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Lamp Shade Tower at Glasgow's Gallery of Modern Art

Thanksgiving used to be my favorite holiday. No services, no matzah, clear guidelines on menu planning. For many years a joyful gathering of family and/or friends. But holidays in general are a challenge when your kids are far-flung and when you’ve moved around a bit later in life. Where you move people you meet have established traditions either with their own families or others, and it can even be hard to find people to invite to our home. This year I decided to circumvent any potential Thanksgiving angst and trauma by going away. Not that we hadn’t BEEN away this year (or any other year), but about August we began to make plans. Eli suggested a car trip to Carmel or Palm Desert. I got a British Air sale email and said Glasgow. I really wanted to see my Cousin Hannah, AND I wanted to avoid Thanksgiving so much that I said, “Let’s go where there’s NO Thanksgiving.” I didn’t want to feel badly going out to dinner alone, watching others enjoy their families.

Glasgow, Scotland, in November? Not exactly a garden spot when you’ve left Wisconsin and moved to California. But that’s where Hannah lives, and she’s 91 and not exactly running around traveling anymore. We’d been to Glasgow before–a few days one January after a very cold week in London–and Eli was not keen on another British Isles winter wonderland vacation. Remarkably, as we often despair of why we own a timeshare, we were able to get an exchange week in Marbella, Spain, to tack onto a few days in grey, chilly, sopping Glasgow. (Stay tuned for post on Spain.)

But, as penetrating as the rain and cold were, the visit was warm, welcoming and worthwhile.

Who is Cousin Hannah, and how do I come to have relatives in Scotland?

Dinner with Cousins Hannah and Eliot in Glasgow

My grandfather (my  mother’s father, who died when I was under three) came from Poland. His mother had brothers who’d emigrated from there to Glasgow (maybe 130 years ago) and started a jewelry business. I suspect it wasn’t exactly the Tiffany’s of the north (pawnshop and loans come to mind), but my great-grandmother was encouraged by her brothers to send her sons, just after their Bar Mitzvahs, to live and work with the uncles. There were originally five sons,  but I believe that Hannah’s father and my grandfather were the only two who went to Scotland. Hannah’s father stayed and had a family, but my grandfather came to the US after a few years in Scotland, still not even 20 years old. (Imagine our kids uprooting themselves and making these moves to the New World all alone, probably never to see their parents again. My other grandfather came on his own as a teen-ager, too, as did so many of that generation.) My grandfather’s time in Scotland made an impact: my mother used to say that her father spoke Yiddish with a Scottish accent.

So, Hannah is my mother’s first cousin, a year older than my mother, who died in 2008, would have been. The two of  them traveled together a few times over the years, including a tour to China. Even at 91 Hannah retains vestiges of the stunning chic she had then and, of course, her charming, cultivated accent. (Many people in Scotland are impossible to understand, but to hear Hannah you’d think you’re listening to Helen Mirren.)

Although she’s a bit forgetful, it was great to visit with Hannah. I brought her a photo I had of an old lady, who I thought was my great-grandmother in Poland, sitting with a youngish man, both of them surrounded by three middle-aged women standing behind them. Hannah verified that the man was her father, who returned to Poland to visit the family after several years in Glasgow. We assume that the three women were the aunts presumably killed in the Holocaust. They were grandmothers by the time of World War II, and they and their families totally vanished. I don’t know their married names, and attempts I’ve made to trace via alternate spellings of the family name (Cukert? in Poland, Suckert in Scotland, Zuckert in the US) have failed. Hannah thanked me over and over for bringing the photo, which she didn’t remember ever seeing. She’s not in a position to enlighten me too much on family history, as–memory issues aside–her father died when she was only ten years old.

While in Glasgow we did a little sightseeing of places we hadn’t seen the first time, including a tour of the historic Glasgow School of Art, designed by the notable architect, Charles Rennie McInstosh. Hannah’s son, Eliot, is Director of Finance & Resources there. We also toured the new Riverside Museum, which is a museum of transportation–a bit of a mishmosh, but interesting–and the Gallery of Modern Art, incongruously housed in an iconic historic edifice built in 1775. One evening we heard the Chief Rabbi of the UK, Sir Jonathan Sacks (LORD Sacks, if you please), speak. It’s hard to imagine a similar post in the US–one rabbi purporting to be the spokesman for the entire Jewish community–but to be a LORD! It was simply an informal Wednesday night lecture at a synagogue, not a religious service, and a paltry crowd of 100 at most. One striking note was that everyone stood up when Lord Sacks walked into the room and again when he departed from the lectern. Cousin Eliot told us this is customary whenever any rabbi enters an assemblage. Another anomaly.

