The World of Ad Latjes, autobiography 1971-1990

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Important remarks by Ad Latjes regarding this book
The text below is written by me during the first half of 1990, published in July 1990 and UNCHANGED published on the Internet in August 2003.
Of course I would now have written minor things differently but I kept the text UNCHANGED because this book has become a document of the time it was written: months after the fall of the Berlin Wall, during the rise of new, interesting technologies and long before anyone had heard about the Internet....!!
Many people mentioned below now have a different function, are working for another company or even passed away...
I truly hope you enjoy reading this book and I am sure it will make you smile or laugh regularly
Costa Rica, August 2003

The World of Ad Latjes

written by Ad Latjes in 1990 en published in July 1990

CONTENTS
1. The history 1971 - 1990
2. Who is Ad Latjes
3. The rise of new technologies
4. Opinions
5. European Travel Network
6. Travel Impressions

This book is dedicated to...
Preface

The History 1971 - 1990

An unexpected beginning
Tough school
A.Peefa
Ice cream vendor
Selling tickets by accident
Land of plenty
Gideon's gang
Scapegoat
Hype
The end of a boy's dream
Wrong
Paradox
Village gossip
Mangled twice
Revenge of a power monopolist
Practical joke
Job
From market underdog to market leader
Accra
Network
Relativity

WHO IS AD LATJES?
Friend and foe give their opinion.

Customer (male)
Customer (female)
Mother Latjes
C.G.Hundepool
KLM spokesman
Ronald Raadsheer
Brother drs.Peter Latjes
American customer (female)
Neighbouring Blokker
Neighbouring Yugoslavian Bank
Attorney Sandra Boot
Friend-in-need Ruud Storm
Supervisor Bianca (22)
Co-worker Linda (21)

THE RISE OF NEW TECHNOLOGIES

Introduction
Freak
Viditel (Dutch Minitel)
Radio and TV pirate
Teletext
Computers which speak and listen
Free phone numbers
Fax
Eurosport teletext page 169

Female staff
Publicity, advertising and marketing
Credit cards
Netherlands bankruptcy law

EUROPEAN TRAVEL NETWORK (ETN)

Introduction
Fuhrer
Three times lucky

TRAVEL IMPRESSIONS

Greyhound 1971
Israel 1975
Martinair 1989
Thailand and China 1987
Berlin 1990
The United States of America
South America 1988
Kenya 1975
Egypt 1973
Middle East 1972
Round The World

The earth has been turning for millions of years....

This book is dedicated to...

I dedicate this book to my mother and to Ruud Storm, without whom “Ad Latjes Travel Agent”
and “Malibu Travel” would never have been,

and to Clasien, Nicole, Lilian and Henriette, with whom I have had the privilege of
sharing good and bad times,

and to Agnes, Annemarie, Annemiek, Annet, Bianca, Birgit, Danielle, Edith, Ellen, Evelien,
Gaby, Hannie, Hedy, Ilonka, Jessica, Karin, Kathleen, Liesbeth, Linda, Marian, Marijke,
Maud, Maya, Mirelle, Nancy, Neeltje, Nicoline, Patricia, Petra, Rianne, Saskia and Wanda,
who have worked for me over the years, whom I have seen blossom from “little ladies” to
young, self-conscious women. Women who always gave 100% to their work and without whom I
would never have accomplished what I did.

and to all who, without mentioning them individually, know they are very dear to me anyway.

This book was typeset, laid out and prepared for printing in one day on the most modern
Electronic Publishing System by Advertising Agency Ron Koreman in Best, The Netherlands,
telephone +31 4998 98672.

Everything in this book may be copied without the editor’s permission:
Malibu Travel, Damrak 30, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Malibu Travel, European Travel Network and Ad Latjes are registered trademarks.

My name is A.A.J. Latjes. You probably know me better as Ad Latjes. Some of you presume
to know me so well as not to allow me any lee way. True, I have probably contributed to my
reputation myself, yet the disastrous role certain external factors have played to that
end may not be underestimated.

What happened exactly? How deep was the pit? Who helped me in it, and who helped me
to climb out? Where am I now? The idea to clarify these matters has been on my mind for
quite some time. First of all, to enlighten unfortunate clients of the 1981 era.
Furthermore, to guard myself against my enemies and to honour my friends.

Yet, I was always “too busy”. Suddenly, like so many events which occur suddenly in
a mysterious way, the moment was there to sit myself down behind my computer
and start writing.

It has become an autobiographical story, larded with a series of turbulent events,
interwoven with travel impressions, notes on the use of advanced techniques of
modern business and my opinions on international cooperation, HRM and PR.
Moreover, a journalist friend has interviewed quite a few members of the public on
their opinion of Ad Latjes, which means you’ll hear things from a third party too.

And thus, my long time desire to render an account of events has been realised.

I offer you, reader, this book in all honesty, hoping to deepen and enrich our
mutual relationship.

Amsterdam, July 1990

THE HISTORY 1971 - 1990

An unexpected beginning

I have always thought of June as being the loveliest month of the year.
Spring has finished its annual union with summer and the trip to the sun can begin.
That June day in 1968 was the loveliest I had experienced in my eighteen year old life.
I had won, and I will tell you of whom and of what.

I was pretty sure to have passed my final high school exams, and yet I felt a vague,
not totally unpleasant tingling unrest while I was waiting in the hall of “Saint Louis”
in Oudenbosch for the results together with my parents on this warm, jubilant June day.

It was even better than expected. After the cacophony of nervous voices and the
following stately quiet of the graduation ceremony, I proved to have collected
reasonably good marks, especially for maths, science and chemistry, to my own amazement.

I couldn’t prevent my mother kissing me on both cheeks. My father gave me a manly
handshake and said, hiding his joy as well as possible: “Despite the advice of going to
Tilburg to study economics, I would like you to consider the Technical University in
Eindhoven with such good grades in science.” He was referring to the test I had taken
which indicated better chances in economics than engineering.
The idea, however, attracted me. Born a Leo in the year of the Tiger,
I would rather live lazily in Tilburg than working hard in Eindhoven.
Indeed, it proved to be an easy-going life until my final exams in Economics.

A year after I was born it didn’t look like things would go easy for me.
We lived in Amsterdam where my father worked for the Dutch Postal Service.
It was on a hot, almost tropical day, that I was vaccinated against smallpox.
Nowadays, this would be out of the question, because a combination of high
temperature and this vaccine may lead to cerebral damage in one in the so-many
thousand children. I was one of these children.
Twice I was close to death and even received, in a good Roman Catholic manner,
the confirmation sacrament prematurely. I made it, though the unfortunate event
resulted in tedious epileptic symptoms. Now, almost 40 years later, it hardly
bothers me anymore although I do take pills twice daily. And once in a while
little stars appear in front of my eyes. When that happens, I lie down for a
while which is enough for the condition to subside.

Things were different during my childhood. At intervals, I would black out and
hit the deck, causing confusion and fear among the shopping public of Valkenswaard,
where our family had moved to. There was even a point during elementary school when
I was to be sent to Sterksel which had, what was called, a special home for the
epileptic, yet the general public knew it as the “cuckoo’s nest”.
My mother, the proud daughter of a farmer, would not hear of it and chose hesitantly
for the alternative: the all-boys boarding school “Saint Louis” in Oudenbosch.

In 1961 I found myself in the Roman Catholic bastion. Like every boy there, I was
homesick a lot. A problem you had to solve individually. It was a pretty tough
environment where you had to acquire independency (emotionally too) in order to
survive and where adaption was the slogan. It wasn’t easy. I wasn’t as meek as
the brothers wanted me to be. Red and black cards were my share.
I didn’t receive a single gold card for good behaviour during those 7 years at St Louis,
although I went to church a lot, too much as I remember too well.
It wasn’t until the end of my Oudenbosch period that I realised how my unintentional
resistance had reconciled itself with the school’s atmosphere and my individual
attitude had developed into a social compassion.

Something else had happened. My epileptic symptoms had decreased and my learning
process had improved. Study results got better each year and come graduation time,
they were at their peak. It had taken some time: from crazy little Ad to future
college student and from mother’s baby to independent young man. But I had succeeded
and on that beautiful June day in 1968 I experienced what winning was.

In hind sight, I am grateful for Saint Louis. Not necessarily for a period of 7 years,
but a few years with peers in the same situation is always a good exercise in social
development. Most young men experience this during compulsory military service, but I
obviously, due to my medical history, didn’t meet the requirements to join the army.
Besides, I have a very bad left eye. It still only functions for about 15%.
This may also have been an effect of this blasted vaccination.

And thus, I was ready to enter college in Tilburg. As said, studying was relatively
easy-going and I was happy to be able to give a reasonable amount of attention to
other things than statistics and the secrets of banking.

I started organising summer jobs abroad for fellow students and I’m still wondering
why I chose that as a spare time activity:
the occupation I owe and blame my further career to. I still don’t know the answer
to that question. Probably because no one else did. When a vacuum like that offers
itself, I tend to jump at it. Maybe in order to help others who are otherwise left
without information. Maybe to tickle myself. It’s what I love to do: adventure.
The need to get to the bottom of something, find the hidden seed, nurture it and see
it grow into a large healthy tree.

So, hesitant and clumsy at first, but more able and efficient later on, I tended to
the travel needs of Tilburg fellow students. There was demand and supply.
What else could a student in economics with a lot of time on his hands want, except
to bring those two fundamental requirements together. The exact starting point is
hidden in the mist of forgetfulness, but at some point I was able to give someone
the address of a kibbutz where foreign volunteers were welcome. I had come across
that address by accident. After that, my interest in mediating for summer jobs had
been ignited and I helped friends who wanted to pick grapes in France or tomatoes
in Canada find the necessary contacts.

Nowadays, a job agency advertises with the slogan: “she sought, I found” featuring
a female law student wanting to earn a little extra money and a slick lady of the
job agency finding her a part-time job at a law firm.
That’s how my job was like 20 years ago. Well, almost, because my clients were
mostly boys (there weren’t many girl students yet in Tilburg) who wanted a summer
job and, moreover, I was putting more money in than getting out of it in the beginning.
But I loved it.

For hours on end I sat in my little rental room writing to embassies, foreign traffic
bureaus and travel organisations to get useful addresses which I would give,
free of charge, to fellow students as no one thought of paying.
Especially freshman Tilburg economics students were to learn yet that, except for
the sun rise, nothing comes free in this world. But it didn’t worry me.
Maybe this was caused by that boarding school where helping one another was a law
of nature. Maybe it was caused by the rich Roman Catholic way of life which had put
its mark on me and which promises a golden future to everyone who lives a charitable life.

At the time, I held this belief sacredly. Not only the needs of my travel loving yet
poor fellow students were my concern, but so was the rest of the world population.
When someone in a country far away had served justice with a spectacular deed,
I would let all national newspapers know how much I appreciated that through a letter
to the editor. I wrote dozens, all of them under the complicated alias “A. Peefa”.
The “A” for Ad, the “Pe” for “P”, the “ef” for “F” and the “a” for “A”.
PFA was short for Peace For All. And in cases where someone had exceptionally excelled
for Peace and Justice, I would throw in a personal letter as well.

By addressing only noble statesmen personally, I was able to keep my correspondence
manageable. Yet, my hobby costed me quite some energy, writing paper and expensive
postage. To my amazement I often received correct and sometimes very personal replies.
I remember letters from Abba Ebban, the Israeli minister of Foreign Affairs and
American senator Edward Kennedy, replying to the ideas in my letters.
It was the late sixties: revolutionary years for A. Peefa.

Later on, the whole world seemed to start cocooning, contemplating no one but themselves.
Ideals were refrigated: commerce sent out it’s seducing messages.

Ice cream vendor

My free-for-all travel business expanded. It was exciting to track down foreign
addresses and catalogue them. But, while around me fellow students were happily
backpacking, I was administrating in Tilburg. This didn’t change until 1971.
As I wanted to check my addresses, I left for Israel in January 1971.
For six weeks I roamed the country and visited the different “kibboetzim”.
At the end of my first backpacking trip abroad, I encountered an American couple in
Eilat, who consequently invited me to their house in San Francisco.
Naturally, it wasn’t really an invitation to be followed up, yet in my ignorance I
rang their doorbell in September of the same year after having picked tomatoes in
Canada for a week.

My stay in Frisco didn’t last that long (I wasn’t that naive), but long enough to
recover from a sunstroke which I had picked up in Toronto. In better shape I
continued my journey, which led from Los Angeles to Las Vegas to Long Beach where
I met, again quite by accident, a very wealthy ice cream vendor.
He owned I don’t know how many ice cream stalls which needed to be manned by young,
active ice cream salesmen. Obviously, he couldn’t find them himself, as he asked me
to gather 40 young, active Dutch students for the summer of 1972.
After all, I was “a travel agent for students”.

Indeed, that’s how I had introduced myself, not hindered by any modesty and
certainly not realising I was definitely pushing my fate into the direction of
“ticketman”. My meeting with this American entrepeneur namely, would, as became
clear later on, mark the moment when my “free-for-all” mediating job in Tilburg
would get a new and lucrative dimension. With a speed too which I hope to meet
during the telling of this story.

What was the case? The 40 Dutch guys who were to sell ice cream at Disneyland,
on the beach, close to baseball stadions and other busy West Coast locations,
would make a lot of money – a thousand guilders a week – but the trip there cost
a lot of money too then: just about 3 weeks worth of ice cream sales.
And I knew I couldn’t sell that in Tilburg. If I wanted to gather 40 potential
candidates, I needed to find a cheap flight. And I did.

Forced by these circumstances, I discovered the route to cheap flights and was
able to offer my fellow-students discount tickets to LA, but also to other
American destinations and world wide. I have continued this route and am still
travelling on it. As far as I know, those Brabant boys never got to their ice
cream stalls. There was no need anymore.

