Translated/adapted from the Groninger dialect. The story, entitled: "Juffraauw Roozendoal," was published on www.dideldom.com under the name of Jan Prak, Sense's pseudonym.

During the early WWII years I attended a kindergarten next to the christian elementary school located on the Hoogklei Street in Winschoten. The kindergarten itself was a new addition to the Hoogklei School which didn't look like a school at all. It looked like a two-storey warehouse. No central heating. The classrooms had tall windows and were individually heated with large, black stoves. This was my world as a child. I still see all the details of the school and playground before me. The school was built on a bit of a hill (hoog=high, klei=clay). Down below, behind the school, were the covered bicycle sheds and further down were the outhouses, for girls and boys. When one "had to go," you stuck your finger in the air, and when the teacher said: "Go," you went outside in hail snow, rain or sunshine to one of the outhouses. No running water, no flushing away of anything. Just large containers which were positioned under a wooden seat with an adequate hole in it.

Hoogklei was one of the Winschoter schools requisitioned by the greedy Germans. We all had to get out. The school board decided the kindergarten had to be transferred to a facility on the Oudewerfslaan, quite a ways from our house. I guess my siblings walked me there each day.

Miss Roozendaal taught at both the Hoogklei School and the Oudewerfslaan School. She probably was one of the best and most beloved teachers these schools ever had. Even today, many old timers affectionately remember her. She had that uncanny ability to tell stories from the Bible that would become alive. The kids sat around her, totally spellbound , bright-eyed with flushed cheeks. And, believe it or not, as I did as a child- and even today - I somehow do connect areas around Winschoten with certain Bible stories. Sounds crazy, eh?

When Miss Roozendaal told us about ol' Father Abraham standing there with a knife about to kill his only son Isaac...or about Joseph in Egypt land finally telling his Dad and brothers who he really was...or how Moses felt when he faced the mighty Pharaoh...all those events happened close by, was it not? They made a deep impression on us....

Did Father Jacob and his sons not wander around the moors of Boertange? And did our Lord Jesus not walk on the stormy waters of the lake near Zuidlaren?

David and Goliath

There is an area in my hometown called St. Vitusholt. As kids we often played on the land of farmer Ufkes who lived on the St. Vitusholt. Yes, we did occasionaly fill our pockets with an apple or pear. Furious, farmer Ufkes would chase us calling us - those miserable "Gereformeerde" (Reformed) boys - every name in the book. Between the St. Vitusholt and a little hamlet, called Napels, was a large tract of land, some of which was farmed but most of it was desolate and empty. The train from Winschoten to Groningen passed Napels. We never dared to go there, because Moe (Mom) said the place was full of bandits and "roeg volk" (dirty people).

Little David, the later king of Israel, wandered around this vast area every day. He looked after the sheep of his father Jesse. Sometimes he'd lose one and then he would go after it and find it. It happened once that he saw a lion attack a sheep. Fearlessly, David approached the lion, grabbed the sheep, and killed the lion. One day he killed a bear about to devour a lamb.

It was the time that Saul, king of Israel, was fighting with the Philistines. Miss Roozendaal told us that the people of Israel were scared silly of those heathen people. What was worse, they no longer trusted in Israel's God, especially when they heard and saw the Philistine giant, with the name of Goliath.

Young David was ashamed that his people no longer feared God and that they were so afraid. I still see him go to king Saul who reluctantly gave him permission to fight the giant Goliath.

It was dead-silent between Napels and Winschoten when David - with five smooth stones in his pocket and his slingshot - finally faced the giant. Goliath laughed and began scolding David, his people and their God. David took a smooth stone and carefully inserted it in his slingshot. How could a little stone hurt this mighty man? Goliath wore his armor and a large helmet, which left his forehead exposed. He carried a monstrous sword, which he now lifted up to slay the little boy before him. Davis started swinging and let go! The stone entered Goliath's forehead and sunk deep into his brain. The giant Goliath died instantly.

The Israelites were jubilant, and the Philistines ran for their lives. Now - 60 years later - I still hear Miss Roozendaal saying: " Children, listen really good, little David knew no one may taunt the Lord God. What he did was to hold high the honor of Israel's God. Remember it well!"

