V 1 N. 21 My First Marathon

 Since starting this blog of short stories,  I have yet to include anything about my favorite sport of running.  For almost seventy years beginning in 1957, I have been a runner, starting with my high school years, then on to university years and afterward as a member of several clubs in the US, Canada, and Africa.  I've only run eight marathons, not many by comparison to a lot of folks, but I'm proud to say all of them have taken me less than three hours.  I ran my last one in 1982.  Maybe I did go over three hours once, but that was when I entered the London marathon, but could not make it to the race, and a British schoolboy used my number to run with my name.   My best was 2 hours 35 minutes and 55.92 seconds in Quebec City in 1981.  You will note that runners like to be specific when talking about their performances.   When I realized I would not get any faster due to aging, I said, "Enough".  But I didn't stop running, just stopped running marathons.

Recently while cleaning out the stable, I came across a reflection I wrote the day after that first marathon.  I put it below in it's original typewritten form.  There is also a picture of me at the finish of that race.  This was the 1976  Ottawa marathon.  It was also the Canadian Olympic trials as Canada was hosting the Olympics in Montreal that year.  You may note that I mention there were only 550 runners in that race.  That number is miniscule compared to the popularity of today's marathon competitions which go into the tens of thousands.  And the fee to run was probably only $5.00, whereas today's organizers bilk runners several hundred to get into the 'big' races.  I also mention that I finished in 40th place, an absurdly good finish in today's races where the top times are much faster.

In the story below, I don't mention it, but if you look at the picture of me at the finish you will note that my shorts look rather tight.  They were.  I forgot to pack a pair in my kit, and Sunday morning when the race was scheduled to start in Ottawa, I discovered that I had no lower gear to run in.  There was no such thing as 'running stores' in those days, and if there were, to find one open at 8;00AM on a Sunday in Ottawa would have been impossible.  Fortunately one of my fellow travellers, Bernard Beland had an extra pair.  However, Bernard was about 5 feet 3 inches tall and had a much smaller waist than I had,  but I managed to squeeze into his spare pair and run a somewhat strangulated race.  

Here is my account:

The Finish

Of note:  No automatic timers, only a single individual recording our number and time by hand.  Also notice that my number is hand lettered.  Nothing like this anymore.  And where is the finish line?  When I moved to British Columbia in 2013, a lady in my new club the Comox Valley Road Runners told me she had also run her first marathon that day.  Her name  Diane Palmason.  Diane became one on the great Masters runners in Canada in the following years. 

From my friend and fellow runner Roy Mason:

 My best was 2:37:something.  I was 17th in a field of 600+ but have a vivid memory of the last 100 yards where there was an older guy carrying his shoes.  Put on a spurt and I could pass him.  No, 16th place was his as he toughed up and sprinted the last few yards barefoot.  The picture of a guy limping, holding his shoes beating me is my memory of that race.  

The lack of an exact time is evidence of cognitive decline. 

(I had a results list.  That's how I knew my time, Roy.) 

Used to be, wake me in the middle of the night and I could supply my best times at any distance down to the tenth.  It is also evidence of the ravages of age which keep me in the recliner instead of going through drawers and exploring shelves where, in 10-15 minutes, I could find the notebook that would supply that info.  That said, I've come to the realization that much of the material I have saved falls into the "nobody gives a shit" category.  

Unfortunately this classification also fits the collection of photos, results and newspaper articles about the La Mirada Meteors girls team I coached in the late 60s and early 70s which I found while organizing a couple rooms.  I assembled this disorganized memorabilia in a large 80 page scrapbook.  Leaf through it and memories flow.  Debbie's record mile is the highlight but I had others that were near her level and a couple with more talent.  Six kids competed internationally and we won a national championship.  

That scrapbook sits on my desk, needing only the subjects of a few photos to be identified.  When that work is done, the book will go on a shelf to be tossed in the trash when my children  clean out the house in preparation for sale.  I could pass it along to one of the few kids with whom I have contact. but while they would enjoy leafing through it and showing it to grandchildren, they aren't kids.  These are 70 year old women.  The book would have the same fate when they pass.  

A last note. The photo you included forces me to comment on your lack of dedication and effort.  This is the finish and you are not leaning at the tape?

 Reply:   Hey do you see a finish line in that photo?  How could I know when to lean?  

V 1 N. 20 An Embassy Adventure in Burundi

 

 

 

The following piece was written about 2007 during one of my regular trips into East and Central Africa to train community mediators.  I would travel for six weeks from country to country teaching seminars organized by the local Quaker community through their organization the African Great Lakes Initiative.  At one point in Burundi I had to go to the American embassy to get some pages added to my passport for several new visas I needed.  Then I went across the border into the Democratic Republic of the Congo.  The folowing are two little adventures along the way.  A third brief story is on buying eye glasses in Burundi.