Selling tickets by accident

The first step towards the yet unknown void in the low budget market was
difficult but Lady Fortuna helped a hand. Directly on my return from the US I
contacted a travel agency for emigrants and their families which organised
charter flights abroad for its members. A trip to New York, for example, costed
only 400 guilders, a ticket to Los Angeles 900.
Still an enormous sum to needy scholarships students, but significantly cheaper
than the official price. With the travel agent’s consent I overwhelmed the college
buildings with large posters advertising the low fares. Most reactions came from
people who didn’t have emigrated family members abroad, but they were automatically
categorized thus after six months of membership. Which is something of course, I
should have mentioned on the posters: “bookings six months in advance”.

In my social environment it proved an impossible situation. Daily, I spoke to
someone saying “great offer, travelling to the States and cheap too, but those
six months are ridiculous. Can’t you get me on a plane next week, or next month?
Or during the summer holidays?” And that’s exactly what I couldn’t do.
The travel agency was good, but in its typically Dutch way very strict and to the
rules. I was desperate for a solution. And that’s where my stroke of luck came in.
In January 1972 I read an advertisement in the International Herald Tribune about a
number of London travel agencies offering cheap flights world wide. Had I not read
that paper, I wouldn’t have known. And had I not been on this short holiday trip to
Lausanne, Switzerland where there were no Dutch newspapers available, I hadn’t
bought the Tribune. That shows you what holiday can do for you.

I saw my opportunity for trade, my mother for a break, and together we travelled to
London by boat and train in March 1972 to visit those six travel agencies which I
had marked in the Tribune for their lowest rates to the U.S. I was still specifically
interested in the U.S. because of that corpulent ice cream king in Long Beach with
his 40 job offers.

In London I tumbled from one amazement to the other. Everything was possible!
Travel discounts impossible to Dutch standards. Emigrant flights too, including
membership cards. Salesmen kept those cards in their back pockets by the dozen,
making them look old and used. A dated stamp, a signature and the next day you could
take a cheap flight to visit your “family” in Australia.
They had long forgotten the Dutch proper way to do things.

But I hadn’t, and I left those half illegal membership trips well alone.
There was enough on offer on the legal market at the time caused by the introduction
of the Jumbo jet like the Boeing 747. Giant planes, common nowadays, with hundreds
of seats which airlines had to sell. The way to do this was to offer tickets abroad
at bottom prices: 50 to 70% under the officially published fares.
Their slogan: “rather half an egg than an empty shell.”
In short, because of the gigantic and rather sudden capacity boom and the international
airlines’ response, a specific market for cheap airfares was created in the early seventies.

London was one of the central places for this opportunity and without realising the
circumstances at the time, I had landed in the right place at the right time: the
land of plenty in air travel. I could buy what I liked. North Africa, South Africa,
the Far East. And all at 50% cost price or less. The whole world opened up to a 21 year
old student who had tumbled into this fairy tale setting.

Still a little numbed by all my new experiences, I made the necessary contacts.
On my return home and fully recovered, I placed an ad on the front page of the “Telegraaf”,
one of the largest Dutch national newspapers, offering Bangkok, Bombay and Johannesburg
for bottom prices. I still remember the Johannesburg price: 1295 guilders.
My net profit was 95 guilders on that, but the consumer’s was about 2500 guilders.
That’s how much the difference was with the “normal” fares.

A reporter once asked me to explain how I had stepped out of the shadows of student
amateurism into the sun of national publicity from one day to the next.
The answer is simple. Once I had found the entrance to that dream world of cheap flight,
I was eager to cash in on that information as I was still in need of financing my Tilburg
travel-mediating agency. It was still operational in 1972.

I sent some fellow students to Canada to pick tomatoes in the summer of 1972.
And so, I finally saw my chance to earn something back from the costs I had made.

The advertisement was a big hit. The regular Dutch travel world acted like they were
brought to beggar’s conditions because of my actions. Yet foreign airline companies
saw opportunities in my initiative. Kuwait Air, for example, called me to ask if I
wanted to sell tickets for them from Amsterdam. I did. And encouraged by this phone
call, I searched for other opportunities. Most airlines were reluctant but some weren’t,
and to my surprise I raked together my own discount market in this manner.

I was in business. To the annoyance of my landlady in the Tobias Asserstreet in Tilburg
where I had my digs on the second floor. Students would be waiting their turn for a
cheap yet great trip on her stairs. That wasn’t the agreement, she said, and I had to
leave. The case being that I had made a name for myself, outside the lecture halls at least,
I was swept up in the student council. As a member of the subsidy commission I sat next to
a guy concerned with student housing, and he could help me with a building which was
nominated to be torn down at the time, yet still stands today. I rather liked the symbolics
of this: dump prices sold from a dump.

I moved house and gradually increased my business hours to part of an afternoon, a whole
afternoon and finally, a day. The sleepy young man from Valkenswaard had grown into a
clear-minded travel agent in 1972, selling six hundred thousand worth of tickets and
profiting on 1% nett. It was time to quit college. I dropped out in my senior year.
I dived full-time into the travelling business. Rather than getting my title I became m
y own boss. I got help from a neighbour’s daughter and shortly afterwards, from Clasien,
my wife-to-be.

Together we worked on the increasing incoming phone calls for we kept advertising.
Whenever I could I went out to acquire knowledge about the market in which I was working
but of which I really knew very little. Fortunately, only a few people worldwide – and
as far as I know, no one in Holland – knew which secrets this young trade in discount
tickets had in store and it was vital to close ranks with this Gideon’s gang from the beginning.

Who offers the cheapest airline ticket Where? That’s what it was all about for me and my
foreign colleagues. This is the information we shared with each other. In this way a
circle of relations was created slowly, a sort of intelligence agency on cheap travel,
with the sole purpose of offering the customer the cheapest possible way to travel.

Every two weeks I traveled from Tilburg to Brussels and almost every month to London to
visit airline companies, to reconnoitre the market and to buy tickets.
Regularly, I did the same in Germany, Luxembourg and Paris, but I couldn’t get along
with the French very well for some reason. Terrible people, businesslike.
(My revenge at times is using the Dutch spelling in words like “bureau”).

It is therefore no surprise that my first conflict was with a French company, although
it wasn’t caused by an “incompatibilité d’humeur” (French for hating each other’s guts)
but by the core problem of the discount trade. In short, the story is as follows:

In London I bought the earlier mentioned trip London-Paris-Johannesburg at bottom price
from the French company UTA. It was UTA’s intention for customers to board in London,
but no one of my customers did. It was easier and cheaper to travel to Paris.
Especially for my ex-fellow students wanting to travel to South Africa, because I could
offer them a round trip to Paris from Holland for only 27 guilders which I had bought
at large discount from a Belgian student organization.

These guys would eagerly check in at UTA Paris with a ticket excluding the London-Paris part,
which I had torn out. From the young travellers’ enthousiastic conversations and not by
inspecting the ticket, it soon became clear in Paris that they had paid far less than the
regular rate. Consequently, an angry phone call was made to the UTA office in Amsterdam,
which knew nothing about it of course.
The Paris manager then confronted by the problem is now the UTA man in Amsterdam.
He still doesn’t greet me, after 18 years.

It wasn’t long until KLM started to stir. Although they themselves had
started discount prices abroad as one of the first companies, they had to try and convince
their full fare paying, Dutch passengers that a discount bird like Ad Latjes was of
dubious character. They even said in public: “You know, those cheap travel agencies which
advertise on the front page of the newspaper. All unreliable!” They were prudent so as not
to mention names, but it was obvious they meant me and my co-workers as we were the only
ones in Holland advertising enormous discounts in different newspapers.

It didn’t bother me. It was part of the game, however hypocritical.
At airlines’ receptions, I was the main subject of conversation, always in my absence as
I never attended. On one of these occasions, Sabena’s manager in Holland, for example,
from whom I had just bought a couple of tickets Amsterdam-Brussel-Chicago, for only a
thousand guilders, would deny that he was the seller.

I had probably bought them abroad, he lied. I got labelled with their indecencies and I
was sent into the proverbial desert as a scapegoat. I didn’t mind the role.
I only attended parties given by airline companies which openly declared being my
business partner like Kuwait Airlines, Iraqi Air, Jordanian Alia and a few others.
They acknowledged and respected my person and my work. Many others in the market looked
down their noses or denied me. From jealousy, as more and more customers were pouring in.

In 1973, my company turned over 1.3 million guilders. And it boomed each consecutive year.
I advertised under my own name in Holland and Belgium and moved from the dump to a rental
house in Tilburg. More girls came to work with us. All of them friends who didn’t want
a male co-worker in their midst, afraid he would play boss in no time.
Seven years after I had travelled to London as a novice with my mother to be shown the
secrets of discount alchemy, I had become reasonably experienced in the clouded art.
I sold 7.5 million guilders worth of tickets that year (1979) and I decided on taking
two chances to be able to expand.

First of all I bought a building in the Telegraafstreet (Telegraaf also being the name
of the newspaper I had first advertised in!) in Tilburg as we had outgrown our latest
accommodation. Secondly, I started advertising on Viditel in September 1979.
The first to do so – and in a big way. Everyone who had access to this means was able
to receive eight thousand pages of travel information on their tv screen.
Information which I had been preparing for months: prices, destinations, hotels,
tourist tips, but also hundreds of Belgian jokes. Very popular in those days and very
different, which was also trendy. A fine way of getting publicity.

Two different publications wrote large articles on the discount phenomena that year.
The result of all this was that I doubled turn-over in 1980 to 15 million guilders!

I was 30 years of age. In Tilburg, twelve girls were selling tickets mainly by phone
and in the Leidsestraat in Amsterdam there were three. This second office was opened
in the summer of 1980. Clasien, who had become my wife in the mean time, managed this
office and it was so busy that she had to help customers by the numbers system, the
kind you see at the butcher’s or the post office. In Amsterdam too we only sold
discount tickets outside Europe and in the Mediterranean area.
A standard ticket was processed in ten minutes, a trip around the world took twice as
long at the most, and still people had to wait in line for about an hour at times to
buy a cheap flight ticket from Ad Latjes.

It had become a hype and sales an attraction it seemed, because often airline
managers and other airline personnel would drop by during lunch break to see how
fast we “processed” customers. I bought a house on the canals in Amsterdam for Clasien
and the staff, a floor in a new office building next to the railway station in Tilburg
and a sports accommodation, also in Tilburg, as the building in the Telegraafstraat –
which I kept – had become too small as well.

The end of a boy's dream

And then, things went awfully wrong. No surprise, you will say, with all this real estate.
But that wasn’t it. I should indeed have been more cautious and I should have financed
the real estate – four buildings in all – more “burglar proof”, as my story will show,
but the acquisition of them was responsible in more ways than one. The main reason was
to create my own “piggy bank”, capital to be used in case anything went wrong with my
travel agency because I couldn’t become a member of the ANVR-guarantee fund, the
Dutch Association of Travel Agents.

This association wasn’t happy with me at all, to say the least. Travel agents were
confronted daily by mutinous customers saying: “How is this possible? Ad Latjes sells
for ……, and you ask twice as much for the same trip”. Which couldn’t to be explained,
except for the stereotype referral to my allegedly unreliable way of business, an excuse
which became weaker as my position on the ticket market became stronger and the army of
satisfied Latjes-tourists grew. However, I could not become a member of the ANVR.
Had I put down all guarantees on the table, I still wouldn’t have been accepted for
psychological reasons. End of story. So, I had to create a financial buffer zone,
my real estate.

From a pure business point of view, buying houses seemed at that moment a sensible
thing to do. By buying, I felt I was not being impulsive and reckless but instead
rather conservatively using my money.

The building next to the railway station was representative and brand new.
We were the first tenants of a spacious office, but just as we were about to move in,
a better opportunity presented itself: a sports hall with great space for our expanding
company. I rented out the hall which went well. The building next to the railway station
was immediately put up for sale. This didn’t go well, as a dip in the real estate market
had set in. I didn’t sell it until my bankruptcy in the fall of 1981.
However, this was no major set back yet. I still had control over the business.
Part of the buildings were mortgaged. The rest was financed with private capital and
with a bank loan of 400.000 guilders by the ABN bank in Tilburg.

The bank thought this construction as solid as I did myself, and our relation was fine
both commercially and privately. That’s why I know the bank’s decision to cancel the
account came from higher echelons, because that happened in March 1981.

I had to pay back twenty or thirty thousand a week, sometimes more. The man at the bank
in Tilburg just told me one day: “Next week, you only have credit up to 380.000 guilders”.
And the week after that he would set another limit. I protested of course, but he
wouldn’t hear of it. Again, I had the feeling he personally couldn’t influence the
decision to limit my credit, but that was of no use to me. And from my economics study
I remembered the conditions of a loan like this: withdrawable immediately.
Formally, the man was conducting proper business. At that moment, even more than realising
which financial disaster was awaiting me, I recognised my mistake clearly.

It wasn’t the four houses. It wasn’t my rebel attitude in my difficult profession.
It wasn’t the fact that I had had radio transmitters on my roof for three months, blaring
music and advertisements. It wasn’t even the illegal tv-station with which I had
transmitted all James Bond movies into Tilburg homes. It was the fact of not protecting
my real estate and choosing a loan construction in the form of a current account instead
of a long-standing one or a separate company construction. I could kill myself, for I
realised I was finished. When you earn 300.000 nett a year, you can’t pay up 400.000
in a few months. Which I told the banker. “This is no good.
In this way I will be bankrupt in a short time.” His remark, probably to soften the impact,
I will never forget: “Oh well, mister Latjes, so many go down nowadays.
You will make no difference”.

I racked my brains going home. I couldn’t understand, and the bank couldn’t or wouldn’t
explain. Why this sudden squeeze? I was one of their biggest customers. I had all my
business there – some 16 million guilders worth of turnover – which would bring them
around 100.000 guilders worth of costs, provision and interest. Two of their employees
could be paid with that amount. I was the goose with the golden eggs.
Why slaughter me? Something was up. It wasn’t until six months later that I discovered
who had handled the butcher’s knife.

