During my 86 years, I have experienced many countries, and not necessarily for pleasure. I have lived in Poland, England, Israel, and the United States. I owe thanks to each country for allowing me to adapt and live a good life there for some period of time.
I had my struggles in England, I loved living in Israel, and I am now a proud American. As for Poland, where I was born, my feelings are mixed. On one hand, my early childhood years in Zaleszczyki before World War II were some of my best. Sometimes I think I would like to have lived there all of my life. On the other hand, I was lucky to escape with my life after the German occupation.
I have also visited a few other countries as a tourist. France, Spain, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Austria, and Canada come to mind. At my age it is now difficult to travel long distances, so I only visit England, where one of my sons and my sister and her family live. On the way I also stop in Israel to refresh my happy memories there. That is quite enough for an old lady. I do regret that I haven’t visited some other places like Australia, New Zealand, and a few Eastern European countries.
To my surprise, I still dream of visiting a couple of places in Poland: Kraków where my family is from and Zakopane, a ski resort town where my mother practiced various sports when she was young. I normally shy away from going to Poland, where I almost died, but I think it would be a sort of farewell tour to my mother, which would give me some kind of closure.
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