Hot Danish is continually trying to give up smoking. Allen Carr’s bestseller lies, half-read, by his bedside. ‘I’m not a quitter,’ he quips when he can’t resist the urge to light up.

Natasha could not live with a smoker. However, she recently discovered that Maria, her new 40-something Spanish flatmate, may have a worse habit… ‘Did you realise that you are in the minority if you don’t take drugs?’ Maria said.
‘Yes, I know I’ve been in the minority for a long time,’ Natasha replied.
‘Even my dentist takes drugs,’ Maria continued. Just as Natasha was beginning to wonder where the conversation was heading Maria admitted that her recent mood swings had been the consequence of her fondness for the hard stuff.

Natasha’s new Dutch friend Bas has also revealed his drug-taking tendencies during regular nights out with his nieces. ‘I only take hard drugs occasionally though,’ he said [an average of twice per week]. This preceded his sweeping generalisation of Dutch women. ‘They all expect men to pay for them but there are two main types of Dutch ladies: the ones who work really hard and whom you never meet anyway (because they are hidden away in their offices); and the party girls who want a rich man but don’t want a career – these girls usually age prematurely and end up single.’ (Someone once said something similar about women from my hometown on the South coast of the UK except that instead of one type of woman being a workaholic, the non-party girls simply leave my hometown.)

Having previously worked in finance in London, Natasha isn’t easily fazed by drug revelations – a former colleague used to keep a wrap behind the cistern in the gents’ and disappeared frequently throughout the day. But as writer Rodney Bolt* said in The Xenophobe’s Guide to the Dutch, ‘ Tolerance is not simply a virtue, it is a national duty.’

‘I don’t take cocaine,’ my very tolerant mother once said. ‘I can’t afford to,’ she continued. Perhaps non-drug users really are in the minority.

*Cue shameless plug: Rodney Bolt will be speaking at the next Off The Shelf event in Amsterdam on Thursday 11 July 2013.