On the 16th October 1981, this ticketman was finished. It was a Friday.
There was 40.000 left to be paid at the bank. I had to pay it with the last money left.
Money which was paid by 400 customers, waiting for their tickets.

I don’t remember how I got to Brussels. It could only have been through a miracle that
I arrived in one piece at the airport of the Belgian capital, as I sat totally numbed
behind the steering wheel of my Honda Civic. It was a mild, misty afternoon, that
Friday in October, and I was probably surrounded by drivers in an early weekend mood,
but if I could have detected that, I didn’t. I was too busy with myself.
Crying, grey with misery and sick with exhaustion, I drove there and when I think
back I can cry once more. I was running.

Not from lack of courage, I hope, but from pure helplessness. I had tried to reach
Dr Batenburg a few times, the highest manager then at ABN, in a desperate attempt to
postpone the execution, but I didn’t get any further than his secretary.
She had quickly phoned to the bank in Breda and when I arrived there in the morning
of the 16th of October, hoping to reach a settlement at the last moment, I was coolly
shown to the door.

It was over, my beautiful, rebellious adventure, and I knew what was going to happen.
Clients would be coming to collect their tickets which weren’t there. I didn’t want
to see that from up close. They would want my head and I didn’t want to attend my
own execution. Besides, I was in no position to explain them it wasn’t my fault I
had ripped them off. That paradox was too much for me. I didn’t dare, I couldn’t.

Sad about my helplessness, sick about losing something so dear to me and at the same
time scoulding myself for letting it come this far, I drove to my mother to borrow money.
The first thing she said to me was: “Boy, you look awful!”. And she was right.
Worrying had cost me about twenty pounds in the weeks before that and my face showed
the topography of the loser. We didn’t talk long. We quickly agreed there is no fighting
the irony of destiny. I had bought houses in order not to go bust. I had gone bust
because I had bought houses.

I received eight or ten thousand guilders from her, I can’t remember exactly, and I drove
to Brussels with tears in my eyes to take the first plane to London. It was the beginning
of a sad trip around the world which would last a month. An attempt, bound to fail,
to flee the past. In a book by Gerrit Komrij I recently read: “Pity on the one who flees.
He takes the oppression with him where ever he goes. Flight is no liberation.”
Truely spoken, because where ever I went, the image of four hundred victimised people
travelled with me. For me, the worst part of it was the idea that they didn’t know I
hadn’t run off with their money.

The thought of the ruins which I had left accompanied me from Brussels to London,
New York, Zurich, Bombay, Bangkok, Hawaii and Los Angeles.

Even the presence of my friend Nicole, who talked me to Switzerland in order to get me
to return to Holland but whom I persuaded to accompany me on my further desperate travels
in Zurich, couldn’t chase away the ghost of the “kladderadatsj”. This wonderful word,
I am not even sure of its spelling, entered my brain somewhere along the way and stayed
with me since. Probably because its childlike sound combined its disastrous contents in
the same manner as the frivolous appearance of my joyless wanderings did.

Nicole. She supported me tremendously when I lost Clasien during the maddening stress in
our company in 1981 and afterwards, when I seemed to lose my head. Nicole encouraged me,
not in the least when we, after the bankruptcy was declared, flew back to Holland from
California on a sunny Sunday. For coming home wasn’t easy. Fortunately, my parents and
their four siblings welcomed me heartily, although they had had their share of abuse
thrown at them. Because of me, our family name had been shamed considerably, something
which hurt my father the most. The “Latjes” soon recovered though. My friends also seemed
happy to see me again. One of them, who had suffered great financial loss from my bankruptcy,
even helped me later on.

The problem was the village gossip. It had been more disastrous than in my worst nightmare.
I had skipped town with more than a million in my pockets. I had secret bankaccounts everywhere,
big cars and expensive villas. Tilburg hummed with gossip and the bad jokes (Santa Claus won’t
come this year, he booked through Ad Latjes) as well as the horrible word plays on my name
(Ad Gladjes, meaning Ad Slick) were every where.

The truth was that I was totally down and out. I had no money, except for social security
benefits. I had no real estate but a council flat. My only possession abroad, a wooden
bungalow in Florida which I had bought in my good years, was divided among the creditors.
I had lost my wife and Nicole too had disappeared from my life. I had no job, and last but
not least, I had no reputation left as many people didn’t know what had really happened.
The only thing I had plenty of was time. Enough to consider, time after time, what had
gone wrong and, in a sporadic optimistic mood, how I could come back.
How could I help the victimised customers? Now what?

But before I could start on the future, I had to settle two private scores from the past
first. And how. Even the devil himself would have had trouble coming up with a
screenplay like this.

One morning, at the end of November 1981, a Friday morning, both my personal bankruptcy
(my business bankruptcy had already been declared) and my divorce from Clasien were
pronounced! At 11.30 one case was scheduled at court, at 12.00 noon the next.
Within the hour I was mangled twice. My misery was at its peak that day.
It was a worthy counterpart of its old record, that of Friday 16th October 1981.

Revenge of a power monopolist

Quite some time after my bankruptcy, I finally found out who had indirectly been the
cause of it and why the bank loan had been ended so abruptly. Different sources pointed
into the direction of the KLM. Besides, the Dutch manager of our
national airlines at the time has indicated so much in front of reporters.
It doesn’t surprise me one bit, although I don’t exactly know which person gave what
command. I’m presuming it was at top level, and KLM president Orlandini,
being commissioner at ABN bank as well, must have personally insisted on finally
financially liquidating that irritating Latjes-creature in the spring of 1981.
The bank, bank to KLM too, kindly honoured this enforced signal by
strangling me slowly using the ready noose: my bank account! This is not the first
time I mention the ugly combination KLM/ABN bank and neither companies
has ever denied my accusations. Even Orlandini would have protested if he hadn’t been involved.

KLM wanted to get rid of me. At the end of 1979 they had tried to buy me out.
This happened during a trade convention in London. The European salesman for the national
Peruvian airline invited me to diner at the Ritz. After some introductory chit-chat, he
told me he was authorised to offer me five million dollars in order for me to end my
discount business. I told him I didn’t think much of that and ever since it was total war
between KLM and myself.

In January or February 1981, shortly before the bank told me they would limit my credit,
I had another conflict with KLM. I was at a trade convention in Utrecht,
talking to the manager Holland of British Airways in my own stand, when some one from
KLM passed by. Next day, the Englishman received a call from KLM with this evil message:
“do business with Latjes, and we will hang you from the highest tree in Amsterdam”.

This threat was nothing new as back in 1975 Singapore Airlines had also been threatened
of having their landing rights revoked if they sold me tickets.
Sabena too, at that time, had regular visits from Royal Dutch Airline personnel at their
office in Amsterdam, banging on the table, shouting not to sell to me. Every month I
heard news like this from one airline or another who had been summoned at a reception or
a meeting by KLM to leave me and my business well alone.

Back to Utrecht, to the trade show in 1981. I ran into the British Airways guy
again and he relayed the story to me. I decided that it was time for a counter action
on my part to show them I wasn’t impressed. In turn, I advertised Amsterdam-New York
on the front page of The Telegraaf for 650 guilders. By KLM!
Which was fifty guilders (around 25 US dollars) under the KLM advertised price.
Every ticket thus costs me fifty guilders, which was worth it, as I was both suggesting
that KLM was doing business with me and that they were selling me tickets
at great discount. Financially I was losing on the deal, but psychologically I was making
great profits, as KLM was swamped with annoying phone calls. And every
time the story was: “for ten years now we hear that Latjes has to be boycotted, and now you
are doing business with him yourselves.”

Naturally, the KLM spokesman explained the practical joke to them, but
the louder he became, the less he was understood. My intention of beating them at their
own game had succeeded. I was taken to court, but even that was to my advantage.
Ok, I was not to abuse the KLM’name again, which I assented, but
KLM got an even nastier piece to chew. “If Mr Latjes is so eager to sell
under the standard price,” the judge said, “let him”. You could hear the KLM solicitor gnaw
his teeth, because what the judge was really saying meant a bomb under the entire IATA-system:
the international agreement by all organised airline companies to sell tickets at a set price.
(It is only in their own respective countries that they keep this agreement, by the way.
KLM ignores this golden rule like all her colleagues, but not in Holland.
Here, the organisation is holier than the Pope, outside its national boundaries a cowboy
like every other airline.)

Unfortunately, the verdict didn’t lead to a wedge in the market. It did cause a heightening
of the guerrilla war between myself and the rest of the ticket world, with KLM as a sniper
in the front lines. Being a lonely partisan at the cheap ticket front, all aggression was
directed at me. Every customer who walked away from a travel agency because he found a
cheaper ticket elsewhere, was my fault.

Even travel agencies’ own failures like laziness or sloppiness, were my faults.
I was an outlaw and was blamed for everything.

About half a year ago even, a traveller with an incorrect ticket from Schiphol Airport
to Spain received the comment: “bought this at Latjes, no doubt”, whereas I, and they
know this perfectly well, don’t sell tickets to Spain at all.

Latjes was the flea in the fur coat of the ticket market and needed to be exterminated.
And thus, “justice” was done. KLM’ revenge must have tasted sweet for not only had my
business, my baby, been terminated, but my good name at the same time.
“Latjes” had become synonym for treacherous fraud. The bad boy of aviation.
Even now, after almost nine years, it still bothers me, let alone at a time when the
wound was still fresh. I read and heard the most awful stories and I thought, with the
same shiver as the one you get when you remember a nightmare: this is about me!
I caused this. Is this ever going to be put right?

At times I wished I was dead, I felt that devastated. Spiritually, I was balancing on
a very fragile thread and materially I wasn’t doing much better. All I had were the
clothes I wore. And a bed. The bailiff let me keep my bed. I remember how ridiculously
happy I was with that. With the risk of being misunderstood, yet knowing I don’t mean
this insensitively or heartlessly, I suspect I lost a lot more in the deal than most
of the customers I abandoned. Of course, there were dramatic cases involved.
People who had been saving up for years had seen the trip of a lifetime washed down
the drain. They were miserable and I’ve tried all sorts of things later on to try and
compensate for the loss. Others too for that matter. But most clients, who came to
collect their tickets in vain, were mainly terribly mad, angry at me for ruining
their holiday.

I have spoken to many of these people, scores of them really, afterwards and their
story was mainly this: “at the time we spoke of you being an enormous bastard, but we
somehow managed to get over the misery and we believe you when you say you didn’t run
off with our money.”

But I, …. I had not only nothing left, I had lost everything I had ever had.
Biblical Job Latjes. But Job, I knew, had scrambled to his feet, so why couldn’t Latjes?
And slowly, very slowly, I crawled out of the dip. Slowly too, my will to live returned.
In fact, I wanted to return to the ticket world.

People I knew declared me ripe for the looney bin when they heard about my plans.
I couldn’t disagree with them totally, yet I had three good reasons to go ahead anyway.
First of all, it was all I knew. Secondly, the snake pit of discount trade had its
creative and exciting sides too. And thirdly, I discovered that no other travel agency
had jumped into the abyss which I had left through my bankruptcy.

Apparently, I still was the only one in the Dutch ticket world who knew the way in the
maze of discount tickets. My specialty – finding and selling the cheapest tickets to
destinations far away – was not annexed by others, a shame to the rest of the ticket
world, and I decided to pick up where I had had to let go.

In april 1982 I dared to show my face again in the ticket world. Shortly before that,
just to mention it, I let my voice be heard by recording some existing tunes to
carnival music. This had nothing to do with tourism or my problems. I just enjoyed it,
but on discovering that I was the singer, one of the radio stations played it with
the comment: “this was Ad Latjes and the Tickets, with the Choir of Duped Clients.”
A joke which, finally, made me laugh, even if it was not wholeheartedly yet.

But enough. I showed my face again and fell down immediately. Twice! The man with
whom I started a travel agency on the Pius square in Tilburg had too much money and
behaved very arrogantly. This didn’t last long. And the man with whom I started
Atlantis Travel on the Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal in Amsterdam in September 1982,
didn’t have enough money and couldn’t pay the 25.000 guilders for the Chamber of Commerce.
This didn’t last long either. This second false start even got me a fine of 12.000 guilders
and two months probation for I had the official papers and the, illegally set up business,
was in my name.

From market underdog to market leader

I had been too eager, too gullible and I started to doubt people in general and myself
especially. Again I was back to square one and again I had been damaged – and I don’t
even mean that fine which would stay with me for years. I seemed to have been
disqualified indefinitely.

Not knowing where to turn to now, Fortune came my way. At times it walks past me, not
noticing me, but suddenly it will give a knock on my door. This time Fortune was
personified in Ruud Storm, a friend who had lost 200.000 guilders in my bankruptcy
of 1981 and had stayed a friend anyway. I was over the moon with his explicit support
and together we started Malibu Travel on the Damrak in Amsterdam on the 15th May 1984.
When Storm loaned me the money he said: “If I lose it, I won’t hold it against you.
I know you’ll do your best. In that case, we will have had bad luck together.”

I did do my best. Malibu is solid as a rock. Ruud has long since been repaid and we
are better friends than ever. But the most beautiful thing of it is, that we don’t
need any credit. We manage to uphold ourselves financially and we don’t have to fear
any “bankrobbery”.

Moreover, Malibu is an American company. An American law firm, which I consulted at
the time, took care of that side within one week.

I don’t dodge the Dutch tax system with this construction, as I pay taxes and dues
here just like the guy next door, but in this way I have armed myself against KLM.

The reason why I didn’t take the cunning game which they played together with the
ABN bank at the time and which cost me dearly, to the courts is because in Holland
it doesn’t pay to do so. With this American construction, should KLM play a dirty
game once more, I would be able to sue them according to American law and claim
millions of dollars worth of compensation.

