A BLAST FROM ANOTHER GUMP PAST

The next day in Warsaw was the 4^th of July for us Americans and the first person I saw in the Hotel lobby was a Walter Whipple! Probably no one cares about who Walter Whipple was is, but the whole Gump thing for me is that I knew him when I was a junior at The American High School of Zürich, Switzerland. He was my Uncles office assistant. And here he was in the lobby at The Marriott hotel.

I waved him down and shook his hand while yelling “hello!” at him. He looked at me like he was trying to figure out why this strange woman was going to so much trouble to say “hi” to him. Obviously I was an American – but he couldn’t get the connection. OK – it had been 20 years since I last saw him – but he hadn’t changed at all. I, on the other hand had changed drastically from a shy, awkward 16 yr. old to a grown mom and traveler – but it made me laugh to see him so stunned!

When Walter lived in Switzerland, he could speak any and every dialect of Swiss German (and I’m sure he picked up the other 4 languages spoken by the Swiss). He was truly gifted linguistically. He was also musically gifted. Remembering this about him, I asked him why he was in Poland. I knew he had been appointed the Mission President for Poland by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, so I asked him because I assumed it was his gift of tongues that brought him here (Heaven knew I had not even mastered “hello” in Polish myself),

I was surprised to hear that he and his wife and children had lived in Poland during the communist era where he had studied to learn how to make Cello's. So he already spoke Polish, and would not have to be burdened by learning it.

OK -- I had learned some Swiss-German while I attended Zürich High, but no one speaks that anywhere in the world but there -- so I was (and still am) really rusty. My year in Zürich was so magical, it feels like it almost never happened. The more time that goes by -- the more it becomes one of those faded memories that I begin to question being real. But this is an adventure to be discovered at another time. For now -- I'm back in Poland, and things are really beginning to happen. It was, after all -- Independence Day -- and the Poles identify as much with our 4th, as we do -- and maybe the even appreciate it even more.