Alles is liefde

Sinterklaasavond is the eve before Sinterklaas returns back to Spain. On this night, the Holy St. Nicolaas pays every household a visit, and leaves a gift for those good people who deserve the best things in life.

Even my office closed early today, and by 4 pm the streets were packed with cars as people rush home on this Dutch version of Christmas Eve. The tradition is that you put your shoe next to the fireplace, and by the morning, surprise, surprise you will get goodies. By 4pm, everyone had already left the office, but I stayed behinda bit longer...



I had bought some sweets and chocolates letters, and tip-toed around the office and putting it on the desk of my colleagues. It's something I do every single year to friends. I secretly give them a chocolate... sometimes simply by putting it through their mailbox, or placing it in a place they'd find it, or by sending it to people who live in another country anonymously. I don't really want anything in return, and I don't expect anything either... To me it's just good fun, and I like to think of the pleasant sweet surprise people get when they receive an anonymous gift. Spreading the love, if you will...

Yet, stil, on this evening when family gather around a warm fireplace, when dreams and wishes are made and fulfilled, when loved ones thank one another for all the happiness and warmth they give one another, it is lonely being alone.

After I delivered a gift to a special friend who has helped me a lot in the past year, I wasn't sure what to do next. It was around seven, and the streets were deserted, and cold. And it rained too, making it seem even more dreary. I went into a restaurant and had a cheap meal of Indonesian food, and then wandered the streets a bit more...



Then I saw something as I walked past the cinema. A poster for the movie "Alles is liefde" (Everything is love). I've heard about it for sometime, and knew that it was a Dutch movie based more or less on the original "Love Actually", which is a romantic comedy based around Christmas, when miraculous the most miraculous consequences occur, and strangers find one another and find love. The big difference with the Dutch version of this movie is that it has a gay couple, who kiss a number of times and even get married. Thanks to Dutch open-mindedness...

To be honest, at first, I was a bit uncomfortable going to the cinema alone, especially watching a movie that is about love and falling in love. All around me in that cinema hall, where around a hundred people, couples, families, young and old, and it seemed like I was the only one there all alone. But when the movie started, I blended into the dark and didn't mind too much any more.

The story-line is simple. Set in Amsterdam, around the time of Sinterklaas, and random people meeting by chance find one another, while others rekindle their love and rediscover one another's feelings for one another.... about families coming together again after troubles, and about a long lost son who discovers his long lost dad... It's sappy and romantic, the kind of things that you can easily lable 'movie magic', and the kind of coincidences that could only occur on a big white screen... Even so, this movie made me wipe away tears from the corners of my eyes. It was so touching for some reason, even though it was stereotypical, it touched me so much, because it embraced many of the dreams and ideas I live and long for...

"When you're young, you'll believe anything. Spinach will give you muscles, your father is the strongest man in the Netherlands, and Sinterklaas is real. But there will be a day that you look at the man's shoes and think... wait a minute, those are my fathers shoes. You always suspected something like that but it's all getting through to you now. It's nonsense to believe there's a man with a long white beard in Spain who takes the steam-boat to the Netherlands every year to put something in your shoe. And another thing, spinach won't give you muscles, The Netherlands will never win the world cup and you won't marry your teacher.

You will get older and more miserable. The only moments in life that you feel the same like you did back then are the moments you love someone. Truly love someone. Everything that is stupid or hurts falls away. Love is all and we have to keep believing that. So what if we all together decided; Sinterklaas is real. We'll still know that we'll have to buy the presents ourselves but it's the thought that counts. That we keep believing that it can still work out for us, with love. Because love is like Sinterklaas, you have to believe it, because else it's all lost."

It sums up my thoughts very well... and the actors, many of them famous, bring the dialogue and comedy and romance alive. Love is out there, to be found and unwrapped, like a special gift you have been waiting and wishing for, and will eventually receive. Even after disappointments, even if people let you down or don't give you the same in return, you have patience. Little gestures, little words, little glances, little moves... not just the love between lovers, but also between friends and family, between strangers too.

Because love is everywhere, and everything is love.

"If it's about love, then sooner or later we're all too lat. It's about those tiny happy moments in between. Moments when everything just about then fall precise into their places."