Millionaires and the Melting Pot

I’ve been meaning to post something for a long time, but somehow it hasn’t happened. However, today I got inspired. What is written below wasn’t written by me, I’ve just typed it up from the book I happen to be reading. The book is Letter from New York by Helene Hanff. It is a collection of beautifully written short essays that she wrote monthly, years ago, for the BBC Radio program “Woman’s Hour.” This one, from March 1981, seems particularly apropos today.

March 1981

I wish to enlist your sympathy for the poor millionaires who live on Fifth Avenue, in New York’s most expensive town houses and co-op apartments. With the coming of the warm months, they’re braced for a long succession of parades up Fifth Avenue, Sunday after Sunday.

These parades are ethnic. Take the Pulaski Day and von Steuben Day parades, in honour of European generals who fought in our War of Independence. Pulaski was a Pole, von Steuben was German, so the Pulaski Day parade is organized by Polish New Yorkers, the von Steuben Day parade by German New Yorkers. There are parades on Greek Independence Day, Puerto Rico Day, Salute to Israel Day, Philippine Independence Day, and so forth, including Captive Nations Day for Armenian, Bulgarian, Czech, Hungarian, Lithuanian and Romanian New Yorkers.

All these parades go straight up Fifth Avenue, which means that at 8 a.m. of a spring Sunday the occupants of a town house are wakened by the boom-boom of the drum and the raucous blare of a trumpet, as the first marching band tunes up under their windows. It will be followed by twenty more marching bands and the millionaires will get no peace for the rest of the day.

The millionaires formed Community Action Groups and demanded that the city issue parades permits only for weekdays. But this was fought by Fifth Avenue merchants, since parade crowds impede shoppers and are bad for business. So the millionaires demanded that the city move its Sunday parades to some other Avenue. This, the city could not do. You can’t give one ethnic group the right to march up Fifth Avenue and tell all other groups to march somewhere else.

When a century ago the first ethnic groups held a parade, it had its right to use Fifth Avenue written into the City Charter. That group still holds the city’s biggest and most popular parade, popular even with the millionaires since it’s never on a Sunday. The parade is held on March 17^th, and when that falls on a Sunday it’s held on the 18^th because the parade is in honour of St Patrick’s Day, with a reviewing stand in front of St Patrick’s Cathedral.

St Patrick’s Day is unique in New York; for some reasons known to nobody, on March 17^th the entire city becomes Irish. But I have to tell you about the one never-to-be-forgotten St Patrick’s Day, back in the Sixties.

New York has always had a large Irish Catholic population and a small Irish Protestant population. But one year in the Sixties the Mayor of Dublin, Robert Briscoe, was to be guest of honour at the St Patrick’s Day parade and the newspapers announced that Robert Briscoe was not an Irish Catholic, nor yet an Irish Protestant, but – Heaven bless us – an Irish Jew. I mean to tell you, the Jewish population of New York went completely out of its mind.

Cohen’s clothing store and Goldberg’s Meat Market painted green O-aposrophes on their signs and became O’Cohen’s and O’Goldberg’s for the day. Delicatessens sold green bagels, kosher restaurants served green matzoh-balls and green noodles in their soup. Whole Hebrew schools turned out for that parade as the annual sea of green floats, marching bands, and schoolgirls in green shorts rolled past the Cathedral, before the three dignitaries on the reviewing stand: Jewish Mayor Briscoe of Dublin and Protestant Mayor Lindsay of New York, with the Catholic Cardinal between them.

Well, this year’s St Patrick’s Day parade has just come and gone and the long Sunday parade season looms ahead. Which brings us back to the millionaires. Why do they put up with it? Why don’t they move?

They’ll keep fighting to have the parades moved to some other day or some other Avenue. But they know that those ethnic parades, which would be unimaginable in any other great city in the world, are the essence of this one, the visible signs of that melting pot out of which New York was created. They know it, because millionaires, too, are descended from poor immigrants, beckoned here by the Statue in the harbour, holding out hope of a better life. So the millionaires and the marchers are all kin – all New Yorkers – like the rest of us.

Books and Roses

The 23^rd of April is the feast day of Saint George. George was the knight who slew the dragon and saved the princess; and a red rose grew where the dragon’s blood had fallen. The legend here is that he did that in Montblanc, a small town inland from Barcelona. He is a very popular saint, patron of many places, proclaimed the patron saint of Catalonia in 1456.

