Aukje de Vries' Diary Day 41

The weather is not too bad today, so after getting some groceries I go by bike to the market in a neighbouring town. Actually it is one conurbation, so it is hardly noticeable that I go from one community to the next. Voorburg has a lively Saturday market and a very pleasant shopping street, so it is nice to go there.

In the evening Esther comes over for a cup of coffee and she brings a treat: Bossche bollen! Yummy!

We look at some excursions and some more plays that we want to see and we decide when we will do what.

Aukje de Vries' Diary Day 40

During the morning and afternoon nothing special happens other than that I receive a phone call about one of the organisations I am active in. There are problems and my opinion is asked about how to solve them. This gives me some food for thought for the weekend.

This is the day when Esther and I go to see the play recently written and performed by an older actor (in his mid seventies). Before we go there we have a leisurely meal in town, around the corner from the theatre.

The senior actor and the other main character, who is only slightly younger, do a marvellous job.

The actor in the play is (like in the actor’s real life) a famous actor who has played all the important roles in the well known repertory but now he is worrying about his forgetfulness. In the play we learn that he has led a rather wild life, his daughter has had a very rough time with her bohemian parents. Her mother now has Alzheimer’s disease and she must take care of her, which drives her crazy. She has also become an actor, but not a very good one in her father’s opinion. The second main character has also been an actor (in reality and in the play), but in the play he was not good enough to remain an actor so he became a prompter. Due to modern techniques prompters are no longer needed, so he feels like a misfit. In the dialogues there is a lot about the changes in the world of the theatre. Prompters are said to be better and cheaper than the new technical devices. The end of the play is quite surprising! In the hall of the theatre there is a display of pictures and photographs made by the two senior actors, which are quite good!

Don’t tell me that older people are not creative!

Aukje de Vries' Diary Day 39

I do find the information about buurtservices and this is exactly what is lacking when there is only buurtzorg, but buurtservices have not yet been established in our neighbourhood.

There is little to tell about the rest of the day. I do some desk work, go out for a walk, watch TV and read the newspaper. The only interesting thing is that I receive an invitation for a seminar on older volunteers which will take place in Brussels and is organised by the European Commission.

Aukje de Vries' Diary Day 38

Today we meet again with the neighbourhood group. We have noticed that “buurtzorg” (neighbourhood care) has had quite a bit of publicity since our last meeting. We all hope it will grow quickly, because we believe this is the right formula: both the clients and the nurses are much more satisfied with this kind of care and it is not more expensive but rather cheaper than the extremely rationalised care given by very large bureaucratic but commercial home care organisations.

We also have heard that Mea Vita will go bankrupt, but that its work will be taken over by two other organisations, one a cleaning firm that will do the house work (so this is no longer considered as a social service) and another organisation that will do the rest of the work of Mea Vita.

Some of us come up with new stories of older people having been discharged from hospital and sent home without any help.

We don’t think that there is much more to do for us to promote the work of buurtzorg than to have it mentioned in publications of the church and the neighbourhood association and to inform the committee on the elderly of the neighbourhood association.

Some of us have more information about what is going on in our neighbourhood. It seems that the municipality is organising a meeting beginning March to hear the views of the inhabitants in our part of town about wellbeing, in its broadest sense: it seems to cover almost everything: work, income, education, health, “liveability” (I am sorry I cannot explain this term), care and recreation. Only one of us has received the invitation, which is amazing. Those of us who can attend will do so. We discuss whether there are urgent issues to bring forward in the meeting and we decide that one of the great shortcomings in care is that the whole structure of everything that has been organised in this sector is so complicated that it is nearly impossible to find your way in it. Older people who need help do not know where to find it. The different agencies, involved in supporting older people are so many that it takes almost a professional to arrange for a care package that satisfies all the needs of a dependent person. The problem is that many older people, once they need help, are too weak and not sufficiently assertive to go and seek in the maze of care organisations the services they need and to convince the agencies that they need them now. In our neighbourhood there are many older people living alone who do not have children or younger relatives or friends who can do this for them, because many live quite isolated. Aren’t there really any agencies which can do this for them? It is amazing how many agencies we know between the five of us, each doing something, but, as far as we know there is no agency that is able to help individuals get the care they need and to monitor its adequacy over time. So this is one of the issues we will bring forward in this meeting. We also regret that we do not have an easily accessible community centre that is open all the time and where you can go for a cup of coffee, where you find information about activities in the neighbourhood and the city and where groups can meet. There is one, small accommodation of the neighbourhood association, but it let a lot of the time and it is not a centre where one can just drop in. Another issue is that public transportation leaves a lot to be desired.

When I get home I hear on the radio that there has been a terrible plane crash near Amsterdam. Nine people have died and many have been wounded. It is unclear what has caused the crash, but the news on radio and TV is mostly about the crash all day long.

In the afternoon I call the civil servant who organises the meeting in our neighbourhood, telling him that I want to attend. It is a strange conversation. He wants the addresses of the people of our small group, but even if I tell him, that the invitation has been copied so we all have it, he keeps repeating this question. He also does not seem to realise that not yet everyone in the city has internet. After a while he calls me back (unexpectedly and without mentioning his name), saying he was not at his desk during the earlier phone call, but he has returned to his desk, so he can better answer me now. We repeat the same conversation once more, but finally I gather there are more papers than what I have seen and he will forward these to me. The municipality has sent the invitations only to the people whose names are known to them as people involved in some activities. Strange criterion!

In the evening I read in the national newspaper another article about buurtzorg and the news that there is a similar organisation (buurtservices) now for home help on a neighbourhood scale. There are several pilots in The Netherlands, but not yet in The Hague. I will have to go to the internet and find out what he state of affairs is.