A Pandemic Vacation of Memento-Hopping Across the World

Adding to the distress of this already coronavirus-disrupted summer is the latest target of the quick-to-criticize crowd: vacationers. Travel shaming is now a thing. Media reports say it’s common for people on vacation — even those taking every precaution to protect themselves and others in the pandemic — to be reluctant to post pictures on their usual social media channels. They fear being trolled by safety-conscious critics, including their own friends and family members, who might condemn them as selfish for putting others at risk.

I say, to each his or her own. But my wife and I have opted for a safety-first summer this year. Normally, we’d be in Europe right now, enjoying our annual hiking trip to Zermatt, which became a tradition during our 16-year stint as expats living Switzerland. After that, we’d planned to visit friends in the U.K.

I guess we could have bitten the bullet and gone, but not without forfeiting a huge chunk of our holiday in quarantine. That sacrifice, along with the coronavirus risk, convinced us to remain in semi-lockdown. At least we avoided the shaming threat.

But what to do? Our cabin fever is as bad as anyone’s.

Take Two Tchotchkes and Call Me in the Morning The remedy we’ve found, inadequate though it may be, is pouring ourselves a couple of drinks in the evening and surveying our apartment, which is decorated with mementos we picked up on our many travels during our time abroad. From our home in Basel, Switzerland, in the center of Europe, we were a stone’s throw away from Britain, France, Spain and Italy, within easy traveling distance of Eastern Europe and, thanks to more generous vacation time, able to take longer trips to Asia and Africa as well.

Sipping some scotch or wine and scanning our bookshelves, counter tops and coffee table, we always land on a souvenir that carries us back to an unforgettable experience: the happy Buddha from Hong Kong, the colorful pottery vase from Sicily, the wood-carved Burber camel from Marrakesh.

Not only do these keepsakes pass Marie Condo’s test of “sparking joy”; they intensify and almost fossilize, as if in a coat of amber, precious moments that enrich our life partnership. Some are wonderful, some nightmarish, the memories as a whole putting an exclamation point on our precious and still evolving marriage.

Three, in particular, stand out. However, here’s a trigger warning: Each includes a minor catastrophe. Collectively, though, there’s a moral to these stories that I hope will protect me, and maybe you, from sabatoging future adventures.

Memento Hopping — Story №1: Port Elizabeth, South Africa

South Africa was a popular vacation spot among my colleagues at work, so we booked a vacation of touring, wine-tasting and safariing. Upon our arrival in Cape Town, we instantly became fans. Over dinner at a portside restaurant on our first night, we enjoyed fantastic local wine while watching a wave of billowing white clouds pour like a waterfall over the expansive, flat top of Table Mountain.

It took a while to get used to driving a car on the left side of the road. Years later, my wife still reminds me that she was better at managing the spatial disorientation and keeping all four wheels on the road. Once we both got used to that, though, the countryside we took in was breathtaking, with its deep red earth, lush green foliage and magnificent forests along the gorgeous coastline.

We went touring and tasting in the Cape Winelands of Franschhoek and spent a couple of luxurious nights at the paradisical Grand Roche Hotel in Paarl, where we had a mystery tasting menu with each course paired with a perfect wine. It was the best meal we ever had. We went horseback riding on the beach in in Gansbaii, where more adventurous tourists went shark-cage diving. And we were taken by a friendly hotel worker for a personal tour of the shanty town where he lived with his wife and young son in a shack made of mud and wood with a copper top. From a distance it was a speck in a vast sea of huts with no electricity, plumbing or proper sanitation. Yet the little boy wore a bright smile and seemed happy.

The highlight of our South African vacation still lay ahead. We took the scenic Garden Route toward safari country near Port Elizabeth. Along the way we passed an archipelago of fascinating little towns and villages, including the Oudtshoorn Ostrich Farms, which sold all manner of souvenirs from eggs, to beautiful shoes, belts, handbags and wallets made of the distinctive leather.

We then headed for the Addo National Park, known for the densest elephant population on earth, as well as for three of the big five game animals — lions, rhinos and cape buffaloes.

The tour instructions strongly encouraged arriving before dark, so we only planned to stop on the road for a quick lunch so we could get there well before nightfall.

But you know what they say about the best laid plans. Out of nowhere, on the right side of the road I spied a H-U-G-E outdoor collection of one of the premier South African art forms I most coveted: Shona carved stone sculpture.