An Embassy Adventure in Burundi and Crossing the Border into the  Not So Democratic Republic of the Congo

by George Brose

 

Final bits and pieces of things I did and saw but didn’t fit into my earlier letters.  It went extremely fast and even more so when I realize that today is Wednesday and on Monday I’ll be back in my office in Springfield, Ohio wearing a necktie after 6 weeks of liberation from that western  curse.  We are allowed to dress down at work on Friday’s and I have some flashy African shirts to hang on me then.  I’m ready to come home.  Not sure I’ll be needed out here again next year which is a good thing, because I feel that there are enough local trainers who can do the job now.  There will still be a need for funding further training but not a great need for ‘foreign experts’.   Where shall I go next year?  Will Zimbabwe be ready for an aging mediator?  The African Great Lakes Initiative (AGLI) does not have any contacts down there.

 

 

 

Inside the American Embassy in Bujumbura. 

 

I managed to get through three layers of security and into the consular section of the embassy on a Tuesday.  You only get a shot at it on Tuesday’s and Thursday’s.  Once they had me in there, I knew  there was no getting out until they said I could. Hoped I wouldn’t have to wait in there until Thursday.  All the way inside, not a single American made personal contact with me except maybe  indirectly on a TV monitor that could identify me by some secret electronic device.  The first ring of guards were Burundian, and well armed I might add.  The next outside ring of protection was also manned by Burundians, and the third ring inside the first door was still covered by Burundians.  I guess that way if any malcontent Burundians decided to storm the embassy and got themselves killed, it could only be blamed on Burundians killing their own, which they are very experienced at doing.  American staff could  then walk away uncriticized.  “Hey we didn’t know what those guys were capable of.  Blackwater said they did the background checks.”   If anyone from the NSA is reading this, please note that I have not fully described the rings to give away any of my country’s secrets other than the Tuesday/Thursday schedule.  All other days of the week, check the golf course or the beaches for consular officers.

 

Finally got to a thick plate glass window where I was able to speak to a pleasant British woman with a lovely accent.  Wait a minute, didn’t we liberate ourselves from y’all?  Spared me having to deal with a New Jersey screech and a diplomatic attitude.   I sifted through the reading material on the coffee table in the lounge.  Nieman Marcus catalogue, latest speech from the president of Ghana, and an agriculture journal specializing in bull semen this month.  Homing instincts led me to the Nieman Marcus catalogue hoping for some sexy ads.  Alas all the models look like androids on crystal meth.

 

Meanwhile a lot of people who knew the magic code, had a micro chip embedded in their forehead,  or were recognized by an invisible guard at security ring number four could walk through a prison strength door and into  the waiting lounge and on outside.  Obviously a military operation of some sort was in progress, because four people in  uniforms  two  navy(one of the female persuasion), one airforce and the fourth army came out all revved up like they were going somewhere important.  There was a big black SUV outside with a diplomatic flag on the fender, the ambassador?  I have no idea who the ambassador might be woman or man.  In a small country like Burundi,  it could have been one of those androidian models from Nieman Marcus.  Discussions were going on about who would ride shotgun.  Then talk about where they were going.  Sounded like it was two blocks away.  Should I be worried?   Was there an imminent threat from Al Queda?   I had just walked those two blocks alone and unarmed, holy shit!

 

Finally I launched an icebreaker.  “What did you guys screw up to get stationed here?”  That got me a lot of cold stares.  Careers obviously were on the line.   Only later did I realize I could have gotten a hot lead enema from these guys and gal.

 

 

Chinese Army on Bad Road to Nowhere

 

