Trivia

A special square

In Amsterdam there is a square called Jonas Daniël Meijerplein. It contains several elements connected to my life. Jonas and Daniël are the names of two of my sons. My grandfather (and my mother) are called Lugtmeier. On the square is the statue of the ‘Dokwerker’ to commemorate a strike during WWII against the Nazi razes. My grandparents on my mothers side helped to save Jews. Another greatgrandfather of Jonas was one of the Jews that died.

The same grandfather helped my mother to kidnap me back on 4th of May 1972, the day that Dutch people remember the people who died during WWII.

Haunted by rich people

The name of my second father is Rijk Roele. When my mother married him she became Marijke Roelie Roele Lugtmeier. They bought a house in the Esther-De-Boer-van-Rijkstraat. Rijk is a Dutch word for ‘rich’. The co-author of the Book of Needs is named Matthew Rich-Tolsma.

Notice the big HUG in my name

My first name contains two hugs. In text messages xoxox is used for kisses and hugs.

Playing in secondary school

In my final year at secondary school I wrote 50 minutes of comedy sketches and songs, which were performed during 4 nights for the entire school. One text was rejected by one of my Dutch language teachers, because it was ‘too much literary’.

The music for the songs was made by our music teacher Klaver. He tried the songs out at home. That became a bit weird, when his 3-year old daughter started to sing: "I want suicide, do you want suicide, yes, we all want suicide." The song was later censored and made into 'I want split pea soup, do you want split pea soup, yes we all want split pea soup."

Since I was in my final year, I was not allowed to play at the school play. Outside of school I played my first improtheatre show.