Kåseberga
Sweden
August 1, 2015
Hello,
In the south of Sweden, on the bus from Ysad, I met a young man who told me to get off at Kåseberga, three more stops. From there I would be able to walk to Ales Stener.
The young man said he was also going to see Ales Stener so I was puzzled when he got off the bus well before the stop he suggested to me. When I asked him why, he said, “I am flying there.”
Flying there? It’s only a few kilometers!
Grodno (Hrodna, Гродно, גראדנ)
Grodno Region
The Republic of Belarus (Белару́сь)
September 10, 2014
The Family Lifschitz: “Ich Baink Noch Grodno”
In 1902, Jehoshua Lifschitz bought a one-way ticket. All the Lifschitz Family purchased travel tickets. “One-way!” Jehoshua’s brother Schmuel bought a one-way ticket as did his brother Yitzchak, his sister Lena and Jehoshua’s wife Pesha Tziril. Lifschitz nee Lubitsch. I think she was a relative of Ernst Lubitsch, the German motion picure director who was born in Grodno.
They left Grodno, their home town, traveled overland across the Russian Empire (horseback? cart? train?) to the Baltic Sea where they boarded a ship (more than one?) bound for the dangerous, often disease-ridden “steerage” crossing of the Atlantic Ocean to the New World. The Atlantic crossing took at least eleven days.
The Lifschitz Family was not alone. Between 1900 and 1914, eleven million immigrants from Europe made the crossing, 85 percent of them in steerage. Steerage was the lowest fare and passengers sometimes were housed below the main decks of the ship.
Immigrants landed in New York, or Boston. If they were sick, they may have been refused entry. So some stayed aboard the ship and traveled to Galveston, Texas.
They arrived. Most stayed. They never looked back.
Bangkok, Thailand
May 15th, 2009
Dear Family and Friends,
Have you ever wanted to go to a place just because you liked the sound of its name?
Lake Titicaca? How about The Transvaal? Timbuktu?
Timbuktu. Say it quietly, "Tim....buk....tooo." Doesn't that sound enchanting? Lake Titicaca? The Transvaal? Do we even know where these places are? Do we care? Don't the names themselves make you want to buy a ticket?
What about Sevastopol? Sounds so exotic.
Patagonia? Sounds so spacious.
I do have a long "To See" list.
Many years ago I did indulge my sonant fantasy. For no other reason than its sound, I wanted to see Sicily. I flew to Rome, rented a car, drove down the Amalfi Coast, and took the ferry across the Strait of Messina.
What a surprise! I had no idea that I would find Greek temples in Agrigento, and medieval churches in Cefalù. The homes of Archimedes, Pindar and Aeschylus are in Siracusa. There really is a town called Corleone. On the Aeolian Island of Vulcano, I took a bubbling-hot volcanic mud-bath followed by a boiling-salt-water-rinse in the Tyrrhenian Sea.
In Agrigento, the grilled swordfish on my luncheon plate swam that very morning in the Mediterranean Sea. At least that's what the waiter told me as he gazed beyond the window of the hilltop Ristorante Caprice. He nodded to the sea and proclaimed, "Pesce spada, la mattina, la!"
A few years ago, my acoustic-self flew south to "Mah Choo Pee Choo." Now admit it, doesn't that sound positively seductive? My friends in America, especially you Floridians, indulge yourselves and you will be seduced. Machu Picchu is a dream trip and Peru is closer than you think. ***
Tashkent was another place I always wanted to see. Tashkent? Where was it anyway? I didn't know and I didn't care. Tashkent sounds so ancient! So distant! So daring!
Bangkok, Thailand
Noon
Wednesday 17 March
Dear Friends,
To beat the mid-day crush of office workers on the streets, I left my apartment at about 11:00 and walked towards my local barber.
I needed to cross Sukhumvit Road, the main thoroughfare in my neighborhood. But along with all the traffic, I was stuck. The office girls were still working, but the Red Shirts were on parade.
Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia
23 April 2010
Dear Family and Friends,
Fifteen kilometers (nine miles) north of Kuala Lumpur, the Batu Caves lie inside a towering limestone formation.
Standing 42.7meters tall (140 ft) the Hindu deity, Lord Murugan welcomes the devotees and visitors to the caves and the shrines.
To get to the main cave, I climb the 272 steps, while the resident monkeys eye my water bottle.
The cave complex is filled with colorful carvings of the Hindu pantheon and scripture. I recognize my old friends Shiva and Ganesha.
Bangkok, Thailand
15 June 2010
Dear Friends and Sports Fans Everywhere,
Back in 1994, when the FIFA World Cup was staged in the USA, I attended two matches at Foxboro Stadium outside Boston: Bolivia v Korea and Nigeria v Greece. I had never seen a football (soccer) match before. I loved the enthusiastic national pride of the spectators and I was impressed with the athleticism and skill of the players. I enjoyed the constant “stress” of the game. I was “sold.”