This gives me an interesting card in hand, as I’m still quarrelling with Royal KLM
at a regular base. And always about the same problem: the flight to Accra, capital
of the African nation of Ghana. KLM prices the return flight Amsterdam-Accra in
Holland at 4.300 guilders, yet offers the return flight London-Amsterdam-Ghana in
England for 2.400 guilders! An interesting case of price discounting which I exploit
with pleasure and with which I have made hundreds of Ghanese living in Holland
happy since 1972. But instead of being thankful to me for filling their empty
chairs for them – no Ghanese, after all, will fly to Amsterdam at a standard price
with KLM when they can fly at bottom prices with Aeroflot, Balkan, Swissair or KLM,
for that matter – they have been bothering me over the last two years.
Passengers with a London bought ticket (by me) were to start their journey in London
in their opinion, whereas I claimed they could get on the plane in Amsterdam as they
had paid for their ticket and therefore had a valid KLM document.

It’s the core of our conflict, which, noticeably, is no issue for other African
destinations or different routes by KLM at bottom prices. Just because lesser
numbers of travellers are involved. An opportunism ably and royally handled by
our national pride. In May 1988 they suddenly left five customers standing at
Amsterdam airport, unless they were prepared to pay the full price from Amsterdam
to Accra. I was able to help these people with another cheap trip
(with another airline company), but from that day onwards KLM and I met in front
of the judge on an almost regular basis.

It adds no value to expand on these legal quarrels in this publication, moreover
as no winner resulted. At least not on a national level. I trust that the European
lawyers who are since occupying themselves with the matter will finally agree to
the matter in our favour. Practically, we have already won.

KLM has agreed to accept passengers with a ticket from London getting on in Amsterdam.
“We don’t want passengers to get the short end of the stick because of our differences”,
they say slightly hypocritically. Because on the other hand they only sell us limited
discount tickets to Accra in London which means the customer who wants to fly quickly
(because it’s a direct flight) and cheaply to Ghana is put at a disadvantage anyway.

To our company this whole business is more a nuisance than anything else.
The international low-budget market is wide enough to work in and as worldwide we
don’t have any Dutch competition, KLM in 1990 is but a “multiple engined mosquito”
to Malibu Travel, quoting ex-minister Luns here. The fact that we own a monopoly
worldwide is no bravado on our part. Agreed, other travel agencies have accessed
the market which was popularised by us partly by attracting specialised personnel,
but as for know-how and organisation, the hegemony of our agency is still untouched.

When I’m buying tickets in Singapore, Dusseldorf, Los Angeles or other hot spots in
the discount world, I never hear of other Dutch agents there. It’s because we have
been rather successful over the years to keep the door closed. With “we” I mean the
European Travel Network (ETN), an originally European but now intercontinentally
exclusive consortium for dozens of free birds like myself, operating worldwide and
discovering and picking up the cheapest grains in aviation.

As I’m writing this down, it sounds a little like freewheeling and at random, but
reality is quite different. We contact 92 international airline companies daily and
continually through a sophisticated (Dutch) computer programme. This programme finds
out where in the world a certain route of a certain company is the cheapest, and then
calculates quickly what these tickets (some 15.000!) would cost in the currency of
the country concerned.

I started this network four years ago, and since then it has developed into an
efficient and close charter of local professionals, guaranteeing the best product
in their area. ETN now also sells a discount card for 60 guilders which enables
customers to get a considerable discount on hotels, on tourist side trips and other
tourist attractions at their destination. The card is a big success – 60 guilders
are easily won back – and our agent in Miami predicts two thousands members by the
end of this year in the U.S. alone.

Maybe now it has become clearer why we think, with pride, we are the market leader
of the Dutch discount travel agencies in the area of the farthest trips for the
lowest prices. Simply and more homely put, there is no one else in this country with
such an advanteagous look on the whole world. Instead of leafing endlessly through
long lists, my five co-workers and myself are able to establish that Alitalia at
this moment offers the cheapest flight to Australia on the computer screen with one
blink of an eye. Depart from Amsterdam, change planes in Rome and fly to the other
side of the world for only 2.140 guilders.

Another example. 26 airline companies are circling each other – price technically –
on the route Amsterdam-Bangkok, searching for the flying holidaymaker.

Without our European Travel Network, it would be impossible to know immediately who
dares to dive the deepest commercially (1250 guilders? 1500? 1800?) towards a return
ticket which officially costs 4000 guilders. By the way, we don’t only use the latest
technology for the customer. The potential traveller has six very advanced speaking
computers at his disposal for specific information day and night.
But I will explain that later.

All’s well that ends well, but what have I, A.A.J. Latjes, learned from all this?
A question I ask myself at times. Naïve student of 20 in 1970. Ticketman with
15 million guilders turnover in 1980. Down and out bum for a while after that and,
again man credited with four thousand customers, good for six million guilders in 1990.

Rise, fall and come back in almost twenty years. What has this turbulent chain of
events done to me? The true answer is that I have changed. In business, but privately
too, I have become calmer.

I have experienced all there is to experience in the travel world, the peaks and
the abysses. This makes one see the relativity of things. I don’t have a restless
ambition anymore for a head office with a hundred girls and fifty branches in the
province. “I wish you a lot of staff” is a typical Amsterdam expression.
I have come to understand the poison in that saying. My aspiration lies with a
healthy, normal growth of my company. No branch offices anymore, they only lead to
headaches, but a well-led central point where, in a few years, seven to eight girls
perform a specialised service and where technology takes care of the rest.

I’m still a hard worker I think, but I find it more important nowadays to find
time for myself, my wife Henriette and my seven year old daughter Wendy.
Sit down for a nice dinner, a hike through the woods, a book or an hour of tv.
I take the chance of enjoying life once in a while.
I always was “too busy” for that before.

In that sense the negative events have given me many positive points.
The mysterious circle of life has given me back the joy of June, best time of
the year in my opinion, which I stated at the beginning of my epic.
My sincere hope is that it may stay summer for a long time.

Who is Ad Latjes?

Friend and foe give their opinion.

Customer (male):

“That’s what I call service!”

“I regularly travel for pleasure which means you have to be price conscious
or you simply don’t travel. You go shopping, as I call it. At one point I got
to Ad Latjes, can’t remember how, probably through the newspaper.
More importantly, I never left. I’m very pleased and I advise every one to book
through him. I’ve had many reactions like “oh boy, Ad Latjes, are you sure?”.
But I tell everyone to go ahead and after their return they are all converted
and have become fanatical Latjes-fans. One time even, one of the girls at the
desk gave me my ticket and forgot to take my payment. That’s what I call service!”

Customer (female):

“He could use a new carpet.”

“It was a strange experience when I first came here six years ago. They only
had half the space they have now and Ad’s wife, or girl-friend, I don’t know
which, had a child with her. In a pen. When I finally got used to that, I kind
of liked the idea.
I found Latjes through the newspaper. The name sort of attracted me: Malibu.
It sounded romantic and the office was nice and close to the Central Station,
as I lived close to The Hague and couldn’t get through on the telephone.
That’s a point of attention: there are always many people in line on the phone.
Better take the train.
It wasn’t till later that I found out who Latjes was, but I didn’t care.
I’m rather socially developed and have been pestered myself at times.
More reason for me to get my tickets here. Furthermore, I think he could use
a new carpet.”

“If you don’t stand above it, you will go under in it.”

“I believe Ad gets the travelling spirit from me, as I’ve always claimed
to my children “when you are all grown up, Mummy is going to travel!
Foreign people and cultures, it has always fascinated me. I had been married
for almost 25 years before I finally got the opportunities to travel, but I enjoyed
myself ever since. I have written seven books on the travels I made since then.
Stories on Israel, North and South America, Africa, India, Nepal, Indonesia,
the Fiji islands and more. We always travelled together, Ad and I.
My husband wasn’t the type. We ventured into the backlands with a rental car
and we enjoyed the craziest adventures. Sometimes, when Ad was too tired or
didn’t feel like it, I went by myself. I have now bought myself a computer
to write. This is less time consuming, a big advantage, as I have so many
more things to do: crafts, photography, gardening, my day is always a few
hours short.

I’m happy for Ad that his luck has changed once more. He built his business
from the base and when it went down, I felt terribly sorry for him.
But I’ve always told him: “Don’t let it get you down, son. As long as you are
a good human being in a society where you can mean something to other people,
everything will be alright in the end.” In those days, the telephone wouldn’t
stop ringing. The press came after the story too, but sometimes incorrect
information got into the papers. I would revolt at them and take up my pen.
Being hunted by the press was Ad’s own fault, as he gave them opportunity to
speculate, but you don’t just write that someone is dishonest.

I offered the Tilburg paper to publicise my books and with the proceedings form
a fund for the victimised customers. They were enthusiastic about it, but as a
series, and that would take too much time they thought. People would have forgotten
about it. Had they known that events would take as long as they did, they would have
taken the offer for sure.

My husband felt worse about the bankruptcy than I did, but I think he couldn’t take
his distance. And if you don’t stand above it, you will go under in it. I knew Ad,
and that was enough for me. The rest will be alright, I thought then.
And that’s what happened.
I’m already looking forward to our next trip: Moscow.”

C.G. Hundepool, managing director and chief editor “Zakenreis” magazine:

“KLM cannot be caught!”

“The previous KLM managing director Holland once angrily exclaimed in my presence
that he would do anything to get Latjes. At the time, Ad had just moved into his
Amsterdam office, right next door to that of KLM. He was terribly upset that Latjes,
of all people, an annoyance of the worst kind, had become his neighbour. Later on,
when I heard about the financial problems which were tied to the real estate, I told
Latjes, that it could very well be that the one thing was tied in to the other.
It is only a presumption, but when you look into my heart, I’m convinced that it was.

I’ve been in this business for 35 years now and in my experience KLM does not get
caught, yet it is the most obvious explanation.

Ad is one of the most intelligent guys in the travel business and he knows how to
use the holes in the net. After all, he was the one to discover that you could buy
tickets cheaply abroad. KLM reacted with jabs of a needle, until they could haul
in the rope.

Jobs were offered to him, by Arke for example, and he could have been part of the
top-10 tour operators if he had wanted to. But he prefers to be exactly on the
opposite side where he takes all the flak. I can still see him at the Amsterdam
Hilton, demonstrating a computerised booking system in the hallway. He was refused
admission to the room where he was supposed to give his demonstration.”

“That would be very indecent of us.”

“I cannot imagine that anyone within KLM feels the need to give an opinion on
someone who conducts business the way Mr Latjes does. KLM’ opinion has been
clearly and officially been given through the court cases which Mr Latjes has
found it necessary to pursue. You may well imagine that we abstain therefore
from any comment on the man. It would be very indecent of us to do so.”

Ronald Raadsheer, sales manager Benelux for Singapore Airlines:

“Latjes has become more cautious.”

“Ad Latjes is a travel entrepreneur. He instigates many initiatives to make
travelling easier and cheaper for the consumer. He uses the possibilities available,
and that is admirable. On the other hand there are things to his disadvantage,
namely the bankruptcy in the past. I suspect he went too far in following his
ideals at the time, taking on too much and incapable to keep the overall view.

However, I believe his reputation has been considerably improved. He has become
more cautious and personally, I can only be positive about him although I don’t
know him very well and don’t conduct business with him directly.”

Brother drs Peter Latjes, editor Holland and parliament for the “Katholiek Nieuwsblad”:

“Ad is tremendously popular with many people”

“Many times, when introduced, I’ve heard the comment: “Gosh, Ad Latjes, family?”
“Yes”, I answer wholeheartedly, “he’s my oldest brother”. I’m very fond of him.
We connect well and we are in touch a lot. The events around him plagued me a lot
at the time, yet personally I had no problem with his bankruptcy for the simple reason
that he didn’t kill anyone or knowingly robbed anyone of their money. He did nothing
illegal and nothing which didn’t stroke with my own view on life.

I followed the case closely at the time and have drawn my own, clear conclusion.
I don’t mind saying it out loud and I even hope that I’ll be sued for it.
Look, my brother’s bank ABN suddenly closed their credit with him because Batenburg,
then ABN managing director and commissioner with KLM, had heard from his friend Orlandini,
then KLM managing director and commissioner with ABN, that Latjes was such a nuisance
for KLM. So they hung Ad. This is what I distilled from the facts. I said the same on
different occasions, in the paper and on radio, but no one has ever denied it.
I just know it’s the way it went.

I’ve known Ad at his height and during his misery, but he has a tendency to value
money only as a means, not a goal, just like me. This helped him through the difficult
episodes of his life. He often has too much faith, because he puts a lot of confidence
in people which is caused by his own honesty. In communicating with people he is often
self-centered, although he can be very charming, boy-like even. This charm makes him
tremendously popular with a lot of people. He has many friends who have supported him
through thick and thin, and after the council elections of Tilburg in 1982, which, by
the way, he didn’t win, there were some 1200 personal votes.

On the other hand, his self-centeredness makes him a person who has trouble getting in
touch with others and who has difficulty taking his surroundings into account.
In his heart he has always been a socially compassionate man, yet his life, 20 years of
tough business life, has offered little opportunity to expand on that.

American customer (female):

“I’m impressed with the IT here.”

“I came from Central Station, walked across the Damrak and saw the advertisement:
cheapest air fares. That’s the place to be, I thought. I’ve just come back from London
and will go on to Germany, France and Spain. Then it’s on back to the States and re-think
my plans. Malibu service is fast and direct. And I know what I’m talking about because
I really don’t do anything else but travel.

I am a computer programmer by profession and I’m impressed with the equipment and
software being used here. Call Bianca and she calls back…that’s new to me.”

Neighbouring Blokker:

“No, I don’t my book tickets through him”.

“Latjes’ travel agency is not clearly discernible from the street, so people step into
our shop by accident sometimes, but that doesn’t bother me. No, I don’t book my tickets
through him. I’m careful. I rather go to a travel agency which is a member of the ANVR.
Let me put it that way.”

Neighbouring Yugoslavian Bank:

“Nice girls, good neighbours.”

