The national heat wave.

     My cousin forwarded to me some photos sent to him by a friend taken on a trip to Antarctica. I thought that was a good idea though it may not suffice to make one feel cooler. Maybe if one really concentrated on the photos with mindfulness and turned on creative imagination full dial to the right, you might feel better. If not at least you'll see some of these gorgeous photos.

Various views of glaciers, snow, ice on the Antarctic peninsula and surrounding islands.

Above are 25 pictures that are designed to cool you down.

Here are some details about the photos. This trip occurred in Feb 2008. We flew to Santiago, Chile, and visited Valparaiso and Venue del Mar, then flew to Punta Arenas where we boarded the Hurtigruten Norwegian Cruise boat, Nord Norge. Then we cruised the Chilean Fjords, and saw Torres del Peine which is an amazing place. We were able to mount Cape Horn before we crossed the Drake Passage which that day was like the Drake Lake. We had a total of 12 landings because our weather in Antarctica was so good. The only bad weather was one morning when the deck as you see above was coated with slippery snow and also when we tried to cross the Antarctic Peninsula into the Weddell Sea. There was too much pack ice there and we had to turn around. We landed at the Chilean Research Station twice, in the midst of several penquin colonies, on Deception Island which is actually a flooded volcanic caldera, and at Port Lockroy. In the pictures you see gentoo penquins, adelaide penquins, and chinstrap penquins. In the middle of one gentoo colony there is a single kind penquin lying down which had gotten lost there. See if you can find him. We saw all sorts of birds, whales breeching and waving at us, many seal species and dolphins. It was an absolutely phenomenal trip and well worth the rough return across the Drake. Though it was hard to walk on ship for that crossing, with the scopalamine patches behind our ears, neither of us got at all nauseous and were able to eat dinner, though the crew had difficulty trying to carry in the baked Alaska which was served for dessert that night. We returned to Ushusaia, Argentina and then flew to Buenos Aires, and later Iguasu Falls, then home. If anyone has any questions about this trip, please enter your questions in the comments and I will answer them or email me at renraeretire@gmail.com.

Bathroom Wars

     The proverbial war of the toilet seat up or down goes on.
      Our war has some extras that add fuel to the fire. Our large house has 5 bathrooms, 3 of them downstairs where we live most of the time. The one that is part of the master bedroom suite has always more or less been mine so I would usually find the toilet seat down. My husband when he got up to go at night would usually walk to the other end of the house and use the back powder room near the laundry. I don't know why he always walked so far--maybe because he usually left that seat up and so it was ready for him. There is the guest powderroom that is right outside his bedroom door, but that one is special. It contains my Kohler :Wildflowers of the Prairie pedestal sink. Also both of us got in the habit of not flushing because we didn't want to wake the other person, but then we would forget the next day and this is not good for the porcelain toilet bowl or for the welcoming odor of the home. Finally we both agreed to flush even at the risk of waking the spouse. But this still leaves us with the "seat up or down" battle.
     As time as gone on and we have both aged, various things have happened to our bladder musculature. My husband has had prostate issues and subsequent radiation treatment that leaves him with nocturia (medical term for getting up at night to urinate too often). He may also have some urgency, I don't know. (Term that means you have to rush to urinate to avoid an accident). I have definite urgency to a significant degree and perhaps some degree of overactive bladder in addition to the sinking musculature that contributes to this. Both of these factors in the two of us sometimes necessitate us using the other's designated bathrooms. For example, I come home and have that urgency the minute I step in the door that leads me to use the back powder room near the laundry. Hence, seat stays down on husband's bathroom. My husband again avoiding the "special" guest powder room , uses the one in the master suite. Hence I find the seat up and I am having urgency. Those few seconds needed to put the seat down in the middle of the night might be all it takes to prompt an accident. Neither one of us have commented to each other about these issues because they are beneath civilized conversation in the living room or over coffee in the morning.
     What do we do? Write Ann Landers? I think she is no longer doing a column. I think her sister is, but should either of us communicate with her? See our respective doctors and medicate ourselves further than we already are medicated? I for one don't want any more medication. Wear one of the several brands of panty liners and/or with time a Depends type of product? I have already tried the former and it helps, but I doubt I could get my husband to do this. Anyway how would this help under dire circumstances? What should we do, just let it rip? Fill the product, so to speak. Seems rather uncouth, don't you think? I did do some research on the Internet on this issue. Some suggestions for toilet bowl etiquette suggested that both parties lower the seat and the lid each time. Then both parties would be equal when they approach the toilet bowl and can choose which way they want the set up. Each would be subject to the same delay -- certainly an equitable solution. There is also the question of closing that lid on germs and just the general site of the open toilet while washing your hands or brushing your teeth. Before we have company, I always go around and close all the toilet lids, so there is something in me that thinks the closed seat and lid is more esthetic.

