Dreaming in Dollywood: Why Hindi films and Hindustani identity are popular in Netherlands
“Bollywood families approximate the cultural values of my household,” 22-year-old Veenanand Soebhag said candidly, as we talked about Indian cinema on a windy spring evening at Leiden University’s campus.
Soebhag was a second generation Surinamese Hindustani who lived in the political capital of the Netherlands. His favorite actor - for that moment [he clarified] - was Ranbir Kapoor for his performance in Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani.
Although we were enjoying the discussion on our unlikely similarities, Soebhag had to be with his girlfriend who had been waiting for him for over 15 minutes. “These Dutchies are really conscious about time,” he informed me casually.
But before departing, he reminded me of the clichés that were most famous among the Indian diaspora living in the Netherlands: that Bollywood did not have a European parallel and that Indians needed to work on their understanding of time.
Despite being surrounded by a disparate Northern European milieu, Soebhag still appeared to embrace the roots of his forefathers - a trait that was representative of his community. With changing times, however, his community faced new challenges in both continuing and promoting its culture.
Hindustanis in Holland
Soebhag belongs to a community of 1,60,000 Surinamese Hindustanis in the Netherlands - most of whom are dispersed in the urban neighbourhoods of Transvaal and Schildersweijk in The Hague.
These neighbourhoods continue to have several Indian stores for both food and clothing. This cosmopolitan feature of the city is a consequence of the influx of Hindustani migrants in the 1970s; the decade when Surinam gained independence from its Dutch colonisers.
 |
| The 1952 blockbuster Aan surfaced in the country in the late 1950s when the initial Hindustanis arrived there. |
Brought to Surinam as contractual workers in sugar plantations, the Hindustanis then travelled to Northern Europe post independence in search of better circumstances.
Bollywood, however, emerged even earlier in the Netherlands. The 1952 blockbuster Aan surfaced in the country in the late 1950s when the initial Hindustanis arrived here.
The reel was a part of the inventory of “homesick items” - a list that included items local to Surinam - not available in the cold Dutch climate. The reel signified the attempt of the first few Hindustanis to both preserve and develop their identity in a completely new context.
In the 1970s, however, Bollywood witnessed an unseen surge in popularity in the country. From a single reel, Bollywood’s reach proliferated to new scales due to fascinating reasons.
At the time, not only did the new Hindustanis establish popular Bollywood film societies for bringing the community together, but the Dutch government also initiated a programme of Hindi film screenings to encourage the broader goal of multiculturalism.
The following decade then witnessed the appearance of videotheeks (video stores) exclusively for the Hindustani market. Presently, Bollywood is also gaining traction among Turkish and Moroccan communities settled in the country, which keeps these videotheeks in business.
This interaction among different migrant communities in turn enables the development of positive social capital - extending to cultural exchanges of not only food and music, but also of language and thought.
Walking into a Surinamese Eathuis
On walking into a Surinamese Eathuis (restaurant), when I had just arrived in the city, everyone inside gathered around me with his/her drinks to enquire about the latest Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan canards.
The two stars hold a special meaning for the Hindustanis as they had both performed on Paan Banaras Waala - a song that was linguistically closer to the Bhojpuri loaded Sarnami.
This influence of Bhojpuri on the Sarnami language is traced to the origin of most Hindustanis in the North Indian plains of UP and Bihar. Over time, the language has developed interesting characteristics - due to the Hindustanis’ proximity with Bollywood, The Hague is also referred to as Dollywood in Sarnami lexicon.
Most Hindustani festivals and weddings in Dollywood play the latest Hindi hits; dance bars in Hindustani neighbourhoods attract the Surinamese youth. Many young denizens of Dollywood also aspire to work in the Hindi film industry, yet are aware of the fact that entry into it can be acquired only through connections.
But while Bollywood is popular among the Hindustanis, it does not necessarily enjoy universal favourability among the community’s youth. Upon asking a Hindustani acquaintance his views on Bollywood music, he was quick to let me know that western hip-hop was his only preference. In addition, such events tend to be insulated from the larger Dutch populace that enjoys Hindi films.
Fusion - a solution to the problem?
The Hindustanis perhaps attempted to bridge this distance between its current cultural context and their native land by recreating popular Hindi songs in Dutch and Surinamese style.
A prime example is the groovy remix of the 1997 song Kya hua tera wada by "2famous The Jetlag". Although the song emulates Mohammed Rafi’s charming Hindi melody, it incorporates a mixed Sarnami-Dutch-English rap.
A YouTube comment on the song in Dutch captures the Hindustani community’s sentimental relationship with Bollywood: “Dit is een 2011 versie en van dezetijd. En natuurlijkniemand is beterdan Rafi. Alleendeze past beter in onzetijd en is nietverkeerdgezongen” [Of course no one is better than Rafi, but this song only fits our time better].
Bibliography
Verstappen, Sanderien, and Mario Rutten. "Bollywood and the Indian Diaspora: Reception of Indian Cinema Among Hindustani Youth in The Netherlands." In Global Indian Diasporas: Exploring Trajectories of Migration and Theory, 212-30.