Schechter
Solomon Schechter
was born in Vienna in 1934. His Jewish parents arranged for friends to take him
to England in 1937. Schechter grew up in London where German was spoken in his
home and English at school. He could remember nothing of Vienna or his parents
and never saw them again. His "parents", who were non-Jews, told him
that they left Austria because of the difficulties the war brought. He was told about his parents and his origins
when the war was over. He was 11 years old at the time. Up till then, he had to
suffer the taunts of his classmates who called him a "stinking Nazi" for his accent
and "parents" who were Austrian nationals. Like so many refugees,
after the war, Solomon was forced to confront an identity crisis in a world
that had no real place for them. Like so many orphans walking through the
rubble of the aftermath of WWII, from Paris to Moscow, from Shanghai to Tokyo,
across North Africa, Indonesia, and the
once bright coastal resort cities of the Mediterranean, children wandered
homeless and hungry with no real place to go. After the war of Independence, Solomon went to Israel for a trip and decided
to stay. He had found the closest thing to a home available to him.
Now it was 2013
and President Romney and Vice President Ryan had been inaugurated, The world
waited to see what this new administration would do to correct the very heavy
economic crisis and hoped that stresses would be relieved around the world. The
new president had vowed to unite congress toward this end.
Schechter scanned
through some news stories and then brought up the most recent data from their
Doppler study and started graphing the results. "Mark will not be
particularly happy about this", he thought. He looked at the fountain in
the middle of the courtyard from his study. "I hope they enjoy their stay
anyway".
It was late
afternoon when Michael, his family and Laura arrived at Schechter's villa in Santiago.
There was music coming from the courtyard, already in shade, and tables had been
set up around the fountain as they made their way inside. There were already
many people there and many introductions were needed. Dr. Schechter had gone
well out of his way to make sure his guests would be comforable. Laura
noticed Jan standing by the bar with a glass of something in his hand which he
held up in greeting when he recognized her. She smiled at him and made her way
over past three musicians dressed in colorful serapes, jeans, boots with spurs,
and Chilean sombreros. Their music was sweet and special, spontaneous as if
designed for this very evening. It was one of those moments when all things
seemed to coincide into a perfect harmony. "Laura, so good to see
you", Jan kissed her cheek. She was thrilled at it all. "And you Jan,
likewise. How long have you been here?" "Since yesterday morning, but
we've only been drinking an hour or so." Laura giggled and noticed his
slightly inebriated state. "Have you eaten yet?", she asked.
"Only hors d'oeurves, the shrimp are excellent", he answered as the
music rose slightly and ended. "Come let's sit for dinner. Dr. Schechter
has something he's going to tell us." "I hope we've found something significant." Laura said
as they made their way to the dinner tables. Michael will be so happy."
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