LL-L "Commemoration" 2003.01.30 (07) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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From: Friedrich-Wilhelm Neumann <Friedrich-Wilhelm.Neumann at epost.de>
Subject: LL-L "Commemorations" 2003.01.30 (01) [E]

Hi, Wim,

You wrote:

> From: Wim <wkv at home.nl>
> Subject: dates
>
> Hi!
>
> This weekend it's 50 years ago that we had the great flood in Zealand.
> Here in the Netherlands.
> Maybe a date to remember: Saturday 31 of January 1953.  The sea had
> great influence here in the Low Countries all through the ages.

A very good idea to remember that.

I I myself had to go through two floods here at the mouth of the Elbe- a.d.
Febr. 1962 and Jan. 1976.

Though the first one (Ron did experience it, too) had more victims,
specially in Hamburg, I did survive the 1976-one just by being a good
swimmer.
But- as I have to confess- I had been a little bit reckless, at that time.

Regards

Fiete.

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Folklore

Fiete (above):

> Though the first one (Ron did experience it, too) had more victims,
specially in Hamburg,

That's right.  The 1962 flood (wasn't it in February?) was devastating, and
traumatizing for youngsters (of which I was one then), with gas pipes
leaking under water, diseases spreading overnight, and bodies floating in
streets for weeks afterwards, most of them eventually lost as the water
receded into the North Sea.   We lived on a Hamburg river island that was
hardest hit, only a 20-minute walk from one of the huge breaks in the dyke.
My father was in the hospital, and I was "tha man" in the house (at least I
thought I was), feeling obligated to feed my mother, sisters and baby
brother -- wading through filthy, freezing water, standing wet and shaking
in lines for hours, not returning home before I had scraped up some food.
(Once I got a ride back in a helicopter by a soldier who thought I had no
business being out there, so I was thrilled I got home in style.)  It was
the first time I experienced that people can be good and bad neighbors; so
there was a valuable lesson in that.  Scarcity of commodities made some
people into monsters, while others would show their best and heroic sides,
the latter including our neighbors in Denmark, the Netherlands and the
United Kingdom, to name just a few -- yes, also many people in Canada and
the United States.

It has been said that floods or the threat of floods has forged the minds
and cultures of the people of the Lowlands, certainly those living along the
Lowlands North Sea shores and on the islands, and those living along the
Lower Elbe banks, to various degrees also those living on the Baltic Sea
Coasts.  Just think how often the words _dijk_ and _diek_ ('dyke') are
mentioned in the Lowlands language varieties, how often they occur in place
names, and how many subcategories of dykes there are!  Surely there must be
a lot of relevant old-time technology, folklore, literature and tradition
that we could tap into here.  The North Sea has been seen both as a great
benefactor and as a great threat.  Why, it even has a nickname in Lowlands
Saxon (Low German): _(de) blanke Hans_ 'White John' (probably originally
referring to white foam on top of breakers during wind storms).

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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