The Cukerts (sp?) in Warsaw, 19??: My great-grandmother with Uncle David (Hannah's father) and the three sisters presumed perished in the Holocaust. Their names were Sarah, Esther and Leah. I'm named for Leah.

Hannah thanked us for coming to see her. I thanked her for her hospitality and for the lasting connection to my mother and departed family.  I’m so thankful we could take this trip.

It was one of the most memorable Thanksgivings ever–without Thanksgiving.

Popo is the Chinese word that in Mandarin means the mother-in-law on the husband’s side. I’ve also seen it defined as old woman (ahem!) and grandmother (someday soon, I hope). When I’ve asked my son in Beijing, Jonathan, why there’s a special name for the mother-in-law or grandma from the husband’s side, he said it’s because of the traditional dominance of that side in Chinese marriage customs: the bride would go over to her husband’s family. I’ve also seen a chart of family relationship names, and it seems that all sides have specific words for them.

Tiger Mom Amy Chua missed a terrific cross-culture educational opportunity when she wrote about her Jewish mother-in-law, the late Florence Rubenfeld, an arts journalist and author who sounded like one bright, fun-loving and accomplished woman, even though she didn’t always approve of the über-pressure applied to her Chinese-Jewish granddaughters by their mother. In other words, a normal. loving Jewish grandmother. Grandma Rubenfeld had actually directed that her granddaughters to call her Popo, a point Ms. Chua makes without defining the word. I think Ms. Chua could have cut her Popo some slack and acknowledged Ms. Rubenfeld’s apparent respect for Tiger Mom’s Chinese side of the family.

Panda Dad Alan Paul, the author of a touching book on life in Beijing with his journalist wife and three kids they plucked out of New Jersey (full disclosure: a friend of Jonathan’s whom I’ve met, and Jonathan is mentioned in the book), reacted to Tiger Mom’s parenting methods with points about raising responsible, flexible children with flexibility. This resonated more with me than Tiger Mom’s rants about everything from rigid hours of music practice to no sleepovers. Although I can’t help thinking that Ms. Chua’s most extreme bombast was geared to sell books, a Chinese-American friend here in the Bay Area confirmed that her parents were very demanding and hypercritical, too. The Amy (Chinese name Li Xuebai) in our family, on the other hand, told me that her Chinese parents in China raised her with expectations but a lot of praise, too.

I’m way past the on-site parenting stage, but I take the popo role seriously.  Amy calls me “Ma,” which delights me. The Chinese connection has enriched our family tremendously, and our Jewish family life has done the same for her. For one thing, she’s proud to be (probably) the only member of the Chinese Communist party (more a prestige/politic credential than a true political one these days) who’s also a life member of Hadassah, the nearly 100 year old organization that supports medical and vocational education institutions in Israel. When we as a family visited the main Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem four years ago, I made this point to our tour guide, who wasn’t that impressed. Jonathan also reports that Amy makes a terrific matzah brie, and she’s studying Judaism.

Because of the distance and multiple time zones between us, it’s challenging to be the mother of an expat young “Old China hand,” but being a Jewish popo is one of the benefits.

*婆 = Popo

Here are some photos from our four days in gorgeous Cape Town.

Atop Table Mountain

With Nobel Prize winners at V&A Waterfront

Cape of Good Hope

Cape Point

Fish kebabs served with individual kebab stands (just like at home)

One variety of protea (national flower of South Africa) at Kirstenboesch Botanical Gardens on magnificent property formerly owned by Cecil Rhodes.

Castle of Good Hope daily key and canon ceremony

With Cousins Merav (Leviten) Bendavid and her husband, Eitan Bendavid, in the courtyard of the Jewish Museum/Holocaust complex--after lunch at café there

Cape Town blog to follow (maybe from the airport tomorrow night? SOOO much to do in this gorgeous city!).

And, by the way, in case you wondered, we DID end up seeing the BIG FIVE: finally caught up to a leopard or two in Botswana. But once it was at night and once well hidden in trees, so our photos weren’t good  (you can’t really tell it’s a leopard) and we will get some from one of the better photographers.

We’re in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe (vs. the Zambian side of the Falls, which is outside the city of Livingstone). We’ve been here since Tuesday afternoon, staying at an actual lodge with walls and windows, which makes the nights a whole lot warmer than the last camp and a whole lot less scary than them all (though there’s a watering hole down the hill from the lodge, and reportedly a killer elephant in area).