     To add further analysis to this question access the following website. You will see an analysis on work units starting with two different schemes pertaining to the position of the toilet seat after use. Convincingly there is less work if the toilet seat is simply left in the position in which it is found. But the level of kindness to the female is at least perceived to be higher if the seat is left down even though it takes more work units to accomplish this. Access this website to see the statistical analysis: funny!  http://www.speech.sri.com/people/anand/toiletseat/index.h  Or google toilet seat up or down etiquette and you will find this site listed.

     I guess after my husband's encounter with prostate neoplasm and mine with melanoma, the urgency and nocturia problems as medical problems go are rather diminutive. Just another sign of aging and another deficiency to deal with. Maybe some day there will be a toilet seat reader that reads an implanted chip on the butt of the urinator and automatically raises or lowers the lid. Wouldn't that be something?

     I have often thought about how much time and effort each human being needs to spend to stay healthy. It came to me again today.

     I often attend Grand Rounds at Columbia Hospital even though I am a retired physician, because I like to keep up with my old profession and I also like to exercise my brain a little bit. Today's talk was by a cardiologist at the hospital talking about reducing salt in our diet, what that will accomplish and whether indeed it would be possible to achieve that in this country of fast food and prepared foods in boxes. It is known that indeed we would need the full cooperation of our food industry to reduce salt. Studies have shown that there are remarkable reductions in hypertension -- reducing salt can lower systolic blood pressure by 10 to 13 mm of mercury which is what each individual blood pressure medication can do. This means that a significant salt reduction in our diet will allow us to drop one blood pressure medication. Our high salt diet has been linked not only to hypertension but to gastric cancer, osteoporosis, kidney failure, obesity, strokes and heart attacks. Finland, later Japan and then England have made national moves to force the food industry to lower salt intake. In the English study for example, heart attacks were reduced by 80% and it is calculated that the average person in England with this salt reduction will live 5-6 years longer. Pretty impressive numbers! It is estimated that in this country there are 100,000 deaths per year by cardiovascular events that could be prevented by lowering sodium in the diet. This is the equivalent of 2 jet liners crashing every day for a year. Now if a single jet liner crashed daily for 3 days, don't you think that all planes would be grounded and there would be a huge shake up to improve safety and figure out why such an awful thing was happening? Yet that equivalent of people die each year from the salt in our diet, and so far very little is being done to help the situation. Needless to say it was a very interesting talk and following discussion. But this prompted me to try harder to reduce salt in my own diet and avoid the snacks and other foods that unfortunately I love so much. Therefore I am back to reading the ingredient lists on foods I have in my pantry and when shopping at the store. This all takes a lot of effort and I can't even venture the amount of extra time it takes.
     In general, we eat way too much fast food and deli food with its salt and with too many calories in the form of fat and sugars. If we each really try to buy less of this kind of food and prepare food from scratch at home we will invest a very large amount of time. I can only guess that we cooks would be spending at least 2 more hours a day to prepare these healthier meals.

      I also recently went to the dentist. After such a visit I am always inspired to floss better and brush better and try to keep up with my teeth. Add maybe -- oh let's say 20 minutes a day to brush better and floss at least once.

     Then of course there is my recent encounter with skin cancer. So I am being very faithful about wearing sunscreen. Of course, I now put it on whenever I go out in my garden or go for a walk. But I have recently learned that I should be putting it on just when I drive to run errands. Did you know that the majority of skin cancers occur on the left side of the body, usually the arm, side of neck or shoulder, or face. This is especially true in men. Why would this be? Well, it is postulated that it is because men usually drive the car and hang their left arm out the window. But even if you don't hang your arm out the window, significant UV light can come through your cars windows unless they are made to block UV light. Even if they are, they may not block UVA light and that can over years of time cause skin cancer. So now when I am driving I am conscious of what part of my body is in the sun and am now putting on sunscreen even if I am just off running errands. It doesn't take much time but it is another obligation I am trying to meet. My exercise patterns which you will read about below involves water aerobics. In the summer, there is lots of sun exposure so now I have sent for sun protection swimwear with long sleeves on the top and longer pants on the bottoms. Cost: $130. Time to put on sunscreen: 10 - 20 minutes per day depending how much you are out in the sun.