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I emigrated to Canada in 1953. Almost thirty years later, Pa (Dad) de Jong, died. Brother Cees and I flew to Holland to be with Moe. We buried Pa on "Selwerderhof," a cemetery in Groningen. A few days later I traveled by train to Winschoten. After renting a bike, I quickly made a visit to some of the most important haunts of my childhood. Oh, how things had changed! I drove into Oudewerfslaan and soon found the school I had attended. Not much had changed, really. The playing area - still surrounded by a high fence - was a bit overgrown with weeds, and the buildings needed painting badly. The covered bicycle shed was still there. It was open on one side, the roof being held up with steel pillars. In the corner was the same little shed used for garden tools, etc. It had a door and a window.

All sorts of things went through my head. What connected this scene to my subconscious mind? Why was all this so familiar? And then it hit me: Miss Roozendaal's story about Samson and Delilah.

Samson and Delilah

During the time before David became king, the people of Israel again did things that were bad in the eyes of the Lord. That's why the Lord gave the people of Israel into the hands of the rough and coarse Philistines, who worshipped the god of Dagon. That lasted no less than forty years. Then Israel got a judge whose name was Samson. He was a burly, robust man, with good looks and immensely strong. The Philistine leaders plotted to get rid of him.

Samson was crazy about a Philistine girl with the name of Delilah. Samson, however, was a Nazirite ever since he was a boy. He was set apart to God from birth. No razor was allowed to ever touch his head. If his head was ever shorn, he would lose the strength the Lord gave him and he would become as weak as a tea towel. That was his secret. But that was exactly what the Philistines wanted to know! They knew he was immensely strong. One day, Samson had stood in a city gate and, grabbing both doorposts, he tore them loose, bar and all. Once he was visiting Delilah who slept in the little shed next to the playground behind the Oudewerfslaan school. She had lured him in there. The Philistines were hiding in the bushes waiting to pounce on him. He allowed himself to be bound with seven fresh thongs. Jokingly, he told Delilah: "If I'm tied up like that, I'll become as weak as any other man." When he was completely tied up, Delilah shouted: "Samson, the Philistines are upon you!" But he snapped the thongs as easily as a thin thread. And so his secret remained with him. He displayed many amazing feats of strength.

Delilah, secret agent of the Philistines, kept playing with Samson. She pretended to love him, and Samson - naive as always - fell into the trap. He told her: "If you weave the seven braids of my head into the fabric on the loom, and tighten it with a pin, I'll become as weak as any other man." And that's what Delilah did. She shouted for the Philistines, but Samson awoke from his sleep and pulled up the pin and the loom, with the fabric.

Delilah told Samson: "How can you say that you love me if you won't confide in me?" Day after day she prodded him, and Samson finally had enough. He told Delilah his secret that he was a set-apart-by-God Nazirite, stating: "If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me, and I would become as weak as any other man." Samson went back to sleep on her lap. She called a man to shave off the seven braids of his hair, and Samson's strength left him. She had also notified the Philistines to be ready. Now she knew she would collect the eleven hundred shekels of silver they had promised her. And so the Philistines subdued him, gouged his eyes out, and - blind as a bat - they locked him up in the little shed. It became his jail. As a little young fellow walking past the shed I always wanted to peek inside.... Samson sat there for many a month. Meanwhile his hair began to grow again. He heard that the Philistines wanted to make an offering to their god Dagon at a great feast, which was to take place on the school playground.

Samson heard it all through the little window. The Philistines arrived in great numbers and drank themselves into a stupor. They sat everywhere, on the ground, on the roof of the school and even on top of the bicycle shed. They demanded to see the blind Samson, so they could make fun of him.

A little boy led Samson outside. Samson told the boy: "Please lead me to one of these pillars, so I have some support." Once there, the Philistines teased him. Samson cried out to the Lord: "O Sovereign Lord, remember me. Strengthen me just once more!"

He stood somewhere in the middle of the shed. He grabbed the pole and reached out for another. Then he pushed and pushed. And the Lord heard him. The whole shed as well as the school came tumbling down on all the Philistines. The entire school property was full of dead Philistines. Miss Roozendaal said: "And Samson died too. His dad's family came to pick up his body and they buried him in the grave of his dad, Manoah. He had judged Israel twenty years. Children, you may never play games with the Lord. Our Lord is holy. Samson had not been faithful to the Lord. He lost his life because of that. But he did call out to the Lord for help. And the Lord heard his prayer. He knew that when he died."

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This is just an example of my many reminiscences about how a beloved kindergarten teacher could tell us stories from the Bible. Not a bad thing to write about while one is recovering in Hotel Dieu - a St. Catharines (Ontario) hospital - from a stomach bleeding (February, 2002).

P.S. It was just an ulcer said the specialist who "scoped" me, You may go home. Here are some pills and take it easy.