It was last December – the sixth anniversary of her husband’s fatal stabbing – that Nadja Ensink-Teich saw an Instagram post advertising “Randy”, a Land Rover Defender. The fully equipped vehicle was up for sale in Cape Town – some 8,000 miles from Nadja’s home in the Netherlands. The post sparked an idea the 43-year-old couldn’t shake off.
After two years of lockdown – much of it spent “writing and then crying” – Nadja was itching for a change of scene. So, three days later, she bought the camel-coloured 4x4.
Several weeks after that, she boarded a plane to South Africa with her six-year-old daughter, Fleur.
Nadja’s husband, Jeroen, 41, a renowned water engineer and Dutch academic, was stabbed to death by a stranger in a random attack in north London in December 2015. His daughter was just 11 days old.
Jeroen had left the family’s Islington flat to post cards announcing their first child’s arrival when a student in the grips of a severe psychotic illness attacked him, mere yards from his doorstep. The cards, stained with Jeroen’s blood, were later found scattered beside his body.
The killer was convicted of manslaughter, while a gruelling inquest found there had been a series of failings from the Metropolitan Police in advance of the stabbing.
Now, Nadja, Fleur and a female family friend, are planning to spend a year driving the Defender across eastern and southern Africa in memory of husband and father.
“Africa was one of Fleur’s first words – so the idea felt right,” says Nadja. “The idea just constantly grew and grew into something bigger.”
Nadja and Jeroen met on a dating website in 2010. “As you do nowadays,” she laughs. “But the strange thing was, we had so many links – as soon as we got together, it was like ‘OK, this is it’.
“We always had this idea that when we had children we would all settle in Africa, where lots of Jeroen’s projects were based,” she says. “So this road trip is kind of what we had planned, but different… this is my way of doing it. He might have declared me slightly crazy, but he wouldn’t be surprised – I think he’d be proud.”
Jeroen, a public health academic at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), had dedicated his working life to improving water and sanitation in lower-income countries after a stint in Pakistan as a student. At the time of his death, he was focused on better controlling cholera in emergency situations.
Now, as Nadja drives in a loop from South Africa to Uganda and back again, she hopes to introduce Fleur to the work Jeroen was so passionate about.
“I want to show Fleur what Daddy did. It’ll become a part of her that she can relate to. We’ll meet people who can tell her stories about her father,” says Nadja. “And we’re travelling with Jeroen. Every time Fleur opens the car door, there’ll be the logo, ‘Driving for the Jeroen Ensink Memorial Fund’”.
The initiative, set up in the days after Jeroen’s death, funds scholarships for students from sub-Saharan Africa or South Asia to complete a masters in Public Health for Development – the LSHTM programme which Jeroen was course director of between 2009 and 2015. So far, five students have studied through the scheme.
“So raising the profile of that, how could I not?” says Nadja. “It really changes, not just the life of the students, but wider society because of the big impact these graduates will go on to have.”
Jeroen’s name in black lettering is not the only visual reminder of him to make it aboard Randy. At a leaving party in the Netherlands, friends gave Fleur a Knuffelmakers – a stuffed toy customised to look like her father. Now they’re inseparable.
“At first Fleur was taken aback, but then she didn’t want to part with it,” says Nadja. “I thought we’d already narrowed down the toys she could bring, but you can guess who has now joined us on our adventure.”
For Nadja, this trip – which she is documenting on her Instagram account, Journey of a Widowed Mom – is also the next step in her own attempt to reimagine her life following such an abrupt bereavement. She has retrained as a grief therapist – something she will continue to do remotely when Wi-Fi permits – as well as taken Fleur on a trip across South-East Asia. A book about her experiences is set to be published in the Netherlands in September.
This journey – as ambitious as it sounds – was the logical next step.
“It comes back to: instead of thinking of the obstacles, think of the opportunities and what works for you and what life can you create,” Nadja says. “That’s not necessarily going back to the same life you had together, but creating a life that works for you in this moment in time.”
And the timing of this journey felt right. When her father died in February, it strengthened Nadja’s resolve.
“The last thing I could discuss with [my dad] was literally, we’re going to Africa. He was like, ‘that’s such a great idea! When are we going?’ she says. “I knew he couldn’t do that, but it was so sweet – it’s really special that it was the last thing I could discuss with him.”
Now, a week after the mother and daughter first climbed aboard Randy in Cape Town, Nadja is focused on the journey ahead – driving thousands of miles through South Africa to Mozambique, into Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda, then south to Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia.
“Am I worried about the car? No, I just have a whole lot of respect for it,” Nadja says. “Randy is a massive car, a heavy car, a safe car – I’ve had it checked twice.”
First on the agenda when touching down in Cape Town was an off-road driving course, learning how to control the huge 4x4 when bouncing along dusty, rocky tracks.
“Today was the day that I drove Randy for the first time, and in true Nadja style I immediately attended a 4x4 off-road driving course,” she wrote on Instagram. “There was no slowly easing in and getting used to Randy, we were full on right from the start.”
The pair are also getting used to the thought of camping out in the Land Rover for the next year, under the cover of canvas atop the roof.
“This morning we did our first practice run in setting up the roof tents and made our bed, can you imagine the excitement for Fleur?” she wrote on Thursday, alongside a picture of the six year old proudly showing off her ice cream, teddy at hand. “It’s been a very physical morning, but this afternoon we took off and visited the Groot Constantia wine farm… I appreciate every second of this adventure so far.”
“I wonder if Jeroen and I would have done such a trip together,” Nadja adds. “But I know Jeroen fully supports me, and must be incredibly proud I’m showing Fleur another part of the world.”
