You are the solution

As I reflect now on the events of the last three months, there are naturally things that I will never forget. The experience has added so much to my life, but the end result is what matters most. This posting was written to include you in the story. You are the solution, commitment is our only obstacle.

New York finale on Pier 17

I must admit that it has been strange being back at work confined to four walls. We covered more than 15,000 miles between us and I had become somewhat accustomed to changing shifts, meals and bedtimes every five days. Being back home, sleeping in the same bed every night, working the same “day-shift”, and traveling six miles to work in the morning is a bit of an anti- climactic experience at the moment. When going on a trip like this, you experience such an incredible high, and the last week on the run we were counting down the days in anticipation of the finish line. We were nearing the completion of the first ever relay run around the world …! Then, after that festive celebration you come home and it is all over! The bulky black duffel bag is unpacked and put away, the familiar smell of muscle relaxing gels no longer lingers in the air, the days are void of wisecracks from our Scottish teammate, and last but not least, there is no more beer for breakfast at the end of our midnight running shift! So when all these and other thoughts flash through my head, I am beginning to wonder whether it was all real or just a dream!

Looking back on our trailblazing adventure and awareness trip, one of the many highlights for me was when I ran the one-kilometer dash in the Netherlands together with 160 Dutch third-graders who were all shouldering six water bottles in their blue back packs to emulate what many children in Africa do on a daily basis. Also, seeing my father support me from the sideline when I ran into the busy center of Amsterdam was a Blue Planet moment I will never forget.

 
1. Mongolian Yurt 2. Gobi Desert.

But I have so many fond memories. We were all looking forward to visiting countries such as Belarus, Russia, Mongolia and China - - places we’d never been to before. And they, for the most part, exceeded our expectations. The food was great and the beer brewed to perfection wherever we went. I thought Siberia would be desolate and desert-like, but instead it was green and in bloom with purple, white and yellow wildflowers. The foothills of the Urals were beautiful, and Lake Baikal, the largest fresh water containment in the world, was stunning. While camping in the Gobi Desert, we visited a local sheepherder family and sat with them in their yurt, where they served us horse milk and a “snack” made from sour milk. From beginning to end, we encountered four full moons, experienced flaming red sunrises and sunsets and gazed for hours into the star studded evening sky in the Gobi desert. We saw stars streaking across the sky, but contrary to Western tradition, in the Far East seeing a falling star is considered bad luck.

1. Ulan Bataar 2. Kansas City 3 and 4. Gansk

The people were all so incredibly friendly wherever we went. We always had lots of children come up to us at baton exchange points, curious and wondering what we were up to. We’d give them Blue Planet stickers and blue shoelaces and posed with them for pictures. In Gansk, Russia we met a group of teenagers at an outdoor breakdancing contest, and they soon were practicing their English language skills on us. One of the runners, a longtime music teacher, gave them a quick rhythm and blues lesson, resulting in a group of high school girls snapping their fingers and mimicking his “boobabteedo” songs. It was a blast! We met people from all walks of life - - schoolteachers, truck drivers, farmers, vendors, young professionals and elderly folks. They’d sometimes watch from afar, and other times come out to shake our hands and occasionally and spontaneously give us little gifts and mementos, which now will always remind us of the places we visited and the special moments we had with them. Yes, we had so many of these unforgettable Blue Planet moments.

On a personal note, the low point for me was the injury I sustained pulling a groin muscle under somewhat odd circumstances when the vehicle we were traveling in hit a big ditch. Continuing to run injured aggravated the injury more and more. By the time we reached Japan, I was unable to run my ten-mile leg, but was determined to carry on as best I could, in spite of the pain. People have asked me why I kept running and I tell them that I kept running because I know that people are dying every day due to waterborne diseases. In my mind, when I carried that baton even for part of the way, I carried that all important message to the world that says water is life, pass it on.

