KRUPUK - MUCH MORE THAN JUST SHRIMP CHIPS, DEPENDING ON WHOSE MOUTH THEY ARE IN

Back in 2007, when Dovbear was on vacation, I briefly guestposted on his blog.

Not being in any way averse to cannibalizing myself, especially after an interval of four years, that guestpost is now below.


http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2007/08/creative-dutch-invent-new-nasty-slur.html


CREATIVE DUTCH INVENT NEW NASTY SLUR

The Dutch language is sodden with slurs and insults. We speakers of Dutch are not known for our subtlety.

A sampling of Dutch terms of misaffection will be illustrative:
Kut-Marokkaan = “Erva-Moroccan” (generic term for any North-African).
Kanker-Jood = Cancerous Jew (generic term for a Jew).
Klote-Jenk = Testicle American (again, a generic term – applies to either gender).

There are many more. Some, like the extremely long list of insulting sixteenth century terms for the different types of German, are scatological. Some are heretical.
Some sneering, and repulsive.

Such as this recent one: Kroepoek
Pronunciation ‘crew-pewk’. Diminutive: kroepoekje - 'crew-pewk-yuh’.

[Krupuk is a crispy snack cracker made of tapioca flour (manioc or cassava starch), seafood flavourings, salt and spices, kneaded to a dough, rolled into a snake shape, sliced thinly across, and dried in the sun. The resultant chips are deepfried when needed – they swell up enormously. They are very popular in South-East Asia and Holland. Called ‘shrimp-chip’ in English. Most are not kosher. There are also entirely vegetarian 'shrimp chips', but I do not know the brand names or whether they are even imported. Sorry.]

As the term applies to a human, what is meant is an attractive woman of partly or entirely Dutch East Indies ancestry, especially one to have a brief and exploitative affair with; a tasty little snack of a woman, but not the kind you would marry. The term is both racist and sexist. And, if you think about it, additionally offensive on so many different levels.


BACKGROUND

Indos are people of an Indonesian background, often of mixed race - Dutch mixed with Malay types or Chinese. They were citizens of the Netherlands, who after Indonesian independence either voluntarily "repatriated" to a country they had never seen , or were later chased out.
In the fifties and sixties, most Indos were self-effacing, and did their very best to assimilate. They were ashamed of their Indischkeit, and spoke excellent proper Dutch in public and at work. Maybe at home they spoke Petshaw, Betawi, or Malay, but they did not want their children to speak it. They were the perfect immigrant group.

Now their children and grandchildren are exploring what it means to be ‘different’. And what it means to have inherited non-standard cultural traits. They do not keep quiet when sneered at, they talk back when patronized, they object to stereotypes.
They are no longer quietly just like ‘everybody else’.

Everybody-else does not like this one bit. It somehow feels like a devaluation of everybody else, and of everybody else's values, or a deliberate insult. Everybody else has a remarkably fragile ego and a tendency to act pissy.


Now, while the point of this may seem to be that majority behaviours show similarities in different countries, especially if you are in the deep South or Rotterdam - and if you wish to read that into this, please do - what I am really doing by posting this is expressing my displeasure at Dutch attitudes.
I expected much better from them, dammit. Buncha farty kaaskoppen.


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