—Sept.1970-May 1971DO 2799-11971

—22 years ago!

—Dad Describing Slides to Family in 1971!

Amsterdam!

1. Praise the Lord! This is our trip to Europe, the Mediterranean & the Mideast! We flew from New York, landed in Luxembourg, caught the train through the Low Countries, Belgium, & we eventually got to Amsterdam after a couple of weeks in London‚ which we'll show you more of later.

2. In Amsterdam we stayed at this old-fashioned hotel or inn, & this is a typical old Dutch family. This old gentleman here (center, with sideburns) looks like he stepped right out of one of those old Dutch paintings! All he needs is one of those big black hats to be one of those rich Dutch merchants. This is his family, & this is his wife on his left & his beautiful daughter on his right who was our hostess. His name was Uncle Dick. We thought he looked very picturesque & interesting, & that's where we stayed in Holland.

3. Here is our boat trip on one of the Dutch canals. Here's a group of folks rowing a boat down there. And here is a professor of Hebrew eschatology that we met on the way. (Dad's talking about himself!) Very interesting. I think maybe he was a Communist or something, he talked like one, always talking about communal living & sharing, etc. But you notice he looks mysterious! He's wearing dark glasses, has a beard & all that sort of thing, which is so typical of those intellectual Socialists, & he's riding up front on the boat.

4. Here's a pretty little girl I saw shopping on the street in Amsterdam, along with a lot of other people. (Maria!) She looks very pleasant, doesn't she? She looks, you might say, typically American. And it looks like she just bought a nice winter coat there to keep her warm when it was cold.

5. Amsterdam is doing its best to try to lick the smog & air pollution problem & they have a big drive on to have everybody ride their bicycle to work. And as you can see here, they had the bicycle brigade!—All these fine-looking businessmen, including this one right in front here. He's sitting on a bicycle, believe it or not, waiting for the light to change. It was a little dark & we didn't use a flash, but all these nice-looking businessmen in fine business suits—suit‚ coat & tie & all—dignifiedly with great dignity ride their bicycles majestically along the streets!—It's just really interesting! They get a lot of exercise besides, it's very very healthful for them.

6. Actually this is Dam Square, but it's commonly known as Hippie Square, as you can see right there. Now most hippies wouldn't like to be called "squares," but these hippies are just a handful of those left here in the Fall of the year. Here's where hundreds & hundreds used to pack this square & sleep there at night, until finally they had some problems with the police & they ran them out.

7. Amsterdam is the most popular spot for hippies & drugs in all Europe, because the Netherlands has a very free & very easy policy on young people, a very permissive society. In fact‚ they finally tried to solve the problem of all these hippies that came there. The kids were gathering in the square & sleeping by the hundreds & hundreds at a time, sometimes a thousand or 1,500 hippies sleeping there! When the police moved in to try to move them out, they had a big riot & did a lot of damage. The poor kids weren't doing any damage or any harm at all until then. I'll tell you who it was that made them move out: The Systemites said, "They're damaging our image to the tourists, so therefore we've just gotta move'm out!" So that's what they did.

8. But they did try to provide a substitute, a very permissive club instead where the kids were allowed to do anything.—I mean, anything goes at this club! The police were not to interfere with anything—drugs, sex, anything that they wanted to do at this club—& this club is still in full swing. But some of the kids now condemn it & say it is a dangerous place, because a lot of criminals & crime & whatnot has entered in.

9. For the first time right now I notice in the picture that there's apparently a crucifixion scene up there on the monument. I hadn't even noticed that. I was so busy looking at the kids & talking to the kids when we were there that we didn't even really figure out the images above. We were always going around bragging about you & what you are doing back home & the wonderful sample you are, & how we've got Colonies of hundreds & hundreds of kids that live in Love & in peace & in freedom & in cooperation & a real pure form of Christian Communism‚ or whatever you want to call it. So the kids loved it & everybody was interested & we kept passing out our literature etc. to all the kids & talked to them about Jesus. PTL!

Swede & French Gal on the Train!

