From February 25th 2013 to March 15th 2013 

***  shortest Version  ***

In 2010 we were in New Jersey, 2011 in California, 2012 in Israel and 2013 in Florida.

Why we went to Florida

– Visit to Litzi Carmel, born Alice Reininger in Wiesmath in 1934, banished with her family in 1938 by the Nazis. Lorenz managed to trace her in the Holocaust Museum in New York.

What we achieved:

– cycling

– homeexchange and a Servas meeting

– to work against the following prejudices

In America you can buy all medicines without prescriptions in a drugstore – that’s not so!
To get antibiotics I had to go to a doctor who examinated me in great detail, before I got the prescription – as in Austria. They even asked if I had an insurence. I don’t have one for the States, so I had to pay (122.- Dollars), as in Austria.

In America there are no cycle paths: that’s not so, there are a lot. Even used, but only when the temperature is more than 20 degrees C.

Friendliness is superficial. Not so! We had intense and deep conversations with our host and exchange partners.

 The best experiences:

– cycling to the Gulf of Mexico – walking on the beach – sunrise and sunset on Lorenz‘ birthday

– Dolphins swimming in the bay in front of the house

 

Most interesting encounter:

– our hosts Carol and Bill
– their friend Marti and her foster child Kivianté
– one quarter Indian man at Chattaway

One of the best houses:

– comfortable, big, on the seaside, 15 min to down-town, to the pier, to the museums by bike

One of the best house swaps:

-perfect communication with our exchange-partners Bill and Carol, they were in June and in September in our flat so we knew each other. We spent some days together and we are happy to have them as guests next October.

The most exciting moments:

– by car through the unknown rain soaked countryside with a bladder problem and without map
– lost cycling in the neighboring quarter
– at Doctors‘ Express

The funniest comment:

– „Are you OK?“ a worker in the Supermarket asked me observing my outfit: on the head my hood and over the hood my helmet.

One of the most successful moments:

– “That’s what I should do“ exclaimed a woman, seeing me on the bike in front of the supermarket
– I drove the Ford with automatic

*** Short version ***

In spite of Lorenz‘ good preparation for our travel, the beginning was difficult. Delayed take off even in Vienna, arriving 4 hours late, but nevertheless Tom, Bill’s cousin, was at the airport to take us from Tampa to St. Petersburg. The next morning we met other relatives who showed and explained the house to us and who left some hours later. In the afternoon, after having lunch together at „Chattaway“, a nice garden restaurant near the house which became our favorite place, we took Tom and his wife to the airport.

First the weather corresponded to our tiredness, the clouds hung low and even some rain drops fell. The pool, the boats, the waterfront, could not impress us.

The same day we received the message that Litzi Carmel’s husband had passed away the day before and, if possible, we should come the next day to meet her and her son for lunch. So we started the next morning in Bill’s car from St. Pete to Boynton Beach (400 km) to see Alice Carmel, born Litzi Reininger in the neighboring house in Wiesmath, the main reason for our travel to Florida. Somewhat late we came to Litzi’s house in a village for pensioners similar to thousands of others in Florida. Warmhearted welcome, son Dan and daughter Nilly are also there. This was a very emotional moment, to meet somebody who, 75 years before, had been expelled from our village and who, since then has avoided our country and even thinking about it. Worse: Nobody from the village was interested what happened to Litzi after her flight or apologized to her or her family. Litzi Carmel (78 years old) of course first told about her husband, his last hard years, his death the day before we came which was felt as a release, then she spoke about her memories of Wiesmath, the flight to Vienna, to Palestine and her life afterwards in America. Her son Dan heard many things for the first time. Not only the culprits wouldn’t tell anything to the next generation but also the victims couldn’t verbalize their history. They repeated several times that they welcomed our visit and that they will come to Austria next year.

