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IN THIS ISSUE

• Irene Harvalias concludes her story of her happiest years
• Peter Weatherby reflects on his best years
• Zvonko Springer continues his generic winter warmup
• Nightmares disturb Dick Monaghan´s long winter naps
• Jean Sterling tries out her new digital camera
• Gerrit de Leeuw´s story is about an embarrassing encounter
• Catherine Green reminds us it´s time to post Christmas cards
• Miriam Ockenden asks that you respect e-mail privacy
• Betty Brightwell suggests an inspiring video
• Bruce Galway forwards a site of an amazing magic act

Irene Harvalias concludes her story of

THE BEST YEARS OF MY LIFE

It was mid-July when we got here, and the ship chandler who supplied my uncle´s ships had found us a house to live in. It was furnished and came complete with housekeeper and gardener. I don´t remember the housekeeper´s name, but she cooked for us, and one day she made a chocolate roll which we all though was divine. Ever since then, whenever a friend came over, we HAD to have chocolate roll. To this day, nearly sixty years later, this chocolate roll is my family´s favourite dessert!

The next thing we had to do was to find a school for my cousin and myself. We went for an interview at York House and were accepted. But there was the slight problem of language - I spoke NO English at all! The principal suggested that I take a few private lessons from one of the school´s teachers before school started in September. So off I bicycled to Miss Langridge´s house every day for two weeks - from 40th and Granville to about 20th and Cambie. And I learned how to say "Hello, yes, please, thank you" and all sorts of other interesting things which didn´t really help me at all in trying to make conversation. After buying uniforms (the "bloomers" were my favourite - and the black lisle stockings!) we were ready to start school. My first day in grade nine was totally overwhelming. I didn´t know anyone, and I couldn´t communicate in any way. I sat next to a girl who was kind enough to let me copy her notes because I sure didn´t know what I was doing. I was exhausted by the end of the day, and when I got home there was lots of work for me to do. My aunt translated the notes so I knew what they meant, and then I tried to memorize as much as I could - parrot-style.

And so it went ... but by the end of two months, I was beginning to be able to speak and understand what was going on around me. I don´t think I have ever worked as hard in my life as I did that first year at York House. By the end of the year, all my marks were excellent except for English and Social Studies, which involved a lot of essay-type writing. The girl who sat next to me for the first few days became my best friend, and remained that until I lost her three years ago - something that still hurts.

During the next three years, I went through school and loved every minute. I was always one of the top three students in the class, and I was a real "star" in French since I had learned that in Greece. I loved everything about school, about Canada, about Vancouver, about my life here ... and then came graduation and I was told that I would have to go back to Greece. I was devastated. I was planning on continuing on at university, but it was not to be. I had no choice.

So the next September, while all my friends were getting ready for UBC, I packed and my uncle took me to Seattle, where I boarded a train for New York. (They didn´t want me to fly, for some reason.) His sister-in-law picked me up and took me under her wing and I spent a week there, until I boarded another ship, a big liner this time - and was on my way back to Greece. We sailed from New York to Naples, where I met one of my mother´s Italian cousins (my maternal grandmother had been Italian), and after spending three days there, boarded another ship - Turkish this time - and arrived in Piraeus a few days later. Yes, I had missed my parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins, friends ... and I was happy to see everyone again, but my heart was left in Vancouver. My four years of high school had been the happiest in my life. Four years later, having married the year before, my husband and I emigrated to Vancouver. I´ve been here ever since, and to me, this is HOME!

Peter Weatherby contemplates

THE BEST YEARS OF MY LIFE

The best years of my life have been the past 20 years, and I am 80 now. I don´t mean that to sound like a typical "golden years" senior as often depicted on TV, brimming with good health, hefting his great-grandchildren in the air as they squeal with delight, and enjoying a Caribbean cruise with his doting wife. The past 20 years have been anything but golden, but they have been better in many ways than the first 60.

My childhood was a troubled one, with a great deal of family strife. I was a thoroughly awkward teenager, since there was no such thing as a "teenager" in those days in England - you were a child until you became a man, and you suffered through those in-between years with varying degrees of embarrassment, humiliation, and efforts to please.

The twenties, when I was married, were a time of struggling to improve my job and income, and trying to become a good husband and father, neither of which I seemed to be particularly suited for.

By the time I was in my thirties, we had emigrated, first to Canada, then after four years in Toronto - where I managed to improve as a commercial artist and maintain a fairly decent standard of living for my (now) two children and wife - to California, lured by the vision of sun-drenched beaches, easy living, and streets paved with gold. Ha!

My forties were marked by mid-life crisis and the eventual break-up of our marriage after 25 years. In my fifties I had another shot at marriage, and made a fairly decent go of it before my second wife died of cancer (my first wife died of cancer too, after remarrying).

