The People We Met

The people we meet provide the context for the sights we see.  They are the main ingredient in the dish, the sights provide the spice and the beauty and color.  Those we met include Daniel, the wonderful director of the Malmo Sweden Synagogue who showed us around and talked knowledgeably about the Jewish communities in Sweden in general as well as offering insights into my own family.  The other people we met at the synagogue were also helpful and some were from families that go back historically to the time my great-grandparents lived there.  We joked that they might have been friends,  The staff at our hotel in Malmo and the waiter who had lived in Hoboken and regaled us with stories about his life there also made our trip fun.   Our friend Eva who lives in Copenhagen invited us to her lovely home for dinner and gave us a glimpse of what day to day life is like there.  It was also great to have a home cooked meal and to get her tips on local activities.  Our young friend Manuel (a Spaniard who now lives in London) and his lovely girlfriend Cecile who we met for the first time also offered a lovely home cooked meal and wonderful conversation.  They're both journalists and it was fun to compare notes about our experiences.  Digital has made a big difference.  There were also the countless strangers who helped me schlep by suitcase up and down stairs in various subways and those who helped us on public transportation.  I'll always be grateful to Richard, a young man we met trying to get on the right train to Helsignor in Denmark.  The trains were totally unmarked but he got us on the right one.  Everyone we met was helpful and some were interesting, too,