Amsterdam Travel Forum

What does the word "rookvrij" mean? As in the sentence: "Het Muziektheater is een rookvrij theater."

(My guess is "smoke-free". Am I right?)

My dutch is somewhat limited, but it does sound like "rauchfrei" so, I guess you are right. Smoke free.

That's right.

Thanks for your answers. That sentence was printed on the back of my ticket, and it was the one thing I wasn't sure about.

NO SMOKING (but you got that message :) )

PJ

If it helps, rooken in Dutch is cognate to "to reek" in English, which used to have a more general meaning than just "to stink". And, yes, rooken is the same word as rauchen in German...

If you read JRR Tolkien, for example, you'll see that he uses "reek" in its older meaning of smoke, albeit still perjoratively...

Bill

The rest of it was easier:

"Na aanvang geen toegang." No admittance after the start.

"Geen restitutie mogelijk." No refunds possible.

"Geen zicht op boventiteling." No problem, since I know the opera pretty well, and I understand Italian better than Dutch in any case, so I don't have to see the Dutch surtitles.

"oneven" I assume means the odd numbered seats, since I have "stoel 55".

I give up my VT language helpership, haha

Great translation; bravo!

PJ

all the languages are the same in some way there is alway an connection :o) ( in Europe)

Those Dutch phrases containing the word "vrij" (free) have a misleading meaning.
They mean that a certain product or place is "free from the previous word", i.e. it is forbidden to use something, therefore, not free at all.

They can be misunderstood as "there is absolute freedom to do something".

Is freedom itself a contradition?