1976
On March 4th, 1976, Hedy and I went on vacation to Costa Rica. Our good friends, Dan and Janet Samuels, knew of a nice hotel there and we went there too. It was a most pleasant vacation. We were in the Hotel Irazu, one of the best in San Jose, the capital, and we had there a very big swimming pool. Every evening we went to a different restaurant for dinner and we went also on many trips, once by plane to the small port Limon on the Caribbean Sea. We saw there among other things a few sloths, high up in the trees. From there back to San Jose we went by train, which gave us an opportunity to see how the people of Costa Rica lived in their small villages in their small houses. We also went once to the University and were taken on a tour to the different institutes. Once I went with Hedy to the serpentarium of Costa Rica, where we could see great numbers of poisonous snakes and also how some of them were “milked”, which means how the venom was taken from them. This venom is being used for the production of serum for the treatment of snake bites. This serpentarium was founded about 40 years ago by a Dr. Picardo. When I was in Cuba and produced the Viperin ointment for the company Vieta-Plasencia, we received the snake venom from that serpentarium. They sent us also a book, written by Dr. Picardo about his institute and he described also, how he was once bitten by a poisonous snake and had then just for a moment time to tell his assistant about it and to get fast a vial of serum and inject it intravenously into his vein. He soon became unconscious, but his assistant did everything that was necessary to save his life, but it took months till he fully recuperated. Dr. Picardo had died, about 30 years ago, and the institute is named after him. Some people went on a trip to the top of Mount Irazu, which is a volcano, but, since it is over 12,000 feet high, I did not go on account of my heart.
I was then still interested in butterflies and went once alone by bus on a trip, came home late in the evening. I was not very successful, since it was not the right place where I had gone. The main thing was that we swam a lot in the pool and had a nice rest. By the way, we celebrated my 79th birthday there on March 14th.
There were two other major events in 1976. One was the wedding of Ginny and Lenny, which took place on May 23rd. It was a beautiful affair in a nice hotel in lower Manhattan, with more than 150 people participating.
Francis had offered his services of playing the wedding march for the ceremony, which he did in an excellent manner. He had to repeat it a few times, as it was a long-drawn affair, when the flower girls and bride-maids walked by in a slow procession till finally the bride herself appeared.
The parents of Lenny had given them their apartment in their house in Brooklyn, had had a lot of re-modelling done there before and left it with all the furniture and equipment in perfect condition, and they themselves had bought a condominium in Miami and had gone there after the wedding. It was a great thing for two young people.
The third major event in 1976 was a sad one. Erich, our beloved Erich, had died on June 11th. It was a massive coronary thrombosis. Aviva was at that time in New York, had come only a few weeks before, and had now to leave in a hurry to be there at the funeral. Lisl reported that Erich was alone at home when It happened, as she was out on an errand for a very short time. Erich had collapsed near the entrance door and fallen to the ground in such a way that he leaned against the door and it could not be opened, and Lisl had to call a friend, who helped her to get in.
A great person gone. One of the finest members of the family Ziegler gone. His fine character, his goodness known to everybody, to his family as well as to his patients, who all loved and adored him. As to myself, I always had especially warm feelings for him since I met him, when he was about 14 years old. I also admired him, his great Intelligence, his modesty, and kindness. He enjoyed life, enjoyed his family, even at a time when he was already very handicapped and was almost unable to talk and to express himself. Even so, he enjoyed life, enjoyed being taken out in the car, even on bigger tours, like to Canberra and then to Tidbinbilla, where he could see the kangaroos and emus running about. What a shame! Just he, such a good fellow, stricken with such a disease, that early in life. I call it early.
I remember, when we were in Canberra and went to the War Memorial, how interested he was to see everything. When we entered, there were wheelchairs available, and we put him in one and then I pushed him to all the showcases and in front of the many paintings and relics from the wars, like airplanes, artillery pieces, rifles, etc. It is a fantastic museum. I could have spent myself days there to see everything, especially the enormous oil paintings showing scenes from the First and Second World War, and he was also very interested, and wanted to see more and more.
I thought I should describe that too when writing about our beloved Erich.
At the end of August and the beginning of September of 1976 we had to stay at Marvin’s and Johanna’s home for 3 weeks, as they had gone with the children on a vacation tour to Europe. They had a great time there, went first to Switzerland, visited many beautiful places, among others Zuerich, the Aare Glen, the area of Meiringen, Interlaken, and Grindelwald, enjoyed hiking there, went then to the Italian lake area, from there to Venice, to Vienna, and finally back to Zuerich and home. We had, while they were away, to take care of their house and especially their plants, and we enjoyed staying there. It was like a second vacation for us.
Towards the end of the year 1976, Marvin bought a dog, a little puppy, about two months old, a pure golden retriever, a charming animal, which they called Grindel, deriving the name from Grindelwald, the place in Switzerland they had greatly enjoyed. The dog grew up to become one of the most precious animals we all had ever known. He grew up to become a big dog, but lovely. He was smart and understood many things you told or asked him. They had a cat also, for quite some time. Her name was Michelle and she and the dog became good friends and never fought with each other. When I asked Grindel to bring me a ball, he got up and started to look for one, put his nose close to the ground, went to a few bushes and came soon back with a ball. I could play with him for hours, throwing the ball as far as I could and he would either catch it when it came down from high up or follow it with great speed. When he brought it back, he would not give it to me and I had to play all kinds of tricks, like throwing a stick or a branch till he would give up the ball. He often was sitting with 2 or 3 balls in front of him, waiting for somebody to play with him. We often played on the road next to the house and he would let the ball roll down the hill on the road towards me and I would stop it with my foot. But when I missed it, he would come down running with great speed and catch it before it went down into the bushes. Then he would run up again on the road and try again and let the ball roll down towards me. We could play that game for a long time and it was a good exercise for both of us.
He had a bad habit: Leaving us and go wandering about for days. That was characteristic for the golden retriever, we were told, and nothing could be done about it. When he was alone and got bored, when nobody played with him, he went off. Somebody brought him back, either the dog catcher or somebody else. The most time he was away, was about 10 days, and he seemed to be happy to be at home again and to have his food and the place to sleep next to the door. At night he barked sometimes, when he heard something outside, another dog or a raccoon or an opossum or perhaps a person. So, he was a good watchdog.
