Sitting close to Greenland. Well, it’s about 200 miles from Iceland, where I’m changing planes to go south into Europe.

Built during the war by the Americans,when they actually were friends with Europe, a reminder inside Keflavik airport with a sign “Checkpoint Keflavik”, an old photo of a barren Icelandic landscape and a sparkling 1955 Dodge Royal . American friendship, prosperity through manufacturing and research and safe from a land war.

A far cry from today’s teeth-bared ferocious destruction of research and scientific discovery, unfriendliness toward a huge chunk of the world with minor pockets of totalitarianism as “friends of the moment”.

The shape of things to come worldwide in just a few years from now is probably as seismic as the past 80 years.

Suffering among millions was probably never as keen as now —- and it’s not just that we have so much more information about it. Hatred, fear, the virulence of subjugation—- political, social, cultural and economic is what drives so much of governance the world over.

Why do I care? Perhaps, it’s the way I grew up. I didn’t want and my parents drilled it into me that helping those who were less fortunate was a worthy goal. More than making money or acquiring possessions. And they lived that life. I remember.