“I don’t know Mr Latjes very well, but there is a pleasant relationship between his
office and ours. Nice girls, good neighbours. I see customers go in and out at times,
that’s all. Bye, bye.”

Attorney Sandra Boot:

“My client tries everything and fears nothing.”

In December 1989 we filed a complaint with the European Commission. That’s the
authority which will have to judge our opinion of abuse of power by KLM, but first of
all we are awaiting the Commission’s word whether they will accept the complaint or not.
It has been registered, but nothing has been done with it yet. Should the EC not react,
I will take it to the Court of Justice with a demand for an order for the Commission
to undertake action. The national courts wouldn’t judge, as it would proclaim a verdict
which will have enormous impact on the entire aviation world. So we await the European
Commission’s reaction. To be honest, I’m not too confident on its outcome.
The stakes are too high. The entire market would have to be reorganised.
Rumour has it that the Commission is afraid to take a decision and would rather have
someone else decide.

We are of the opinion that KLM is abusing her position. Importing cheap German CD’s and
selling them here is allowed in this country, but for tickets different standards are kept.
This is only made possible through KLM’ powerful position. Compare it, if you will, to a
baker who says: “you can buy that cake if you like, but you have to eat it all at once.”
If it’s the only baker around, cake-loving customers will have to accept those conditions.
That’s exactly what’s happening in the aviation market. Residents of The Netherlands who
buy from my client buy cheap tickets from England, and KLM adds the condition “fine, but
you have to fly to London first.”
This is the ridiculous situation which we are denouncing.

I quite like Mr Latjes to battle this powerful giant. He tries everything and fears nothing.
He goes straight for the target, whether it’s the highest boss, or the girl behind the counter.
I can appreciate that attitude.”

Friend in need Ruud Storm:

“Ad likes to stick to his own plan”

“Latjes is the “enfant terrible” of the ticket world. A Brabant boy chasing energetically
after his young man’s dream. I think he is brilliant. Most brilliant people can’t communicate,
but he can. What’s more, he is honest, really honest, and I believe he is very sensitive at
the same time. He harbours this notion that he and people around him have been done injustice.

He is also stubborn like an ox. He continues a line of actions until the contrary has been
proved. I think he shot as many missing arrows as he hit bull’s eye. He once saw this guy on
tv who had a rocket launcher on his back and was shot in the air. That was it. He wanted to
get one of the machines. Where could you buy it? That same afternoon he called the Pentagon,
NASA and factories in France because apparently that’s where they were made. He never got
hold of one, simply because they weren’t for sale, but the possessed attitude with which he
chased after it was fascinating. I was there and witnessed him making phone calls all over
the world for four, five hours. That’s Ad Latjes: a bull chasing a red rag. I think that’s
the quality which makes him brilliant in the ticket world and which has caused him to be on
an ascending route once more, including all unrealistic and dear side roads.
Less positive qualities are his tendency not to ask anyone’s advice and his love to stick to
his own plan.

He was a valued customer of our advertising agency in Alphen aan de Rijn. Before he went
bankrupt, he bought services worth one million guilders annually. When he went broke, he
owed me a few thousand guilders. It almost caused our own bankruptcy – ironically, the
ABN bank helped us through that! – yet I so believed in his integrity and inventiveness that
I helped him set up Malibu Travel some years later anyway. He has become more cautious which
is logical. He doesn’t want to go through that again. He now doesn’t spend his money until
he’s got it.

Ad knows how to motivate and inspire his staff. He trains his girls himself and does so in
a wonderful, somewhat surly manner. But that’s because he thinks faster than he talks and he
believes others have the same capacity. Yet he is able to get his message across and that’s
what I admire in him.

Supervisor Bianca (22):

“I once got fifty roses”

“I’ve been at Malibu for almost four years now together with four other girls. I can only
say that it’s an open and friendly working atmosphere there.
Conflicts are never left to rumble along and we can be honest with Ad too. He encourages that.
He is clever and impulsive and asks the same from us. At times he seems harsh to his staff,
but there’s always a good reason. If you don’t agree with something you have to say so
immediately. It clears up the air. There has been a girl who ran out crying. She couldn’t
take it.

He taught us to work well and quickly: give information at the desk, answer sixteen incoming
telephone lines, call airline companies who are often busy – Turkish Airlines is a good example –
and help customers to find their trip correctly and efficiently at the same time.
It’s a responsibility which is my right by way of my diploma, but which you don’t always get
at other travel agencies.

Customers apparently appreciate our work as they often bring us a present after their return.
We also receive many cards and flowers. I once got fifty roses. And Ad promised us new carpeting
and curtains. Enough reason for me to stay for a long time.”

Co-worker Linda (21):

“I often receive remarks for working at Ad Latjes.”

“After highschool I worked in an American hotel and followed courses on aviation and tourism.
About a year and a half ago, I started working here. Travel is easy for us. We receive two
tickets a year individually, where ever your fancy takes you, so that’s a nice bonus.

I often receive remarks for working at Ad Latjes, but to me he is a good boss and I’m learning
an awful lot from him. Those negative reactions are from people who don’t know him or his
company. Others are positive. Today even, I talked to a customer on the phone who had travelled
with Ad in the old days and he said: “I want to try booking through you once more, as I’ve
never had a nasty experience with you before.” We have many loyal customers.
Many come back again and again.

Once in a while somebody walks out. Recently an older gentleman came in and, very friendly,
I said: “Hello, please have a seat”. Just like that. If I had said “hi”…. With a lot of
emphasis he said “Good afternoon!” Thinking he hadn’t heard me the first time, I said again
“Hello Sir”. He then said: “That’s how you talk to your peers”, and walked out.
I hadn’t expected that. I even called out after him “Good afternoon”, but he didn’t hear
me anymore.

THE RISE OF NEW TECHNOLOGIES

This was the second night in a row that sleep wouldn’t come. The night before it had taken
hours of tossing and turning before he nodded off to sleep exhausted. He had been excited
since Monday. Dresden friends had called him about the trip of his dreams. But before they
had been able to tell him all, the line had gone dead. In vain, he had tried to get back
in touch with them. All his friends knew his desire to make a once in a lifetime trip to
the United States.

Before the wall had crumbled, America seemed infinitely far away and unreachable even,
and even now it seemed an unreal dream. What had his friends tried to tell him?
Or had they played a joke on him?

Not to wake his wife, he creeped downstairs. Out of boredom his fingers roamed the keys
of his remote control. Suddenly he veered up. There were ceefax pages on the English-spoken
channel which they had available on cable since a few months. He often consulted the Western
German ones for the news but he never got any further. He had never even watched Super Channel,
mainly because his English was so bad.

The only English he knew, was what he had learned from a course on ZDF, a German tv station.
But despite his lack of knowledge, a few words had attracted his attention. He consulted the
pages on “air fares”, and page after page the most distant destinations were offered for the
most incredible prices. They weren’t all in West German marks, but he had known all exchange
rates of all hard Western currencies by heart for years now.

Fascinated, he looked at page after page. An increasing disbelief took over. He was ready to
draw the prices out of the tv. It went that slowly for him…
All big cities paraded in front of his eyes. And then, Miami, for the absurd price of just
750 Marks return ticket. He had set his mind on New York in the past, but why not Florida,
where the weather was so much nicer than in the North East. In disbelief, he tossed all
information around and around. As if hypnotised, his fingers chose the number which was on
the screen. Twice he was disconnected as he forgot to dial the number for Holland.

At half past two in the morning, Linda gave him all information he wanted to know.
In perfect German. He was so intrigued with her that he hardly realised, after dialling a 9
on his phone and Linda started to answer his questions so openly, where he lived, where he
wanted to travel and when.

When she asked for his creditcard number, he didn’t hesitate to give the card number from
his cousin in Munich. His cousin had given it to him in case he ever wanted to come over
to visit.

It wasn’t until two days later that he realised he hadn’t dreamed that night. Apparently,
an unknown man had come especially from Berlin to hand him his ticket. He stared after the
man, speechless, until he had vanished from his view. Was this the famous what the West
Germans called service, which according to them didn’t exist in the Eastern part of the
new republic? He had never understood what they meant by it until now.

He realised he had tasted Western freedom and luxury for the first time in his life.
And it’s deprivation for his fellow countrymen and himself caused by 40 years of terror
by the communists. It wasn’t until this moment that he understood the reason why his cousin
Stephan and many of his friends had fled to the West.

Why could a computer in the West provide more service and happiness than the people in the
East? He hurried to get a passport and visa and without a doubt, he was the happiest man
to fly to America on the 8th of March.

Although a car user is not commonly called a car freak, a computer user is called a
computer freak. It probably has to do with the uneasiness with which many of us regard
the computer. That’s why I never thought much of the name. I never took a computer course
in my life, nor one on car mechanics. After all, I only need to learn to use the commands
to be able to use the machine. I don’t need to know what makes it work.

My interest in computers was raised in the middle of the seventies because of the speed
with which I could register prices with this new apparatus. And because a Leo is rather
lazy than tired, my first Tandy computer was soon used for anything that I could think of,
not hindered by any technical knowledge. The main part of this booklet is also created
on the portable computer which I use daily in the train between Tilburg and Amsterdam.

When, in 1979, the Dutch Telecom announced Viditel. Immediately I understood how much
easier it would be for me should Viditel indeed become a mass medium. Informing people
at all hours of the day, book and send tickets automatically. And all this because of
the cheap electronic emigrant worker called computer. An attractive outlook.
So I became the first information supplier in the travel business.

Unfortunately, the Viditel project failed miserably and, in hindsight, it only costed me
a lot of money. Because I had other worries at the time, I never got around to filing
a complaint with the Dutch Telecom. At the time, they were certainly guilty of a much
too optimistic future expectation for the Viditel project, knowingly or unknowingly.
The fact alone that it only had 30.000 members after 11 years in stead of the promised
1 million, proves my point.

During the first six months of 1981 with 8000 pages of information, I was the most
popular information supplier on Viditel, which is a meagre comforting thought. My image
as Mr Viditel has no doubt greatly enhanced the overdose on publicity during my later fall.

At this moment, Malibu Travel has had its own Viditel host computer on which customers
can call in to request free price lists. Viditel probably still has a future as a
communication medium, but certainly not as an information medium.

Radio and TV pirate

An overzealous social servant at the Ministry of Culture, Recreation and Social Services
voiced his idea in 1981 that Viditel information suppliers should have broadcasting
permits as well. Probably reasoning that anything appearing on a tv screen was a
tv program.

I was so mad at this, that I had a professional Canadian tv transmitter placed on the roof
of my sports accommodation and a 24 hour non-stop radiostation on the roof of my office
for 7000 guilders. The tv transmitter broadcasted a movie each night on the frequency
of ZDF, the second German station. Two timers regulated the whole process; one to warm
up the transmitter and one to start the videorecorder 15 minutes later.
The timers were set during the day.

During the broadcast of the film “Bridge on the River Kwai” I received a phone call
from the police. They had removed the transmitter and I had to come to lock the door again.
The tv transmitter was taken down after 3 weeks and the radio sender after 3 months.
This was probably caused by the ability of the Tilburg police to listen to the radio,
and not watch tv.
Anyway, I never heard about a broadcasting permit for Viditel again.

In March 1986 the doors were opened to a new mass medium. Sky Channel announced the
start of commercial teletext. Contrary to Viditel, millions of viewers were guaranteed
from the start. Although the price was sky high and Malibu Travel had to come up with
the money on its own, Skytext has been a successful investment from the beginning.
Especially after I had bought my own terminal after a while and started creating and
editing pages myself. Even after four years it’s still a mighty feeling to be sending
new pages from my home to the Sky computer in London.

The response was enormous. Perhaps because from the start our ambition was to become
a mail order company for all of Europe. This dream never came true because of
practical reasons.

As we were advertising nearest to God, supposing He lives above us, passengers soon
assumed that we could establish miracles. The strangest questions were asked and
Malibu Travel made all the costs to try and answer them all. After a while it became
clear that I was making little or no money on that, despite the fact that we had started
to ask a fee for sending price information abroad and booking fees for Holland.

My growing dissatisfaction on this situation coincided with the start of the International
Discount Travel Association, which developed into the European Travel Network.

The plan was soon put together. Similar travel agencies in Switzerland, Germany, Denmark
and Great Britain were invited to rent teletext pages from Malibu Travel. This was the
more interesting as Sky Channel had raised its prices, but had spared me as their first
and most loyal advertising client.

Because of the successful rental system I even had to buy more pages from them, and
Malibu Travel was finally rid of an enormous cost. At this moment, the 230 teletext
pages are managed by European Travel Network, divided between four page numbers, namely
Eurosport page 167, 168 and 169 and Super Channel page 167. Moreover, advertising
clients are added from Miami, Dubai, Singapore and California.

Because of the 75 million Europeans who have access to the teletext of Eurosport and
Super Channel, our teletext pages form the largest Travel Section worldwide, with
immediate reactions for every advertising participant.
Which is only to be expanded in the future.

From June 1990, Malibu Travel also uses its teletext pages to send prices fast and
cheap to its interested agents throughout Europe. With a special card they are able
to receive the teletext pages on their pc. The information is transformed into a
normal database which can be printed or easily searched. In this way, the complete
price list of Malibu Travel is sent across within a minute.

Computers which speak and listen

Night flees to the West and the Damrak is being cleaned. Junks and bums
have left the hall ways and Central Station releases its first trainload of commuters.
Tourists are on the terraces. Amsterdam wakes up.....

In the Malibu Travel office, the speaking computers hum softly.
Once more, they have done an imperturbable night’s work, without a rest, without a
break. They don’t know any holidays nor union. Year in, year out, they give the
cheapest fares to many destinations outside Europe to everyone who wants to hear them.
Independently, impartially and tireless, day in, day out.

