Two Dutch Girls on a Road Trip to Wiltshire

Road Trip 2017 (2) - Richmond to Chawton to Salisbury.

Good afternoon! Would you like to join me for the second part of my road trip in the South-West of England? A long time wish of my daughter...

Friday 1 January 2016

Happy 2016, Everyone! And may it be a good year.

Whilst I am writing this, I am watching the BBC News from the corner of my eye, and my heart goes out to all of you in the flooded areas. As a Dutch Wetlander I can relate, believe me (have a look at that photo below).


In the meantime I gather those of you in the South and Midwest of the States are having a rough time of it with tornadoes as well... So my heart goes out to you too.
No idea if there are natural disasters at this time in Russia, we get no news like that, but...
My heart goes out to all of you. Where-ever in the world you are. Period.

The thing about natural disasters is that there is absolutely no-one to blame (most of the time) - I mean, an avalanche coming down a mountainside may be due to some idiot having made a wrong environmental decision at some point in history, but right at the moment the avalanche strikes, there's usually not one particular person to point the finger to. 
The same goes for the flooding in the UK. Yes, decades of bad water management may be at the heart of all those communities now having to deal with polluted river water sloshing through their houses, but who can you blame, name and all? Nobody.
So it makes it easier to pull together and help each other out. No-one to blame, just people suffering and needing help.

Could that concept be at the heart of the reluctance many of us feel at helping out all those thousands of refugees hoping to find shelter in our safe (though perhaps twister and flood-prone) countries? For there is definitely someone to blame and name there. And thus it's easy for us to say okay, that guy or that group of guys (they are always guys) are the guilty one(s), he has driven his own people out of their own country, so let him solve his own problems.

Contrary to the 500.000 refugees our Mr Wilders had predicted would overrun our tiny country in 2015, we have come to meet 45.000. That's 45.000 souls, as far as I'm concerned.
Perhaps we will need some flooding of our own, and then the refugees helping out filling the sandbags, to change our minds about them?

I wish you all a wonderful 2016. May it be a peaceful, happy, prosperous year for you.


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