1. Russian village 2. Two-wheeling in the USA

While I was injured, as a form of therapy, I took to two wheels, and daily mustered over sixty miles or more over rolling hills and country roads, passing by amazing fields of flowering sunflowers and ripe for the picking corn fields in Kansas, Missouri and Pennsylvania. On September 4, we all ran the final leg in New York City together through Manhattan, alongside the Hudson River, passed the United Nations building (where we had began our journey 95 days earlier), and on to the finish line at Pier 17 on South Street Seaport. That was an amazing day. My family and friends were there, along with a lot of people from the Blue Planet organization. It was a celebratory ceremony, and up on stage and surrounded by a sizeable crowd, all runners were presented with a memento - - a beautiful glass water drop with the emblem of the Blue Planet Run inside of it, signifying what we ran for.

1. Near Minsk, Belarus 2. China

The next day, however, I felt like the air had gone out of my tires because it was time to say goodbye. As runners, we all shared a very special bond, but I’d inevitably grown very close to the other members of my relay team. We traveled in very close quarters every day for 95 days. We shared the same hotel rooms, were cramped in the same min-vans, although incredibly we never had one argument. Needless to say, it was tough to say good-bye.

Besides the glass water drop, I do have various other items I picked up during the journey to help me remember my experiences. From day one, I collected the electronic hotel keys and local beer mats, and made a point of collecting rocks and (mile) stones. I figured that it would be fun to have a small rock from every country we ran through, and also wanted to collect milestones from places that had a special meaning, such as my 77-minute ten-mile personal best in Siberia and the completion of the run after crossing the finish line in New York. There were two other very important places where I looked for a special stone. I’d never visited the concentration camps in Auschwitz, and we had a chance to go there during the run. It was a very sobering experience. Later on, in Japan, we traveled to Hiroshima and I also picked up a rock there. These were both places where horrific human suffering had occurred during the Second World War. They were particularly significant in my mind because so many people had died there, and now more than 60 years later, we were running past these memorials of death and destruction to save lives.

In California, I was left with another very special memento. While in Malibu, after our media event, a middle-aged man came up to me and said that he had something to give me. He reached into his tattered backpack and took out his cap. On it was a Purple Heart pin. He was a Vietnam veteran and had no money to give, but thought it was so incredible what we were doing that he wanted to give me his pin. I said that I couldn’t accept it, but he insisted, so I now have this pin and find it to be a very special gift and testimony. Many a time during our travels, I have felt this human spirit responding to human suffering. This man wanted to be part of the solution and gave perhaps one of his proudest possessions to someone he didn’t even know. For me, it was a moment of trust and hope; a true Blue Planet moment! I will pass this pin on to the Blue Planet Foundation because I think that is where it belongs, and not something I should personally keep.

And last but not least, there was the story that Victor, one of the runners from Guatemala, told us the night before we started the run in New York. He had gone to a village in his country where they had water contamination and sanitation problems and told them that he was about to run around the world to raise awareness and funds. “Victor”, they said, “We have heard it all before, and have been promised so many times that help was on the way, but it never came. We have no more hope”! Quite disappointed, Victor left for boot camp at the Olympic Village in Lake Placid, New York. But then, the day before we set out on our journey, Victor received a phone call from one of the people of the village telling him that they had put his picture up on an altar in the church, and every Wednesday, they would light twenty candles, one for each of the runners, to wish them a safe journey, and that now they have hope again …

Now that I’m back at work, it’s amazing to hear from people who have said that they told a relative or a friend about the run and that they had made a donation on the Blue Planet website. They’ve all been helping to spread the word, and in a sense they’ve also become global messengers, and that’s the most wonderful thing that I have come back to. As for me, it’s been very gratifying that I could at least leave a small footprint and help to create a starting point of awareness, which hopefully will be followed by a complete eradication of this crisis affecting over one billion people today. Maybe twenty years from now we’ll be able to say that we’ve joined together and brought safe drinking water to 200 million people. That’s our goal. Although the run has forever changed my views on the world and what is out there, my outlook on life continues to be focused on wanting to help other people. I will continue to work and talk about this global water crisis, and wherever and whenever I can put those words into action.

On the route

1. Downtown Dublin, Ireland 2. Conway country side, Wales 3. Pierrefonds castle, France 4. Downtown Mechelen, Belgium 5. Amsterdam canal, The Netherlands 6. Bremen, Grimm fairy tale sculpture

People moments

1. Mandy and Ian, Shropshire, England 2. Soccer kids, France 3. Laurel with BPR supporter in Bruxelles 4. German pub at midnight exchange point

Blue planet runners

1. Richard and Emmanuel 2. Father and son, Amsterdam 3. Taeko, Emmanuel and Sunnil, Holy Head, Wales 4. Yellow team with Jason, who broke his foot, and in the USA became our team driver.

