Hope! (An Extraordinary Life)

By Laurence Marquis-Northcote

Whenever I tell my friends and acquaintances about my life experiences, they tell me I have to publish my memoirs because the experiences have entertainment value, both funny and dramatic, but, moreover, because my story can give hope to everyone.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris UK
• Release date: May 14, 2012
• ISBN: 9781469126913

Laurence Marquis-Northcote

The removals can appear tiresome, but for Laurence, accompanying her parents in countries where her father works, these removals become routine or escape, according to what occurs in the country. The family of Laurence, multicultural and coming from various horizons, passing from the state of “affl uent” to that of poverty for then being “normal”, has to face many reverses and humiliations. This family will remake her life several times while starting again from scratch because of abrupt political changes. For purposes to better include and or understand this “multicultural character” nine commands not to be applied here: precision of an Italian, the humility of a French, linguistic capacities of an American, the diplomacy of an Israeli, the cheerfulness of a Swiss... This autobiography also describes that Hope gives you enough strength to go ahead with your life. No matter what anyone tells you about your fate, as long as you have a dream and determination you can achieve amazing things. Laurence Marquis-Northcote is French mother tongue, and….

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HOPE!

(An Extraordinary Life)

Laurence Marquis-Northcote

Copyright © 2012 by Laurence Marquis-Northcote.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

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Contents

Intro

Preface

France

Iran

Israel

Greece And Yugoslavia

Poland

Austria

Switzerland

Years AS a Young Woman

France

Italy

Venice

Verona

ROME

Florence

Bibione

My Years AS A Mature Woman

Slovakia

Northern Ireland

United States

Washington

Winston Salem

Dallas

New York

San Francisco

Las Vegas

San Diego

Miami and the Keys

Scotland

TURKEY (2009)

Epilogue

LAST COMMENTS

ENDNOTES

DEDICATION

To you Luce, mother, these verses engraved on your tomb; to your courage in adversity, they are you and the life you have lived.

This book is also dedicated to my father, to my brother Lionel, to you Léonore my niece. To you, Louis, my maternal grandfather, Lucien my paternal grandfather, Lucienne my aunt, Louisette my great-aunt, and to all the L of our past who generated the family tradition, and to all the descendants which will perpetuate it.

Like the rivers that mark and flow through the earth,

Like the mountains and trees, which rise of the land,

Like Hope, that reappears after a war,

Like the sky and the stars that govern our lives,

The seas, desert winds, flowers of one moment,

The Birth and death, eternal beginnings,

Like the past, present and fragile future,

Such as happiness or distress all our life we carry,

I would like to imprint the memory of my family.

Without my parents who gave me life,

Without my friends and their confidence,

Far from the churches, but not without belief,

It is not beyond tears and emotion

These memories were awaken and written.

I dedicate this book to my friends Beverly and her husband Daniel, Marcelle, Patricia, George, Sarah, Halli, and to John my husband. Without them and their support, these undisclosed stories of my life would not have seen the light of day.

Intro

Whenever I tell my friends and acquaintances about my life experiences, they tell me I have to publish my memoirs because the experiences have entertainment value, both funny and dramatic, but, moreover, because my story can give hope to everyone.

In fact, as far I can remember, my life has been guided by several characteristics: Optimism, hope, choices and determination. From the beginning, I was not meant to live; as a prematurely born twin, I had to fight my first battle against the laws of Nature. Nature gave me hopefully everything: beauty, maturity, a brain to think, the possibility of development and knowledge, to be able to chose my present and future life, and determination to improve my standard of living, sometimes not, but let me not despair when my family and I were in trouble.

How did I end up a globetrotter? It was never the intention of my family or myself to be globetrotters; it was Fate that made us this way, causing us to flee countries because of war, bomb attacks, racism, xenophobia, and, more often than the others, totalitarian regimes.

Why a globetrotter? It is not the correct word neither gypsy but I could not find any other term for someone who changed countries. The globetrotter is more related to someone visiting a country by foot, we were obliged to leave our country with almost nothing. Like the picture of the Mayflower, I felt or we felt the same when we arrived in new countries with a single piece of luggage to start to build a decent life from scratch again. The perseverance of my family, the curiosity and learning of local customs made us become new citizens of the country, adjusting ourselves to their philosophy, food, religion, way of thinking and acting.

Perhaps globetrotter is not even the right word; what I am trying to convey is one who changed countries often. The globetrotter may be construed as someone visiting a country by foot, recreationally, while we were obliged to change countries with almost nothing. I am sure we felt the same as the Pilgrims on the Mayflower when we arrived in new countries with only a single piece of luggage to aid us in building a decent life from scratch. The perseverance of my family, as well as both the curiosity for and learning of local customs, made us able to become citizens of each new country, adjusting ourselves to each host country’s philosophy, food, religion, way of thinking, and behavior.

