The World Cup this year did me a great favor: People stopped asking about my trip to Scandinavia, to visit Denmark. Because the Netherlands made it to the World Cup finals, more people–friends, co-workers, family–stopped confusing the Dutch with other people. They had at least a little bit of new knowledge about the Dutch: They’re good at soccer, and they love to wear orange.
What is the deal with all the orange, anyway? Their flag is red, white, and blue. So how does that explain their love of orange, as in this apartment complex, festooned with the colors of a traffic cone?