I last saw my father in 1950, when I was six. Over the last couple of years I have found out that he lived most of his life since then in southern Ontario and that I have six half-siblings, some of whom I have now had the pleasure of meeting. Also in 1950 my grandfather — my mother’s father — died in Plymouth, England, where our family home was. We had not seen him in three years, not since my parents had taken me to Canada, where they were serving in Pembroke, Ontario, as Salvation Army officers at the time of his death. My father had been away at war, and then went back to…

My scariest road trip was late in the afternoon of Easter Saturday in April, 1999. Roland Sewell and I had just been up to the Albanian border to bring relief to the flood of incoming Kosovar refugees. Roland remained there distributing bread, sausages and essentials, while I returned to Kukes in the truck, carrying a refugee family in the back as well as the remnants of the food and supplies which we were going to bring to refugees who had already reached the relative safety of Kukes. I’m trying to record a commentary on what we are doing while I’m scared out of my mind. The driver and his mate weren’t…