I’d seen some examples of the beautiful black and dark green carvings at craft shops in Greenwich Village, but here was a vast treasure trove of pieces of all shapes and sizes, lining a stretch of roadside that must have been 50 yards long and 10 yards wide. There were dolphins and whales and mermaids, fertility statues and abstract geometrics.

Back and forth my wife and I walked, trying to decide on our favorite, and having the luxury of speaking with some of the artists themselves. Time ceased to exist.

We found a piece of a man and woman holding on to each other for dear life, with expressions on their meticulously carved faces that, to this day, reveal different moods and feelings every time we look at them. But mostly, it’s as if there were a thought bubble hovering above them saying, “I can’t imagine how I’d get through life without you.”

We bought it for a song, and the South African woman who sold it to us wrapped it in newspaper. Shipping the two-foot-tall, 40-pound piece from the makeshift roadside concession was not possible, so I had to carry its awkward bulk in my arms like an oversize infant for the rest of the trip.

I lugged it from destination to destination, and through airports and security check-ins, until we finally got it home, where it now resides happily on our window sill. But the heavy lifting was not the only price we paid in exchange for the bargain we got on the beautiful artifact.

By the time I loaded it into the trunk of our rental car, we’d already gotten way behind schedule, and before long, sunset was upon us, and we hadn’t encountered the first sign to the animal park. Civilization was receding and nothing loomed on the horizon except a bleak stretch of concrete roadway and a desolate landscape. By now it was dark, and we were getting uncomfortable.

Finally, we came to a small sign announcing the park and I breathed a long sigh of relief. We parked the car and entered the small reception office, where the guard on duty told us we’d only reached the entrance; the park and lodging were still 10 kilometers away. “Drive carefully, and keep your windows closed,” he cautioned.

I took his words lightly, failing to grasp the reality of what we were doing: driving on a bumpy dirt road only a hair wider than our vehicle with thick jungle on either side, and all manner of wild beasts lurking in the pitch blackness.

If I’d strained any harder to lean forward to see the few meters ahead of our car illuminated by the headlights, I might have crushed my chest against the steering wheel. It was slow and very scary going. Until … the road ahead was blocked … by what appeared to be a dead end — as if the road had run smack into the side of a mountain.

Then the mountain lifted its head, and two unfriendly eyes looked down upon us. They glared from the humongous head of a gigantic elephant. Just recently we’d read that some tourists on safari had been crushed to death by elephants. We were terrified we’d be next.

I flipped the transmission into reverse and prepared to press the pedal to the floor, but couldn’t see a thing behind me. What if the path were blocked by another gargantuan pachyderm?

Next I contemplated a three-point U-turn. But the visibility was just too poor, and I couldn’t tell what lay to my left or right. I grabbed for my BlackBerry and saw the battery was low and it had only about had only about one bar of reception power. My wife gave me the park’s number and whoever answered the phone told me to be calm and wait for the elephant to walk away, assuring me he would. I dimmed the headlights to the low beams, thinking the bright light in his eyes might antagonize him.

But his expression didn’t change. And he didn’t move. So I called again, as the tusked terrorist blocking our way continued to stare at us.

Eventually, he did mosey along, and someone from the park came in a jeep and rescued us.

They drove us to our quarters — a comfortable, roomy tent — where I took an Ambien and awoke to silhouettes of a family of monkeys prancing on the roof.

Today I took a look at the park’s website, which said: “The excitement of discovering elephant, rhino, lion and plains game in their natural habitat lingers long after returning…” You can say that again!

Memento Hopping — Story №2: Siena, Italy

Something about the perfect symmetry of clocks has always appealed to me — especially antique clocks. When we lived abroad I wanted to find a special one, and made it a priority on our trip to Tuscany.

We thought we’d search the antique shops of Siena. We drove to the edge of the Medieval city, parked the car on one of its narrow streets and had a delicious lunch of salad, pasta and Chianti. Then we meandered, hand in hand, heads in the clouds, toward the city’s historic center. Called the Piazza del Campo, it’s home to the Palio di Siena, a horse race held twice a year. James Bond fans may know the Piazza from the opening of Quantum of Solace.