Lost? No. We were never lost or we never felt lost since we knew ourselves. We were not looking for a someone else or escaping from our own problems. We just had to move because of political reasons.

Did we enjoy changing countries? For the first change it was fun for me (Iwas 6 years old) but it has been a burden for my mother since she prepared all the papers, luggage and house by herself. The second was a nightmare because we had been arrested in a totalitarian regime, the third was much better and we did enjoy the people and the place but we could not stay due to continuous war, the fourth was better but too cold, the fifth was a lovely small country but racist and xenophobic and when my parents stayed I found a job which allowed me to travel a lot and finally, the recession and unemployment made me live in another 7 countries.

And what about settling down? That will be the final chapter. Am I going to regret my decision to stay with a man somewhere in the world? No. My country is where I am happy and if I am happy with this man, my country is definitely this one.

The final chapter will be about settling down. Am I going to regret my decision to stay with a man anywhere in the world? No—my country should be where I am happy, and if I am happy with the man, I will be happy with the country, wherever it may be.

Preface

Spring took a long time to appear. The day was dull. A mantle of snow covered the surrounding mountain peaks. Winter in Geneva seemed not to end and Spring seemed not to want to take its place. Not the tiniest sign of any buds.

Sat behind my window to contemplate motionless nature, I reminded myself the years of my childhood, my adolescence and finally of a young and mature woman, intersected with voyages, of more or less long stays always in new countries. I remembered the years during which, whatever were the circumstances, sometimes overtaken by dangerous events, my parents, often in delicate situations, did not cease lavishing tenderness and love on us. For that, I cannot but be grateful and hope that my memory is faithful and is an accurate account of what I witnessed.

1989 was a black year during which my mother’s illness became progressively worse and my father’s distress deepened. To see the doctors being helpless before such a malady was, for us, desolating. At the same time, we hoped that rapid medical evolution or a new discovery could, in the absence of effective treatment, save the woman we cherished.

We still had the hope that my mother who, even weakened, still resisted a few years and which her hour had not come yet. She will die on November 21. She had decided it. As I knew it, she was to be serene at the time of her last sigh, I suppose, because I was not there when she died. Only my father was present.

This standby, sometimes difficult to sustain, brought me back certainly to a nearer reality, that which we had lived under other skies, which had followed me tiniest hint of emotion when it awoke a more-or-less-precise memory. I became more sensitive to the least emotion than a more or less precise memory awoke.

So that my sleep should no longer be haunted by nightmares and that my nights should no longer be sleepless, I used to read. So that my daily life should not become a black hole, I built castles in Spain. In order to calm my pain and to show, as often as possible, a smiling face to her who needed it, I hung myself to a blank page in the shape of a chronicle what I shall call my Past.

Was this the ideal remedy that I needed suddenly? I do not know, but it is possible. And rather than to spend my days lamenting an outcome over which we had no control, I set about writing. The writing had to prevent me from sinking into melancholy, which generates the fright of uncertainty, the panic of the following day, the fear of death.

In what I considered as unbearable, I reconsidered, although that was not the favourable moment, about this year 1989 in what it represented on the level of the history and in which this story began to be told: the bicentenary of the French revolution; the arrival, at the same time of George Washington to the presidency of the United States and the birth of the American constitution. Then, seventy years ago, the beginning of the Second World War, and more recently, around fifty years ago, the Hungarian uprising.

It was also the tenth year since the Camp David agreements had been signed and that began, by the same occasion, the reign of Khomeini.

1989 also saw the events, which our generation will not be able to forget: the awakening of certain East European countries, their return to a still supervised liberty, but freedom all the same, however letting the anguish that for these countries, in process of emancipation, was not a new Prague Spring, leaving us to re-examine or revise, simply or doubly, certain of our politico-socio-economics judgments.

To this boiling of the History I wanted to bring my small stone through my own saga, of the experiments lived only or with my family, by my testimony and surprising desire of my mother, discovered with the reading of her will, that part of her biography and the one of my father, be written but never be published.

Whereas I recall what I have or what we lived in France, in Iran, in Israel, in Poland, in Austria, in the United States and in Italy, I do nothing but fly over Greece and ex-Yugoslavia where we also put our feet. I also describe my experience as an expatriate in Slovakia and Northern Ireland, and my holidays in Turkey.

