The boas

Virtually everyone working in or around public transport I found helpful but the station staff and Dutch boas were especially lovely. 

I first encountered them at Amsterdam centraal. Are they station staff? I checked with Pieter months later: I don’t think so, he said, looking at one of the photos of the guys checking my tyres - carrying cuffs is not for everyone. I hadn’t even noticed the cuffs.  

Then he sent me the translated explanation of a boa:

F: How interesting. So they could move between environments, perhaps?

P: No... not exactly. Each of them is a boa, meaning they have certain power (to write fines, investigate, make arrests... although citizens can do that too)

F: Oh, but if you're a train boa you stay on the trains?

P: In certain professions you need the possibility to "maintain the law" to a certain degree. Those professionals will need a BOA certificate. Accordingly, to make maintaining easier and clearer to the public, they usually wear some kind of uniform as well. Forest guards, train inspectors, parking inspectors all fall in this category.

F: Oh, so a boa is not a profession, it is an accreditation for certain professions?

P: Indeed.

In Amsterdam Central station in August I approached three staff on the barriers about taking my bike on the train.  They told me you can take your bike on an Intercity type train (off peak and in July/August). I had a €6 supplement for my bike but was already through the barrier. They scanned my tickets for me. The hired bike was a real workhorse, big and heavy, built to withstand...everything.  Whereas fifteen years ago I used to lug, daily, a heavy bike up and down a fire escape in London these days I avoid it if I can. I asked the men how I could get up to the platform. One of the guys carried the bike up the escalator for me past the sign saying “No bikes”. Another came with him. At they top they hadn’t finished. 

- Is your bike hired? they said. 

- Yes, I said, surprised. 

- Are you coming back today?

- Yes. 

- We are going to check your tyre pressure for you. 

 They seemed to use a kind of app on the phone belonging to one of them. I wasn’t sure whether to believe this but they seemed in earnest. They seemed satisfied. 

- Is this a service for tourists? I said thinking I might tease them into confession of a joke. 

- Yes said the younger guy, seriously. 

- Do you check everyone’s tyres, or just tourists? I asked bemused. 

- Only the people we like, he said with a grin which made me wonder again. 

This was starting to feel like gallantry which I enjoy as much as the next girl though it struck me as at odds with Dutch ideas of independence and equality. 

It didn’t end then with a courteous nod and a turn on their heel. They went to see about getting my bike on the train. One of the other cyclists on board seemed to be saying the train was full but by now I had complete faith in these modern day urban knights. Sure enough they arranged for someone to fold up a bike. Suddenly there were three fully sized and two folding bikes on board and I was ushered on by these, to me, heroes of the Dutch transport system. I felt very spoilt and very grateful! 

The second encounter was at Leiden station on I think the same day. The guy on the right in the top photo is well known on the Dutch dance scene. He organises cheap dance trips all over the world. He and I had found we shared ideas about how the commercialisation of learning to dance tango was unnecessary, harmful and exploitative. It was so rare for both of us to find someone who also saw this that we were surprised and delighted. 

We were both travelling on after the Leiden afternoon milonga (review) to the Amersfoort evening milonga (review) by bike and train. We asked, separately for information about our different trains home later - Frank in Dutch and I in English.   Then we got the lift down to the exit level.

There was the same guy who had given us the information upstairs now hurrying down the stairs towards us, smiling, a little awkwardly, evidently with some query about which he seemed a bit bashful. He spoke to Frank in Dutch. I was deeply curious. What did this tall, handsome young guy  - Wim - want to know? He explained a bit in English that in his job he met and saw a lot of people but we were different in manner. He wanted to know where it came from. 

Afterwards I asked Frank again what exactly Wim said he thought we had but Frank said precisely he didn’t name it, being no more specific than “something about us”.  Clearly he thought it was something good.  It had been a nice afternoon. I suppose we had an openness, a freedom, a happiness about us.   Evidently, we were not a couple being unconventional heights, uncouplelike and asking for separate trains. 

I think Wim asked if we had a particular belief because I remember laughing and that we said we had been dancing Argentine tango, that it can have this effect and that it does change people.  We invited him to the milonga later when he finished work to see for himself.  He looked like he was thinking about it but we never saw him again.

Should my family ever move to the Netherlands, given my experiences so far I would say to my children: model yourselves on these guys: alert, curious, enquiring, polite, smiling, courteous, helpful.