I´m starting to wonder the same about Turkish these days.. I´m so over my top of what I can learn here (without too much effort), that I can only hope I will move back before I lost it ´all´.

 Its really a misunderstanding that Dutch people have a good comprehension of English and a good English accent (or American whatsoever).  Maybe its because you tourists attrack educated people or smt or because you only visit the very touristic areas But I know a whole bunch of Dutch people who speak ´coal´ English with a very bad Dutch accent.

One only has to hear Balkenende (Harry Potter) speak English, and that is how the general Dutch speaking English sounds, if they would have their speeches written for them by someone fluently in English

I tend to think though, that because the Dutch language doesnt have a very strong accent or melody like for example French and German do, it is easier for native Dutch to learn to speak another tongue quite well.

Thanks

 No.. the CH sound in Dutch is a quite rough throat sound that not many foreigners can make, especially in combination with an S, it makes it sound harder and harder to pronounce as wel

 Been there done that

 Believe me im studying at the dining table, to have some space for papers and laptop, well that doesnt work either. I severely and chronically suffer from the -im having my tea now instead of in 10 minutes-syndrome and -im having tea again-syndrome. It results in spending more time waiting for the water to boil than actual brain activity.

Do you know of any transition period? I always keep around 200ytl with me, for the next time I go there, so that I will immediately have some cash at hand in case something happens. I suppose there will be a transition period where you can use both or something right? Im not sure when Im going next, hopefully before new year but nothings sure yet

The banknotes look fine, I recall it was only Atatürk and some places in TR represented on it. Seems they have put other significant persons as well?

 For people who can´t say SCH the way we can, yes

 Doe Maar, you got a point there. I´m not a big fan of Blof and de Dijk, for some reason Dutch men get this weird pronounciation once they start to sing and it bothers me. They do have some good songs, but overall.. I dont know the Jazzpolitie.

 Yes.. well I tend to think they are quite a ´real´ representation of Dutch music tradition though. But maybe that is because I am overall very pessimisticly stemmed on our national music tradition, so maybe I see it all too dark (or too purple for that matter!!)

Agree with you on the -part!