Wengen

Many significant things happened to us during our sabbatical year in Wengen, Switzerland, 1974-1975.  We visited this picturesque, lesser known ski resort during the previous summer, and decided that was the place for us.  We rented a small cottage on the outskirts of town.  Small, but modern and cozy. It was called “Chalet Much,” (pronounced “muck”) which means “Beloved Chalet.”  We had a breathtaking view of mountains from every window.  We had a big living-dining area, flooded with sunshine when it wasn’t raining or snowing, which happened frequently.   When I think of the living room, I remember André and Herr Fuchs sitting there, speaking German and drinking schnapps (a very strong alcoholic beverage.)  Herr Fuchs was our milkman, delivering milk, cream, sour cream and other things in a horse-drawn wagon.  A tough old mountaineer.  We had a good heater, small kitchen, two tiny, spartan bedrooms, and one bathroom. The children had to share one of those tiny bedrooms. They hung a big poster of the Beatles on their wall.  There was also a long balcony surrounded by hazelnut trees, where we sunned ourselves in the spring sunshine.  I was trying to read the German classic, Imensee in German, with André’s help.  Every Sunday we took an all day hike in the surrounding mountains.  The trails were very well marked. I remember that once we picked wild blueberries and I made a delicious blueberry pie for my family.  Chalet Much was a very livable little home which is still standing there in the shadow of the Alpenrose Hotel.  

Wengen is a village perched on the side of a mountain.  You reach it by train, going up steeply from Lauterbrunen.  If you go to the top, Jungfraujoch, there is an Ice Palace in which everything is carved out of ice: a car, a house, a piano. 

There was one paved street in Wengen, Dorfstrasse, and no cars except for motorized carts for transporting bags to the hotel.  There were very nice shops lining both sides of the street.  I remember Herr Glor, who was always glowering in the meat shop and “Photo Fritz” in the photo shop.  At the end of that street loomed the famous snow capped “Jungfrau” mountain.  You felt you could reach out and touch it.   The village was surrounded by mountains, huge, rugged snowy mountains and dark forested ones.  Jani knew the names of all of the mountains.  He loved them, as I did.  Day and night we could hear the mountain stream (The White Lucinen) splashing over rocks on its way down to Brienzer Lake.  

We had many challenges as Americans living abroad for a whole year.  I feel that we rose to the occasion and got along better there than at home.  The first challenge for our children was to learn two foreign languages, simultaneously.  Eva was 12 when we arrived. Jani was 8.  The classes, much stricter than what they were used to, were conducted in German, what they called “Hochdeutsch.”  But on the playground, the children spoke the dialect, “Svitzerdeutsch.”  We were very proud of their accomplishments at school, their adjustment to a new culture, their ability to make friends, and to hike all day.  That year in Switzerland toughened all of us. 

Another challenge was downhill skiing.  In Norway, with my first husband and our friends, I enjoyed cross-country skiing.  But downhill is very different, as every skier knows.  Little Jani was the best skier in the family, having taken lessons from an early age.  His teacher was Fritz Gertsh, a champion skier and mountain climber.  He and his family were our neighbors.  His lovely wife, Charlotte taught André and me.  We were 50 years old at that time.  It took great patience on her part.  I was sure I would break a leg.  I didn’t, but I was very happy in the spring when the snow became too icy for safe skiing.  The Gertschs were ideal neighbors and became lifelong friends.  But tragedy hit them when they lost their teen-aged son, Roli in an airplane accident.  I remember him as an attractive little boy, already wearing glasses, wanting to play with our children who were somewhat older.  

The Swiss people didn’t know about Halloween, but we had a lively Halloween party in Chalet Much.   It included our children’s friends, dressed up in costumes their mothers invented for this occasion,  and Eva’s 7-foot tall teacher, Herr Wolf.  He was very supportive of her and encouraged her to write a play in three languages, which she did.  At the party, Eva was dressed up as the Hunchback of Notre Dame, Jani was very funny as Igor, Frankenstein’s assistant, André was the butcher, Herr Glor, and I was the Queen of Spades from Alice In Wonderland.  I was constantly shouting, “Off with his head!”  Everybody had lots of fun. 

We had a quiet, homemade Christmas celebration.  We decorated a tree, under which lay a carved “crèche” including Joseph, Mary and baby Jesus. I bought it in Interlaken.  (I used to make Saturday train rides to Interlaken, a very attractive tourist town, where I did shopping and always enjoyed lunch on the patio at Shuh’s Restaurant.  It is still there!)  I don’t remember if we sang Christmas carols, but I remember a lively, horse-drawn sleigh ride in the sunshine.  

For me, the high point was a trip to Zurich, made by André and me on my birthday, Jan. 2.  In a store full of mink coats on hangers, I bought a beautiful white one with a matching hat, a gift from my mother.  In Wengen, I later bought André a warm, fur-lined winter coat with a matching hat, which he needed. 

Another significant thing which happened in Wengen was André’s attempt to write his memoirs.  I had been encouraging him to do that ever since we met.  I had brought materials to write my memoirs;  my life in Norway, but stuffed them under my bed.  I said, “Your book is more important than anything I might write.”

Every morning after the children had left for school at 7 am, we had our breakfast and got dressed.  He went into his tiny “office” and wrote about his childhood, growing up in the inner city of his beloved Warsaw.  I typed up everything he wrote.  When he came to 1938, the Nazi occupation of Poland, he stopped writing.  He couldn’t deal with the Warsaw Ghetto, Russian slave labor camp, and the Polish Secret Police.  He didn’t discuss it with me.  He just stopped writing.  But what he wrote is very interesting and well-written.  The caregivers who took care of him when he was bedridden during the last 3 months of his life, read it eagerly.  Many friends as well. It depicts the life of a lower middle class Jewish boy who loved stamp-collecting, chemistry and classical music.  He had a brilliant mind and determination to learn and grow.  His beloved mother, who died when he was 12 years old, hoped he would become a “scholar.”  He became a tenured professor at the University of California in Davis.  

During our year in Wengen we took many side trips to Zurich, Paris, Athens, Budapest.  In Budapest we visited Granny’s younger sister, Ilonka who, though smaller, resembled her sister remarkably.  My mother and Aunt Rita used to fly to Europe frequently just to see someone who resembled their deceased mother.  She had lost her husband and son in WWII.  I was proud of our children who spoke fluent German with her, since she didn’t speak English.  

We have returned to Wengen several times since the ‘70s.  We were always warmly welcomed by our friends there, the Gertsches and the Grosses.  In 2018 I spent several unforgettable days, accompanied by my hired traveling companion, Paul Terpeluk at the refurbished Alpenrose Hotel, next to Chalet Much.  The memory of that trip, my last trip to Wengen, still warms my heart.