On the run

1. Conway Beach, Wales 2. Exchange point, Dublin 3. Exchange point Trafalgar Square, London 4. Exchange point, Brussels

From now on we are traveling just with our relay team of four, consisting of Laurel from Hawaii, Heiko from Germany, Paul from Scotland and myself from The Netherlands. Designated the yellow team, we will be together for at least the first 15 days of the route. Each relay team will run four consecutive days with the fifth day off for some rest and media events. The rest of the time we travel, run ten miles per days, pack and unpack our suitcases and pass through the night to be gone again by dawn. Most of the teams will stay at the same hotels at different points of the day and as we come and go, we will exchange our stories, hugs, good byes and hellos with the blue, green, red or silver team.

For the first week we are running the 9:00 am to 3:00 pm “shift”, and the mid-morning to afternoon time slots proofed to be fairly hot, with temperatures in the middle to upper eighties. Add to that some hills and head wind, and we have a good daily workout. Admittedly, I was slightly nervous when it was my turn to take over the baton and run my first leg of the global run, but at the halfway mark I was in the groove and paraded at a comfortable 8:30 pace through the rolling countryside of Connecticut. On occasion a curious onlooker would ask me from a front porch or a sidewalk what was going on. I would than raise the baton and simply respond with a smile and say: ”blue planet run”. Traffic was polite and shared the road at a safe distance. Intersections would come to a halt to let me through, and scooter-man, our personal guide and pilot rider, was always in sight to give directions, and make sure we were safe and secure.

Before I knew it, my run had come to an end and still breathing heavy from the run, hot and soaking wet, I was looking into the giant lens of a camera! Everything I say now and every move I make will be recorded and could end up in some evening news show or local newspaper. Wow! I felt good and concluded my interview with the hope that this global run would produce the desired result, to bring safe drinking water to over a billion people. Nearly finished with the run and the interview, we boarded our team truck to the next exchange point. That night we flew across the Atlantic Ocean, destination Shannon Ireland, for the start of the European part of the run. And so our journey has begun.

Blue planet run kick-off

At long last the day had come to take the run on the road. The night before we had enjoyed a pre-dinner reception with Hillary Swank, our guest of honor, followed by a family style get-together at the Salmon Dinner restaurant in downtown New York. Temperatures had been in the mid-eighties all week and the weather forecast called for another sweltering hot day. Brynn and Sean were selected to be on the Today Show at 9:30 in the morning and were picked-up by a limousine service for the occasion. The rest of us, dressed in orange and black, walked the four blocks down 42nd avenue to the United Nations building in full anticipation of the day ahead.

The opening ceremony took place on the UN lawn, a nicely groomed grassy field, bordered on the street side by large deciduous trees, yet dwarfed by the tall skyscrapers of downtown Manhattan, and yielding on the far side to the banks of the East river. Sculptures depicting messages of global peace complimented the United Nations grounds with hundreds of colorful flags of all the nations in the world waving in the wind, as if to bid the runners “G-dspeed”. In front of a sizable crowd of hundreds of supporters, press and curious onlookers, Mary Chervenak, the first global messenger to run, took to the streets to kick-off the ninety-five day long journey around the world. After years of preparation by Jin Zidell and other senior members of the blue planet foundation a long awaited dream shifted gears from the planning phase into the awareness- and fundraising phase.

The runners, one by one had been announced and called-up to the podium and from there, witnessed the moment we had all waited and prepared for. As Mary descended the podium-steps the crowds came alive and sent her on her way. Waiving the baton in the air she ran under the air inflated blue planet arch off into the distance, and out onto the crowded streets of Manhattan. While four of the relay teams boarded their team trucks to travel to there exchange points, team yellow, my team, stayed behind to attend to the media.

