Just last month, I was reminded how fortunate I have been to be born to these two people. My parents, though 13 years apart in age, celebrated their birthdays a day apart, March 4th and 5th.
1932 England, my dad is in the back. His parents are on the left and right. The ladies are his cousins.
My dad was British by birth and migrated to the United States in steerage. My dad’s parents and brother also migrated though they came at different times. They all become American citizens and settled in Rochester, NY.
My mom was born in the Philippines. Her dad was an American, an Army soldier, from Philadelphia and her mom was Filipino. Her whole family survived living through the WWII under
My mom circa late 1930s
the Japanese occupation in the Philippines except for her father who died in a Japanese concentration camp.
My parents met and married right after WWII in the Philippines when my dad came to the islands with the War Damage Committee before he returned to the Army/Air Force.
For the first 17 1/2 years of my life, I was raised in 5 different countries around the world before I lived here in the United States. Yes, I had been to the States several times during my upbringing but never for a period of longer than 60 days.
My world revolved around different countries, customs, and sights. I never once felt that I was deprived even though we had no television, no radio to listen to, and our closest friends or my family moved after a year. It was our way of life. And to be truthful, I didn’t have a say in whether I liked it or not. But I did like it.
Besides living in 5 different countries, when we did have to return to the States, we would normally circle the world visiting family in the Philippines, friends who had moved to a new country or because my parents wanted to see a sight in a country along the way.
As I reflect about those memories, I know how fortunate I was to see the world without cells phones distracting me, hotels surrounding and pushing up against some of the worlds’ greatest sights, and when the world was, maybe, just a bit calmer.
Though I have lots of memories, my three most memorable ones:
- Going to St. Catherine’s monastery in the middle of the Sinai Peninsula with my mom, my sister, and this other lady and her kids. There was no actual road but our driver knew the way through the desert. This monastery sits right at the bottom of the mountain where Moses got his 10 Commandments. At that time, you were allowed to stay in the monastery with the monks. We had to bring our own food, our own flashlights, and sleep in a dormitory style room. It was and still is definitely the most spiritual place I had ever been to even though I was a young girl of 11 or 12. And if there is only one place I could go back to, this would be the place.
- Riding horses around the Great Pyramids and the Sphinx before going through the date palms and looking for a fallen palm so I could jump it with my horse. I did this every Saturday or Sunday if my dad played golf near the Pyramids.
- Fishing that short time with my dad in Kashmir. The water was icy cold and the view was breathtaking. Oh, and I also caught the only fish that day even though my dad had been out there for hours.
And yes, there are other places just as memorable, like the Taj Mahal which we visited numerous times, the Grand Palace in Bangkok where my mother would do her Temple Rubbings while my sister and I ran around the palace grounds in the 1960s, and taking a freighter from Penang to Genoa for 45 days. There were only 10 passengers and we were a family of 5.
Today, my mother would have been 93 years old and, tomorrow, my dad would have been 107.
Happy Birthday, Mom and Dad. I still miss you both each day. And thank you for the wonderful upbringing you gave me.
I love you both,
Your youngest