An incredible example of useful high tech.
Many viewers have had the need to reach us outside our normal office hours, Monday
through Friday from 10 to half past five, caused by the teletext pages being in the
air 24 hours per day on Eurosport and Super Channel. Because of the high Dutch wages,
an extension of office hours by “live personnel” was out of the question.
Until I came across software for the “speaking computer” quite accidentally during
a trip to California in October 1987.

Using this relatively cheap standard software, all functions and possibilities of
the telephone, computer and digital audiorecorder are integrated. A database of
spoken text may be recorded in which callers can peruse at length by using the
dialling numbers on their telephone. A spoken index gives the choices available.
Kind of a spoken Viditel database.

A question may be asked in this way, the answer is recorded, and again a question
asked. In this case, the answers are saved on a hard disc and have to be listened
to and processed by live persons. Malibu Travel has used this possibility for years
now to request a free price list and for the speaking booking computer.

For some time I also had a toll-free telephone number: 06-0167, coupled to 3 speaking
computers on which customers could record their destination, name, address and city.
They were Gorby 1, 2 and 3, a hommage to the former Secretary General of the Soviet
Union, who had to note down everything too, just like the Malibu computers.

When I placed an advertisement with this telephone number in the biggest Dutch
newspaper De Telegraaf (The Telegraph) on a Saturday, receiving some 750 phone calls
within a couple of hours, I was cured. In Holland too Gorby was well loved it seemed.
But people calling free of charge night and day for free information in our niche of
the market is making the threshold too low.
The 5 guilders every given information costed me didn’t not compare to the low profit
per ticket for a discount travel agency.

It may very well be a great idea for other markets. It has always surprised me that
others have not ventured there. The public is definitely ripe for it.

Gorbatsjov is no longer Secretary General, and Malibu Travel has baptised the Gorby’s
to Bianca, Linda and Wanda, as a token of affection for the loveliest co-workers I ever had.
And everyone requesting information free of charge, now pays the normal telephone rate.

Since June 1990 Malibu uses an improved Canadian version of the “speaking computer”
software. With this programme the computer “reads” the text to which it is led.
All words which it may come across during the reading process have to be recorded once
in the memory. After that, the green light is on. Malibu doesn’t have to record all
prices again with every modification, only a copy of the new price list into the
speaking computer.

So, no new recordings. One typesetting of all possible words, one recording of all
possible words, and the computer assembles full sentences at the same time the customer
calls, straight from the database. Obviously, speech may be recorded in any language
which makes this software also applicable for translating computers. The software reads
databases and text documents.

Transformation from speech to text is still in the laboratory stage. The most developed
computers in this area can understand 96% of the English spoken by the entire world
population, so it won’t be long until it will be a reality.

Once this “listening” computer is a fact, it may be hooked up to airline computers and
to speaking computers. It will then be possible to phone in bookings from home, without
a computer, hear the confirmation, or receive confirmation by fax, pay by computer and
the tickets are sent out by mail.

The main objection to videotext systems, the need for a computer, is not applicable for
these audiotext systems. A cautious estimate on future damage the 100% speech recognizing
computer could cause is the job of 10 million Europeans. Whether the travel agencies will
survive this is a big question, but undoubtedly Ad Latjes will. If nothing else, he’ll be
a computer salesman!

Naturally, the speaking computer may phone a particular number in order to send a message
recorded earlier without human intervention at any given day or time. This may be done
within certain hours to thousands of different phone numbers, with different messages.

When the computer phones its message through, this may be repeated, a reply may be recorded,
the reply may be repeated, deleted or complemented. And the computer can phone the message
through immediately to its boss to give your message with date and time. No reply?
No problem. This faithful electronic slave will try the given number again and again 16
consecutive times at adjustable intervals with a 1 hour maximum.

Finally, a fully automatic “recorded messages” service can be made available through the
speaking computer whereby members receive a code. In this way, members are able to
communicate with each other by using their own code, the code of the addressee and
recording a message. When the addressee later phones in to the computer by using his or
her code, it immediately receives the message by phone.

In short, the speaking computer has unlimited possibilities and offers an immense expansion
to the future service by Malibu Travel.

Free phone numbers

January 1985. During the Dutch Telecom (KPN) New Years speech the announcement was
made that, like in North America, free phone numbers would be introduced in
Holland. Also it would become possible to open toll-free phone numbers between
different countries.

As the exchange rate at that moment was about 4 guilders to one dollar, a toll-free phone
number from the USA to Amsterdam seemed a golden opportunity to me. And thus, the first
free 800-number from the US to Europe was opened (800-626 4280) on the 4th February 1985.

But what were interesting prices to advertise?
Many calculations and price comparisons later I had assembled a list of destinations
which could work. One 1 column/inch advertisement in the New York Times at the price
of US$ 236 was the test case. From the middle of February 1985 I was at the office many
a Sunday as the travel sections of the American newspapers appear on Sunday. I received
hundreds of phone calls. From Connecticut to California. From all nationalities and
races that make up America’s population.

The most popular price was New York-Bombay with Air India which I sold US$ 300 dollars
under the price of American travel agencies. Air India in Amsterdam supplied two tickets:
one New York-London return, one Amsterdam-London-Bombay return. Amsterdam-Londen was
torn from the latter ticket and never used.

In my experience, I talked to every Indian who emigrated to the US at the time.
The only disadvantage was that Indians talk very slowly and I had to pay a telephone
rate of 4,75 guilders per minute. But the profit of 800 guilders per ticket made up for
a lot, although the dollar rate became less and less from the start of this endeavour,
which meant I had to ask more dollars and the amount of bookings decreased accordingly.
But especially after we started advertising in the Washington Post, the Miami Herald,
the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times and many other newspapers with the slogan:
“Book by satellite, pay by plastic”, things speeded up extremely.

The Dutch Postal Service kept accurate accounts on the whole project. In July 1985 they
let me know that only 3% of all calls actually came through. This meant that 97 out of
100 people who phoned our number in the States were not getting a connection because
the lines were busy or because we didn’t answer the phone as the office was closed.
The latter despite the fact that our advertisements mentioned to phone only between
4am and 12noon Eastern Standard time, which makes it 6 hours later in Holland.

Advertisements were placed in American trade magazines and charter guides, but I soon
retracted them. Tell an American passenger something and he will believe you immediately.
Yet travel agencies think themselves experts and know themselves to know better.
It therefore took a lot of time convincing them they weren’t experts in the discount area,
a hard pill to swallow. Once in a while I could almost hear the ocean water because of
the turmoil on the other side of the big pond. Sometimes I even thought the satellite
was sorry to have started all this.

We often sent tickets by courier to Los Angeles. We, in turn, received tickets by courier
from our agents in Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia or Europe. The world seemed to be one
large village. American travel agents still mention our 800-number as a zenith of
telemarketing. Selling a product directly to a consumer 5500 miles away on another
continent. Can you imagine yourself buying a ticket from Amsterdam to Rio de Janeiro,
directly at a travel agent in Bangkok, without the intervention of a Dutch agent?

To get a consumer next door to book at your office is no problem. To get one to book who
lives 6 to 9 thousand kilometres further away is. Every ticket sold directly to a customer
in America gave me a kick at the time. On the one hand it was an absurdity that they
booked through us. On the other hand, it was proof of a strong advertisement, a reliable
image and a good price. Customers responded as if it was all quite normal.
Proof the more how a free phone number can lower the threshold.

Malibu Travel also had free phone numbers from Western Germany and England to Amsterdam
in 1985.

But of all reasons to stop the free phone numbers, one stood out: “pollution”.
Once people realised they were connected “live” from the US, England or Germany,
they started phoning for anything but flights. About the weather in Europe, the train
London-Paris, hotel rooms in Athens etc. And all at 4,75 per minute at our cost.
For the US the low dollar rate added to the problem and by the end of 1985 all free
phone numbers were discontinued because of their large popularity.
An experience which enriched us, yet impoverished us by 15.000 guilders.

In September 1980, I was given the honour, being the apple of the Dutch Postal Service’s
eye, to do the official opening of their telefax service in my office in Tilburg.
With a fax from Tilburg to our Amsterdam office the introduction of the fax in Holland
officially became a fact. I had become the apple of their eye because of the pioneer role
I had fulfilled in the Viditel project.

Ten years later the fax is an indispensable item in the Dutch offices. Malibu Travel has
three machines at the moment: one for incoming traffic, one for outgoing and one fax card
in the computer.

With the latter one the whole European Travel Network of 200 agents in 75 countries is
run. Messages for certain groups of agents (incoming agents, ticketing agents, European,
American etc.) are put in the computer. The computer dials the given fax numbers at the
given time, to send the message. Usually at night as the rates are lower and better
connections are available. Without this faxcomputer, communication between members would
cost more time and would probably not be as extensive as it is now.

From the point of view that a human being needs to do nothing which a computer can do
better and faster, the speaking computer has been coupled to the fax card nowadays.
Customers may phone into the computer night and day, dial the destination on which they
wish to be informed, the computer asks them how they want to receive the information:
by phone or fax. If they choose the fax, the fax number needs to be given and they receive
the price list fully automatically by fax.

Eurosport teletext page 169

I will hold it against no one, should you have started to wonder why, reading about
useful new technologies, so little has been published on them. One reason could be
sky high prices, yet nothing is farther from the truth. All software mentioned above
costs less than 10.000 guilders, which means it’s available to many companies.

The low publicity rate on these technologies has other causes.
First of all, the world has more bright technicians than bright salesmen.
Anything can be invented, but if selling the product gets little attention, it stops there.
And because of the low prices sales aren’t that interesting.

Relatively little money is earned, yet the after sales are huge. And finally, manufacturers
of computers, screens and key boards are not too happy with the fact that their products
may be replaced by a simple telephone owned by almost everyone.

Contributing to the distribution of knowledge on new technologies, European Travel
Network has collected all possible information on Eurosport teletext page 169.
The most phantastic Round the World trips are presented one after the other by the
most incredible technologies. The zenith in travel combined with the zenith in technology.

I happen to be in the lucky circumstance to have worked almost solely with female personnel
for almost 20 years. And your conclusion may safely be that I like it extremely. It’s a
great feeling to have only sweet young women around me all day, and to see them change in
time from naive youngsters fresh out of school into perfect career women. It’s been costing
me quite some overtime to show them the secrets of the international discount world.

Because of the simple organisational structure as in most travel agencies, there is
little kicking downwards nor kissing behinds upwards. This enhances the working atmosphere.
And despite evolving emancipation, customers still have more respect for a woman who knows
what she’s talking about, than for a man with the same knowledge. And staff knowing their
business is my main concern. At times not an easy task, trying to convince a sweet and
beautiful woman that things should be done differently, but usually I’m successful.

Furthermore, I think women are more loyal than men. Especially in the month prior to the
bankruptcy in 1981, I had a lot of support from “Latjes’ Sweethearts”. A man in the same
position would probably have left, thinking of his career. Young women are probably able
to be less worried over the future at a time like that, and give more human support.
They were probably also conscious of the fact that they were working for a unique travel
agency at the time.

Publicity, advertising and marketing

On its own, the source where one books a trip is unimportant. This is “low interest” for
the main public, using one of marketing people’s expressions. This fact is the fate of
all mediators and applies to for example, estate agents, insurance agents and travel agents.
On different parties and social gatherings, one tells other guests about buying a house,
about putting in an advertisement and about booking a trip. But through which agent one
did this is hardly ever mentioned.

Unless one books a trip through Ad Latjes. This is always added. It was done in the early
days, and in the year 1990 it still is. I take this as a compliment and as proof for having
ascended above the grey and colourless mass of travel agencies.
Why this happens is hard to explain and probably a result of multiple causes. First of all
there is the consistent specialist approach: only cheap tickets in tourist class and only
to destinations outside Europe and the Mediterranean area.
Preferring knowing all about little, instead of a little about a lot. Moreover, in 1972 we
were the first to use the price weapon in advertising.

Our advertisements have always been simple announcements with a list of the cheapest air
fares to different destinations. The majority of the public started to realise that flying
wasn’t limited to the elite. The established travel world needed to find ways to cheaper
fares in order not to lose customers, especially when, in 1979, the discount fares were
better known than the official IATA-rates. It is ironic that in 1981 the travel world was
the loudest in calling me a fraud. Whereas they themselves had charged hundreds of
thousands of passengers too much for years.
In 1990 too, tens of thousands of passengers will pay more for their tickets than strictly
necessary because of the ignorance or amateurism of travel agencies.

Our strict discipline to stick to our principles: only cheap rates and simple
advertisements with its reaction from the travel world and its increase of passengers,
was good enough reason for the press to start writing articles on the phenomenon
“discount air fares” in 1980.
No businessman will pass up an opportunity for free and positive advertising, so I let
this publicity willingly happen without ever seeking out reporters.

The highlight was a large article in the “Algemeen Dagblad” in 1981 which used terms
like “wonderboy” and the “American Dream in Holland”. Words which look great in a nice
story but were too far away from the hard day-to-day reality. In those days it was
unimaginable to write something negative about Ad Latjes, just like there was not a
single positive article on me after the bankruptcy. The disadvantage on the “hallelujah”
stories was that the bankruptcy received superfluous publicity.
But then, there is nothing more exciting than seeing a tall tree fall down in Holland…

Fortunately I found out early that publicity wins little more than some extra customers.
Even after the beautiful article in the “Algemeen Dagblad” I still had to pay my way in
the Tilburg bars. It wasn’t even worth a free drink. On the other hand I needed to pay
nothing extra when negative stories were written.
In the year 1990 reporters may write what they like, as long as they don’t abuse the truth
too much. What they write isn’t that important, as long as they write.
Freedom of the press is too important to be restricted in any way.

Consequently, Malibu Travel profits from the earlier experiences in publicity and advertising.
Malibu doesn’t shirk publicity to realise political changes in the aviation world and to add
to the liberalisation of rates. Both court cases against KLM instigated enough publicity for
the KLM shares to decrease in value up to 15% twice. And only publicity gave the Ghanese
KLM passengers the means to board at Amsterdam instead of London. Sometimes publicity gets
more done than a judge!