I live in Catalonia where the holiday has traditionally been celebrated by a man giving a woman a red rose. But in 1931, this changed. Both Shakespeare and Cervantes died on 23 April and here in Catalonia, that day was adopted as the day of the book, coupled with the Sant Jordi tradition, it became the Day of the Book and the Rose. In 1995, UNESCO adopted 23 April as World Book Day.

 Sant Jordi is by far the nicest holiday in Catalonia. It isn’t a bank holiday, but even when it falls on a work day, like it did this year, everyone spills out to the Rambla of their town to walk up and down, buy roses and books, say hi to friends, and enjoy the atmosphere. This Wednesday there were 2 million books sold in Catalonia (that has a population of 7 million people) and 7 million roses. Men give roses to their lovers and vice versa, people give roses to their parents, siblings, friends, co-workers. I didn’t see that many people walking around carrying books, but almost everyone was carrying one or more roses.

I was there for the books, specifically my own book about Catalonia. Last year was the first time I participated in the festival as an author and bookseller. I liked being on the other side of the table, and I did it again this year, once again sharing a table with my friend Teresa in the section for local authors.

Bluebell

That's Edwin (on the right) who is from the Dominican Republic and Javier (on the left) who is Spanish and speaks English! They are the reception guys at the Citroen garage where I take my C3 for repairs. I’ve dealt with mechanics in Catalan for the past 20 years and each time I learned a new word. But there are a lot of words in car talk and oh my, how much easier it is in English.

My last mechanic, recommended by my friend Josep, didn’t like me. I don’t know why. He was a sourpuss who, when I would come in, would see me, and then without so much as a hello, ignore me for a good long while before asking what I wanted. I put up with him because when it came down to business, he seemed to know what he was doing. But about a year ago, the last time I came, he told me he wouldn’t be able to even take a look at the car for at least two months. I thought I had misheard, but no, “Dos mesos. minim” I took that to mean that he didn’t want to work on my car at all. At Citroen I found Edwin and Javier and was happy I had made the change.

I’ve been without a car now for ten days and it looked like the latest problem was going to be the car’s last – the mechanic couldn’t figure out what was causing it and I won’t drive a car that is incurable. This is Citroen. If they can’t figure out what is wrong with one of their cars, it is unlikely that anyone else can. I don’t use a car much, but there are times when I need to get out of town. I’ve missed two country walks I would have taken during these holidays and it looked like I wasn’t going to be able to go to the beach on New Year’s day, as I had planned. If the mechanic couldn’t figure out what the cause was, I would have to get rid of the car and find another one.

For the last few days I was pondering what kind of used car I was going to look for. But I didn’t want to look for a car. I wanted my car. I like my car. It’s a throwback to the Citroen 2CV – originally the French Everyman’s car, now a classic that I couldn’t afford to buy or maintain. It's the right size, shape, and color. It suits me. So I was a bit worried when I came into reception this morning. But there was no need. After having the car all these days, the mechanic found the problem and fixed it. I have my car back. Bluebell, Sweet Pea and I will be going to the beach on New Year’s after all.

Happy New Year!

Happy Thanksgiving

Today being Thanksgiving, I took myself out for a special lunch. I’ve always loved the holiday: It’s good to be reminded to be thankful, and of course there’s the food. I love the whole meal but to be honest, if there wasn’t any cranberry sauce, I’d have a hard time eating the turkey. In fact, who needs the turkey? Cranberry sauce, stuffing, sweet potatoes in any form, and pumpkin pie, those are the makings of a happy Thanksgiving for me.

Having no one to celebrate with, I took myself to my favorite restaurant in my favorite place: Restaurant Pont Vell in Besalú. Thanksgiving is an American holiday so you can’t expect the same food here. And in fact, my lunch was completely different: no cranberries, no stuffing, no sweet potatoes, no pumpkin pie, and no turkey. Instead I had fish mousse for first and sausage with mashed potatoes and sauteed wild mushrooms (rovellons) for the main, followed by more mousse, this time chocolate shaped into a cake. And look at the view I had from my table.

They don’t do Thanksgiving here but they have adopted Black Friday with a vengeance. Never mind that it can start on any day of the week, any time in November, and last for days or weeks. Many people don’t know what Friday means anyway. I remember a time when there was no such thing as Black Friday. People started shopping for Christmas right after Thanksgiving, but it didn’t have a name except the Christmas Shopping Season. When did it get a name? Who named it?

