The first “free composition” exercise in my intensive Dutch learning course, so I had to write a short essay “In het café”. Not easy to write anything well in just ten minutes or so, but inspired by the coffee I’d bought earlier that morning in the quiet Kafnush coffee bar in Oud Scheveningen, I wrote the following few words.
Het is een warme dag en ik heb zin in koffie op het terras. In het café is de serveerster een mooie jonge vrouw met lang golvend haar in de kleur van goud en een mooie glimlach.
“Goedemorgen meneer, wat wilt u?”
‘Ik neem een latte machiato, alstublieft, mevrouw, en ik ga buiten op het terras zitten.’
Zij zet mijn koffie.
‘Bedankt mevrouw. Goededag.’
Het café is rustig en vredig. Ik ga zitten, haal het boek uit mijn tas en begin te lezen.
De serveerster komt en zit tegenover mij.
“Je leest ‘Nederlands in Gang’”, zegt ze, “Leer jij Nederlands?”
“Ja”, antwoord ik, “ik probeer de taal te leren.”
“Misschien kan ik je helpen als je wilt.”
Ik zie haar lange benen, haar mooie gezicht, haar echt prachtige glimlach.
“Dat is een leuk idee. Ik ben Mark. Hoe mag ik je noemen?”
Mark Baker's Blog 
Hi Mark, you asked for some language-related pointers. I had just four comments. Three of which aren’t even strictly speaking grammatically incorrect. Hope these’ll still be of some use.
– The first section of the second sentence, “In het café is de serveerster-“. This phrasing would sound odd to a Dutch speaker in this context as it mainly emphasises the waitress being physically inside the café.
Instead you’d probably say something more like “de serveerster van het café is een mooie jonge vrouw”.
– I was a little on the fence about the third sentence. Something like “Ik had graag een latte machiato, alstublieft” instead of “ik neem graag een latte-” might come across as slightly familiar when speaking to people you don’t know. This comment feels like it might be a little too nit-picky on my part though.
– “Zij zet mijn koffie.” Here you’d probably write/say: “ze”, rather than “zij”. Using zij isn’t strictly incorrect I think, but does sound rather old-fashioned.
– “Je leest ‘Nederlands in gang’-”, traditionally staff at a café or a shop would use the more formal “u”, rather than “je” when speaking to a customer. This convention isn’t as universal anymore as it once was, but remains very common.
That was all I had. Overall this was pretty clear to me and I had no trouble at all understanding what you were saying. Again; hope my points will be of some help!
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Thanks for the feedback.
I think the ik-persoon can get away with some grammatical faux pas because they are learning Dutch
And I also want to show the developing relationship between the ik-persoon and the serveerster, so a gradual lessening of formality in their interactions, but it is possibly too abrupt. I’m partway through a second draft of the dialogue, expanding it further to develop that growing relationship, so I’ll take note.
I’ll take the comments about the descriptive phrasing on board. A second stage of evolution will expand the descriptions to try and provide more atmosphere to the setting, the smell of the coffee, the sound of the milk frother, etc; so “Zij zet mijn koffie.” will change at that stage.
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