Amsterdam

 

I was invited to the World Congress of families in August, 2009 to Amsterdam. I had earlier been to Amsterdam and had spent three days here with the Kids when Somu was in Zambia and I was going to meet him. At that time  I had travelled all around this place with the kids and went visiting the various canals in the boats. We also visited the Rijks Museum . But the best place which I liked was the Vincent Van Gogh Museum and Ann Franks House. I had become a great fan of Van Gough after I read Irwin Stone’s Lust for Life. Amsterdam derives its name from Amstel and Dam meaning a dam in the river Amstel. Earlier this was a fishing village. What I really liked about the place was that many people used the bicycle as a common means of transport. The airport at Schipol was also amazing with the vast multitude of people from different nationalities who were going around and the vastness of the structure.  Hence this time I did not  go for any sight seeing but spent my time in the Conference. On the first day Prof. Theo and Nicole came to meet me and we had a lovely round of the city and sat down to have coffee. The world Congress was amazing that for the first time family was the focus and most of the speakers were pro- family. In India every one has to be pro- family as we have no choice. In the absence of the State structure support family is the only alternative and one has to rely on the family. My paper on Families in South Asia – Challenges for the New Millennium was very well received and many people came to meet me after my presentation and we exchanged a lot of cards. The highlight of this Conference was that we saw some lovely films such as Firewall, The Demographic Bomb which talk about the issue of population explosion.