Once a year in the Netherlands, joggers in the park stop running for two minutes. Bicyclists pull over to the side of the road. Television sets and radios are turned off. Parents hush their children. And in many villages and cities people congregate in public spaces for a communal ceremony.
May 4 is the annual Remembrance Day, and this year my wife and I joined millions of Dutch citizens there in observing a customary two minutes of silence, beginning at eight o'clock in the evening.
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