Having been to Iguassu Falls in Argentina (and Niagara), I can say that Victoria Falls is at least as spectacular, but it’s impossible to compare the three. We were offered the opportunity to sign up to bungee jump or swing (zip line) from the bridge over the falls between Zimbabwe and Zambia. Uh—I don’t think so. Ditto for helicopter rides over. Just being here is enough of a thrill! (And Eli and I DID volunteer to be among the three group members to take yet another four-seater plane ride between Hwange and “Vic Falls.”

An unknown “meshugunah” person bungee jumping from the bridge linking Zambia and Zimbabwe over Victoria Falls

Statue of David Livingstone, who officially discovered and named the Falls, at the entrance to Victoria Falls National Park

Bearded guy (with our group leader, Edison). Could we presume that THIS is Dr. Livingstone?

Adjacent to the Falls is the historic Victoria Falls Hotel,a gracious colonial complex of buildings dating from about 1905. Just the spot for an English history buff like me. Its terrace is a gorgeous setting for lunch and/or high tea. Since Eli and I were ahead of the group in arriving on Tuesday, we had a lovely lunch there. Then yesterday, after we dried off from our walking tour of the Falls, we joined seven of our fellow travelers there for tea!

Base of flagpole at the very grand Victoria Falls Hotel

The bridge over the Falls (note rainbow) from lawn of the Victoria Falls Hotel

Breathtaking!

On this OAT (Overseas Adventure Travel) trip we have stayed at four different camps in three different countries (plus Eli and I were in Kwa Zulu Natale in South Africa for five nights beforehand). You might think that it all would begin to look alike and also that we might begin to get a little jaded. But, like crossing the Bay Bridge into San Francisco (or taking in one City view or another—even coming home from the grocery store or waiting for the eye MD at UCSF)—each tent camp and game ride was a new experience. Remarkably, neither of us has had one back twinge the entire time, which says something about the relaxation factor of this amazing holiday.

First, there was Botswana, and the aforementioned (Elephant in the Room) lodge in Chobe National Park—ravine setting, pontoon boat trip on the nearby river. Then, in the Okavanga Delta, also Botswana, where the reeds and grasses hinted at the delta beyond, but the nocturnal hippo sounds confirmed it; we also road mokoro canoe boats on the delta itself. Lufopo Lodge in Zambia boasted a fabulous view of the confluence of the Lufopo and Kafue Rivers in Kafue National Park. Finally, here in Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe, it’s an open savannah-like, with tall grasses prevailing over occasional thickets. Very “Out of Africa.” (But where are Robert Redford and Meryl Streep when you need them? The theme music floats through my head all the time!)

Most mornings we set out for a game drive after a 6 or 6:30 am wakeup knock or voice “good morning” greeting. As it is late fall-early winter here in southern Africa, the sun is just rising as we get to breakfast by 7. Then we bundle up to load onto the two- or three-tiered Land Rover vehicles, laden with cameras, field glasses, and backpacks, the latter useful for storing the layers we peel off as the sun gets warmer. The guides/drivers in each country have stood out as professional game trackers, knowledgeable naturalists, and generally genial fellows. Edison, our group leader who came up through the ranks as a safari guide first, is a strapping Zimbabwean who seems to have a great relationship with the local guides and staff at each lodge.

Most days the morning drives have lasted 2-4 hours, followed by brunch or lunch back at the camp. We’ve also had one walking safari, with our driver/guide, Godfrey, carrying a rifle (better safe than sorry, the guides say!)

Many afternoons (starting anywhere from 4 to 5 pm) were the “sundowner” game drives, some punctuated with an outdoor cocktail hour rendezvous of the vehicles at the day’s last light. These provided some of the best game viewing of the hard-to-spot nocturnal animals. In the dark, the drivers shone red lights around, and the eyes of leopards and hyenas that shone in the thicket were incredible. Dinner followed our return to camp. The final nights at each site—at outdoor open fire pits–the staff performed their native songs and dances and gave the group an opportunity to do out thing, too. Not too original, we’ve done the “Hokey Pokey” ad nauseum. “Have Negilah” was suggested (not by us, the only Jews in the group) but rejected. Eli’s suggestion of a parody to the tune of “Old McDonald” is on tap tonight for our final safari night: “OAT Man Edison Led a Safari…”

Food: considering the lack of exercise (though maybe hoisting ourselves up into the vehicles will have worked the arms a bit), it’s been too good (though my safari pants actually feel a little loose, and there’s no forgiving spandex to stretch them!). Though the cuisine could be called universal in general (eggs, cereals for breakfast; pasta casseroles; roasted meats and fowl, etc.), there have been differences. In Botswana and Zambia we got more of an African flavor with the corn maize they call “polenta” used for side dishes and morning porridge. Baked goods were outstanding. One standout was a rosemary cookie wafer served for a tea/coffee break during a game drive. Here in Zimbabwe, where the lodge amenities (including luscious outdoor shower glorious in the mid-afternoon breaks) are the best (last safari stop—that OAT is a smart cookie company), the food is more colonial British (the manager and “senior” staff is also white Zimbabwean, unlike the other places). Nights are also chilly (close to freezing, we hear the next morning)—the chilliest here in Zimbabwe, but the hot water bottles left in during turndown have been welcome lumps in the bed. Talk about layers: last night I even wore gloves to bed.