At the start Malibu Travel had difficult access to the Dutch market because of all former
negative publicity. This is why Malibu has always been more tuned to the European market
than the Dutch market. First through advertising in German, British and Swedish newspapers,
later through teletext on European satellite tv-stations and through European satellite radio.
In hindsight, this was a lucky turn of events as Malibu Travel cannot sell imported tickets
to Dutch KLM passengers, the most profitable ones. This forced focus on the European market
has made Malibu Travel the most European travel agency in Holland and probably in all of
Europe in 1990.
Relatively speaking, no other travel agency has as many foreign customers and receives as
many bookings from customers abroad.

Americans and other initiates will agree that the American banking system is not of this
century. People are still sending each other cheques at the other side of the big pond in
the absence of a credit transfer system. In those circumstances the introduction of the
credit card was quite an invention at the end of the forties.
In Europe, however, with its modern banking traffic, the credit card is an uninvited guest.
Here’s to hoping the European banks will concentrate on the distribution of the Eurocheque
card with individual code, so it may be used throughout Europe and worldwide.
Personally, I have nothing against plastic cards, but I do hold a grudge against a card for
which the receiving party has to pay 3 to 7 per cent to the credit card company.

Netherlands bankruptcy laws

The Dutch government gives itself the right to demand forty cents out of every guilder
earned, yet it does not acknowledge its duty to help companies in (temporary) trouble.
Individuals are supported in comparable situations through unemployment money and
disability payments, but for companies there is no such system.
Even in the United States, not best known for its social security systems, there is better
legislation on bankruptcy than in Holland. U.S. companies in trouble get a chance to
improve and reorganize for a certain time without creditors making this impossible.
Holland should at least have regulations to this effect.

The amount of unemployment benefits after my bankruptcy in 1981 was many times more than
the amount with which this bankruptcy could have been prevented.
Assuming the fact that each member of staff receives about 6 months of unemployment benefits
after bankruptcy, I would like to propose to use the amount necessary for unemployment benefits
in aversion of the bankruptcy. Naturally under the responsibility of a bankruptcy
administrator and on the basis of a viable business plan. This should be a right,
and not a favour. Food for thought.

European Travel Network (ETN)

Since 1972 I have imported tickets from abroad. At the start, only from England, later
from Belgium, the United States, Switzerland, Singapore and many other countries.
My only contact with the different agents was on trade exhibitions, on the phone or when
we happened to meet up during travels.
There was no structure and we never got together all at once.

Others had noticed this too, so it was not surprising that during the largest travel
exhibition in the world, the ITB in Berlin, in 1986 the idea started to organise a meeting
to which we would invite all the agents we knew.
“We” were a Swiss agent, a German one, one from California and myself.

And thus, Malibu Travel would organise the first meeting in Amsterdam.
Everyone would supply names and addresses of agents to be invited. Some work.
First of all I had to invite most agents myself, as the others proved not to have the
extensive network which they allegedly had. Everyone worldwide whom I had met during the
past 15 years was invited.

Secondly, the majority of the people invited couldn’t believe I would succeed in getting
all the discount boys worldwide around the table. Most were considered to be too
individualistic and odd man out. I had to convince them one by one that they really
should be there, and, no, they weren’t going to be the only ones in Amsterdam.
“Is so and so coming?”
“Yeah, yeah, so and so is coming too. So you should be there too.”
And so on. Numerous phone calls.

It took a lot of money to organise the first meeting, but the result was great.
At the end of April 1986 some 45 people from 27 countries got together in Amsterdam to
discuss discount rates around the world. They came from Australia, Asia, Europe and
America. From the beginning the atmosphere was unique. Their frankness and manner of
discussion could lead one to think that the boys had known each other for years.
But nothing was further from the truth. Most had never met before, but working in the
same trade, selling discount tickets had apparently created an invisible band of trust.
The prices we heard during the first meeting were a downright sensation and a revelation
to most of us.
And from that first meeting every one was convinced that it wouldn’t be a one time event,
that more should follow.

The seed of greed started to grow from that moment too. Because everyone realised the
importance of such conferences, questions like ‘who are to attend the next meeting’,
‘who determines whether my competitors are to be invited’ and ‘to how many people do we
limit this conference’ were born. Understandable questions, points of discussion for
certain, yet causing a lot of simmering unrest.

During our second meeting in Brighton, England in November 1986, I had had enough.
With the support of my two co-organisors from Zurich and San Francisco, the attendees
decided that the Zurich agent was to have the exclusive right to determine who could
and who could not attend. A right which I didn’t even wished to give myself despite the
fact that 60% of the attendees had been introduced to the meeting by me personally.
The Brighton conference decided that the April 1987 conference was to be held in Singapore,
and I decided to hold another meeting in Amsterdam in that same weekend with new agents
together with the best from the first two meetings.

In January 1987 it appeared that most agents would attend the Amsterdam conference,
partly caused by the fact that some new agents had not attended a conference before.
Moreover, many hadn’t realised until after the Brighton conference what the effect of
their votes had been, namely giving the veto right to one agent. From the small number
of registrations the Singapore agent understood that his meeting would not be a success.
And as he wasn’t happy with the decision taken at Brighton, he proposed to forget the
Brighton failure, give everyone the right to invite new agents for Singapore and give
no one a veto right. I could agree to those terms and I subsequently let all agents
invited to the Amsterdam meeting know that the conference was moved to Singapore.

The Swiss agent, renamed FÜhrer, was furious when he heard of this palace revolution.
He immediately organised another meeting in Singapore, a week before ours and without
the co-operation of our Singapore agent.

He sent invitations to most agents who would attend a week later.
Some spineless chaps couldn’t decide and went to both meetings. But they hadn’t reckoned
with the FÜhrer. At nine o’clock on the Saturday morning everyone was asked who would
attend next week’s meeting organised by “that Dutchman”. All attendees who held up their
hand, about half of them, were asked to leave the room. The dummies had to wait a week
before they could attend a discount rates conference.

During this meeting the ASFA, the Association of Special Fare Agencies, was officially
founded. Because of his age, the Singapore agent was elected as President of the
association, I myself vice-president. A task with which I was at peace.

After two more meetings in Dublin and Los Angeles, the meeting was to be held in London
in November 1988. Until then points of discussion had been the exchange of cheap flight
rates and a computer programme to efficiently communicate these rates among agents.
By order of the ASFA, the South African agent had started to develop a programme, but
after he had quit this development was continued by a Danish software company.
These guys presented their new programme to the London conference.
After a demonstration, everyone agreed that the programme was excellent.
A 100% vote elected the programme to be officially used as the rate exchange programme
of the ASFA.

On my insistence, a vote was cast on who would buy the programme. Only 40% voted for it.
For a programme of only $ 500, which would serve its purpose extremely well.
When I learned some months later that finally only 10% had paid for the programme, the
situation was clear to me. One couldn’t win a war with agents like that.
And discount is war, war against vested interests and war against conservative forces
which intend to keep flying rates absurdly high.

As early as before the London conference a certain unrest had settled within me on the
functioning of the ASFA. Meeting up with intelligent agents from so many different
countries twice a year, should result in more than exchanging rates. Repeatedly I had
suggested doing more together: joint advertising, introducing a travel card and
approaching airline companies as one worldwide marketing organisation. These proposals
always met a willing ear, but I wanted to go too fast, we couldn’t tackle everything
at once.

After the London conference, things were clear to me. I had to do something different.
To convince ASFA agents that we should use our strength better would consume too much
energy and time. It would take years, and should my ideas prove successful, everyone
would jump onto the moving train, profiting while I had been investing time and money
with all risks involved. And besides, I had no control over ASFA as it was an
association by English law.

Three times lucky

European Travel Network was born.
A foundation according to Dutch law which has the co-operation between European agents
as a goal as well as organising different activities for its members.

Although name and colour are European, non-European agents were involved in its
activities from the start. At every ETN-conference, American agents ask for the name
to be changed into a more global name. Perhaps the name doesn’t appeal to
non-Europeans too much, but Europeans can identify with the name and the use of the
stars and colours blue and yellow. After centuries of differences it’s time for
Europeans to become more conscious of their European identity. They could be a little
more chauvinistic. Proud of their history and culture.

I’m always a little jealous of the Americans and how they show their pride of being
American. In places like Disneyworld (the movie America the Beautiful, the American
pavilion in Epcot) and the Capitol in Washington I get goose bumps to see the American
people showing their feelings and pride over the rights of the American people.
Nothing to be afraid of as an outsider, but distinguished feelings of respect for
their homeland and forefathers. It would become Europeans to celebrate their Europeanism
in the same respectful manner.

Contrary to the American ETN-agents, the American consumer reacts enthusiastically
on the European image of the “travel card” which allows members worldwide discount
at hotels, incoming tour operators, shops etc. After recent publications on the
European Travel Network in the American Consumer Travel Guide and several American
travel publications, we received hundreds of applications. Rich Americans buy
European cars, drink European wine and use European perfume. Europe means quality,
culture and history to the American. And to Americans who love plastic cards, the
European travel card is an absolute must, despite its cost. Nice if it gives you some
discount at the same time.

Besides conferences twice a year and issuing the travel card, ETN organises many other
activities. The European ETN-agents advertise together on the teletext pages of
Super Channel and Eurosport, in the new European weekly magazine The European and
with the American ETN-agents in the International Herald Tribune. Moreover, a worldwide
exchange of personnel has developed and incoming ETN-agents in different countries are
making programmes to be sold through ETN-agents in Europe and America.

Beginning of 1991 the first recordings will take place of the new TV series “Round the w
orld in 30 minutes” which will be broadcast on cable networks in Europe and North
America with a maximum reach of 100 million people. Furthermore, efforts are made to
have all ETN-agents use the same air fare booking system, in order to realise lower
prices and to communicate cheaper within the network. With a total ETN turnover of
1 billion dollars it’s easier talking than as a loner.

What ETN will look like in 5 years is hard to predict. Probably not to be compared to
the early start of this moment. Many agents have, rightly so, high strung expectations.

The euphoria around Europe 1992 still has to begin, so everything is possible.
A “think tank” of George Washington University in Washington DC, however, already has
requested ETN’s opinion on the development and future of the independent travel agencies,
to enable them to make up a report on the future developments in world tourism.
A “report” to be officially offered to the United Nations and the European Community
in 1991. ETN has placed its first steps on the road to a leading role in the Europe
after 1992. A European nation which will soon lead the world to a community with peace,
welfare and justice for all.

TRAVEL IMPRESSIONS

With understandable apprehension, I stepped onto the Greyhound bus in Los Angeles which
would take me to New York at 6 o’clock on Thursday evening. For 72 hours this monster
would be my home. Thundering along day and night, over mountains and prairies, past
thousands of gas stations and through 23 states, 12 drivers would take me to the
Big Apple. Sleeping was next to impossible, because there were no reclining seats,
only very hard benches.
A trip like this teaches you that a sleepy feeling subsides after 100 huge yawns.

When Clasien and I entered the King David Hotel, the general manager was waiting for
us. He had reserved a beautiful suite for us with a view on the old city, an abundance
of fresh flowers and a gorgeous bowl of fruit. Apparently the telex I had sent from
Holland, announcing our arrival, had left a big impression here.

Walking into the eternal city of Jerusalem in the evening dusk is just about the most
emotional travel moment a man can have. Writing this down 15 years later, it still
gives me goose bumps. Talking about Jerusalem without becoming emotional is still
impossible for me. There is no other place in the world where you can feel history
breathing out of every wall as within the old city walls of Jerusalem. The stones in
the road still echo Roman, Persian and other conquerors’ footsteps. You can still hear
the masses scream “crucifixion” in the Via Dolorosa.

Jews pray night after night at the Wailing Wall, their only beacon during 2000 years of
Diaspora. Just the fact that the Jewish people, out of longing for the city of Jerusalem,
has been strengthened for thousands of years to strive for its own Jewish nation, makes
this city incomparable to others. Sauntering through the old streets you experience the
longing.

Access to the city of Jerusalem for foreign visitors is guaranteed in a better way by
the democratic Israeli state than by most Arabic Muslim dictatorships.

It would be a big political blunder if Israel, in exchange for peace with Arabic
dictators will give up control over Jerusalem.
Dictators disappear eventually, but the city of Jerusalem will continue for ever.

The ocean reaches far behind the horizon beneath us. It’s 50 degrees below outside.
We’ve passed the Shetland islands, Iceland and Greenland and when we enter Canadian
air space the announcement is made that we need to make a stop in Montreal because of
bursting toilets. The excuse being that the airplane was diverted the day before to
Rotterdam, had been cleaned there and was then flown to Amsterdam. In Amsterdam the
assumption was made that the toilet containers had been emptied in Rotterdam.
Makes you wonder whether there was something called “checklist”.
A spooky idea for something so simple. In hindsight you wonder if you should count
yourself lucky that there was enough fuel on board.

Thailand and China 1987

My colleague’s office in Bangkok, a refugee Czech, was full of Asian folders.
I had traveled there in July 1987 to relax after a stressful season. I had no idea
where I would go after Bangkok, or whether I would continue my journey. Bangkok was
even less inviting than the last time I had been there: more humid, more exhaust
fumes and more penetrating stench in the streets.

A perfect reason to go to a massage parlor a couple of times a day, get yourself
cleaned up by some beautiful Thai woman whom you had handpicked out of the
shopwindow. Although 10 guilders would buy you one hour of bathing and massage,
the girls would start whining about their secondary activities after about 20 minutes.
On mentioning that you were not in the mood, or didn’t have the guts, they would get
angry and walk out. So, it was necessary to stall that moment as long as possible.
Telling them you weren’t clean yet, still wet behind the ears or not understanding
what they meant were the best stalling tricks. Yet, stalling for more than 45 minutes
was virtually impossible.

