Niels Boutsen - If only I were a mouse

Niels Boutsen (Stoomboot) worked for two years as a musician in De Rotonda, a reception and guidance center for teenage girls. Without experience in youth care, he played the piano there with the young people and wrote songs together with them about their lives and challenges. In Was ik maar een muis he shares his story and brings these songs to life. It is about small and large truths, about what touches young people, what happens to them, and what it is like to live in a world full of expectations. Without grand gestures, but with an open view. The performance offers a unique look into an often closed world, from an under-exposed perspective: that of the young people themselves. Q&A afterward After the performance, Niels talks with a moderator, an expert by experience, and the audience. Everyone gets the chance to ask questions. A conversation for everyone The performance and the subsequent conversation form an open invitation for organizations that work in or with youth care, but also for young people and adults who want to think along about a system that affects more people than we realize. According to reports from, among others, Kind en Gezin and the Children's Rights Commissioner, about one in seven children in Flanders grows up in a vulnerable home situation, such as poverty, divorce, abuse, or psychological problems in parents. That makes this performance relevant for a wide audience. The podcast Niels also made a podcast about youth care that digs even deeper than the performance. Key figures such as the court, the CLB, the JAC, psychologists, psychiatrists, and experts by experience are indirectly addressed in the performance, but are essential to understand the world of youth care. In the podcast, Niels talks with them and sheds light on a world that still operates too often in the dark. Because the story of young people in residential groups is ultimately a story about us all: how we as a society deal with people who (briefly) color outside the lines. A moment that lingers Was ik maar een muis is a moment full of music, stories, and perhaps a new perspective.