However cold the beginning and end of the day is, every day has brought clear skies and warming sun by late morning. The afternoons are probably 70-80 F. In short, perfect.

Between camps we’ve traveled by safari vehicle, bus, and plane. Some of the “airports” have been terminal-free airstrips. The planes have generally been 12-seaters, which has meant that that group needed more than one. A couple legs used four –seaters, and volunteers were requested. Eli and I rode one 1.5 hour leg in one, a HUGE challenge conquered for me. (Even the 12-seaters…now I take them in stride, as if they were 747s!). And then there was the “marking of territory” bathroom facilities (gents in one area, ladies behind other bushes) available on most game drives. I’m now a pro!

Our OAT group of 15 has been remarkably congenial, and everyone shows up on time, and no one holds up the group in any way. Of course, there are different “personalities” and a couple of characters, but we’re very lucky. Our guide says our group is “as good as it gets.”

Photos tell it better than words, and we have taken more than 1300 in Africa. (Don’t worry—we don’t intend to bore everyone we know with all of them when we get home.  And, like the much discussed overpopulation of elephants in southern Africa , there is need for culling! Some members of our group are MAJOR photographers with huge lenses (one even with tripod: it’s a wonder they could bring any clothes with 37 lbs of equipment, and the small plane weight allotment of 44, including backpacks). We are not in that league, and our cameras didn’t do as well at night, but, as our guide Edison says, “The best pictures are the ones in your memory.”

Walking safari with guide, Godfrey, and his trust rifle.

Last night at Malolo Lodge, Hwange National Park. Zimbabwe: Eli, the creator and producer of the evening’s “OAT Man Edison Led a Safari” group presentation.

We ran into a pride of about 15 lions en route to the airstrip leaving Zimbabwe.

Monday, June 6

Some blog readers might remember our Milwaukee house across the street from more expensive homes that over looked Lake Michigan. For those who were never there, it was on Barnett Lane, a lovely street in Fox Point, a suburb only 15 minutes from downtown—20-25 minutes on the scenic route along Lake Drive, instead of the freeway. But the setting was bucolic–a mid-century modern ranch home perched atop a wooded ravine and set back from the street as the second house on a long driveway. Sometimes we’d drive in and have to wait while a deer or two crossed the path into the garage. I remember once having a guest from New York City nearly fainting with awe at the tableaux of deer assembled in the back yard at the exact moment she walked into the living room. At night there was a menagerie silhouetted by our motion detector lights: the spooked deer (“caught in the headlights”) which would stop in their tracks, but our scrawny resident red fox (it WAS Fox Point, after all) and the feisty raccoons took it in their stride. The trees and bushes surrounding the house and filling the ravine lushly bloomed to capacity around Mother’s Day every spring and, even bare of leaves, framed a picturesque landscape all winter. Never much of a gardener, I felt less need to be one there, so we welcomed the deer nibbling on our leaves—unlike our neighbors with more extravagant landscaping.

What does this have to do with Africa, you ask? (The woman lives in the city of San Francisco, she’s on a fantastic trip to Africa, and she’s pining for Fox Point, Wisconsin?)

Well, here in the bush we hear all kinds of sounds and are cautioned not to walk alone in the dark, as there are animals a lot more threatening than even the fox of Fox Point. Occasionally, even back there, though, the sounds of a nasty raccoon squabble would keep us awake. And I did worry sometimes about the motion lights detecting something or someone other than the animals.

However, never on that ravine did I have a night like the one on another ravine, our second night in Botswana, at Baobab Lodge adjacent to Chobe National Park. We were in a tent cabin (not talking pup tent here—bedroom and bath, complete with mosquito netting and electricity).

Our cabin, Baobab Lodge, Botswana

About 2 am noises a tad (!) louder than mosquitos and birds awakened us. It sounded like elephants were stomping all around, plowing through trees, breaking branches en route. In fact, if you’re in Africa, and it sounds like elephants, it is elephants!

During the day we’d learned from our guides about the destruction wrought by elephants, and we saw plenty of it firsthand—huge, old trees felled as if by hurricane or earthquake. Would our sturdy canvas up lodgings stand up against these marauding creatures? They’d looked so benign loping through the plains–from the safe vantage point of our safari vehicles crash into our canvas accommodations?