10. Ah, now this is a very interesting couple with whom we spent the night on the train. He may be Jewish, but he is a Swedish Jew if he is‚ & she is a cute little French gal. They had met for the first time when they, along with us, occupied this compartment on the train, & this was the train I think coming back from the all-permissive society of Denmark where they make all those pornographic movies & magazines nowadays. They have no obscenity laws or pornography laws any more at all there.

11. This young couple was coming back on the train with us & spent the night with us on what they call these "couchettes," "couch–ettes" in other words. The seats are made into sort of couches, more like bunks instead of berths‚ & you just pay a little bit more, not very much, a couple of Dollars for a place to lie down. It's like a big long seat where you can stretch out, & you can take off your clothes & go to bed if you want to. And this young couple—showing the permissive Swedish society—having met for the first time on the train when they moved into the compartment with us‚ both took off their clothes & went to bed together.—Right while we were across the aisle from them, & enjoyed life together!

Paris!

12. Here's a typical American tourist in Paris! (Maria!) American in Paris! This is a beautiful garden in the heart of Paris right next to the river Seine, & a very beautiful place to stroll through, especially if you have a pretty girl like this to walk through with you.

13. Here is an American in Paris also (Maria!), having a sidewalk snack at the sidewalk caf, using the hood of a typical little European car for her table, & she is eating some kind of sweet bakery goods which was real cheap at that particular little bakery shop. (See picture on page 4.) Everybody was standing in line to get these goodies & to eat'm, & apparently she has quite a mouthful there. She looks like she might be a schoolteacher.

14. Oh, here's that Socialist again! (Dad!) What do you know about that!—Sitting in a sidewalk caf in Paris. We keep running into this guy. I wonder if maybe he could be tailing us! He is apparently looking the situation over at a Paris sidewalk caf.

15. And this girl is an almost disciple! A very beautiful French girl who is fluent in many languages & a professional translator, professional interpreter who works most of the time in Geneva for these big international conferences. The time we met her she was on her way to Geneva for a big international conference on the new oil pipelines to the Mideast that Europe is building, so that they won't have to worry about somebody sinking the oil ships coming across from Egypt & some of those places, like the Jews maybe. She is just a charming girl.—Anaik!

16. We talked to her about Jesus on the train to Paris, & she just practically flipped out for the Lord & accepted the Lord, got turned on to the whole message & about the way we live & everything‚ & almost joined our little team! But I think she makes lots of money & was pretty well off financially, compared to most people in Europe—interpreting pays a lot of money—& I'm afraid this sort of caused her to go back. It was a little too strong for her. (See "Follow God!", ML#4:119-158.)

17. Oh, there's that Socialist again! (Dad!) I believe every place we go he seems to be there. Here he was pretending to be asleep. I'm sure he must have had one eagle-eye slit looking at us while we were taking his picture asleep on one of these luxury trans-European express trains which cross Europe in a matter of hours. These are amazing trains, always punctual, always leave on time no matter what, & are very reasonable.

18. And if you buy your ticket (the Eurailpass) in the United States before you go, you can travel all over Europe for three months, as much & as far as you want to for only $200, three whole months, all Summer long, or all Winter, whatever it is. And not only that, you can save money—as you can see this cheapskate of a tourist is doing here—sleeping on the train! (Dad!) Whenever your day's travel is over & you decide you don't want to have to pay for a hotel room, you just stay on the train & you can sleep on the train, & it costs you nothing! Because you've got this pass that you paid for in the U.S. & you could just keep on‚ & no telling where you'd wake up in the morning. You can get off any time you want to anywhere‚ get on any time you want to anywhere. It's called a Eurailpass. You don't have to worry about the different kinds of money, exchanges or standing in lines buying tickets. It's terrific! Really terrific!

Vienna!

19. Here is a poor typical sidewalk artist (Dad!) on the sidewalk of Vienna (seated in front of a monument). Apparently the little girl that took this picture couldn't hold the camera steady & it jiggled a little bit, & that's why it looks out of focus! But you see, he was trying to appeal to both classes of humanity: The serious religious side with the Madonna on his left, & the humourous foolish side with the clown on his right. And in the middle is what all humanity seems to be after—money lying on the sidewalk. He's inviting you to throw in a little donation to help him earn his way through art school.—Ha!

