaboration with Satya Nadella and G Baba

After a year of living in a house that showcased its toilet before the living room, I was looking forward to others that exhibited their best before the rest. But after rejecting a handful of houses, I realized that an ideal house exists only imagination and not anywhere in the platteland(land). Thus, after one year and one hundred missed houses, I have drawn some conclusions about the Dutch habitation.

Dutch houses are of two types. Free standing ones (that you might have to starve to afford) and row houses that share walls and therefore some secrets. On deciding on the latter, I can further split them into two variants. One, where the house is modeled around a curved staircase and the other, a house that is modeled around a single passage, in case of ground floor residences. Other things are pretty much the same. Mis-shaped bedrooms (in worse cases, broom cupboards that are passed off as bedrooms), toilets that accommodate only half a human and finally the kitchens that are basically glorified closets that can hold some electrical appliances, two pans and exactly one pot of basil.

All houses without stairs are much the same. They fall under the second category of being modeled around a passageway. Think of this tunnel as the main trunk of the tree with rooms jutting out like branches at various weird angles. The passage leads through to a kitchen and the back yard.

As soon as the main door opens, one is greeted with 17^th century coat-hangers that are abode to a heap of jackets, raincoats, scarves and hats that vie with each other to stay at top. Go past that and you will first see a bedroom shaped along the underside of the staircase that runs next to the house. Given the size and shapelessness of the room, it is generally assigned to the kid. After that comes the toilet, a cramped facility with a toy-sized basin and tap that spouts an icy jet of water. Next door is the spartan ‘bad’room with a wash basin and shower cabin which hints at the need to conserve water. Then comes the master bedroom which can accommodate a queen-sized bed and a closet. It opens to or looks out at the garden, which is usually the star of any house, maintained impeccably by the nature-loving Dutch.

The living room is the biggest room in the house. Often, it comes with a fireplace to give a cozy vibe – a great accessory that can be the centre piece, pushing your television to a corner. After all, in a cold country one would like to look into the fake fireplace rather than Game of Thrones, even if Winter is coming.

Dutch kitchens are magazine models. They are super shiny and clean, probably because they are used for making quick sandwiches or half cooked delicacies from the supermarket that only ask for some oven time. It is either that or copious use of stove cleaning, tile brightening, odor removing, nose burning and eye stinging liquids at rigorous work that keep them new. They are furnished with cupboards that have anorexia. In fact, I know of one desi family, that uses a part of their bedroom to store sacks of rice and pulses!

The house we found follows much the same road map but has been designed with some clever quirks. Inside, we got three bedrooms instead of the usual two, something almost unheard of in this neighborhood. A kitchen with smart cupboards and hidden spaces that could hold all the ingredients for a good Indian feast, which is saying something because I use three different kinds of rice, four types of flours, a plethora of spices and some vessels and edibles imported from the loving kitchens of my mother and mother-in-law. To this compact, well-thought dwelling, we added our own essentials, a roomy bathtub, an extra toilet and the quintessential Indian bidet shower for a luxurious morning clean up.  

But what really drew us to this house were the front garden and spacious, tree filled backyard that transported me to the pre-apartment era of India.

Finding the perfect house is like finding the perfect partner. Most good ones are taken anyway. But, jokes apart, they are seldom ideal and when you do find that one house/person, even faults look beautiful. At least for the first few years.

The best part? We are all geared up to live the Indian summer in Netherlands, complete with hammocks, clothes-drying and poppadam making!

(The content and opinions on this blog are mine alone and do not intend to hurt anyone)