Lekker ding! Sophomore Julia Knoeff has brought her Dutch pride across the pond with the help of this useful phrase. In addition to her sparkling personality, cool fashion style and intelligence, Julia makes friends easily by teaching people Dutch compliments such as this opening one used to describe someone attractive.

Before Colby, Julia went to high school both in her native home of Amsterdam, Netherlands and then in India. She spent her junior and senior year of high school on the gorgeous campus of the Mahindra United World College (UWC).

Knoeff says her UWC experience was “amazing, the campus was on a hill and about five hours from Bombay.” There were about 200 students and 60 different nationalities represented.

After high school graduation, Julia came to Colby and became involved with the woodsmen’s team. Her favorite events are the chainsaw disc stack and the vertical chop.

When she’s not spending her afternoons preparing for the various woodsmen meets across New England and Canada, Julia works in the Admissions Office, helping people to fall in love with Colby just as she did. As an anthropology and international studies major, Julia has a lot on her plate and takes her studies seriously. Impressively, she speaks Dutch, English and German fluently in addition to some Hindi and French.

Next year Julia hopes to study abroad in Cape Town, South Africa. This JanPlan Julia will be returning home to Amsterdam where she will be reunited with her family, friends and houseboat. Yes, houseboat.
“It’s great, I can see the swans and ducks from my window! There’s a certain family of ducks that I always give bread to from my balcony,” says Julia. 

Earlier this year, Julia put her friendly demeanor and leadership skills to work when she served as a COOT leader. She said it was especially fun because she led the white water kayaking COOT, which was the same trip she went on as a first-year.

Reminiscing about leader training and kayaking brought a smile to Julia’s face. “My COOT babies are the best! They did a great job.” Julia would also like to send her love to her handsome COOT husband, David Lowe ’11. “He was a great father to our nine babies, and I really hope they all follow in his footsteps because my only wish in life is to be a COOT grandmother,” Julia said with a hopeful sigh.

If you see Julia in the next few days wish her team good luck for the iPlay field hockey championships. Be sure to keep your eye out for this radiant lady, and if you get star-struck just remember these two words: lekker ding.