Martijn Maandag is the Dutch translation coordinator for the Joomla core. He also translates the release announcements for Joomla and puts them on the Dutch Joomla forum https://www.joomlacommunity.nl/, a forum he moderates as well. Besides this, Martijn translates documentation on https://docs.joomla.org and marks documentation for translation, and, if that wasn’t enough already, he also provides translations for several Joomla extensions.

Hi Martijn, please tell us a little about yourself!

I live in the center of the Netherlands, in Utrecht (the 4th town of the country). I’m married to Lia. We are both retired. We like to travel and up until now we have visited more than 120 countries all over the world.

How did you get involved with Joomla and the J! Community?

In 2007 I wanted to change our personal website from HTML into a real CMS. Looking into Joomla got me to thinking that was something I could use. With the help of all the answers (did not ask anything myself) on a Dutch forum, I managed to build the site. During this process I started answering questions on the forum myself.

When my site was finished, I decided I wanted to do something back. That’s when I started translating extensions into Dutch which ended in translating the Joomla core.

What is your background, what was your profession?

When I was young I wanted to become a Mechanical Engineer but during the study I discovered computers and software programming. After graduation (1979) I started an education at my first (and only) job at one of the big Dutch banks. There was no education in ICT at that time. For many years I was a System Designer and Information Analyst there. In 2006 I stopped working.

How do you use Joomla? (hobby,own website, building websites for clubs, friends etc)

My own website is still there and sometimes I make a site for a friend.

I am a volunteer for an organisation that promotes the history of Utrecht, my hometown, and I’m the webmaster for their Joomla website.

Are you involved in the Joomla community, apart from in your official position (for example JUGS, events, etc)?

I am a member of the Dutch foundation that organises the Dutch Joomladagen and facilitates a Dutch forum. For the Dutch Joomladagen Lia and I organise the “Partner program”. Visitors of the Joomladagen can bring their partner/children and we have a nice program ready for them, with various outings. In the evening they join the official program.

Each summer we organise a BBQ party at our house for active Joomlers in the Netherlands and Belgium. I don’t know if we can do it this year, due to Covid-19 regulations.

How did Joomla change your life?

Well, when I stopped working in 2006, I did not know what would come. Travelling, preparing a next trip and updating our website was the main thing. But Joomla did bring me a day job! If I want, I can spend every day doing things for Joomla.

When I started with Joomla we planned our travel-trip first and then we discovered there was a Joomla-event at the same time which we could not visit. After a while we waited until the date of the events were known and we planned our trips around them.

What did you learn and / or gain personally from being a J! Volunteer?

Because of Joomla I have met a lot of people. Going to JUGs I get to know even more people. Sometimes I give presentations to teach how you can help translate documentation. I had never done this in this way before. I even teach end-users how to use Joomla!

We know you travel a lot and you meet many locals during these holiday travels. Does this make communicating with members of the international Joomla easier?

Most of the time Lia and I travel to countries and regions where there are no members of the Joomla community. But you do learn a lot about other nationalities, customs, traditions. In the Joomla community there are a lot of nationalities. When you have not seen all these people in real life and you disagree on something, it’s not always easy. You need to focus on staying polite. In the meantime you can still disagree. Meeting people in real life really helps a lot.

A while ago you received not just one, but two JOSCARS for your work. What do they mean to you?

Well, a community is not always nice and friendly as I mentioned, not everything is going smooth. Then it is nice to know that other people like and appreciate the things you do. It is inspiring and motivating you to go on.

What is your most important, funniest and/or interesting J! memory?

The funniest memory:

At the end of Joomladay 2018 in the Netherlands there is a quiz. All kinds of questions about what you know about Joomla. After every round of questions the overall best 3 are invited on the stage.
Lia, my wife, did the partner program, but she joined the quiz anyway, and after three rounds she was on place 4, after round 4 she was on top! This is her story (in Dutch): https://www.joomlacommunity.nl/nieuws/evenementen/op-de-eerste-stoel

Combining Joomla and travelling:

I traveled to India a lot of times, but never to the south (it was on the list). In November 2015 the Joomla World Conference was in Bangalore (Bengeluru) India.
We went there, met a lot of people and afterwards we made a trip in the south of India. Beautiful trip: https://www.reisverslagen.net/reisverslagen/azie/140-zuid-india

Meeting Joomlers:

I remember I was on Schiphol, our national airport, and posted a message on Facebook that I was there and would leave for the Caribbean, St Martin. A member of our Dutch community sent me a message: “Bring a present to Sandra Decoux, she lives there”.
I did not know her at that time, but I bought her a bag with “Stroopwafels”, a Dutch syrup waffle. Arriving at St Martin I sent Sandra a message and we met at Calmos Cafe (I am afraid it is closed now). Sandra and I both wore Joomla-shirts so we could identify each other. We will always remember and hope to meet each other someday again.

Remarkable:

JandBeyond, 2012, Bad Nauheim Germany. Dutch Joomlers rented an apartment building near Bad Nauheim. Other Joomlers from other countries joined us in the building. In the evening we drank lots of beer, moving from one room to another, because the occupant of this room had to give a presentation at 9 am and wanted us to leave. In the morning, one of us bought all the bread the local store had in stock, for breakfast. During the day Lia cleaned up the house a little bit and went to buy more beer. After this she was on holiday. We discovered that the owner of the house also lived in one of the apartments. She must have been sleeping for days after we left.