The price list mentioned numerous destinations with attractive rates. Bali, Manila,
Brunei and Peking, 950 guilders return ticket. I never knew Bangkok was so close to
Peking. Never realised either how small the world became because of cheap air fares.
I couldn’t suppress a feeling of pride.
It was an easy choice. The three days I had to wait for a visa to China were spent
with a day trip to Pattaya and regular visits to the Thai “bathing salons”.
I couldn’t suspect how much this visit to China would impress me and how much I would
come to admire the Chinese people.

I had heard many stories on the bad service aboard CAAC, the Red China airline company.
But then reality…
Friendly service, good food and a brand new American plane. After good American custom,
passport control was at the first port of entry in China, namely Canton.
Fast, efficient and without much ado all passengers were handled.

After retrieving my suitcase from the belt in Peking I was prepared for hours of minute
checking of luggage by bad humored immigration officers. This had been my experience
in visits to other communist nations like the Soviet Union, Romania and Mongolia.
No such thing: just like in Western countries, there was a green and red zone.
Continue your journey. At the exchange office I asked how many dollars I had to
exchange daily. Another communist habit not applicable to China. No obligations.
Off then, to that grey bus, which would take me to my hotel already booked in Bangkok.

No buses, just a whole group of cabdrivers who, like anywhere else in the world, were
plucking at my suitcase in order to get me to go with them. Entering Peking was
tremendous. One enormous building pit. Busy workers everywhere, high cranes proving
their work. It seemed as if all Chinese were intent on catching up 40 years of
laming communist despotic regime within a few years. The service at the hotel desk
was contrary to communist traditions, friendly too.

The first thing I did that evening was pay a visit to the Square of Heavenly Peace.
In case the revolution should start that evening, they couldn’t take that away from me.
The square was peaceful. No protesting students. It was incomprehensibly busy though.
Thousands of strolling Chinese who seemed to be enjoying the warm summer’s evening too.
Just like in Times Square, New York, you can feel the heartbeat of our current world,
yet a totally different world. A world of 1100 million Chinese who find their own way
into our history, with a totally different culture which attracts me. If nothing else,
for the great diligence of the Chinese, all over the world, which I admire.

I visited the Forbidden City the next day and several other tourist attractions.
I booked a day trip to the Chinese Wall in the hotel, about four hours’ drive from
Peking. If Christ would have laid the first stone on the day of his death, and if
since then a piece of wall 5 metres in length and 3 stories high had been built daily,
the Wall would still not have been finished now. An unearthly accomplishment by a
people which started building this monument of human perseverance some 3000 years ago.

The evening before my departure I had dinner with my Chinese agent and his staff.
I had come across this agent through a mediating Chinese reporter of the China Daily.
In no way could I discover to be dealing with people raised in any other way than
capitalistic. They had completely adopted the western way of economic thinking and
I often thought of them two years later during the student revolt. Did they survive
the suppression?
I thoroughly hope they did, as it is people like this China will need immensely
in the future.

Even after strong blows with the hammer he had taken from the Italian restaurant,
the wall wouldn’t budge. He hit it again and again and only small pieces would chip off.
The hated wall didn’t give up that easily. After David, an American Jew living in Paris,
Heinz from Switzerland, and Rudy, a Swede living in France and working in Germany, I
could have a go. Lots of sparks flew off, but little stone.
Finally I managed to get a few souvenirs for aunt Anne and the others at home.

Having worked all day on the European Travel Network stand at the ITB in Berlin, I had
agreed to have dinner with a few people afterwards. During dinner David had suggested
the idea of visiting the Wall. There had been more symbolic parts of the wall then
the part close to the Brandenburg Tower. The passage to Eastern Berlin next to the
Tower was oddly enough only for Germans.

Foreigners still had to use Checkpoint Charlie in the Friedrichstrasse.
We didn’t bother, not to see grey, disconsolate Eastern Berlin.
So, David took us to the Reichstag. A frightening feeling went through
me when I walked up the steps of the monumental building. The world’s biggest murderer
had inspected his endless troops from these steps, troops who were sent to their death
for the Fatherland, troops who had departed from this spot.

To David especially, this was an emotional moment. Who knew what had happened to his
family during this last war? It’s best to say nothing at moments like this.
Like an experienced guide he had the taxi drive by other parts of the wall.
Through quiet areas where hardly any pieces had been hacked out of the wall and where
the Western Berlin graffiti was still to be admired. Often an expression of frustration
and anger on so much communist injustice.

The United States of America

Every time I fly into the States, I’m reminded of the words of Kamal Dafesh, Jordanian
Airlines manager, who often told me to move to the States as Holland was too small for
me in his opinion. Indeed, America is the land of unlimited possibilities.
Every time I visit, I’m inspired in one way or another by their way of thinking, their
advertising and business manners.

The only reason I never settled in the States is the simple fact that I wouldn’t think
of moving without my wife, and she doesn’t want to. Besides, it has become more clear
over the past few years that a United Europe will offer similar chances in the future.

Describing America is a mission impossible, it is too divers. Hectic New York,
outstretched Florida, the diversity of California, the peace and quiet of prairies and
mountains, Las Vegas decadence. Anything may be found there.
My preferences have changed over the years too. At first, New York was my favorite.
When strolling on Times Square with lots of other people, or in Macy’s, you can feel
the heartbeat of our time. Living day and night, a city that never sleeps, like in
Frank Sinatra’s song.

But after a while I fell in love with California, not only because of the cold in New York,
but because of the unique combinations in the American culture to be found there.
Hollywood glitter and glamour combined with the hardworking winefarmers around
San Francisco. Chique boutiques in Rodeo Drive, Beverly Hills and street gangs in the
slums of Los Angeles two miles down the road. Watching skiiers coming down the slopes
from the beach in Malibu.
However, endless traffic jams on the 405 day and night plus the suffocating smog on
some days thoroughly ruin the happiness in this beautiful state.

That’s why, since a couple of years, I’ve fallen in love with Florida.
Not the New York hussle and bussle, not the Californian diversity but peace and quiet,
and endless space. Things that charm a middle-aged ticketman. Arrive at the airport
and in no time you find yourself in a luxury car close to a beach and numerous hotels.
America is the country to just get up and go. No worries about hotels, shops or anything
like that. There is plenty and available day and night. The land of milk and honey.

South America 1988

He drove much too fast through the dark night. From Iguassu Falls back to Asuncion:
400 kilometres. Although the road was paved, he needed to swerve once in a while to
avoid the potholes. No lights in sight. And then, a cow in the road.....

To avoid collision he janked the steering wheel to the left, flew across the ditch,
turned around and came to a halt beside the road in the ditch. Within a few minutes
loads of Paraguayans came to watch our van. Henriette’s leg was heavily bruised and
she could hardly move. For two hours they tried to recover the van from the ditch
using manpower and tractors. In the end, we traveled on to Asuncion with a bus,
accidentally stopping, fully packed. The next day the leg was treated in a private
clinic in Rio, where we had flown at 7 o’clock the next morning.
This was the reason why we didn’t see much of Rio apart from the tourist ‘musts’
like the Sugarbread mountain and the Christ statue.

It wouldn’t budge. The gear box had probably died on us. So, there we were,
Loek and I, half way up African’s highest mountain, Kilimanjaro.
Our only luck was that there was a way back, thanks to the law of gravity.

Roadworkers, who were working on the concrete, helped us turn the vehicle around
and slowly we drove back to the police station in Arusha, at the foot of the mountain.
But how were we to get back to Mombasa, Kenya, from where our flight home would depart
in two days? We had little time left as we had been driving in Eastern and Western
Tsavo for almost a week. Just lucky therefore that we hadn’t broken down earlier
in this outstretched area.

In that case our only option had been to walk with a group of elephants in order to
survive.... The taxi took us to Arusha airport, but unfortunately the flight to
Mombasa was booked full. For US$ 20 the traffic control leader, also known as
check-in counter clerk, had everyone off the plane and weighed all luggage, but no
one had excess luggage. Or they did, but they had paid more, who shall say?
Without our US$ 20 donation for the Third World, we took a cab back to Arusha late
in the evening where we spent the night. The next day we finally reached Mombasa
after a taxi ride which took most of the day.
Back in Tilburg, Clasien had bought our first house.

“No sir, no flight today, the war has started.” Matthew and I looked at each other,
speechless. War? And we were to fly back from Luxor to Cairo today, fly on to Nairobi
and then over land to Tanzania and, if possible, to Madagascar. Great.
That evening we took the night train to Cairo and checked into the Sheraton Hotel,
waiting for things to come.

Which was very little at the moment. The ambassadors of EEC countries were busy
planning the evacuation of around 1200 EEC inhabitants. In Cairo little was
noticeable of the war. Daily life was the same as always. We followed the war on
the Reuter telex in the hotel foyer and on the World radio.
After a few days it became clear that we were in the wrong hotel.
All guests staying in Egyptian state hotels were given free accommodation during
their forced prolonged stay by the Egyptian government.

We visited the Netherlands embassy every day, and after a week we were told that
the French government had directed the Marseille-Algeria ferry to Alexandria in
order to pick up the Europeans. For four days we sailed the seas escorted by
several European naval ships.

Middle East 1972

From half past eight that morning we had been screaming for more passengers.
Literally. The cab driver had sworn not to leave until he had two more passengers.
Only then would he start the long ride which would take us through the desert
from Damascus to Baghdad in 18 hours. The alternative was to pay 40 guilders
more per empty seat. Ok, we’ll scream a little longer. Close to twelve o’clock
we had two more Saoudi’s who wanted to reach Kuwait and beyond via Baghdad.
The taxi left. There seemed to be no end to the desert. Boiling hot.

At regular intervals there was a stop in order to pray in the direction of Mecca.
In the middle of the night and in the middle of the desert we reached the Syrian
border point. 100 kilometers further down the road the last one.

At the time of the first prayer meeting in the mosque, the taxi driver dropped us
off at a hotel where we were met by the cockroaches at the door. We made it clear
to a local taxi driver that spoiled Westerners really were used to a different
sort of hotel. The next hotel still wasn’t cream of the crop, but Westerners
were staying there which made us feel a little more at ease.

We couldn’t sleep anymore, so we started the hunt for a visa. Kuwait was no problem,
but the Saudi Arabian embassy was. We were made to understand that only Muslims
were given a visa.

No delay, off to the mosque. Six hours after our arrival in Baghdad we stood
in front of a theologian, looking like he had run off out of Arabian Nights
including a long grey beard, wanting to “convert” us as long as we had two
witnesses who could convince him that we would be eternally faithful to Allah
after our return home. But we only knew the taxi driver who had accompanied us.

What else could one expect after 6 hours in a strange town?
The Dutch embassy couldn’t help us either, they only had Christian civil servants
there. Probably because they pray less and work harder. Besides, the embassy
staff rightly didn’t believe we would stay Muslim for long once we were back
in Holland.

Well, we were going to Kuwait anyway hoping that Allah would offer us a solution
on the way. First Babylon of course, visiting the hanging gardens.
We were the only tourists that day and had all the time of the world.

A week before we had traveled through Lebanon in a red Beetle.
We had visited a lot of old ruins. A beautiful country, more beautiful even than Israel.
Matthew and I had noticed then that one had to have a lot of fantasy to be able to
imagine how things looked like two or three thousand years ago.
Why not restore everything with the ruin as a base? All stones are the same age, whether
they are part of the ruin or not. It would make history alive and attract more tourists.

After Babylon, we went to Kuwait via Basra. We couldn’t resist stopping the taxi on the
way entering a city with a name which in Dutch would translate to an obscene
four-letter word and which the Arabs pronounce as “Koot”. And on a beautiful July day
we checked in at the Kuwait Hilton in a pair of shorts and a t-shirt.
They looked surprised at the sight of these Dutch wise guys, but were too nice to
say anything.

In Kuwait we weren’t successful at the Saudi embassy either. So, on to Iran.
From Kuwait to Abadan by air, and at that point we were so fed up with the whole thing
that we decided to go to Israel. From Abadan to the border by taxi, walk two
kilometres to the Iraqi border, a taxi to Basra, Baghad and on to Amman and the last
taxi to the Allenby bridge over the Jordan river, the dividing line between Jordan and
Israel.
Unfortunately, the Jordanian still think they rule the West bank and they make everyone
apply for a visa which means a 5 day wait in Amman. So, a taxi to Damascus via Beirut,
a plane to Cyprus and the boat to Haifa.

At luggage control the Israeli police found the PLO pins we had bought as a
souvenir in Damascus. Four hours of questioning was the result, and only then
they finally believed we weren’t terrorists. Also because we were Dutch and had
worked in the kibbutz before.

Two days later I flew back to Holland. Dead tired from our trip to the Middle East
which had only lasted 17 days. And to think that we had planned to go to India
for 6 weeks..... Across land that is…

Round the world

Long flights between the continents. BERMUDA
Circling forever before permission to land. BAHAMA’S
Endless rows of waiting passengers for immigration control. MIAMI
Expensive taxi rides to town. LOS ANGELES
And more waiting at the hotel desk. HAWAII
Discover a new country every day or week. TOKYO

No cruise or luxury train trip can give you the feeling of the Round-the-World trip. SEOUL
The cosmopolitan feeling for a while. TAIPEI
Flying across Mother Earth like a bird. HONG KONG
Belonging to the “jet set” for a while. BANGKOK
Far away from problems at home. BOMBAY
And pick up where you left off on return. HOLLAND

Leave the dream world of the “top of the bill” in travel: Round the World

The earth has been turning for millions of years....

The earth has been turning for millions of years
We all get to ride a few turns
Like a kid in the merry-go-round
Some rides are fantastic, others horrific
Nothing has eternal life

Everything is relative, in good times and bad
All men have a choice in how to take that ride
The way in which you take it is not that important
Because at a given day, the fair will be over for you too....

Copyright 1990-2003 Ad Latjes

Dutch version WITH photoos Click here (2350 Kb) Dutch version WITHOUT photoos Click here (175 Kb)