Wandering around I saw a truck driver pull off what seemed to me like an impossible manuever, backing into a tiny street alongside a lovely Romanesque chapel. That man should win a prize. And then there was the river and a wee bit of fall in the air. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

An Unknown Hero

Varian Fry was a Harvard-educated non-Jew who went to France in 1940 to rescue people in special danger from the Nazis. In less than one year he rescued close to 2,000 people – labor leaders, politicians, writers, artists, Jews. Have you ever heard of him? Most people haven’t.

My interest in Varian Fry was sparked when I first heard about him in And The Show Went On: Cultural Life in Nazi-Occupied Paris by Alan Riding. Such an important hero and yet I had never heard of him. That led me to A Hero of Our Own by Sheila Isenberg, an informative but not very well written biography of Fry. Then I read Fry's own (but abridged) Assignment: Rescue (an abbreviated version for school children of his original Surrender on Demand which is impossible to find for a reasonable price); followed by A Quiet American: The Secret War of Varian Fry, by Andy Marino, a well written biography and the most complete of the books I had read so far.

The people Fry rescued were not all Jewish but they were all hunted for various reasons by the Nazis. They included Marc Chagall, Wanda Landowska, Hannah Arendt, and Andre Breton, among many others. He wasn't trained as and never had worked as a spy or secret agent, but when he arrived in France he found that legal means for getting these people out of France were few, and so he quickly learned what he needed to do.

The best book about Fry is Villa Air Bel by Rosemary Sullivan. This is not a biography, but a history of his work, those who worked with him, and many whom he saved. It is more detailed than any of the others, it is well written, and gives the most complete picture of the rescue work that Fry set up and led. Netflix made a film based on this book, but I didn’t watch it. When I read that they had turned Fry’s character into a gay man, I suppose to add some spice. I decided I didn’t need to. Why add spice to a true story that was so interesting, engaging, and important?

Fry was called back to the U.S. because the State Department did not want him to do his work, and they prevented him from finding any work with the government once he returned. It was very strange instance of the blacklisting of an American hero.

Shortly before Fry’s death, the French government awarded him the “Croix de Chavalier de la Legion d’Honneur,” France’s highest decoration of merit. It was the only official recognition he received in his lifetime.

In 1991, the United States Holocaust Memorial Council awarded the Eisenhower Liberation Medal to Fry. Three years later, Fry became the first American to be honored by Yad Vashem as a “Righteous Among the Nations.”

Cockeyed Optimist

 

Dolors is an older woman who lives on the next block. We met years ago when we were both trying on shoes at a shop and have been casual friends ever since. We don’t really socialize, but we always stop to chat when we meet on the street. Sometimes I need something and she helps, and sometimes she needs something and I help. But as we get older, helping becomes more difficult.

A few years ago when I still had Cupcake there was a day when I couldn’t take him out. Dolors was a big fan of Cupcake so I called her and asked if she could take him for a walk. She came a few minutes later and I buzzed her in. She huffed and puffed her way up the stairs (there is no elevator in my building). I didn’t know she had a bad heart. That’s the kind of person she is.

Today I met her a few houses down. She now goes with a walker. I had just read in the NY Times that Mitzi Gaynor had died, and reading through some of her credits really got to me: There was No Business Like Show Business (which I never saw but I’ve heard Ethel Merman belt out that song countless times), Les Girls, with Gene Kelly, and my favorite, South Pacific, among others.

I asked Dolors if she knew who Mitzi Gaynor was, but she didn’t. So I told her she had been an actress/dancer/singer in the 50s and she died yesterday. I told her that all these years later, I still sing some of her songs, in fact I sing one from time to time to my dog, and I started to sing A Hundred and One Pounds of Fun... which she knew! She knew the song and now knew the actress I was talking about. Those were the days, she said, her, Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, those were the days when people did beautiful, graceful, elegant dancing instead of looking like they were having sex on stage. We agreed that elegance isn’t a word you hear often any more. Sexy is what counts. We didn’t sing it, but we both also know another favorite, I’m gonna wash that man right outa my hair.

R.I.P. Cockeyed Optimist

Photo from the NY Times (Getty Images)

The Spanish Judicial System vs. President Puigdemont

Not for the first time has Spain made itself ridiculous by searching the Barcelona Zoo to make sure that the former Catalan president doesn't enter the parliament building in a monkey suit or dressed as a lion. The Spanish congress has voted to give Puigdemont amnesty, but Spain's high court feels otherwise and has decided to ignore the law that it doesn't like. So much for separation of powers in Spain as well as the rule of law. Politics in the judicial system (as Americans are learning) is not a good thing. 

You can read more about it here.