International students queue for 7 hours to register in Amsterdam

Hundreds of international students queued for up to seven hours on the Bos en Lommerplein on Wednesday to register with the municipality of Amsterdam. The guard closed the line at 10:00 a.m. with some 500 people waiting. Anyone who showed up after that couldn’t be helped on Wednesday, Parool reports.

The Dutch universities and universities of applied sciences start their lectures next week. International students need to register with their municipality for a citizen service number within five days of arrival in the Netherlands. They need the number to open a bank account and take out health insurance, among other basic necessities.

Amsterdam expects 8,000 new international students this year, a spokesperson for the municipality told Parool. They can only register at the Amsterdam West city counter on Bos en Lommerplein. The city set 20 days aside for this, divided between the University of Amsterdam and VU University Amsterdam. Students can’t make an appointment in advance.

In general, the registration has been running smoothly. But on Wednesday, waiting times increased to seven hours, sometimes in the drizzle. “When I get home later, I will put on dry clothes and drink wine,” a student from South Africa told Parool. A Mexican student wondered why you can register digitally for everything except this. “Even in Poland, this would be better organized,” Lena from Poland told the newspaper.

Parool spoke to a student who missed work to stand in the line on Wednesday. Another ended up leaving the queue empty-handed after hours of waiting so he wouldn’t miss the introductory meeting at the university.

A spokesperson for responsible alderman Hester van Buren told Parool that the long waiting times were due to six employees calling in sick on the same day. Other Amsterdammers weren’t affected. The students are helped in a separate room.