Between the Burundi capital of Bujumbura and Uvira, the first big city in the Democratic Republic of the Congo lies sixteen miles of roadway, two border checkpoints, several MONUC (United Nations Military) fortresses, manned by Pakistani troops, smugglers disguised as taxi drivers and three wheeled bicycles manned by polio victims also in the smuggling game.  On the Burundi side of the border a small town of Gatunda lies alongside  beach resorts for the diplomatic corps and aid worker communities. On the Burundi side the road is paved and there appears to be some infrastructure.  Once you enter into the DRC, all bets are off.  Patrols of MONUC, run up and down the rutted and pock marked dirt and gravel road.  Did an artillery barrage do this or forty years of non maintenance?  The Pakistani’s I assume are counting their worry beads, glad they aren’t running up and down the Swat Valley looking for terrorists.  Somewhere out of all this confusion and mayhem, a small team of Chinese UN soldiers is working a mechanical shovel trying to repair the road, but making a bigger mess of it.  When my overheating taxi gets up to the repair crew, the shovel has half the road blocked by its presence and the other half blocked by its digging.  The operator appears to be getting on the job training (OJT) , because I don’t believe a tank could pass the open half of the road where he obviously has been digging.  Suddenly a Chinese sergeant orders us through.  I see no opening nor does a Congolese policeman who runs up to the mess and starts picking up boulders and tossing them off to the side.  The arm of the shovel is elevated now and the sergeant is insisting we drive under the elevated arm so thoughtfully held there by the nervous trainee.  We approach slowly.  The Sarge’s name tag is in Roman letters, probably by some MONUC directive.  His name tag reads  Sgt. I. P. Wang.  I’m not making this up.

 

By a miracle , we pass unscathed to head out of the DRC and onto the Buj.  Each time the Burundi cops stop us for a shakedown, the taxi heats up worse.  I know now that a 92 Toyota Corolla station wagon with hundreds of thousands of miles on it, really doesn’t need a lot of oil to keep running.  We make it into Buj with pistons and connecting rods to spare.  I ask to get off in the middle of town to avoid a final calamitous breakdown. 

 

Buying Eyeglasses in Burundi

 

Travelling last year through Burundi, I learned that eyeglasses are relatively cheap.  In fact there are many optical shops in the city, most run by the Indian community.  I stopped in one and noticed they had a very stylish selection.  Talked with the proprietor, a very pleasant fellow and asked about prices and delivery.  His price was good and delivery was ten days to two weeks.  That fit my schedule as I’d be leaving the country in two weeks.  He copied my prescription and did bifocals instead of tri focals which I had been using for a long time.  The order was then emailed to a manufacturer in India where the lenses are made and fitted and then air freighted back to Bujumbura.   Sounded like a winner to me except my hosts scheduled me against my insistence to go straight back to Kigali, bypassing Bujumbura.   I asked one of the Quaker ladies to pick up the glasses for me, giving her my receipt.  The owner had said that if I didn’t show up he would send them to the States as I had paid in advance.  The lady was my back up plan just in case.  She could also pick them up and mail them.  After six months , I gave up the ghost about getting the glasses and just about forgotten  them.   But when I came through Bujumbura this year, I made plans to try to remember where the shop was and go ask about the glasses.  I talked also to Joyce the hamburger lady to whom I had given the receipt to pick up the glasses.  She said she went numerous times,  but the manager wouldn’t give her the glasses, saying she must have stolen the receipt.  Eventually she gave up, but she insisted on going with me,  so that I could inform the owner that she was not a thief.  I was willing to do this for her pride and also to see if the glasses were still there.  When we walked in, he saw her and was about to exit quickly then saw me, and said, ‘Oh, I’ve been waiting for you Mr. Brose.  I sent the glasses to your home but they were returned.’   I verified with him that Joyce was indeed not a thief, though he seemed to take no recognition of this.  But it satisfied Joyce to hear me say it.   After a year to the day, I got my glasses.  Irony is they don’t seem to be very easy to get used to.  I’ll have to have them checked out at home to see if there is anything that can be done. 

A comment from an old Peace Corps buddy.

George, 

I very much enjoy your essays. Thank you for all of them. 

A year to get a pair of glasses has to be a record. 

I may have set a record in the opposite direction. 

Sometime in late 1966 or early 1967 I was in Dar and couldnt check into one of the dirt cheap places I favored and was darned if I was going to pay for one night at the Twiga, let alone the East African. 

To save money,  I did what any 23 year old idiot would do. I went down to the harbor, found a stone bench, took off my shoes, put them under my head and laid my glasses on the ground. In the middle of the night I woke to find my shoes and my glasses gone. I still had my wallet. And my life. 

I spent the rest of a fitful night trying to sleep at the door of an optical shop near the Askari Monument. When the shop opened I was of course literally on their doorstep, with, by good luck, my prescription, which was in my wallet. 

By noon I had my new glasses. And a pair of Bata sandals. And a resolve never to sleep in the open in Dar es Salaam again. 