     What about your exercise plan? You are supposed to exercise aerobicly for at least 30 minutes every day. If you are not in too good a fitness shape then you will have to exercise at a slower rate and maybe are just going to go for a walk. Then you will have to spend more time at that exercise to get the same benefit -- probably spending 50 minutes or so with that slower paced exercise.

     How many of you women spend a lot of money on skin products for your face and skin elsewhere on the body. I usually don't use too many of these products but as I get older my skin on my legs is getting dryer and with the water aerobics that I do, I need to put lotion on my legs to keep the skin moisturized. It is recommended that you apply this moisturizer after showering to trap the moisture into the skin. Extra time -- maybe 5 minutes.

     How much sleep do you get? We all know the touted 8 hours per night.

     I am a very spiritual person! I try to meditate daily. There are many studies that show that regular meditation lowers blood pressure, lowers pulse rate, calms anxiety, prevents and even treats depression, lengthens life. The usual minimum for meditation is about 20 minutes a day, but more frequent practice can only help more. Though some of the benefits from meditation are seen after regular practice for only 4 days. But one would assume those benefits are lost if these practices are not kept up. If you do not meditate and instead obtain your spiritual practice from  church attendance you are investing time there as well. Membership in a church also is membership in a community which requires other responsibilities and volunteering time and effort as well as money to the community. Difficult to estimate this time and money, but let me venture an average of 2 hours per week minimum.

     What about you ladies with your hairdresser. Do you go once a week for a wash and styling? If you do your hair yourself, you are investing more time than that a week. I would estimate at least 15 minutes per day.

     Do you get regular manicures or pedicures? I have never had one of these so I can't estimate the time and money spent on such luxuries. But it must be about an hour per week. Is this a reasonable estimate?

     I have read that if we don't exercise our brain regularly we may be more at risk for dementia in later life. We can't just sit in front of the TV. We must actually learn something new each day whether it is studying a new language, doing crosswords, or word puzzles, or taking a class. Let's figure at least an hour per day with these endeavors.

     It has been shown that those who live longest and healthiest are those with the largest and most effective support group. Support group equals friends. So for our health we need to maintain a healthy group of people around us who care about us a great deal. Those people are not going to be there for us unless we contribute to the maintainence of these friendships. This maintenance takes time as well. Let's figure at least 2 hours a week to keep friends as close as we need them for this purpose. I suspect that it would take a lot longer.

     What else do we need to do to keep ourselves happy and healthy? Any other ideas?

I think we are up to about 4.5 hours per day without your required sleep. Just do some math and you will find where that 5-6 years you saved watching your salt intake went. Yup, reading ingredients, and doing all the other things listed above. It's a wash!

Birds on Lake Michigan

     Lately we have been having excellent birdwatching on Lake Michigan. Today for example, I was just sitting in the great room reading and I looked up. Out on the lake were some white things; they were pretty distant and I couldn't tell if they were boats or could they be large white birds? Grabbed the binoculars and then ran for the Swarovski spotting scope. Indeed, they were birds! Very large birds! Four mute swans all in a line. They paddled from just off our point northward, pausing here and there to preen. Two even seemed to be napping at times with head tucked under their wings. They paddled north until they were out of sight. Four together. They must be unmated 2 or 3 year old birds. Right now mated pairs would be still raising their young which after 35 days of incubation, are hatched, but do not fly for 120 days. So the mated pair would still be very busy indeed.

     Several days ago I saw the female eagle fly along the lake bluff with a large fish in its talens. My grandson asked what kind of fish it was. I don't know, I told him, but it looked like a very good lunch for the two eaglets in the nest.
     When my grandson was recently here we made regular trips to my bluebird house. Low and behold the pair in the back nest box have already fledged the first set of offspring and are working on their second for the season. The first night I looked with grandson Sam there were four sky blue eggs in the nest. The next day when we looked there was a freshly hatched baby bird. And the third day that we looked all four had hatched. I looked the day after my family left and the four babies already had black fuzz on their backs. Wow, they grow fast. Grandson Sam enjoyed making trips to the lake bluff to look for the eagle and to see the baby bluebirds and other birds we could see from the bluff top -- swallows, gulls, and a great blue heron.
   