Train to Switzerland!

20. Oh, wow‚ that rascal again! (Dad!) There he is! How about that? I think his hair is even getting longer now. He's making eyes at this pretty little Viennese gal. She was a reporter for an Austrian newspaper‚ she claimed. Her father was a very distinguished-looking diplomat. We saw him kissing her good–bye at the station. I presume it was her father, & she was very intelligent. Her name was Maria Theresa.

21. And she was another almost convert! We talked to her about the Lord for quite a while. This guy here in our compartment (Dad) kept trying to convince her, & she was almost persuaded & she just really didn't want to even get off the train when she got to her stop on our route.—And I really felt like we should have gotten off the train with her or persuaded her to go on with us because we weren't quite finished.

22. That's what happens when you get bound by a schedule & you think you've got to be some place at a certain time. To Hell with schedules! I wish we had gotten right off the train, because if we had, then I think we would have won Maria Theresa completely. She was just thrilled with all we had to say about our way of life & colonies, etc.

23. By the way, did you notice how decorative the beautiful trains are in Europe? They've got pretty pictures on the walls, lovely woodwork & every convenience. They're the most luxurious trains you've ever seen. I've never seen anything that could compare with them in the United States. And talk about the scenery, the beauty of the scenery!—Here is Lake Geneva, the beautiful peaceful scene with the Heavenly light pouring through the clouds. There lies a newspaper, which is almost symbolic of the dangerous times in which we live. And there is light breaking through the storm clouds, the clouds that are gathering‚ dark, dark‚ red, red with warning, black, black with warning for the Great Confusion that is coming upon us! The mountainsides of Switzerland are beautiful indeed‚ & the lakes are even more beautiful! God's beautiful Creation!

Italy!

24. Here we have a sidewalk dance in the train station while we were changing trains, or I guess going through Customs at Ventimiglia at the border of Italy. I just got out there to take the pictures, & about that time they were whirling around so fast that we just about missed'm! This guy in the white shirt, though, was crippled & yet he was the best dancer in the bunch! He was just jigging around on one foot most of the time.

25. In Rome, this other fellow was very friendly. He offered to haul our baggage for us although he obviously doesn't look like a porter. We couldn't find a bellhop or a redcap, everybody was busy, so we just piled our luggage on & let him pull it. (Dad!)

26. Here are the Spanish Steps in Rome, a regular art colony. Uh oh! There's that guy again! (Dad!) Look at him right there at the foot of that light post! He's got a whole big bagful of his seditious literature over his shoulder there, I notice. And he's trying to hide behind some dark glasses now, I see. Uh-huh! Well, maybe we'll know what he's up to pretty soon!

27. These hippies sleep out here on the steps & they exhibit their artware & underwear, & they are just poor kids trying to survive & make a living.—Most of them Americans who are evading the draft or various other things they didn't like about the United States. Europe is just full of young people travelling all over the World, hitchhiking & bumming around & getting by the best they can from place to place, nearly all of them carrying backpacks, as you may see later in some of the pictures. They apparently are supported either by their meager efforts like this artwork, or some of them, their parents send them cheques from home to keep them from being in the Army so they can stay abroad & escape the draft. You'd be amazed how many draft dodgers you find in Europe travelling around from country to country!

28. Well, God bless them, here they are, asleep. As I recall, when we pointed the camera at this guy he said, "What'd you come to see, the monkeys in the zoo?"—The guy with long hair on the left there, poor guy, I really felt bad taking his picture. Here they are.—I thought you'd like to see how the poor American hippies are living abroad, anything rather than go into the Army! Notice their shoes & belongings piled along the wall there? Their underwear hanging, their shoes, their little transistor radio or record player‚ junk stacked all around, backpack leaning against the wall. (Family: That's better than white-glove inspection in the barracks.) Yes‚ Sir! Better than being in a military barracks!