At the end of our tour of duty, as we were walking back to the hotel, a dozen school kids from the Bronx, who had raised over $3,000 dollars for the blue planet, ran up to us armed with blue planet tee-shirts and colored markers. Soon we were signing their proud and priced possessions. It was a treat to see their enthusiasm for the cause and it gave us hope, that if kids like them and others all over the world understand the message and call for action, we will be able to bring safe drinking water and save thousands of lives all over the world.

By mid-afternoon we left New York destination Hebron, Connecticut where we will start our run tomorrow morning. For the next ninety-five days, we will run and travel, eat on the go, overnight in different towns and hotels and sleep in different beds every night. We will travel across all time zones, and run a range of elevations from below sea level in The Netherlands, to over 12,000 feet in the Rocky Mountains, with temperatures from the low-forties, to the one-hundred plus high-noon summer temperatures in the Mojave Desert, Nevada and Utah. In full anticipation of all of that and more we have begun our journey of hope for those less fortunate on our planet.

A dream awakening

What for me began as a dream last November is now becoming a reality. Early Saturday morning I took-off from rainy Detroit to arrive 90 minutes later in summery Albany, New York. The flight was uneventful and at the baggage claim area we were awaited and welcomed by Ignition staff members. After an airport lunch we boarded the passenger-van to travel to Lake Placid. The route to the Olympic village was scenic and the Adirondack Mountain range with its deep blue water lakes, presented under a sunny sky, made for some picture perfect moments. My farewells at home over the last several days were wonderful and the hellos and reunion with the team at the village were equally exhilarating.

Boot camp is what it is, and we are busy preparing for the kick-off on Friday morning. Hands-on, and classroom style instructions, presentations, photo-shoots and team building exercises are on the agenda. We used the Olympic gym and massage center and learned the finer art of massage, fleurage and effleurage, and became familiar with some alternate stretches for our pre- and post runs. Yesterday the sports psychologist taught us our Blue planet anthem, a beautiful song of giving light, teaching peace, standing together and giving hope. We sang our heart's content and then last night from 9:00 till midnight we topped it off with a practice run through the surroundings of the Lake Placid Olympic village.

While on the global run, we will pass through a little under 1,500 exchange points, where the baton is passed from one relay runner to the next. Here media and curious locals can gather, meet and greet the runners, and hear the run message that will be recited during the exchange. It is here that we hope to touch as many people as we can on our planet route, to share and to invite people to give enlightenment and purpose to over a billion people that do not have safe drinking water today. It is here that we come together and give hope!

The Blue Planet Run Message
By Adrian Lurssen

We run like water. We run FOR water.

We run to bring news to every person in every town we pass through—urgent news of a crisis that affects one in five of all of us on this earth.

We run to remember the sons and daughters, the mothers and fathers, the 6,000 human beings who die every day, because they lack safe drinking water.

We run because time, and water – essential to our existence – is running out for all of us.

We run to tell a story that begins with suffering but ends with hope.

We run to include you in the story. You are the solution. Commitment is our only obstacle.

We run to tell a story that ends like this: twenty years from now we will have joined together to bring water – to bring life – to 200 million people around the world.

We run because, in the words of the Iroquois thanksgiving prayer printed on the baton we carry with us: “Water is life.”

“We give thanks to all the Waters of the world for quenching our thirst and providing us with strength. Water is life. We know its power in many forms - waterfalls and rain, mists and streams, rivers and oceans. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to the spirit of water.

Now our minds are one.”

Corporate response

Every time I tell someone that I will be circumventing the world for the blue planet foundation initiative, the response most always is congratulatory, followed by some elaborate explanations and then a final question: “What about your job”? Most certainly a fair question to ask and one I often have contemplated myself prior to the acknowledgement of my participation in the blue planet run. Fortunately for me, I work for Akzo Nobel, a Dutch multi national not unfamiliar to corporate social responsibility and an organization that over the years has done much to support local communities on all five continents.

Although, not an automatic “shoe-in” the company responded with a justifiable three months leave of absence, if a temporary solution could be found for my vacated job during my absence. Elated with the response we found lots of support and willingness from my employees and other corporate citizens and I feel very good about the final arrangements. And so after the Memorial Day holiday I start my LOA, leaving behind a great group of co-workers who undoubtedly will keep an eye out for me at work and on the rocky road ahead. And thus I thank Akzo Nobel and all my friends and colleagues locally and globally for their grandiose interest and magnificient support!

