It was a “day off” to relax. As I said in my previous post, I slept in til 11:30 (!) and spent 5 wonderful hours with Hans Haemon of World Partners. I had met him for the first time in my own apartment February 3, where he came to Kit’s and my “anniversary party” as a guest of my good friends Maarten and Calene Fleurke from Virginia Beach! Then a week later we saw each other again at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington D.C. Now I found myself a week later spending a free day in a town only 3 miles from his home in the The Netherlands. It is surely a small world. Visiting the Wageningen University town and especially the absolutely delightful church square, Saturday market, and unique de Kater pub/bar was a pleasure….I think the sunshine and warmth after a few days of grey rain probably helped make it so nice. I am impressed again that Holland is so clean and organized! As I may have said before, the only way I knew which of several trains to catch from Schipol to Ede was because it arrived at precisely the time posted….there as another only 3 minutes before at the same platform, but that COULDN’T have been the one! J The little ferry ride across the Rhine in the sunshine, the gorgeous houses, the history of the battle fought in this tiny region (Arnhem where the Bridge Too Far is still found today), my vigorous walk from the Reehorst Hotel to Ede, and then munching almonds walking the cobblestones in Ede as the evening shoppers finished and the stores closed….even the 1-stop train ride to avoid the long walk back to the hotel….It was all great! I didn’t have supper tho because because with good wireless in my room, I wanted to sort out the complications of Korea. Taking trains instead of planes down the peninsula means I have to coordinate with four institutions, one of which I have still not heard from! But one contact at another of the four has so I’m hoping I won’t arrive like Quito! It also took me a while to make all my onward appointments and flights time-zone linked. When I put them in to begin with, I merely put them in at the time of the day in Virginia Beach…as if they were on EST. But of course the flights are all “local” times, so when I change the time on my computer and phone….they all get changed. I could have left them all on EST but since I need my phone as my sole timepiece for getting around and for alarms, IT must keep local time, and since it syncs with the computer schedule I’d get new appointments every time I sync’d! And that happens everytime my computer is on since the phone sync by Bluetooth! Oh well…more than you wanted to know!
My day today has been all travel…and I DO mean to ask Karoline why she has sent me from Amsterdam all the way up to near the arctic circle to Helsinki Finland (2:30 minute flight) to sit for 2 hours and then fly all the way back down to Austria. I think I could have DRIVEN to Vienna in the same amount of time…and could have flown directly in probably an hour rather than these 5-6 hours. I think it may have something to do with the complex special One-World partners round-the-world ticket, or the combination of tickets she had to put together. Anyway, I got up at 7:15, had a huge and delicious breakfast all alone in a large but beautiful dining room,
walked to the train station, caught the 8:40 to Utrecht, crossed the platform to the waiting train to Schipol which pulled out within 4 minutes of our arrival from Ede, 
checked in at Schipol 
and spent an hour online in the Menzies lounge…..NOT technically allowed….not even with Jimmy’s Platinum AMEX….but she was kind!
Helsinki airport had an exotic feel about it…probably due to the Scandinavian ultra modern feel and the snow on the ground, and especially the very low sun angles even in early afternoon. I couldn’t help think how this was as far north as I have been….on the ground that is…about the same level as when we visited Bergen Norway. I also imagined the many peace conferences held here. I couldn’t help think of isolated even from Europe it is this far north. During the day I’ve also reflected on the Dutch (and perhaps European?) mindset…..one that can COUNT on the trains arriving when predicted, where clothing worn even by the average person seems to me more fashionable than in the US, where everyone seems so much healthier (trimmer) than in the US, where in Holland those thousands of bicycles parked at the train station which I show in my pictures from yesterday are really ridden (!), where the bread is SO good and taken seriously, where the foods eaten daily seem finer and better prepared, where there is quiet in restaurants, and people sit together at the same tables, not necessarily in conversation across groups but in a warmer friendlier, more neighborly way, generally reading newspapers….unlike what I usually see in the US. This morning in the train station a small group of people gathered who obviously did not know each other (they introduced themselves) but they were all dressed for outdoor walking, in very snazzy gear apparently ready to do something active with strangers despite the cold. It’s a different way of life at least in that part of Holland…an attractive, predictable one, without so many cars, and noise, and confusion. Maybe it’s that I’m getting older and that predictability is attractive!! I can say that Holland felt more attractive to me than it ever has before.
I read the life story of Hans Haemon on the plane today. He gave me the small book yesterday. A remarkable story of intense entrepreneurship that would make most souls blanch! His travels all over the world in using business (Impact) as a cover for Bible smuggling are mind-boggling. The things he has seen (“necklacing in Haiti!”) are amazing. It is easy to feel one has done little with one’s life when comparing to his work. He’s 62, and last summer back-packed across China alone….in territory with which is familiar because of his work in business there….that included my friend Maarten! But his life has also had the dramatic ups and downs often associated with entrepreneurs….a bad accident, bankruptcy, rejection by friends, conflict even in the church. So there is an emotional price to pay that comes with the excitement and energy of a visionary.
My sense of the CCCU school CHE is of one that is very well run, that is growing, that is staffed with topnotch people. I sense the commitment to making it distinctively high quality AND Christian is quite high…but that may be in part because in Holland it is easier to FIND the qualified faculty that are both credentialed and believers than in Ecuador or Bolivia. I find however the same leaning toward very practical education that is also typical in developing countries. We Americans don’t realize how distinctive our “liberal arts” wholistic approach to education really is.
I wish I could say that our approach produced a more reflective population in general. But I’m afraid that would be presumptuous. So for someone like me, passionate as I am about Christian liberal arts education, it’s interesting to speculate why it seems to ME (sic!) that we Americans are on average less engaged with politics and world affairs, less likely to read substantive literature in spite of the fact that unlike Europeans I think we are MORE likely to have had a liberal arts education and they are MORE likely to have had a vocational/specialized/practical education. CHE is unapologetically committed to practical education….it is a school explicitly of “applied” sciences!
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