Post surgical stories

     I have to write one more story about my little surgical/medical excursion with melanoma. And there is a chance for you to tell me about your surgical pain experiences. Below is a neuropathic pain scale to use to assess your own pain levels at various times of the day. This might be useful to your medical care team. Read on below to learn more about my experiences and medical studies that sometimes document poor postsurgical pain control.

I did absolutely great after the surgery; took oxycodone doses on time for the first day, and by the second morning home, I changed to Tylenol. Even the Tylenol, I only took for that second day. By the third day I was on nothing for pain and feeling fine. I was limited because I was instructed to keep my arm up most of the time but that was my only limitation. Then about 10 days after the surgery I started getting strange sensations in the arm, in a several inch circle around the lower half of the incision. I couldn't keep my arm down at all because I started feeling pressure and tightness, and heat, and a sense of strong discomfort in this area. Slowly these sensations became worse so that I had to sit with my arm up again and I became more uncomfortable and more limited in what I could do than I was several days after the surgery. I tried an ace wrap and that helped some but it would slide around and pull on the arm tissues and make the symptoms more noticeable. I went back at 3 weeks to get the sutures taken out. I told the surgeon about my symptoms in detail trying to describe them as I have above. I told him that I had a similar pain syndrome occur after a breast biopsy many years ago and a nerve drug called Tegretol took it away in a few days. He said that my symptoms were probably just due to swelling, but he suggested I get to see a therapist at the hand clinic. He wrote "scar mobilization and desensitization" as the orders on the slip to the therapist. But when I described where it hurt to her and showed her how I could move the scar itself around and rub on the scar without any problem, she didn't know exactly what to do for me. She tried some ultrasound therapy which in one area irritated the arm more. She did give me some silicone gel sheets to put on the scar to soften and flatten it and that worked well. Also she gave me an elastic sleeve to wear on the arm over the scar and that did help me keep the arm down a little longer before it would start to burn. But the desensitization rituals she showed me of massage, rubbing with a towel and vibrator use over the sensitive area didn't do anything to help and was quite uncomfortable though I was a good patient and did try them. Meanwhile I had spoken with my general surgeon son, and he asked if I was on either of two drugs that he uses for just this purpose: Lyrica (pragbolin) or Neurontin (gabapentin). He said he uses these drugs quite often to treat these types of nerve damage symptoms. He said that some of his surgical partners even use the medication preventatively right from the time of surgery with good success.
     I researched on the Internet and found articles that support the use of these drugs for postoperative neuropathic pain and proof that they reduce narcotic use and seem to prevent this type of pain development. There are all kinds of elaborate theories for why these pain syndromes develop. One postulates that the nerve firings recruit more pain nerves in the spinal cord and even the brain until there is a distribution of the pain even to more distant points from the surgical injury. Many people then go on to develop chronic pain syndromes that become more and more difficult to treat. I could identify with that myself both times I have had this problem. With the strange discomforts in the arm or chest wall like last time, I would catch myself grimacing with my face. Similar muscle contractions were occurring in my shoulder and neck muscles and then pretty soon the muscles are aching just from being tightened in discomfort for long periods of time. Now pain messages are coming from sites distant from those touched by the surgeon. Tense shoulders and neck muscles lead to headaches. A general sense of hopelessness and depression creates an inability to move, exercise, eat, or take an interest in usually pleasurable activities. Then sleep disturbance can enter the picture worsening all of the above. I could see this cascade starting to develop in my own situation. Therefore, the idea is to catch the neuropathic pain early before this cascade of events has gotten started and becomes habitual.
     I called the surgeon 1 week after the sutures were removed and told him I was no better, perhaps even slightly worse. I received a messsage back that as far as he was concerned I could go on a Tegretol like medication but I should call my primary care doctor to get the prescription. Apparently he was not comfortable prescribing these kind of drugs. So I made an appointment with my primary care doctor and saw her today. Indeed she was willing to prescribe a newer version of the Tegretol that had worked for me, one with fewer side effects. So I started this medication today. We will soon see if it worked as well as last time.
     All of this led me to research several medical articles on the Internet about treating post surgical pain. First I learned that several medical articles indicate that acute postoperative pain and then persistent pain after the acute pain should have remitted occur and are inadequately treated. An article in May, 2006 Lancet quoted that between 10-50% of post surgical patients have persistent pain beyond that of the acute surgical injury. And in 2-10% of those people, the pain is severe. These persistent pains are attributed to neuropathic pain with mechanisms similar to that I have described above.
     Another large (1299 patients) and well conducted survey following hysterectomy found that 1 year after surgery 32% of the patients were still experiencing (chronic ) pain and of these 15% did not have any pain beforehand. Of patients receiving spinal anesthesia, 15% had pain at 1 year compared with 37% receiving general anesthesia. Using a pain relieving model that extends for 2 weeks after the surgery, this incidence of chronic pain was reduced from 7% to 1% of patients in another study. So chronic pain after surgery is a common problem. It seems to be influenced by the type of surgery, whether there was pain before the surgery or not, presence of other risk factors such as diabetes, and other history of neuropathic pain, and even genetics. There seems to be a gene which codes for a lower tolerance of pain and having that gene allows manifestation of surgical pain to become expressed to a greater degree in those individuals.
         One other interesting question arose in my mind during my surgical experience and since. Many of you readers may have been asked by various members of the medical profession to rate the level of your pain on a scale from 1 to 10. Most of us whether with medical background or not have no idea what these different numbers might mean. I would venture to guess that if there were a way to measure objectively that pain, individuals would still cite a range of numbers for that same level of pain even if their pain tolerance were the same. So I researched the pain scales being used and found that there are indeed ways to make these scales more representative of the actual pain being experienced. Following are two methods to make these pain scales representative of the pain being felt. The first is descriptions of each pain level on a 1 to 10 scale. The second pain scale gets away from using word descriptions and uses simple facial features that might show the level of pain and would ask the pain victim to point out the face that represents his/her pain. Using this 1 to 10 scale I would say that my current chronic pain is mostly in the 2 and 3 level. Occasionally after having my arm down for a while, it reaches 4. When I am sitting with my arm propped up on pillows level with or higher than my heart, the pain level is usually 1. So not severe, but enough that my quality of life is affected and my daily activities are reduced.
    
