All over the world, the Netherlands (or Holland, as some may prefer) is renowned for its tolerance of prostitution and soft drug; providing methadone to heroin addicts (as a ways to help them become clean or as a ‘maintenance dose’).
Now, the Amsterdam East district has come up with a way to deal with the many, oftentimes disruptive, alcoholics in the Oosterpark. They ask the alcoholics to clean up the park and it surroundings for a day and in exchange they will get 5 cans of beer, €10,-, half a package of rolling tobacco and a hot meal. At 9 o’clock in the morning the participants convene and are allowed to drink two cans of beer. They’ll get two more during their afternoon break and another one when they’ve finished working. Right now they even have a waiting list at the district for people who would like to participate in the project.
The participants realize that this project may be frowned upon by a lot of outsiders. But, as one of them says, he’s unable to function without alcohol and in this way he drinks less in a day and at the end of that day feels he has contributed by cleaning the streets.
I tend to agree with him. As a Dutch saying goes: “Children and drunken people always tell the truth.”