29. Well‚ I'll be switched, there's that guy again! (Dad!) And this does look like he got in with some real Communist-looking Americans! In fact, this fellow on my right here‚ his name was Jay, & he & his girlfriend were living together in the same room‚ same bed, in the same hotel where we were living, along with a friend of theirs. In fact‚ there were several of them shacked up in the same room, until the young lady manager caught'm. But this fellow is a very fine fellow, a wonderful guy, Jewish, & I think she was too. They were very interested in our message, & we really socked it to'm & they were almost disciples. He remembered us from way back when. I think maybe, Shad, you might remember this guy, because he remembered us from the dear old days in our early beginnings‚ in the Light Club!

30. And here we are sitting in a little cheap Italian restaurant where we could buy our dinner for something not much more than 50 or 75 cents, something like that. Of course in Italian Lire that meant hundreds of Lire, which sounds like you've got lots of money when you're in Italy, because I think it takes 600 Lire (now 1400!) just to make one Dollar, doesn't it? So you've got one of these 1,000 Lire bills in your pocket & you really feel rich, but it's only worth a little over a Dollar! They were really good kids, & we had a lot of good fellowship with them & talked to'm a lot. I don't know, maybe they've come back since then & visited one of the colonies. She invited us to her home in Wisconsin, said she's got a cabin up in the forest & she'd love to have us come visit her, & we've got her address & we've got to get up there some time.

Mediterranean Cruise!

31. Ha! There he is again! (Dad!) The CIA or someone must be after him, looks like he is just getting ready to dive overboard to escape & he's got his Mae West life jacket on. You see, the wind is blowing his beret & he's just ready to take to sea! This happens to be a Mediterranean cruise ship.

32. Ship travel can be the cheapest way to travel in Europe, believe it or not! In the U.S. it is the most expensive way, but in Europe this is the cheapest way to travel because it is less than half of the plane fare to the same place. Plane fare is almost the cheapest way in the U.S. But the ships, if you've got lots of time, will carry you the same distance for less than half that much fare, & at the same time you live luxuriously with a nice stateroom & sumptuous meals three & four times a day, & all kinds of pretty places to see as you ride smoothly‚ leisurely along the beautiful blue Mediterranean & enjoy all those good meals. It costs you nothing extra for the stateroom & the good meals & several days of rest, relaxation & recreation.

33. And the best thing about it is you're cooped up with the same people on the same boat for five or six days & you really get a chance to sock it to'm! You have a whole lot of bull sessions (informal discussions). Sometimes we'd be sitting out on the deck with a whole ring of young people all around us, just like having a class & really socking it to'm, & we just had a great time! And this particular ship happened to be just filled with young Israelis coming back from their Summer tours of Europe & America, going back to Israel, & some of the others going to Israel for the first time. Many of them were from Kibbutzim.

Israeli Banks!

34. And here is a Jew (Dad!) in Israel, who is pointing to his little rinky-dink bank. I want you to notice that bank in particular. It's just an old rickety building, as you can see, & there's a store on one side & there's an apartment overhead. You could probably bore a hole right through the floor into the bank, & it didn't look like a very secure place for anybody's money. But we didn't have much anyhow so I just thought it would be interesting to see.

35. Leave it to the Jews!—You almost stumble over these little banks all over the place. They've got one in almost every block in Israel. The people want to be sure they've got plenty of places to keep their money, & they're open all hours of the day & some hours of the night.—Typical Jewish country where money is still god to them.

Afif & an Arab Family!

36. Here we are with an Arab family, introduced to us by our dear friend Afif, who you can see in the upper left hand corner of the slide, along with his friend who was the son of the family & worked in a hospital. His name is Habib. Afif is standing arm-in-arm with Habib there.

37. Afif was a little rascal, had been, when he first ran way from home, from his village in Nazareth. His father was a fairly well-to-do man with a big villa in his home village, but he got mad at his father & ran away from home. Afif is the guy up there in the corner, the young fellow with the black hair.—The one we made the tape of which we sent you.—Remember? He's just really a rounder (a drifter), but an awful good-looking guy, & a very friendly fellow, & he liked us a lot for some reason. I think maybe that pretty little American girl there (Maria) may have had something to do with it. But you see‚ the only hopes that any of these people have of ever getting out or getting anywhere in life is if they can just marry a pretty, rich American girl. So they're all chasing after the American women over there, & you don't have to be very rich to be chased. And you don't have to be very chaste either if you want to get caught!—Ha!