I cowered in bed, while Eli got up and looked outside. Despite the darkness he could see the shadow of at least one elephant just below the cabin. From the sounds there had to be more than one, and they were next door, on the right, where there was a thicket of trees. At one point the canvas seemed to vibrate. We checked the clock again at 3:30, after not one moment of dozing off. At one point the noise simmered down briefly, and pungent odor pervaded.

“Was that you?” I asked Eli.

“Nope,” he said. “You?”

About 5 am (?) I went back to sleep until our six o’clock wake-up call. In the morning, as we exited the cabin for breakfast, we saw our nocturnal visitors’ distinct (and stinky) calling card, as well as the detritus of tree branches and limbs.

Night deposit–aka, evidence!

Here’s what we surmise happened:

The elephants were marching down from higher ground to the ravine below us toward a watering hole (that leads to the Chobe River). The thicket I mentioned–about four feet wide—was between our cabin and a walkway leading to the main lodge. Some of this brush touched the side of the tent. As the elephants tramped through, they pushed the trees against our wall. Between that and branches snapping back (some breaking), it sounded like attempted entrance. We don’t know how many there were, but we later saw parades (the technical term for groups of elephants) numbering at least fifty. Since they lumbered by for at least two-and-half hours, who knows what the count was?

One woman in the cabin next to ours had heard something, but her travel companion slept through it entirely. Others in the group were thrilled by the baboon and bird action they had on their side of the camp. “Adrenaline rush.” “Wonderful.” “Who could sleep?”—all comments that made me feel, I confess, like a wuss.

Yeah, some baboons (and even hippo noises we’ve heard since at our second Botswana camp, in the Okevanga Delta)—fine. A parade of elephants for hours around me in the middle of the night? Adrenaline rush? Call it terror!

Was this one of the “perps”?

Sorry for the lag, but the five days in the province of  Kwa Zulu Natale were internet-challenged: we were able to get email via the lodge’s computers (for a fee), but spending the time and money for a blog post wasn’t in the cards. We’re back in Johannesburg again today (free WiFi at our airport-area hotel), toured Soweto and  a museum dedicated to the deadly June 16, 1976, student anti-apartheid demonstration, met up with our OATS (Overseas Adventure Travel) fellow-travelers of the next two+ weeks. Most from CA (Walnut Creek predominates), as well as Oregon. The Zululand experience was the one we bought at a charity auction in 2008 (as did everyone at the place; Eli is curious about its business plan). Not an area most people get to (Indian Ocean proximity), but cool. There, most of the people were from Seattle or Alaska. West Coast people gravitate to Africa–why?

Anyway, I’m downloading a small portion of our photos from Kwa Zulu Natale. You get the picture (so to speak). We hear every area has its unique safari experience. We won’t bore you with TONS of similar photos.

As for the Big Five: this is the term used to describe the ultimate aspirations of safari-goers. According to our guide in Kwa Zulu, it means the Five Most Dangerous African animals to hunt. They are lion, leopard, elephant, water buffalo, and rhino. We saw all except leopard, although we tried to track the latter in the reserve. Maybe in Botswana?  As for hunting, the nyala (a graceful deer-like creature, described by one of the guides as the most stupid, because it will stand in a road not try to feel until the speedier cheetah–or even a vehicle–is much closer) is prey lowdown on the food chain in the bush. Not only did we witness two cheetahs devouring one on the first morning drive out (could make me consider becoming a vegetarian), but we met a guy named Bill from Arizona who was there to hunt. The reserve culls out prey when there’s an imbalance in the species, and guests at the lodge can participate. Kind of creepy when we had lunch with him one day and figured out that his was the gunshot we’d heard the day before. That night the nyala steak  he bagged was marinated and served up! I hope that end was less traumatic for the nyala than the attack of the cheetah.

Don’t know what the next week or so will bring blogging-wise, but stay tuned.

Cheetahs eating their kill, a nyala

Nyalas -- not too bright prey for both cheetahs and hunters from the US

Eli joins nyala hunter and wife as platter of its steak is served

Feeding time comes in all forms

lounging lions at Phinda reserve

Elephant crossing

Beach at St. Lucia on Indian Ocean

Coral tree

Group swim on St. Lucia estuary

Time for sun bathing

Boat excursion on St. Lucia estuary

Croc alongside St. Lucia estuary. His peers were on the menu for lunch afterward.

Our game drive group at Zulu Nyala Lodge

This guy sure doesn't have his head in the sand!

Watering hole mates