In the afternoon we returned to St. Pete, unfortunately under heavy rain, through the famous Everglades, called Alligator Highway. These nice animals were not interested in us and I was only interested in the facilities, because of my foolish bladder; besides we began to feel the jet lag strongly. Enormous black and white birds on the edge of the highway, in the swamps, on the trees and in the bushes emphasized our feeling. We drove hundreds of miles straight ahead through the peninsular and finally at about 10 pm we were back at home in „our“ bay.

For the next days only relaxing and discovering the neighborhood were on the program, which wasn’t immediately successful, because I needed antibiotics which we knew we could buy in the USA in a drugstore. Mistake! I got the prescription at Doctors‘ Express, 3 miles by bike from our home after an intensive medical examination, in the pharmacy. Like in Austria! The antibiotics had effect; my revival could start.  In the Mitchell’s comfortable house there were souvenirs from all over the world, posters from Poland, Kumpf paintings from Vienna and Salzburg and a lot of books.

We used the two hammocks on the seaside whenever the sun came out; we didn’t touch either the pool or the whirlpool because of the low temperature (about 15 degree C) There was also a long light blue wooden platform with a long seat and broad steps into the water.

We left the big sail boat to the birds, the mast was the lunch place for an osprey, the ropes were used by the pelicans and the ducks for drying their wings. Now and then we could see dolphins swimming across the bay.

A small pedal boat clacked in the wind, the canoes lay on dry land.

We only took bikes for our first excursions.

In the nearest bay there was a park on the seaside with palm trees on the meadow and a colorful mixture of family houses, from magnificent to modest. The most normal of them was Mary’s house. She is a Servas host and she answered Lorenz‘ inquiry that she was ill and that she couldn’t receive us. The most gorgeous building with a splendid entrance, decorated with columns and stone figures, in the evening full of lights, was an Amish family’s house, as Bill told us. More about that later.

Nearby there was the Driftwood Park: very old, very big Mangrove trees wound round by thick vines; wild jungle-like gardens reaching to the seaside. Splendid ancient villas giving the impression of being uninhabited. But suddenly there were smaller wooden houses with dry ground in front and in several gardens there were religious inscriptions on the trees or on things which seemed us to be something like altars.

We were in one of many quarters of black people (a quarter of St. Pete is black). But there were also black quarters with big houses and nice lawns, high palm trees. The density of churches is high everywhere: Catholics, Methodists, Babtists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Episcopals; we could see their meeting rooms every hundred meters with big bills quoting words from the Bible and the name of the chief priest.

During the week there were nearly no pedestrians or cyclists on the road, only at the Saturday market during the warm weather. They crowded between the handmade art goods or agricultural products such as homemade honey or macadamea butter and cooked food. The vegetable stand was one of the biggest, but there is no CSA (Community supported agriculture); we were a little bit disappointed. At the entrance to the market musicians were playing Country Music; between listeners and the band there was a lady in her eighties or nineties dancing in a short skirt and sport shoes. People passing by took her by the arms and danced some steps with her. It was a mixture of a good atmosphere and a little embarassment. On the other side of the market place there was a one-man-band with rock music and there we saw them finally: hundreds of bicycles.

Twice we went by bike to the Gulf of Mexico, once to Treasure Island and once to Fort De Soto, a nature reserve with broad white sandy beaches, where, according to the danger warning, the thorn-back fishes were lying in wait for us in the shallow water.

We went by car to Sarasota, the famous and elegant place about 50km south of St. Pete, we went by car, when I finally tried do drive the big old Ford with automatic. After several miles full of anxiety I found out it was easy. There we saw the rich harbor with luxury yachts which couldn’t impress us. So we went to the Amish Village, of which there was no trace in the tourist guide, but Lorenz googled the address in Sarasota – since he saw the film „The last witness“, he wanted to see them in natura. After a 2 hours foot march we saw their first trace, their tricycles. And then more and more people in their strange looking clothes, the men with long beards, straw hats, black trousers with braces; the women with their wide dark colored clothes with small white bonnets on the back of the head and many children around. Why are we interested in these strange people? For Lorenz besides the movie it is their lifestyle, the rejection of cars and consumerisme. Here we learned that they are able to profit from their old fashioned lifestyle and their anachronisme. In the shop we found a lot of Amish souvenirs for example the hats (Lorenz bought one). Beeing Amish is folklore and a kind of business. Another of our illusions shattered! After our visit in the Amish restaurant and the shop we took the bus.