38. But anyway‚ Afif ran away from home when he was about 14‚ & for the first year in Haifa he slept in empty city buses parked in the bus parking lot. Afif is an Arab, of course, & this is an Arab family, very charming people who all claim to be Christians because they're members of the Greek Orthodox Church, as many Arabs in Israel are.

39. Most of the Arabs in Israel are Christians—which is something the Jews don't tell you—& are only allowed to have third–rate citizenship because of their religion. Israel is strictly a religious state & you're only a Jew if you're a Jew by religion & if your mother was Jewish‚ etc. This little Arab family once had a lovely home which they lost in the war. The elderly man you see there, the father of the family, was a fine man‚ fairly well-to-do, & now he is doing well to even get a job. And they have a family there of 11 all together, as I recall, living in this one room!

Jewish Cats!

40. Well, the cats of Israel are really something!—All these Jewish cats. They feed cats, whereas you see very few dogs. Jews have an aversion to dogs‚ usually, because of them being somewhat unscriptural, but they love cats & they've always got cats all over the place. You can see the cats running from all parts of the neighbourhood while this man is throwing out food to them behind that hotel.—Because the more cats they have, the fewer rats they have, & there are virtually no mice or rats because of the large number of cats. Here they are, all scrambling for the goodies‚ nice big fat cats, & they are filled with rats!

Life in Haifa!

41. Here's how to camp out in your hotel room! In this case, this was before we got our hot plate, we just bent the heater over backwards. In fact, hardly any of the rooms or houses in Israel were heated at all! It can go down to the 30's & 40's Fahrenheit (0 to 5 C.) there in the Wintertime & still they have no heat & they live with their windows wide open! They are the toughest, hardiest people! Nothing is heated! The theatres aren't heated!—Everything is icy, refrigerator, icebox cold in the Winter time! So it doesn't matter how many covers you pile on or anything else, it seems like you can never get warm. We finally broke down & bought this heater for the room after the hotel refused to give us any in spite of all our requests. It was such a cheap room, I guess they didn't want to give us one. So here we are both trying to keep warm, wearing everything we could think of, long underwear, overcoats, hats—in our hotel room—while we cooked our soup on our little campstove in the middle of the floor.

42. And here we are eating our lovely little health breakfast. You talk about Jewish! This guy (me!) was such a skinflint‚ so chintzy that he wouldn't even go out of his room to eat! For one thing, it was too cold, & for another thing it was too expensive. Prices in Israel are almost as bad as in the United States. Of course, they don't sell cereal over there. No Jew in his right mind would buy a box of dry cereal full of 90% hot air, at a high price! There's almost no place you can buy cold cereals like they have in the States.

43. But every little Arab store carries lots of nuts & beans & health foods & dates.—Healthy natural health foods that they have sitting in sacks, like gunny sacks‚ just like they came from the fields in, sitting right on the sidewalk out in front of the store. You can grab a handful of all kinds of delicious things you never even heard of & I can't even remember the names of! But you put everything into this cereal, including oatmeal & the kitchen sink, & you've really got a dish! And it just makes me hungry thinking about it! I haven't had any for a long time, but it really is delicious & we'd put all kinds of stuff in there‚ including our leftover "pita" from the night before, which is an Israeli bread; in fact, the bread which is used & made all over the Mideast.

44. Notice that little clock radio there that somebody gave us before we left? That was certainly a thoughtful gift, because that was one of the most useful belongings we had, & we could always get the BBC News. Virtually the only English news you can get in the Mideast is BBC. Everything else is in chattering Arabic, Turkish, Israeli or Greek or something else. With all the U.S. has done for Israel & all the billions of Dollars they've poured into Israel‚ they still hardly allow one damned program in English on the whole Israeli radio! They've got half an hour of English news in the morning‚ & one half-hour in the afternoon, & most of it is nothing but propaganda‚ so you don't really get much news in English in Israel at all. You certainly don't get the whole news‚ & all you get is propaganda aimed at the Americans, since it's in English. But on BBC all day long you can get a lot of news, information programs, lots of things about politics & what's going on in the Mideast.