The Pain Scale in words:
0 -- Pain Free
     Mild Pain - Nagging, annoying, but doesn't really interfere with daily living activities.
1 -- Pain is very mild, barely noticeable. Most of the time you don't think about it.
2 -- Minor pain. Annoying and may have occasional stronger twinges.
3 -- Pain is noticeable and distracting, however, you can get used to it and adapt.
     Moderate Pain - Interferes significantly with daily living activities.
4 -- Moderate pain. If you are deeply involved in an activity, it can be ignored for a period of time, but is still distracting.
5 -- Moderately strong pain. It can't be ignored for more than a few minutes, but with effort you still can manage to work or participate in some social activities.
6 -- Moderately strong pain that interferes with normal daily activities. Difficulty concentrating.
     Severe Pain - Disabling, unable to perform daily living activities.
7 -- Severe pain that dominates your senses and significantly limits your ability to perform normal daily activities or maintain social relationships. Interferes with sleep.
8 -- Intense pain. Physical activity is severely limited. Conversation requires great effort.
9 -- Excruciating pain. Unable to converse. Crying out and/or moaning uncontrollably
10 -- Unspeakable pain. Bedridden and possibly delirious. Very few people will ever experience this level of pain. It may cause unconsciousness.

The face pain scale.

     It is interesting to read all about these items while being affected by the problem oneself. We will see if the Tegretol nerve drug does anything for me this time. I am hopeful it will act like it did in the past.

     I am very interested in any of you who have experienced persistent post surgical pain extending out beyond 14 to 21 days after surgery. I would like to know if it had the characteristics of neuropathic pain that I described. And I am interested in how it was managed by your doctors. Send me some comments.



   

Getting Older!

Observations on Growing Older 

~Your kids are becoming you...and you don't like them

...but your grandchildren are perfect!


~Going out is good.

Coming home is better!


~When people say you look "Great"...

they add "for your age!"


~When you needed the discount you paid full price.

Now you get discounts on everything ...

movies, hotels, flights, but you're too tired to use them.


~You forget names ... but it's OK

because other people forgot

they even knew you!!!


~The 5 pounds you wanted to lose

is now 15 and you have a better chance

of losing your keys than the 15 pounds.


~You realize you're never going

to be really good at anything .... especially golf.


~Your spouse is counting on you

to remember things you don't remember.


~The things you used to care to do,

you no longer care to do,

but you really do care that you

don't care to do them anymore.


~Your spouse sleeps better on a lounge chair

with the TV blaring than he does in bed.

