In today's Dutch papers, a rural road accident re-awakens a national trauma. Attempts to be young, hip and trendy meet with disapproval from TV evangelists and politicians. But graffiti and tattoos go down well with public libraries and the older generation...
 

The unremarkable death of Ferdi Elsas
All of today's Dutch papers feature a story about a 66-year-old man killed in a road accident on Monday. Ferdi Elsas was out riding his bicycle in a sleepy Gelderland backwater when he was hit by an industrial digger at a junction. A sad tale, yet not the kind that usually makes the headlines. But Ferdi Elsas is the man behind a grisly kidnapping that held all of the Netherlands in its sway back in 1987-88 and his death has re-opened the wound and brought the collective memories flooding back.

De Telegraaf describes the deceased as "A cruel psychopath" and "heartless and cold-blooded", while de Volkskrant charts his path "from unemployed engineer to ice-cold murderer". What did he do to deserve these epithets?

NRC next provides a blow-by-blow account of what it calls "The kidnapping that dominated the news for months". Ferdi Elsas abducted supermarket millionaire Gerrit Jan Heijn in September 1987. He obtained ransom from the Heijn family by sending them taped messages and part of his hostage's little finger. Only when Elsas was arrested seven months later was it revealed that he had shot and buried Mr Heijn on the day of the kidnapping and kept the family and indeed the whole country in agonising uncertainty all that time. He was sentenced to a 20-year jail term in 1988 but was released in 2001.
 
Searching for answers and forgiveness
According to De Telegraaf, Elsas declared in an interview in 2006 that "around the time of the murder I was completely mad" while de Volkskrant reports that he was "at war with Dutch society" after losing his job. The paper also reports that Gerrit Jan Heijn was a random choice of victim: "it could have been any wealthy Dutchman. Elsas just wanted money to finance a vengeful campaign to get back at his former colleagues."
 
De Telegraaf talks to the man who led the hunt for Gerrit Jan Heijn's kidnapper at the time, former police commissioner Kees Sietsma. "Of course you don't wish death on anyone, but this man caused so much suffering... My memory of him is dominated by the utterly immoral nature of his actions. It surprises me to this day that someone without a criminal background was capable of such a horrible crime."
 
The former police commissioner ends by expressing "an incredible amount of respect" for the murdered hostage's widow Hank. "While many crime victims' families drown in sorrow and hatred, she found the strength to talk to her husband's murderer face to face. To turn hatred into something positive." The Heijn family's response to the news of Ferdi Elsas's death is also a testament to this spirit of forgiveness: "It is always sad when a wife loses her husband and children lose their father. We wish them every strength at this difficult time."

TV evangelists axe Jesus show
What's a tattooed hunk with a penchant for stripping off for the camera doing working for the Netherlands' evangelical broadcasting company EO? The hunk in question, presenter Arie Boomsma, must be asking himself the same question these days. Having only recently bounced back from a media ban imposed by his God-fearing employers after he peeled off for a photo shoot for a gay glossy, he now finds the broadcaster has axed his latest show before production had even got properly under way.
 
Under the headline "EO halts production on Jesus series", Trouw reveals that the show There was this guy who walked on water has proved too much of a hot potato for the broadcaster. The idea was to give prominent non-Christian Dutch comedians carte blanche to present their own views of Jesus. "A unique opportunity to remove prejudices and encourage an open and honest discussion about Jesus" according to the presenter.
 
But this is a vision the Christian press and the broadcaster's old guard do not share. "It's regrettable and cheap." "Making fun of Jesus is an attack on the sanctity of the Lord. It's sheer godlessness." AD reports that 2000 people have already cancelled their membership and the broadcaster has ditched the show unaired as "an error of judgement". So it's back to the drawing board for the EO's hip and trendy brigade and evangelical poster boy Arie.

Amsterdam's alternative art course sparks controversy
There's yet more hipness and trendiness gone awry in De Telegraaf, which reports that the Christian Democrats and Amsterdam's public transport company are up in arms about a graffiti course being organised by the city's public library this summer. Five of the city's 18 library branches are even running the course for free, tuts the paper "But opposition is mounting."
 
"Graffiti is an art form" insists a library spokesperson. "We are talking about kids between the ages of eight and twelve. They're not being encouraged to go out and spray paint trams or viaducts."
 
But the Christian Democrats are having none of it. "It may sound innocent ... but our public space is being ruined and it costs piles of public money to remove all this stuff." The public transport company puts a figure on the damage "It costs us 650,000 euros a year to clean up our vehicles and stations."

Devil-may-care gran and her guardian angel
AD treats us to the tale of adventurous granny Lenie van der Meer, complete with a fetching photo of the 71-year-old and her brand new guardian angel in the form of a tattoo on her shoulder. "The time that tattoos were the province of young rebels and tough bikers is well and truly over" comments the paper.
 
Mrs Van der Meer admits "I can be a bit impulsive. When I heard that they were opening a tattoo shop here, I started getting excited about the idea. So I went along and we agreed that I'd be their first customer. They got free publicity for tattooing a woman of 71 and I got a free tattoo."
 
"Times have changed. Anything goes these days." says the devil-may-care pensioner. But while her granddaughter is a fan of her gran's new image, Mrs Van der Meer hasn't dared break the news to her daughter yet. "She'll probably ask me if I've lost my mind..."