45. Incidentally, you'd be amazed that the war in Vietnam is not considered very newsworthy throughout all the rest of the World! They don't even think it's important. It's virtually insignificant & you hardly even hear it mentioned. They have much more important things to talk about, like whether Britain gets into the Common Market or whether there's going to be war between the Jews & the Arabs, & all the interesting & important news of all the rest of the World!—Nothing about that stupid idiotic little war down in Vietnam. I think that's about all I can tell you about that picture. See the cans of all kinds of food we were getting stuff out of to put into our cereal?

46. And here's an Eskimo in her igloo typing out the latest news from Alaska! (Maria!) Actually this is Israel, pardon me, & it is a borrowed or rented typewriter, but it was upon this little machine that we first began to produce those famous Letters, those controversial doctrines that you've been reading which have been turning the World right-side-up, causing some people to jump up & down & get very mad, & others excited & very happy!

47. But anyhow, this is how it was done & this is one way to keep warm‚ keep your fingers warm, just keep moving, when it's 40 degrees F. (5 C.) inside your igloo! And as you'll notice, someone's breakfast is being neglected there while someone is busy typing, and this is not unusual. And we're not kidding here, those coats and hoods and wraps were necessary to try to keep warm in an Israeli Winter without heat.

48. And here was the indoctrination & dedication of our new campfire! We finally bought a little hot plate, & that was a real innovation! We could boil our own water then. This particularly came in handy when the hot water failed in the hotel & was out for about a week or two, which was our original way of heating our room, we'd run a wash-bowl full of hot water & that helped a lot. Of course, it made the atmosphere awful clammy as well as cold, but it did help kind of warm up the room a little bit. And here are our utensils, & here's our little Eskimo cook in her Eskimo parka, trying to cook over the campfire in her igloo! I tell you, in that place, you have to go to bed with all your clothes on, your overcoat, your long underwear, everything but your shoes, & your hats & your parkas to try to keep warm!

49. And here he is carrying on his nefarious underground work, reading the mail in his comfortable office! It's a "comfortable" 42 degrees F. according to the actual thermometer we had, & we managed to keep from getting pneumonia, or both frozen into one solid block of ice this way, until we did finally get a little heat. Between the hot plate & the little electric heater we finally managed to get things fairly warmed up to where we were almost comfortable by the time we left there.

50. You notice her little black tape recorder that you sent us over there on the stand, which took about four batteries to play one tape. Therefore we didn't play very many tapes & we certainly didn't make any, or not many, & that was one cause of our finally reverting in desperation to the typewriter, which certainly was a God-send because we learned that by typing & printing we could get a lot further & do better than any other way. A tape only went to one Colony at a time, whereas Letters could go to all Colonies at the same time.—And are much lighter & cheaper. Especially when they start opening your mail & checking its contents, you're thankful that you're not mailing something that draws a lot of suspicion, because they're apt to think you're there as a spy! They had a six-month trial in Israel‚ a secret trial of some poor old Englishman who they said was spying at 70–some years of age, taking pictures & selling them to the Egyptians! Well, we weren't doing that‚ & we weren't the party, but he (Dad) sure looks like he could have been!

51. Here's his typical spy regalia (Dad!), attired as a member of the Arab Mafia with his insignia on his hat, which is obviously something subversive. Looks like the Resistance symbol, the Omega, sign of the End! Actually, though, if you'd had a chance to ask him‚ he was really just trying to keep warm & put everything on he could think of to try to keep warm. He did speak English, however‚ & that was very interesting, considering how foreign he looks. He looks like an Arab Santa Claus, security style! And this is really a very effective way to try to keep your Jewish nose warm, which can really stick out there & get awful cold at 42 degrees.

(Remember, this running commentary on our slides was given to the Family heads in our Motel room in Dallas on our return from our first trip to Europe in 1971‚ 21 years ago! Sorry we had to change the faces for security even this long ago! Wish you could see the original colour slides!—But thought you'd still enjoy it! GBY! WLY!—D.)

(To Be Continued!)

Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family