A FORK IN THE ROAD
"Two roads diverged in a wood and I...I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference."
Robert Frost (1874-1963)
I'm sure we've all been in the situation where something in life offers us a choice and we decide on which path to take, and the rest of your life is either enriched or regretted. There are many forks in the road for all of us, some chosen with careful thought, some more impulsively. I suppose my decision to go to Belgium is certainly one I've never lamented. As you remember, in my last post, I wrote about meeting the Steinbergs that cold, rainy night in a fairly empty Henri Premier restaurant, deciding to pull our tables together and share a meal, after which we shared a long and fruitful friendship as well. Another road taken.
Fred Steinberg drove a BMW, at a rather fast pace I might add, and living in a rustic suburb of Brussels, Ohain, he had plenty of opportunity to open his car up on the curvy country roads that were nearby. One day, however, he was pulled over by the gendarmes, Belgium's National Police, for speeding. A few days later, he had to drive out to the Gendarmerie to pay his fine. It was located in the little village of Lasne Chapelle-St. Lambert on, where else, but rue de la Gendarmerie at the top of the hill overlooking a valley through which flowed the Lasne River. As he drove up the hill, he noticed an old estate at the edge of the village, adjacent to the river. It consisted of three buildings, attached to each other, with spacious fields in the rear, backing up to an old Brabant type of farm. On the third section was an "a louer" sign, (for rent) and, thinking of us, called us that afternoon and told us to take the thirty minute drive south and look at it.
Arriving at this 1800's-era estate, we were greeted by a very charming woman, Jacqueline Colet. She and her husband, Jean, the town's physician owned the place and lived in the middle section with their two sons, Bruno and Vincent and their mischievous black lab, Virgil. We chatted a while and, after viewing the house for rent, impulsively decided that this was where we'd like to spend our last 4 years in Belgium. It was quite near Waterloo where the school at which Suzanne taught had just moved, out of Brussels. For you history buffs, the next village over was Plancenoit, which is where the Prussians outflanked Napoleon on the way to his Waterloo! When they build homes around this area, they still find old bullets, muskets, and other military detritus that have been buried in the soil for many years.
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| A scene near Lasne and Plancenoit |
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| Suzanne and Rex getting to know our neighbors at the old Belgian farm behind our home |
Jean Colet was a faculty member of my school and Jacquie was a well-known and accomplished horsewomen in Belgium, very adept at dressage with her beloved horse, "Auteil". She built a large coral behind the estate where we would delight watching her put Auteil through his paces.
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| The horse corral with Auteil in the background |
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| Our home in Lasne |
She invited us (and our barbecue grill) to a lovely lunch she hosted for the Austrian Colonel Hans Handler who was the head of the Spanish Riding School in Vienna, famous for its Lipizzan horses. Jean was a bon vivant who enjoyed cognac and cigars after a great dinner and drove around town making house calls in his white Mercedes. Once a year, he and his buddies would head off to St. Andrews, Scotland for a golf outing. They were very kind landlords to us and, while it was a 30 minute commute for me by car to Brussels, it was well worth the trip, living in a lovely valley and hearing the Lasne flow past our kitchen window. I do remember a few snowy days where it was virtually impossible to drive out of the valley for lack of snow removal equipment and salt on the roads. There were great little restaurants nearby, our favorite being "Les Ails" (The Garlics) where, on a special occasion, we'd go for Tournedos Rossini, a nice filet of beef covered with a pate' and truffles!
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| Tournedos Rossini!!! |
There were also wonderful trails around for long rambles in the woods, providing it wasn't hunting season! This area had been a center for the Resistance during WW II. On one of our hikes, we discovered a plaque on a tree, memorializing a group of young boys in the Resistance who had been shot on that spot by the Germans.