I retired when I was 60, fed up with the rat race. I didn´t miss commercial art at all; in fact, I still have an overwhelming feeling of gratitude that I don´t have to get up to go to work each morning. My children were both in Colorado by then, and I joined them in 1990. They too have had their problems, and I saw some flashbacks of my own life in theirs. But we all live within a short distance of each other now, and can share our joys and troubles.

I lead a quiet life, enjoying reading, music, and the small things in life - marveling at a beautiful sunset, looking forward to the evening meal, happy when I can sleep for eight hours with only one trip to the bathroom, and never failing to be amazed at American life with all its myriad creativity and its incredible absurdities.

My son says, "Look forward to the next 20 years, Dad." I´m not sure I want to be around as a centenarian. But "whatever," as the bored teenagers say. It´s not for me to decide.

To be continued - but unrecorded, for now at least.

Zvonko Springer and his wife have just reached their destination on their

WARMING UP HOLIDAY ON KENYA´S COAST

Two bumps on the access road wake me as soon as the bus stops in front of the hotel entrance. There Anthony, the mighty bodied head porter, is waiting to greet guests and direct them to the proper reception desk. Guests booked into the hotel go straight on, while those booked into the Golf Club have to walk to another portico at left at the wide garden compound of the Club.

Ljiljana remains at the bus to supervise the baggage unloading while I go to the reception desk and sign in and get our room key. The room was reserved about two months before of our arrival, along with "our" table in the restaurant and two longue chairs at the beach under our favourite palm tree. Of course everybody I meet on my way greets me with "Jambo Mzee" (Greetings Elder) and "Habari yako?" (How do you do?) We shake hands the native way, exchanging pleasantries before I can proceed on my way. Soon a smiling caretaker appears, asking me for the room key and rushes away to meet "Mama" (local polite name for my good lady). A familiar waiter brings me a cold-wet towel to refresh myselfme and a coconut with chilled juice that helps me forget the heat and humidity for a moment. I look longingly through palms trees and beyond a shadowed veranda at the blue sea only 200m away. Despite my weariness caused by the climate change, I force myself to get up to start a "long" walk (some 200m and a few dozens of steps) towards Block C. I look forward to getting rid of heavy boots, thick trousers, and elastic stockings (against swelling of the legs during long hours of immobility), all drenched with sweat. On the way I am greeted by several "askaris" (watchmen), gardeners, and room servants, who all recognize me as an old (elder too) guest. I wonder how these people remember my face, when for me most of their features are hardly familiar - they all look alike to me. Ljiljana knows them better as she keeps a record of most of hotel staff members (wife´s name, number and age of children, and other details) when she writes simple notes of her donations to them. Seeing my ungainly walk, a familiar room service man will rush to take my handbag, carrying it to our room on the first floor. Ljiljana will have had our luggage brought to the room already, where she still talks in Swahili to a few of her "rafikis" (friends). Oh, will they stop with this "maneno" (chatting) soon so that I could undress and get into something more comfortable!

There is a large fruit plate and a bottle of wine presented by the room service and soon a gardener will bring a bunch of freshly-picked flowers for Madame. After a few minutes which feel like an eternity we are left alone to start undressing and unpacking our suitcases. Ljiljana does most of the packing except for the "technical stuff" (like cameras, electric razor, tooth brush, etc.)

The room has a full glass front with a wide sliding door that is open, but the double wings of mosquito screen have to be kept shut as soon inquisitive "visitors" will appear - Sykes or Vervet monkeys. Nonetheless, the view from the balcony is exquisite and most promising. In front of the block there is a garden on a coral rock with palm and frangipani trees at each side, edged by a row of blooming bougainvilleas. Beyond and below stretches the white sandy Diani Beach, gently sloping into a shallow channel which reaches out to the coral reef some 600m out, and beyond starts the openness of the Indian Ocean.

Well, here are we again and our "warming up" holidays can begin - at last! It is well after 10 a.m. before we are moving freely in our room. First we get rid of any clothing and walk around barefooted, after peeling off those elastic stockings. We start sorting things taken from the suitcases to put them almost automatically on shelves and in drawers - we have done it so many times in this type of room. Ljiljana hands me over a rope that I have to fix on the balcony to hang clothes to dry in the light breeze coming in from the sea.

Oh, a long swim would do me so much good, but there are things to be done before we can have this pleasure. It takes about an hour to accomplish the most important tasks. Our first probing visitor appears on the balcony out of nowhere, to be followed by more that we have to chase away because they balance on the rope too. Some cling to the frame of the mosquito door that we must keep shut as otherwise an impudent monkey will enter the room and steal anything within its reach.

To be continued.

Dick Monaghan has

NIGHTMARES

Have you ever had nightmares that ruined your sleep, setting you to tossing and turning? Here are a few of mine:

1. I am forced to attend a production of "Hamlet" in which the title role is played by football commentator and pre-game host Terry Bradshaw. His co-stars are Paris Hilton as Ophelia, John Madden as Claudius, Lily Tomlin as Gertrude, and Adam Sandler as Horatio.