My wife and I then began to randomly wander the streets, hoping to find a shop with a nice selection of centuries-old clocks in good condition. After a while, we found exactly what we were looking for, at a price we were willing to pay. It was gold and intricately sculpted with a girl holding a wreath and a book standing to the left of the finely carved face.

Just one question, we asked the charming, grandfatherly shop keeper before agreeing to the purchase: How do we know it’ll keep running when we get it home?

“It’s been running for 200 years,” he said. “Why would it stop now?”

That was good enough for us. Mission accomplished, we headed back into the Piazza and back to our car. Which was… Where?

We looked at each other, standing amid a giant maze of spoke-like streets that all looked the same and connected in the center of this foreign city 700 kilometers away from home. Our car was at the far end of one of those streets. But which one?

For a few minutes, we were hopelessly lost and freaking out. But then I remembered I’d kept the receipt from lunch in my wallet: La Volpe. We hailed a taxi and he took us there, yelling and gesticulating in the inimitable Italian way, to fellow cab drivers who tried to share the tiny streets with him.

He dropped us off in front of at La Volpe, and we found our car a few steps away, as welcome as hug from mom.

Memento Hopping — Story №3: Phuket, Thailand

Thailand was another vacation spot that many of my friends swore by. When I asked why, I always got the same answer: Nicest, friendliest people in the world!

Really? Ok. Let’s see what’s so special about them.

We arrived in Bangkok, checked into our beautiful hotel and headed to the poolside tennis court to get a little exercise in before dinner. My wife and I had just warmed up and gotten a nice little rally going when she forced me deep into my backhand side and then looped a long shot way back to the baseline on my forehand side. I galloped like a wild man, confident I was good for the highlight reel get.

But just when my racket reached a couple of inches from the ball, I felt something snap like a broken rubber band in my left calf. I crumbled to the hardcourt in a heap of excruciating pain. The attendants fetched an ice pack and applied it to my calf for a few minutes before wrapping me up in a bandage.

My wife was not happy about this. I had foolishly put a big damper on our walking-intense vacation before it had even begun.

I did the best I could, though, hobbling through awesome orchid gardens, Buddhist temples and jade museums until it was time for us to fly to Phuket for the R&R portion of our holiday. All along the way, and most especially in Phuket, shop keepers, restaurant servers and hotel staff greeted us with their gentle “Swahdeekaah” and almost invariably inquired about my injured leg.

One of the staff in Phuket was so concerned that she brought the hotel doctor to check me out. “I don’t like the looks of the discoloration on your calf,” he said, touching the inflamed black and blue skin lightly and looking concerned.

The next thing I knew my wife and I were whisked away in a taxi headed for the Phuket Hospital. There a pretty young Thai nurse took me to a room in the radiology department and told me, as best as I could tell, to get naked and cover my junk with a small cotton cloth she gave me that was about the size of a napkin.

The radiologist then came in, laid me down on a gurney for an ultrasound exam to determine, he explained, if I had a blood clot that could travel to my lung and kill me. For the next 30 minutes or so, he ran the device up and down my leg, from my groin to my ankle, as I felt my heart racing like a spooked animal’s.

“All clear,” he finally pronounced. “You can go, but try to rest that calf.”

That night after dinner, there was a crafts fair at the hotel where we bought an amazingly tranquil Buddha head that now sits on a Chinese cabinet next to the reclining chair in the living room where I read. It’s one of our favorite mementos.

The Moral of the Story The invaluable life lesson that these three episodes have in common can best be summed up by one of my favorite lines from The Godfather. Marlon Brando, as the elderly Don Vito Corleone, tells Al Pacino, as his youngest son and heir apparent Michael: “I spent my whole life trying not to be careless. Women and children can be careless. But not men.”

Before you crucify me for sexism, let me amend the message to simply this: “Adults can’t afford to be careless. Especially when they’re on vacation.”

My practice today is to make sure I know where I’m going, when I need to be there and how to get there. Thank goodness for GPS. I know I have a poor sense of direction, so I need to be extra careful to take precautions to not get lost, to remember where I parked the car, to make sure I have important addresses and phone numbers handy.

I try to be carefree without being care-LESS. I don’t take risks that are unnecessary, and to quote our former president, I “don’t do stupid shit.” At least I try not to.

If nothing else, the pandemic has given me plenty of time to let the lessons of these near fiascos sink in. Hopefully I’ll remember them the next time we take a vacation. Next time there’ll be no excuses.