Celebrating Connections: Ben Coates

The Celebrating Connections Podcast is a short series of podcasts celebrating the amazing things happening on either side of the North Sea. The podcast series features a group of exceptional people who are writing a new chapter in Anglo-Dutch relations. Dutch people living and working in the UK and British people making a name for themselves in the Netherlands. The series explores what it takes to move from the countries they grew up in, and thrive in the countries they came to call home. The podcast is hosted by Nick Heath, Britain’s Deputy Ambassador to the Netherlands.
Writer of the books 'Why The Dutch Are Different' and 'The Rhine: Following Europe’s Greatest River from Amsterdam to the Alps' Ben Coates, tells Nick about how he ended up in the Netherlands in the first place. Now with a wife and a young baby, he has settled fully into the Netherlands. Ben takes us back to the process writing a book that gives a honest look at what makes the Dutch so typical. Through historical and geographical descriptions, this Brit gives shape to the identity of the Dutch.