Ten minutes before these words were spoken to me, I saw a father giving his chubby baby a pleasant bath in a washtub. The image moved me deeply.
Marie-Anne suggested that we top up the water tank of our camper van. Had we skipped that task, Ivan, holding his child in his arms, would never have had the chance to speak those words to me, and we would have missed each other entirely.
It was the summer of 2024, on a campsite in Denia, along the Spanish coast. We first met Ivan in 2015 when he was working as a laborer for a Polish contractor who was carrying out a small renovation on our recently acquired house in the city center of Haarlem. Months after the renovation was completed, Ivan rang our doorbell. I immediately saw that he was not doing well. He had become homeless and was seeking help.
I’ll spare you the detailed account of what happened to him, but it’s clear he wasn’t the only Eastern European craftsman to fall on hard times due to someone else’s actions. Back then, I introduced him to the world of shelters for the homeless. If I recall correctly, I also gave him some money, and after that, we never saw him again.
Until October 11, 2024, at 9:35 AM, at Camping Rio-Mar in Denia, just before we drove our camper van onto a ferry to Ibiza.
“I know you too,” I replied, not entirely sure yet who was standing before me, but something clicked. Ivan looked noticeably healthier than the last time I had seen him. We embraced. At first, it surprised me, but then again, it didn’t. We had always liked him and had felt, back in 2015, that we had left him to fend for himself without proper support.
And now, here he stood before us, healthy and with a chubby baby in his arms. Not long after, we met his German girlfriend. After many years of wandering through Europe and living on the fringes of society, he had met this wonderful woman. Everything in his life had turned around for the better. They were now on a six-month trip through Europe, partly for vacation, but also to dream about finding a place in the sun for the future.
What’s certain is that Ivan will be building an outdoor kitchen on our French courtyard in the Spring of 2025. He and his family will be staying for a month in one of our holiday cottages.
I love feel-good stories. And this one is straight from, into your heart.
