Siesling

Jan Laurens is born in ‘s-Gravenhage (Den Haag, The Hague), Netherlands. Address: Petuniaplein 8 (attic)

Mother: Ruurdje Paulina Maria (Rudie) van der Meer mamma

Father: Martinus (Mart) Siesling pappa
Sister: Maartje Margaretha Hermien (Marieke), born 06/13/1950

Move to Guntersteinweg 457 (ground floor), Den Haag,
Sister: Jannigje Theresa (Janneke) born 03/22/1954
Sister: Martine Ruurdje (Martrude) born 04/29/1956

Move to Perenstraat 157 (third floor), Den Haag

Enters elementary school: Victor Rutgersschool, Mient, Den
Haag, five minutes’ walk (run) from home. This school was of the
relatively orthodox Reformed Christian Church (Gereformeerd)

Teachers:

1. juffrouw Baalbergen

2. juffrouw De Boer

3. juffrouw Schouten

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Sister: Gerdine Maaike (Gerdine) born 11/11/1959

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4. mijnheer De Vries

5. mijnheer De Vries
6. mijnheer Kramer

Enters ‘s-Gravenhaags Christelijk Gymnasium, Sweelinckplein, Den Haag. In 1965 the school moved to a new building, and became Christelijk Gymnasium Sorghvliet.

In the Dutch secondary school system then, the “intellectual elite” of the elementary school (+ 1-2 % of the population would pass the exam for the gymnasium or the high school where Latin and Greek were central in the curriculum. It gave six years later admission to the university. In the city, there were two gymnasiums, maybe the best of the nation, this one being for the Christian population of The Hague. The director of it was Mr. Vels Heijn.
Some teachers remembered: Latin and Greek – Den Dulk, Wynia, Wolf, de Meyere; Dutch language: Nauta, Hissink; History: Nannen, Nauta. Geography: Mrs. Baalbergen, French: De Fries; Engels: Miss John; German: Van Gent; Physics: Maclean; Math: Keuzekamp; Biology: Mrs. De Vries; Arts: Mrs. Renkema; Sports: De Man; Chemistry (shame: I forgot his name, not his height) … and others. With my friends Erik Bloemen, Johan de Bakker and Frans Koolschijn, I enrolled in an afterhours course of Hebrew taught by Dr. Van Deursen who came twice a week for us guys all the way from Brussels, where he taught at the university. He advised me to study theology. He was right, but I could not do so, because of my strict orthodox Christian education. The gymnasium ended in a fork, 5th and 6th years were either language stressed (α) or science stressed (β). I chose β, considered the more difficult direction.

Passes the final encompassing exam.

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I was not a brilliant student, and I hated most schoolwork, or I hated to be judged all day. I spent a lot of time in sports, gymnastics, basketball, tennis, table tennis; I was the champion and the “president” of the tennis club and of the table tennis club of the school, a big organization. I was not afraid to speak in public or in class, to make my classmates laugh, make fun of teachers (they had to laugh themselves), loved debate, and wrote some pieces for the school journal (AVE). I had good friends, I often spend long afternoons with them. Still I was rather melancholic, spent time in the parks, on my bike, or on the beach, alone. Later hitchhiking to unknown places. I disliked school and found all the materials in school difficult to learn, in a lesser degree the modern languages. Poetry struck me, and I knew that only poetry could save me in the end. It did. I was weak in Latin and Greek, which was the reason for my choice of science, but I was weak in the sciences, too. Well, anyway I passed the exam nicely, with the highest score of the school in poetry. And in math, that I suddenly had begun to understand. After that exam, I felt free for the rest of his life. I was.

Enters at the Vrije Universiteit (Free University), in Amsterdam. Free means here: Protestant Christian    . For Siesling it was for Amsterdam, for his parents it was for the Free. Siesling’s choice of study had been philosophy; his parents’ was art history, so it would be art history.