I speak about France where I was born, lived with my parents and returned when I was an adult, about Iran to have remained with them lasting three years, about Poland to have visited it during three months, about Austria to have resided for six months, about the United States for the discovery of the country where my mother resided for ten years and taken as part of my roots, about Israel for the search of my Jewish origins, about Switzerland to have remained there a very a long time, about Italy for the holidays and to have also worked in the country. However, I do not write about the forty and some other countries, which I could admire at the time of my holidays and will describe shortly some events in various countries. On a later stage I will speak about Scotland, the country of my husband, which became my country.

France

Another removal

In addition, yes, in the year 2000 still another removal. Whereas I slandered, cursed and moaned unceasingly against France, whereas I still do not understand how the French act or react, that they are and remain a enigma, I must make my luggage for the umpteenth time and this occasion is to reside at Paris or in its area.

To work, to subsist, I obtained a contract to assist a General Manager in his steps to start a subsidiary of a Swiss company in Paris in the field of telecommunications. Consequently, it will be necessary for me to discover and can, finally, include and understand the French customs and habits, their manner of living, their way of seeing their universe and the others.

I will find a family, which was torn between by the events, by too much concern, too many constraints, by the effects of the fate. After more than thirty years, I found my cousin Viviane and their children. Moreover, my first questions will be how will they perceive me. Will they understand me? Will they forget the past? Won’t they see me like a black sheep or the child prodigy? With my cousin we have years of wounds so much, confidences to be caught up with. We are so close but we do not know each other. Our parents, faulty or not, divided us. It is up to us to find us again.

Can that be for the first time of my life that I could say I settle down definitively in a country, that I will finally be able to stop travelling, moving house, changing my pace and rhythm of life, and can be the time to find my alter ego? I remember thinking whether, for the first time in my life, I could settle down permanently in a country, stop traveling and moving house, slow down the hectic pace of my former life, and find a comfortable rhythm, and possibly even find my soulmate.

The first four months

As of the first weeks after my arrival, I resided in a hotel located in Caumartin Street very close to my place of work. Already there I found a little of my roots, since all the family lived there years ago (I do not dare to mention the number!). It is in the N°5 building of this street that were taken my grandparents, uncles and aunts with their children by the Gestapo (French?) and took the last but one train N° 76 in departure for Auschwitz in July 1944*[1]. They will not return. My father had become orphan very young and I would never know my paternal grandparents.

In spite of the heavy one passed of this street and to live, I work approximately fourteen hours per day, and there I still find my old pace and rhythm of life when I was part of a Swiss multinational, which does not leave me much time for exploration and better knowing the members of my family. Fortunately that they telephone me and that I release myself to eat with them from time to time.

At midday, I also eat in street Caumartin and starts to familiarize me with all the tradesmen and commercials, restaurants, companies, and her inhabitants. I take the air of Boulevard Haussmann that is very close to the street Caumartin where the shop of my cousin is. How the shop changed since my uncle died!

The first troubles start. The person who should have rented me her apartment, without passing by an agency, made all the opposite of what had been said in Switzerland. Because I refused the kind of blackmail of the real estate company, because I refused the changed terms and conditions prior to our agreement, I see myself in the obligation to seek an apartment by my own means.

Therefore, before and or after my working hours, I only have a target: visit the apartments of Paris and its suburbs. This makes me take the metro as well as the famous train of the franciliens, the RER. I can tell you that in the late afternoon, when the RER is full of people going back home, it is not so funny! You are squeezed, face-to-face with a person you never met before; you will find all kind of smells, all kind of behaviours that are not very pleasant.

At the time of my visits of the suburbs, I find that they all look like the same. Then I made tests. Test of intuition, test of my feelings, of colours, and finally a test of well being. I started then to dream lively of what could be my future apartment in front of certain buildings; I asked myself how I felt; are the colours appropriate? Are the people sympathetic and welcoming, and, with some twenty-five kilometres of Paris in front of a castle taking the tenth coffee, I thought that I needed to elect residence here, at Saint-Germain-en-Laye.

I took note of all the telephone numbers of the estate agencies. Out of ten, only two will contact me!

For two months, I will only have one bed lying on ground lent by Nadia, my cousin. My cat Caramel, present given in Switzerland for my birthday by my friends Isabelle and Marcel, comfort me, hum and gives me company. I play with him as soon as I return from work. I cook meals for Caramel and myself only. I speak to him and he answers me. We make a funny couple!

I decided that all my furniture should be bought progressively. I want my place be the small soft nest of which I always dreamed. It will take a long time before everything will be bought since I do not want to acquire anything that does not match. Viviane, my German cousin, lends me two chairs and a small television. These two pieces of furniture helped me to feel better before the purchase of the sofa, the bar, vases, curtains, the bed and chess for the bedroom, two paintings and other small pieces for decoration. Now my apartment seems to be very nice and I began to feel at home.