2. The U.S. Govt. decides we all ought to have cell phones permanently wired to our brains and linked to a satellite, so it always knows where we are, and it can text-message advice on diet, terrorism, and child rearing.

3. The CIA and NSA (Nation Security Administration) develop intelligence warning that Canada is engaged in a secret program to drive herds of radioactive moose into Minnesota, Maine, and Montana (Weapons of Moose Destruction). The U.S. invades Canada, but everything goes horribly wrong: the Canadians simply ignore the troops. A U.S. platoon smashes its way into The King´s Arms (Whitehorse, Y.T.) and the commanding officer bellows, "We´re here to liberate you!" A Canadian rises, pulls himself to his full height, and says, "You´ll be buying a round, then, eh?" This scenario is repeated a thousand times, and the cost of the incursion escalates astronomically. Molson buys Anheuser-Busch. The radioactive moose do not exist. The U.S. seeks an exit strategy and forms a committee to make recommendations....

4. Terry Bradshaw enters politics.

Jean Sterling gets a new camera:

VISITING FLORIDA PARKS

I had an ancient digital camera which took pictures that were adequate if it was a distance shot but quite fuzzy for close-ups. I remember sending Jean some pictures of hurricane debris after Charlie, Francis, and Jeanne, and the resolution was quite bad. But it was adequate.

However, last May I learned that at long last I was to have a grandchild and suddenly adequate pictures were no longer good enough. I needed a better camera that would do close-ups that weren´t fuzzy. I ended up buying a Canon Powershot which has 6 mega pixels and takes great close-ups. It even has a 4X zoom lens.

I practiced on the cat who was a great subject as she doesn´t move much.

A couple of weeks ago my husband and I went over to the southwest coast of Florida. The west coast of Florida is always a bit disorienting to us who live on the east coast. Not only is the traffic much worse, the beach is on the wrong side. I had some directions for going to Myakka State Park and told my husband that we needed to drive east for five miles. "What?" he exclaimed. "If we do that we will end up in the water." But of course the Gulf of Mexico is on the WEST side, not on the east side like the Atlantic Ocean is where we live.

But I digress. We went to two parks while there - Myakka State Park and Bok Tower.

Myakka is the second largest state park in Florida and has lots of nature trails to explore, and I got to take some really neat pictures with my new camera. Especially satisfying was the picture I took of a heron that was doing some fishing. Fantastic! I never would have gotten that shot without the 4X zoom lens.

Bok Tower is a lovely place. The tower is built of coquina rock, which is native to Florida, and marble of varying hues that came from Georgia. A reflecting pond in front of the tower has some beautiful swans, and there is a carillon in the tower which is played several times during the day. Bok Tower is a most peaceful place with some nature trails and places to watch bird life.

Both these places present a view of what Florida used to be - unspoiled and slower-paced.

ED. NOTE: To see a larger version of some of the pictures Jean took, click your mouse button on the picture. Then return to the text with your browser's "Back" button.

Gerrit de Leeuw says this could happen to you:

THE OTHER STALL

I was barely sitting down when I heard a voice from the other stall saying: "Hi, how are you?"??I´m not the type to start a conversation in the restroom but I don´t know what got into me, so I answered, somewhat embarrassed, "Doin´ just fine!"??And the other person says: "So what are you up to?"??What kind of question is that? At that point, I´m thinking this is too bizarre so I say: "Uhhh, I´m like you, just traveling!"

At this point I am just trying to get out as fast as I can when I hear another question. "Can I come over?"??Ok, this question is just too weird for me but I figured I could just be polite and end the conversation. I say, "No ... I´m a little busy right now!" ? Then I hear the person say nervously, "Listen, I´ll have to call you back. There´s an idiot in the other stall who keeps answering all my questions."

Cell phones - don´t you just love them?

This blonde joke from Catherine Green reminds us it is almost that time:

BUYING CHRISTMAS STAMPS

A blonde goes to the post office to buy stamps for her Christmas cards.

She says to the clerk, "May I have fifty Christmas stamps?"

The clerk says, "What denomination?"

The blonde says, "God help us. Has it come to this? Give me six Catholic, 12 Presbyterian, 10 Lutheran, and 22 Baptists."

Miriam Ockenden sends this timely reminder:

PROTECT OUR PRIVACY

Thank you for deleting the sender´s e-mail address (as well as any other e-mail addresses) and any other personal information from any message you plan to forward. Please use BCC: instead of TO: for list mailings or any mailings, to ensure email addresses are kept private.

AN INSPIRING VIDEO

Betty Brightwell recommends this video about the rescue of horses isolated on an island in the Netherlands. Catherine Green points out that one of the difficulties encountered was in trying to find a route where the horses wouldn´t get caught in barbed wire fences.

http://video.google.nl/videoplay?docid=-4584913278289860160

You will enjoy this amazing act in the site sent by Bruce Galway:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xf9oo_jerome-murat

"Do you know the difference between education and experience? Education is when you read the fine print; experience is what you get when you don´t." - Pete Seeger