It's called his "pre-sleep".


~Remember when your mother said

"Wear clean underwear in case you GET in an accident"?

Now you bring clean underwear in case you HAVE an accident!


~You used to say,

"I hope my kids GET married ...

Now, "I hope they STAY married!"


~You miss the days when everything worked

with just an "ON" and "OFF" switch..


~When GOOGLE, ipod, email, modem ...

were unheard of, and a mouse was something

that made you climb on a table.


~You now use more 4 letter words ...

"what?"..."when?" ???


~Now that you can afford

expensive jewelry, it's not safe to wear it anywhere.


~You read 100 pages into a book before you realize you've read it.


~Notice everything they sell in stores is "sleeveless"?!!!


~What used to be freckles are now liver spots.


~Everybody whispers.


~You have 3 sizes of clothes in your closet ....

2 of which you will never wear.


~~~~But old is good in some things:

old songs

old movies

And best of all OLD FRIENDS!!



Love you, "OLD FRIEND!"

Your Tax Dollars in Action!

I'd like to tell you a little story about our trip into Hungary.

We went on a tour outside Budapest to the Lazar Equestrian Park, home of Vilmos, and his son Zoltan Lazar, both of whom have won championship awards for competitive carriage driving. Though Arabs

and quarter horses are used, the Hungarian horsebreeding program centers on the Lippazaner horses. At this famous Equestrian Park, we saw all of these horses and others and very entertaining demonstrations of this carriage driving and other activities of the Hungarian cowboys, called czikosak. (See photo at left).  Before lunch another activity was a carriage drive out onto the pustza (the Hungarian range). We noticed a group of young men waiting to take their carriage ride; we interacted with them somewhat because Amos wanted to take their photo. They were in a happy mood and a couple of them knew a little English. But they never agreed to a photo.  But they were clearly having a good time. After the equestrian demonstrations we were ushered into a huge dining room for our Hungarian lunch. (Delicious, see below!)

     At lunch we noticed that again there were lots of young men sitting at least at a dozen tables. I noticed that they were all "hunks." Amos asked a young man at the next table where they were all from and he said they were men from Serbia, Kosovo, Croatia, and Hungary training to be police officers. Amos asked this young man if this meant that our boys would be able to come home soon. This young man either didn't understand the question or didn't know the answer. He just smiled and sort of noded his head. The lunch was being served. A gypsy band was performing for our luncheon entertainment and after their own set, they were passing among the tables and asking for requests. Each table of the young men had requests and got very involved in singing them and clapping and generally being exuberant. It didn't bother us but we began to wonder more and more about all these exuberant young men. After we had finished eating, a clean cut gray haired gentleman came over to our table and in perfect American English said, "I saw you folks speaking English and thought I should come over. I apologize if my young men disturbed your lunch. They needed to have some time to blow off some steam." After lunch we went outside the dining hall and saw this gentleman standing to the side. We went over to talk with him again and asked him where he was from. We learned that he was from Oregon, but had not been home for 2 years. He worked for the US State Department and was in charge of a training camp for police officers. This young group of men and 2 young women had been training there for 7 weeks and would graduate in one more week. He said that they needed to get out and let off some steam and that was why they were all there today. He had been directing these 8 week camps, one after the other for the last 2 years.  Amos asked this gentleman the same thing he had asked the young Kosovan across from us at lunch: "Would this enable our young men to get out of Kosovo?" Just like the young Kosovan, this US State Department man in charge locally could not answer that question.

To the left is a photo of the performing gypsy band. When they came to our table, I asked them to do Hava Nagilah for Amos. They performed a very rousing rendition. They could very nicely perform at a Jewish wedding. When we were chatting with the US State Department gentleman, in sharing where we were all from, I said I was from Milwaukee, WI,  and that was where we lived, but that my husband was originally from Israel. The US State Dept man said, simply, "I know." So he had been doing his job, and had noted that we had asked for Hava Nagilah at the request time. Very astute!

Here is a czikos with his donkey. This segment was amusing, we could tell though it was all done in Hungarian. It reminded me very much of visiting a ranchero in Argentina outside Buenos Aires on the pampas. There was a similar segment there with a donkey and the rider not knowing which end to climb up on and always managing to mount the donkey backwards. For cowboys from all over the world, it appears that a humorous donkey segment is universal. This whole day was a very enjoyable one for us. We had no idea that such a life existed in Hungary.