I now often see my cousins and I feel quite well near them. Most of the time, we are always alone with our sorrow. It is not easy to speak about everything, about your fears with those, which are still the unknown ones. I would like so much that a companion be with me, comforts me, help me in my decisions, share with me the serenity which has been acquired hardly, make me laugh, dazzle me by his actions, his spontaneity, finally I look for the Perfect Man. Is this kind of human being really exists? I doubt it. That will come maybe later. Not too late, I hope for it.

The second trouble arrives. The company changed her tactic and found us not anymore suitable. Therefore, I needed to search another work as my boss, Alain, who became my friend. By the end of January 2001, I was not any more working for this Swiss company. I should have never signed such a contract! The company went bankrupt short time after having laid me off. I was feeling very bad and I became afraid. Am I a future SDF (sans domicile fixe—without fixed domicile)? I brought them onto justice in France. My case has been rejected. I have been told to attack them in Switzerland. I am desperate and I do not have enough money to go on. I gave up despite I have been told by lawyers and solicitors that I was in my right!

When you are 20 years old, it is easy to find a job, when you reach 30 it is still easy, when you are 40 it is more difficult, but when you reach 50 years old it is very hard. Despite my multilingual skill, my various knowledge, in our today’s society I have to resign myself, I am useless! On the other hand, the National Agency for Work agree on the principle that age represents the dedication, knowledge, experience and discipline, and above all, recognize the fact that I will not leave after three months, but I really wanted a steady job for years.

The other eight months

It is not for lack of looking for jobs, I did everything. I retyped my Curriculum Vitae in several forms (remove some studies, some courses) so it does not reflect this manager side hard-won, to lower my salary. Nothing. I’m too old, too expensive, too qualified, and they cannot put a sticker on me, therefore I am nonexistent.

At the same time when surfing on the Net to find work, I enrolled, always on the Net, a dating agency to meet the gem. Many from the first words were boasting of being the most powerful male, others they said liked to share, but without actually doing so. They only were speaking about themselves. Further, pure selfish, I let them fall into the quarter of hour after our first meeting. How beautiful are our French macho! No one asked me what I wanted, no one asked me what would make me happy or what they could do to give me joy. No, them first, always them.

What man is willing to watch a sunrise or sunset for hours and be lulled by rough seas? What is the one likely to listen to a piece of music and gush about a movement on air, on a note, a word, on a sentence?

Who is really ready for an adventure more interior that gives meaning to his life, which enhances his aura, which increases its potential, which doubles tolerance vis-à-vis the little things that do not work and human being not acting according to our own rules? How to find someone to share these feelings? What man is strong enough to cry without cheating? Who is the man who, like my father could admire a woman with the intelligence of the heart, the awakening of life, openness, depth of reasoning rather to love her for her sculptural body? What man is gentle enough that I want to curl up in his arms without fear of tomorrow? What man is able to participate in moral, spiritual and laborious tasks without abandon at the first hurdle? Who is the man who will take me and understand as I am? I already met him. His name was Arnon. He was Israeli.

At the same time I was looking for a job I created a company for sustainable development and environmental management. I made various contacts with the local organisations such as Comite 21, Ineris, etc. and the French Government. I had fantastic ideas, everybody said. My articles about Sustainable Cities and Sustainable Management have been published, however I think I have been seen as an utopist or a visionary. After one year I gave up and put the company into bankruptcy. France was not ready to change!

Within the year I’m going to queue as the poorest of the poor for food, for food stamps and some money. But no money, my case takes months to be validated with the local authorities. I do not know how to present myself to potential employers because I do not even have money to pay the Metro! I can hardly call because the phone is expensive, and the associations and authorities do not think about that kind of expenditures. I borrow from the closest friends. The fall begins. Is the hope over?

In the Centre for Unemployed, one day I saw an advert for Customer Representative in different languages. I applied, and after a due check up and a test, I flew over Northern Ireland. I began to live again.

I could say a lot about what was happening in Belfast, but before I must first return to my past, my birth and my early years of a little girl.

The family

I know only little about my father, mother and grand parents. I only know want they wanted to tell me. I remember that my mum and dad used to speak English when they did not want me to understand their argument; I remember mother listening American singers like Gene Vincent and Julie London; I remember that mother was born French but left with her father France to live in New York and New Jersey; I remember she told me to be part of the French/Belgium resistance during the WWII when my father stayed in London to come back with General Leclerc liberating Paris. I remember his Cross of Merit and my mother