February Blog

Here in Vancouver we are now counting the days to the Winter Olympics. In fact the entire province of British Columbia, as well as the rest of Canada, is gearing up for the games with mounting excitement, partly thanks to a torch relay that is touching neighbourhoods all over the country.

Everywhere you go in Vancouver the talk is all about the expensive tickets people have managed to get or, more often than not, been unsuccessful at getting. There is a lot of talk about people getting exorbitant rents for their houses but then there are just as many people still hoping to make some money on that extra bedroom. Vancouverites worry about commuting during the games while parking restrictions are already in force within an ever-growing perimeter around the venues.

In Whistler the skiing has been fantastic with the added bonus of shorter line-ups as the usual crowd has kept away during this Olympic year, something that was expected judging from the experience of former Olympic hosts.

In the February issue of Swedish Press you can read about a local cross country legend (page 27), the Swedish Olympic team (24-25), how the King and Queen will be received by the Swedish community (15) and an interview with Gunilla Lindberg of the IOC (20-21). We will report on the Swedish medals in the next issue!

With all this talk of the Olympics I thought of my maternal grandfather. Turning to the worldwide web, I was thrilled to find out that Henrik Horn af Åminne, with his horse Omen, really took gold as part of the Swedish equestrian team in the 1912 Summer Olympics in Stockholm.

In those days the competition was only open to male military officers on active duty. Today the equestrian competition comprises dressage, cross-country and show jumping, but during grandfather’s time there was also a long distance ride (55K in 4 hours) and a steeplechase course.

My grandfather also competed in the individual event and he was leading after the first three trials. But during the show jumping competition one of the straps of his brand new saddle from Palmgrens (the Hermès of Sweden) broke and although he cleared all the jumps, the strap touched so many that he only came in as number 16. Instead of being close to gold, my grandfather finished as number ten individually.

There was a story circulating in Stockholm that grandfather, who was both a rather choleric military man and a count - used to getting his way - was so upset that he went straight to Palmgrens and, with his riding crop, gave the owner a good flogging for selling him a defect saddle.

January Blog

Through the years we have written extensively about Raoul Wallenberg in the swedish Press magazine. The Swedish hero, who saved tens of thousands of Jews in Budapest during World War II, was taken into "protective custody" by the Soviet Union on January 17, 1945 and was never to be heard of again. In the February issue we bring you a revealing article by Josh Prager about the inefficiency of the Swedish government to come to Raoul Wallenberg’s aid, and the toll this tradgedy took on his family.

The story of Raoul Wallenberg is somewhat special to me as there have been family associations through the generations. My paternal grandfather started his career as an officer in the Swedish navy the same year as Raoul Wallenberg’s father. The two became good friends and so did their wives and I still have photos of the two couples sailing in the Stockholm archipelago.

Raoul Wallenberg’s father died of cancer before Raoul was born. His mother Maj later married Fredrik von Dardel with whom she had two children, Guy and Nina. When Guy started a company in Sweden my grandfather was one of the board members.

The von Dardels rented an apartment in a building that my maternal grandmother owned on Strandvägen in Stockholm. My mother lived there too, and when a Hunga-rian Jewish friend wrote to her asking for help, my mother wrote to Raoul Wallenberg in Budapest. I still remember the two letters he wrote back because of the German censorship stamps all over them.

Unfortunately the letters have disappeared, but I know that Raoul Wallenberg saved my mother's friend and her whole family.

A few years ago when I visited Raoul Wallenberg’s half-sister Nina Lagergren, to interview her (SwPr Dec01) the first thing she did was to bring out a family album and show pictures of me as a six-year-old playing with her daughter Nan (who is now married to the former Secre-tary General of the United Nations Kofi Annan). As my parents are long dead I did not know that our families had been close, but my conversation with Nina Lagergren brought back memories. I remembered her children’s play-house and even a long discussion at their breakfast table about whether one should crack or cut a boiled egg open.

It really is a small world in Stockholm.

If you happen to be in Vancouver on Raoul Wallenberg Day January 17, please join us at the Jewish Community Center where the Chair of “The International Commission of Inquiry into the Fate and Whereabouts of Raoul Wallenberg”, Irwin Cotler will speak of the Swedish hero's fate.