Last weekend home - May 22, 2007

Springtime is finally here to stay and the dogwoods are in full bloom. Flowers are decorating the landscape and the fragrant sweet scent of snow-white Convallaria majalis, otherwise known as lily-of-the-valley is filling the air. The vernal equinox is easily my favorite season and a welcome change from the cold and snowy wintry weather. Friday night we celebrated the Sabbath with our friends Lon and Jane, who stopped in for the day on their way to Frankenmuth. After dinner we headed for Temple service at Temple Israel where we sang in the Sabbath bride and listened to a great sermon delivered by Rabbi Tisdale, reminiscing over the great and splendid past of the city of Detroit, and the belief that, the city will surely rebound and reinvent itself to return to its previous grandeur.

Towards the end of the service Rabbi Bennett stepped onto the Bimah and prepared the congregation for the Aleinu. From behind the lectern, after adjusting the microphone to match his height, he began with the words: “As you all know I am a runner … I immediately perked up and wondered how this unusual intro would bring us to the ancient prayer of thanks. Instead he connected it to the Blue Planet run and the journey I am about to undertake. Totally unexpected I was invited up to the Bimah to open the Ark. With Anne at my side we opened the glass sliding doors, bringing the Torah scrolls into clear view, and felt blessed and fulfilled with the unexpected honor.

Saturday morning we had brunch at Sunny’s Café, a local diner tucked away in a strip mall nearby. Under a giant mural depicting a moment of Capote’s Novella “breakfast at Tiffany’s” we enjoyed a scrumptious Greek omelet under the watchful eyes of Hepburn and Peppard. The food was great, the company exquisite and time stood still if only for a moment. Before long, and way too soon, Lon and Jane's visit came to an end and shortly after the noon hour they went on their merry way to the wedding party up North.

For Sunday morning I had signed up for the West Bloomfield rock and road 10K run, which offered a smorgasbord of asphalt roads, graveled trails and a grassy field. While many of my friends from Running Fit competed for time and placement, for me it was a final testing of the engine and various running parts. All turned out all right and the tune up concluded uneventfully in slightly under fifty-one minutes. After the early morning workout and some salty chips with guacamole dip at the finish line, I headed back home to return to my forever lengthy to-do lists.

Blue planet friends

From left to right and top to bottom:1. Michael 2. Andrea 3. Lon and Jane 4. My Russian tutor: Irina 5. Horizon Health Care: David Betts, D.C. and Krisztina 6. Robin, Jean and Deborah 7. Running Fit: Dave, Fritz, Lori, Melanie, Tom, Jan, Will, Arlinda

Going for a run – May 19, 2007

By next week I will be on my way to the Olympic village in Lake Placid for blue planet boot camp. There we will find out the make-up of the five relay teams and receive the complete instructions and logistics details for the blue planet run. Then finally, on June first we will hit the pavement, marking the beginning of a 15,200-mile journey around the world.

In preparation for going on this run I have made some lists. To-do lists for home projects and work projects to be finished before take-off. Then there are shopping- and packing lists and a check-off list for things already in process. My passport is somewhere at one of the foreign embassies awaiting fancy visa stamps from Russia, Belarus, China or Mongolia. My newly acquired regular- and sunglass frames are being fitted with progressive, scratch resistant lenses and will next week be ready for pick-up. Over the last several weeks I paid visits to my doctor and dentist, chiropractor, massage and physical therapist and underwent check-ups, alignments and adjustments. An ankle strain, incurred on one of my practice runs, put me on ice and heat packs. Medical advice had me elevated, wearing compression sleeves and greased-up with muscle balm and therapeutic warming ointment. My physical therapist, apparently knowing me better than myself, had threatened to put me in a glass box with the door shut, but after the incident changed her mind to a padded room with the key safely out of sight! “Stay healthy and off the trails”, she said with a threatening voice. “You worked way too hard to now blow it on one of your crazy run-arounds!” Oi Vay, that Tracey can be so tough!

Back at home, maps have become part of the décor. Mounted on a poster board and tagged with colored pins the Europe map is staged on a paint easel in one of the kitchen corners. I have practically memorized the route and am contemplating taking some Russian lessons, just enough to be dangerous during the twenty-three day Soviet land crossing.