Charles

V 1 N. 19 A Memorable Plane Ride

 

A Memorable Plane Ride

 

By George Brose

 

 

On August 13, 1985 my family were preparing to go home at the end of our teaching contract in  Zimbabwe.  We settled into our seats on the KLM Dutch plane in Harare.  Why KLM?  Because they offered a nice ‘missionary’ discount to foreign nationals working in the developing world.  They didn’t know I was a hard-core agnostic at best in those days.   All seemed to be going well until the steward distributed newspapers to the passengers.  It was always nice to get fresh papers from Europe in those days, because the local papers though timely and occasionally covering major international events were often filled with local news that only the locals could manage to find interesting such as the current price for tobacco at the tobacco auction in Harare or the latest rantings from Robert Mugabe and whatever dignitary might be visiting the country. 

            Tragically the day before our flight a Japanese air plane (Japan Airlines Flt. 123) had crashed near Mt. Takamagahara  and all had perished. Actually four people survived of the 524 on board, making it the most deadly plane crash of all time.   These were the headlines on the paper that was passed to me from our well intentioned servant of the airways.   He must have known what was there and probably should have withheld distributing those papers.  Not just about the event but some of the gory details.   According to the story in the paper, the aircraft had had some kind of mechanical failure but instead of heading directly back to Haneda , it had had struggled to regain control, an impossibiltiy because a loss of hydraulics that controlled the aircraft.  It struggled for more than thirty minutes, but ultimately had gone down near the mountain.     The story noted that several of the passengers had had time to write letters of farewell to their families before the crash and some of those letters had been recovered and were transcribed in the story.  So with that unsettling news, I buckled the seat belt a bit tighter than usual and hid the paper from the rest of my family.     

            The plane went on its way and I white knuckled the flight north and finally felt that all was well as we were crossing southern Europe and began our descent toward the landing  at Schipol airport near Amsterdam.   Looking out I could see rather foul weather and  almost without warning there was a tremendous bang on the aircraft, the lighting went out,  and it buckled and took a few twists and then righted itself.  The captain came on quickly to try to calm the passengers in English which was clearly not his mother tongue and said,  “We’ve just been hit by a . ………..long pause…..  hit by a aaa a  a .    Me, I’m thinking SAM missile (surface to air).   After all there were terrorist acts going on in those days.   And then he came back with the word  ‘blitz’.    I was relieved. I remembered my basic German.  Dutch was close in some ways, and that was one of the ways.   'Blitz' meant ‘lightning’, as in the familiar WWII term 'Blitzkrieg'  'Lightning War', but the pilot couldn’t think of the English term.   Eventually someone helped him with the translation and he did say ‘lightning’ and I’m sure many bladders were relieved to hear that news.  We landed without further incident. 

From UPI Archives  Aug. 18, 1985

TOKYO -- A terrified passenger aboard Japan Air Lines Flight 123 scribbled a note saying, 'I don't want to fly anymore. God, please save me,' as the jumbo jet tumbled through the sky before crashing into a mountainside, his family said Sunday.

Rescue workers combing the wreckage of the Boeing 747 said they found two emotional 'last wills' written by passengers before the plane plunged into a mountain in central Japan last Monday, killing 520 people. Four passengers survived in what was the worst single-plane accident in aviation history.

"We’ve just been hit by a . ………..long pause…..  hit by a aaa a  a "   

That had me sweating just sitting in my recliner.   Re the crash that killed 520 but had four survivors, any mention of their religion?   I don't travel much but an ounce of prevention, etc.   Roy,  Ukiah, CA

The actual cause was determined to have been an incomplete repair job done be Boeing technicians.  Nevertheless the plane had made over 12,000 flights after the repair.  Picky Picky Picky.   

Comment from Grace Butcher:

Hi George. 

I was heading home from a visit with poet friend Ann Menebroker (now deceased) in Sacramento many years ago. I forget if my return flight went to LA first, then Denver, but on the way from Denver to Cleveland, we had lunch (it must have been many years ago!) and  then were just droning along, passengers settling in for a boring few hours.  I decided to use the restroom before trying for a nap, and made my way back towards the back of the plane, locked myself in, pulled down my pants.

At that moment, without the usual warning, the plane hit sudden turbulence. I was thrown up against the mirrored door ( I wonder what my expression might have looked like), then slammed down on the seat, then back up against the door again, back down on the seat. While I was flailing around, my pants seemed totally out of reach, as did the door latch, and I had a brief image of my body being discovered in the smoldering ruins thirty thousand feet below with my pants still down around my feet.

Finally I got the door open and lurched out, my pants sort of pulled up. "Sit in the nearest seat!" the flight attendant commanded. But determined to die with my possessions, I kept going, However, by the time I got back to my seat, the other passengers were all just sitting there reading or dozing. My brief glimpse of my mortality was over and would quickly fade along with the bruises on my butt.

Cheers, Grace