A Faxed Invitation From Mikhail Gorbachev,to The Hague

I was on a ten-day sail with my kindred-spirit-in-adventure, Genie Skypek, and we were heading towards Key West.  It was 2 a.m. in the morning and I placed a ship to shore call to my husband to let him know we were okay.  He greeted me with: “You’ve just received a faxed invitation from Mikhail Gorbachev to The Hague Peace Palace for the launch of the Earth Charter campaign”.  With the usual catastrophes at sea, Genie and I had weathered a couple of nights of little sleep so I wondered if I was hearing things.  But no, it turned out to be true!

I accepted this remarkable once-in-a- lifetime invitation and found myself at The Hague in June 2000.  I was a bit surprised that The Hague did not look like a palace; it looked like a huge red-bricked mansion.  But the garden was majestic and tranquil—the perfect spot for calming me down.  Having never been around a queen, I was intrigued by the serious protocol that was put into place for Queen Beatrix of The Netherlands, who had so generously helped to fund the Earth Charter drafting process.  Once everyone was seated, two long lines of people walked down the aisle.  They included Mikhail Gorbachev, Maurice Strong (Under Secretary General of the UN at that time), Steven Rockefeller and other “important persons”.  Following behind was this sweet looking woman in a blue flowered dress and wearing a straw hat—Queen Beatrix. 

Having accomplished the opening ceremony, the speeches began. After a while, John Hoyt, who was representing Earth Charter in the United States, began to speak and I heard him say: “There is a woman here that I would like to introduce, she is heading a major USA initiative on citizen summits and you need to meet her, Jan Roberts, where are you sitting?  Will you please stand up?”  I was overwhelmed and could barely stand but was beaming from ear to ear. John then sat down.  We were it.  We were the major effort in the U.S.  I returned home from The Hague and said to our stalwart group of volunteers: “The announcement of the Summits at The Hague has made them official.  We REALLY need to make this dream a reality now.”