The village itself was surrounded in the hills by large villas occupied by international business executives, mostly American and wealthy Belgians. The village itself had artisans, farmers, and the "functionaires" who made the village government work. We were the poor "Americaines du quartier" but made many friendships with these American families who would often wine and dine us! There was Don and Janet Glinsman who actually were fellow alumni of St. Lawrence U., the Soares family (CEO of Goodyear Europe), Knut and Joan Nielsen and their large brood of kids, the Deenigs (Kodak), and then Frank and Betty Ward with their daughters Erin and Julie.
Frank was a toy industry executive with Fisher-Price. Julie and Erin were actually the little girls on the box that the Fisher-Price garage came in! Many years later, we are still friends with Frank and his wife Monica who live in Florida. Frank had an interesting career with Fisher-Price and Tonka Toys, before forming his own company, Atlantic Renaissance, which went on to produce the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. We last saw them about 3 years ago when we visited them in St. Augustine. Frank and Monica had befriended an 88 year old man in their neighborhood who they would drive to baseball games during Spring training as well as assist him in writing his memoirs. While we were there, Frank invited him over for Sunday breakfast as he enjoyed a nice bowl of oatmeal. When the doorbell rang, I answered it and standing before me was Sen. George McGovern! I greeted him with: "Senator, I voted for you! " "That makes two of us", he replied. We had an unforgettable breakfast with him, discussing Viet Nam, his failed Presidential campaign, Lyndon Johnson, and where America was heading. He gave me a list of books about the Viet Nam War, and I gave him some medical advice! Unfortunately, he was to pass away the following year. I wonder how different things would have been if he had beaten Nixon.
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| Sen. George McGovern |
One night, we were invited out to dinner by the Soares family preceded by cocktails in their home, an old Abbey across from the Gendarmerie. They had invited a woman, Lyle Gaynor as another guest. An heiress of the Shell Oil fortune, she arrived wearing a long leopard skin coat and sheepishly explained that the pelts were a gift from Africa and that she couldn't refuse them....so she had a coat made out of them. When she asked what we thought, my impulsivity along with a cocktail in me made me blurt out that "they looked better on the original animal!!!" She paused, looked at me, and started laughing. By the end of the evening, Ms. Gaynor had invited me to Thanksgiving dinner at her home (Suzanne was going to be traveling to England with her students)!
If Walls Could Talk
I had heard from the Colet's that our house had once been an orphanage but never learned the details until very recently when I came upon an article in the village newsletter that was on-line. Doing a little more research, I found that it was an orphanage in 1943-44 for Jewish children whose parents had been transported to the east where they died in concentration camps. The Belgians knew only that it was for labor but it was a ruse, covering up for the lethal death camps. The orphanage was run by the Gestapo in Brussels, the children being kept around to show how humane the Nazis were, should the International Red Cross show up. The home was run by a Christian Belgian woman and her Jewish Belgian husband. As far as I can tell, there would be 8 children living there at a time, getting their lessons and sports just like any other schoolchildren. They were called "Alleinstehende Kinder" (single lone children) by the Germans.
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| The Jewish orphans in Lasne -1944 |
The home was run by Martin Benzen and his wife, Paul Bourguignon-Benzen. As the Allied armies were approaching Belgium towards the end of the war with liberation in sight, Martin was called to a meeting in Brussels but, fearing arrest by the Germans, preferred not to go. Instead, he sent his non-Jewish wife in his place, after which she returned with the news that the Germans would deport all the orphans in the next 48 hours. As the last streetcar had already left Lasne, there was no way to send the children off before the Germans came, so she decided to appeal to the nuns at the local Sainte Lutgarde School, pleading with them to take the children for only one night to save their lives. They agreed to do this. She then went to the owner of a local mill and asked him to bring straw to the school for the children to sleep on. The next morning, Martin took all the boys to a safe place in neighboring Rixensart and Paule dispersed the boys to addresses provided by a resistance group. From what I know, they all survived the war.
On July 17, 1991, Paule Bourguignon-Benzen was recognized by Yad Vashem in Israel as Righteous Among Nations for her brave acts.
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| The main section of the house as it appeared in 1944 |
That was our home for four years...
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| The daffodils and the Lasne River outside our kitchen door |
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| The ivy was out of control! |
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