But that’s not all! With our favorite daughter moving into a new apartment we drove to Chicago to come to her aid. With a carload full of Ikea furniture we went to work and assembled her kitchen-, living- and bathroom furniture. We hang curtains and mounted shelves until the wee hours and accomplished all with very little shuteye. While in Chicago we managed to get in a sushi meal and stopped-off at the mystical gallery where the elderly Seminole Indian lady foretold our future! The year ahead looked full of promise with guardian angels on alert and ready for action. Every card I picked, conjectured good fortune and with renewed confidence and a big smile we paid our dues and left the semi-dark eerie abode!

Then there is my electronics list. I had bought a new notebook for the occasion and added a PDA with wireless keyboard, mobile phone, GPS, compact digi camera, ipod shuffle and a four-gig scandisk. Now up to speed with the latest Hi Fi, Wi Fi, Blue tooth and skype technology I am ready to take on the world and communicate from whatever and wherever landmass! Add to that some electrical juice and there is another suitcase just for all the different transformers, converters and batteries. Fortunately Radio Shack had a "special" I couldn’t refuse, on a universal converter. I promise it will come in handy!

Oh, and did I mention my running gear and accessories with enough clothes to last between weekly laundry services? Four pair of running shoes, power bars, glucose tablets, sunscreen and borealis Buzz-Off mosquito repellent. And lets not forget my royal Dutch orange bandanas, a water bottle, and the Stick, just to name some other items on that short list. Ofcourse there is more, but I will leave it with that. As you can see, it takes a bit of planning to go for a run, but it will all be worth it in the end! I will be ready and hope that you are too, because we are going on a journey to enrich the lives of 1.2 billion people. So give them a hand and I will do the running for you!

Water is life – May 19, 2007

Unlike you or me, over one billion people on earth have no safe drinking water. Women and children may walk up to 6 hours a day to get water, and even then, it may not be enough, or safe enough to drink. Many drink contaminated water and then get sick. 2.2 million human beings die each year from water borne illnesses. 6,000 people die every day and 240 children die every hour. But there is hope. Click this short video link and watch what is going on in front of our very own eyes, mostly unnoticed, and find out what we collectively can do to solve this crisis.

For the record - May 18, 2007

Although having lived in the United States for the last thirty years as a legal alien, I have never become an American passport holder. As such I consider myself a global citizen, calling Holland, Israel and the United States all home, and am proud as a Dutch American Jew, or is it Jewish American Dutchman, to represent the Netherlands for the blue planet run. I have traveled extensively through Europe, the Middle East and North and Central America and in the early seventies spent time in Israel on kibbutz Sdot Yam working the land and studying Hebrew. It was there that I met Anne and together we traveled the country several times over, from Ras Muhammad in the Sinai dessert to Mount Hermon in the Golan Heights. We went to seminars and Kallahs in Ramallah in the West Bank, where under the watchful eyes of the military we listened to lectures on Jewish religion, history, Israeli politics and the Arab conflict. We walked the land where biblical- and Jewish history was made, from Mount Sinai, Massada and the caves of Bar Kochba.

After almost a year, it was time to go "home", and three years later Anne and I married and settled in the US where we spent the last thirty years between Seattle, Atlanta and West Bloomfield, Michigan. I am a Reform Jew and believe in a pluralistic approach to life and a respect for all human beings, regardless of persuasion or background. During my professional career I have held and enjoyed positions in the life sciences field (NOAA) and sales and services management (Akzo Nobel). For fun I seek the outdoors and enjoy camping, hiking and kayaking. I am a runner and a bike rider (road and trail), enjoy marathons and century rides and look to expand and enrich my fitness activities to include triathlons with the ultimate goal to one day do an Iron man.

So running and traveling the world has been good to me, but when I lace up my running shoes now it conjures up a feeling far greater than before. The blue planet run is so much more than a foot race around the world. It is an initiative to instill an attitude towards reaching out to those in need of safe drinking water and by doing so repair the world and making it a better place to live for everyone. This is what inspires me daily and it feels good to be alive and able to contribute to a better tomorrow.