After waiting 15 minutes we could start, 1.80 Dollar was not expensive; this was the only experience with public transport and it  wasn’t so bad. In 20 minutes we were back in the center of Sarasota, a small touristic city. In the evening we went a little further south, to the city of Venice to admire the sunset on the beach. In a pavilion there is a small orchestra of elder musicians who are playing old fashioned songs for elder people trying to put them in a good mood, with which they were partly successful. The sunset was a full success.

In the first week, when the weather was bad (once even 9 degrees C in the morning) we visited several museums, first the St. Pete’s history museum: the city, founded 150 years ago as the last station on a railway line soon became a holiday paradise. The history of the Indians, bird protection and the second world war were the main subjects.

Other museums:
the Museum of Fine Arts, outside in the style of the thirties years, inside modern, beautiful pictures from the Middle Ages to the present time. In the big entrance we posed in front of a wedding poster, happy not to have to plan or to organize or to pay for a wedding.

Other interesting places:
Sunken gardens, a big botanic garden in a former lake with wonderful flowers; and Haslams‘ bookshop, an enormous selection of new and second hand book – in the background the Blue Danube Waltz was playing.

Birds, dogs

and exotic plants everywhere

but no

and no to see.

The university and the museum of Fine Arts of Tampa

One day we visited the brand new Holocaust Museum: Explanation of the history of the fashism in Germany, of the antisemitism in Europe. I felt really sad, when I realised that all the evil had its roots in Germany and Austria. Nothing new, but from the American perspective you can feel it in a different way: I, an Austrian descendent of the generation of the perpetrators feel guilty an I think that our European arrogance is out of place.

The highlight of the museums in St. Pete was the Dali-Museum, above all concerning the education program. There is a guide (mostly volunteers of course) every hour who explains the pictures in a very interesting way. Dali’s paintings from his youth in Catalonia are wonderfully colorful, his double image paintings such as „Old Age. Adolescence, Infancy 1940 e. g. are full of puzzle and mystery and we were very impressed.

We spent the evening before Lorenz‘ 65^th birthday in our beloved Chattaway where we enjoyed live music from a Puertorican musician, a little bit kitsch but best suited our small intimate party; on the birthday, the 10^th of March there were congratulations from five o’cat’s why we were up for the sunrise in our nearest bay. Then we went to Honeymoon Island to spend the day at the white beaches not lying (too cold) but walking. The birthday boy seemed to be meditating and having his day.

One of the last days we wanted to go to Caladesi Island, a nature reserve where you can go only by boat and where there are no cars. Unfortunately it was windy and the ferry couldn’t start.

So we returned to Honeymoon Island and then to the small town of Dunedin. On a crossroad we saw several older people with plackards saying they wanted a reform of the weapons laws; one woman had a board which showed that she is against weapons at all. She had a peaceful discussion with a driver and than she wanted me to take a picture for her daughter. What I did.

We were successful in contacting Servas people (6 addresses and 4 answered, one meeting): we had lunch in a restaurant near the Pier with Pat from St-Pete.

We spent the last days with Bill and Carol in their house. The first evening Lorenz and I did the cooking, the second evening Bill and Carol. And I had to revise two opinions about America: No good food. Mistake! You can have a good meal, if you cooking at home and the cooks are Bill and Carol. The kindness is superficial. Mistake! Bill and Carol invited 4 friends from the neighborhood for the dinner and we had really good and serious discussions about God and the world. No difference to our talks in Vienna. We spoke also about our next trips: Bill and Carol will come to Vienna in October and in December. And maybe we’ll come to Boston where Bill and Carol will live in a community from June one day. Who knows?

PS: The total costs : 3000- Euro for 2 persons, including the flights and the transport in Amerika