THE START OF ANOTHER MARATHON

Wednesday, October 8th, 2025

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

How does a walking marathoner get his ‘steps’ in when flying distances that don’t allow?  Well, here’s how I achieved some numbers after a six-hour flight.  The Schipold in Amsterdam where I landed in the late morning, covers about 4,500 football fields, or 27.87 square kilometres, and I traversed a small portion of that.  With Air Canada losing my check-in baggage, I was forced to walk from carousel 19 at arrivals to the oversize outlet or odd-size to carousel 16 and back in a triangle again and again, but apart from getting in some footsteps, it was a hope-against-hope situation for my belongings, a box full of copies of The Saffron Path.

The consolation to this flight and the trip in general is that I saw it as a prep day for a marathon on foot through the Netherlands and doing so on the strength of family (I’ve got cousins here), Krishna followers, and finally, the blessing so God – all my support.

I reunited with my Dutch friends of Indian and Croatian origin on the other side of the glass wall and from there to a cozy suburb of Amsterdam.  There we ate and chatted about the coming day – the start of a new walk.  It is exciting.

It is has been 80 years since Canadians forces came to this below sea-level country to help in its liberation from Nazi occupation.  I was born in Canada, but my ancestry is Dutch.  As many people know, there was, or still is, a strong sentiment, a love affair, perhaps, between the two nations.  Many people from Holland migrated to Canada after WW2.  Many babies are born in Holland through Canadian daddies.  They were called “liberation babies” and I imagine some of them are still alive.  I hope I can meet one or two of them.  I’m hoping.

MAY THE SOURCE BE WITH YOU!

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