Times and Travels

Coby Sikkens

Description

This book consists of 28 annual letters written in the years 1992 – 2020. It started as an apology for not writing Christmas cards and grew out to annual accounts of the authors life which were shared with family and friends. They are written with vivacity and humour and a far cry from the usual round robins which irritate us so much at Christmas time. There is a letter for every year, but the date of their appearance varies from anywhere between December and May and one even covers two years in one go. The book begins with back ache and ends with Covid and hoping for better times.

Sujets

• Personal Memoirs
• Biography
• Autobiography

Informations

• Publié par: Xlibris UK
• Date de parution: 07 décembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781664117174
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

TIMES AND TRAVELS


Annual Letters 1992 - 2020






Coby Sikkens



Copyright © 2022 by Coby Sikkens.

ISBN:
Softcover
978-1-6641-1718-1
eBook
978-1-6641-1717-4

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.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.




Rev. date: 12/07/2022






Xlibris
UK TFN: 0800 0148620 (Toll Free inside the UK)
UK Local: (02) 0369 56328 ([phone] from outside the UK)
www.Xlibrispublishing.co.uk
829439



Contents
1992, Ornex, 20 December 1992
Part I
Part II
Part III
1993, Ornex, December 1993
1994, Ornex, 26 December 1994
1995, Jakarta, 15 December 1995
1996, 1 January 1997
1997, Phuket, Tuesday, 9 December 1997
Jakarta, 25 December 1997
1998, Jakarta, 8 December 1998
1999, 17 January 2000
2000, Thoiry, 1 December 2000
2001, Thoiry, 25 December 2001
2002, Thoiry, 12 December 2002
2003, Thoiry, 18 December 2003
2004, 28 December 2004
2005, Thoiry, 28 December 2005
2006, Thoiry, 6 December 2006-3 January 2007
2007, 2 December 2007-8 January 2008
2008, Thoiry 5-18 January 2009
2009, Zanzibar, 22 January 2010
2010, San Agustin, Gran Canaria, 30 January 2011
Zanzibar
Exeter
Smallpox
Verona
Cello Arte
Marbella
Exhibitions
Christmas
2011, Thoiry 24 January 2012
Corot
Basel (Klimt, Schiele, and their times)
Picasso in Zürich
Gran Canaria
Mas Vacquieras
England, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight
FAFICS
Gruyère and Ripaille
Northumberland and the Lake district
Scotland
Crete
WHO
Leonardo
The Netherlands
2012, Thoiry, 22 December 2012
Alimentarium, Vevey
Au fil des Collections, from Tiepolo to Degas
Ariana
Oxford
Pentolina
Americans in Florence
Back to Pentolina
Merzbacher Collection
Cello Arte
The Netherlands
St Claude
Yvoire
Spain
Basel
“Jewellery from the Roof of the World.”
2013, Heredades, Spain 14 February 2014
Zanzibar
Bwejuu
Stone Town
India
Rajasthan
Delhi
Home again
Provence???
Pentolina
London
Dordogne
Valleiry
Gianadda
Summer
Selling the house
Cello Arte
Albufeira
Car accident
Visit to CERN (Centre Europeen pour Recherche Nucleaire)
Where to go?
The move
Spain
2014, 10 February 2015
2014, THE SPANISH YEAR
Heredades
Up and down the motorway
Edinburgh
North Berwick
The Highlands
Northumberland and York
Visitors and the local sights
Toledo, Madrid and Cuenca
Geneva (again!)
Return to Madrid
“Home” for a bit
Benidorm
Marbella
Jumilla
Elche and more local sights
Valencia
Barcelona
Guadalest and Murcia
Geneva
London
The Alhambra, Granada
2015, 11 January 2016
2015, YET ANOTHER SPANISH YEAR
Amsterdam
England
London
Outer Hebrides
The Netherlands
Summer in Spain
Apartment in Valleiry
Segovia and Salamanca
Apartment
Dali
Removal
2016 and 2017, 25 January 2017-30 April 2017
2016
Cordoba
Sevilla
Back to the South again
Bilbao
Bournemouth and London
Quiévrechain (Le Nord) and the Netherlands
The trip of the year: Venice
Back to the real world
2017
India-New Delhi
Subathu, Mashobra and Shimla
Delhi again
Spain (again)
Rest of 2017, 1 March 2018
King’s Lynn
Vienna
Pentolina
Ciudad Quesada
2018 and 2019, Annual letter
Glasgow
Annual Letter 2019
Cruise
Stratford on Avon
Lisbon
2020, Valleiry, 19 April 2021



1992
Ornex, 20 December 1992
As you know, I am not in the habit of writing circular letters at Christmas, as I generally prefer to write to each of you individually about the latest news. However, this year the events of the last few weeks have completely overtaken any possibility I might have had to get Christmas cards and Christmas shopping done on time (i.e., before Christmas 1992).
On 16 November, when one is normally just about to start all these activities, my back decided to give up on me and I had, I think, the lumbago to beat all lumbagos. Now that all is well again, I shall tell you the story, which is quite funny, if you think about it.
Part I
It was my habit to leave the keys of the house on the inside in the locks, both of the door to the garage as well as of the front door, to prevent, I thought, burglars from creeping in at night. It also prevents anybody else from coming in if keys are positioned that way. I should have thought about that. Anyway, on this famous Monday morning, I had gone down, opened the shutters, and given my ironing to Mme Roth, who comes quite early to collect it. I then went back upstairs to have my usual bath, and as I bent over to put the plug in, my back just got stuck and gave me the most frightful pains you can imagine. All I managed to do was get back to the bed and let myself fall on it. I was in absolute agony. I just lay there for some time, until it dawned on me that somehow or other, I could not stay like that forever and die of pain and cramps in my back. Fortunately, I have a telephone by the bed which I can reach from a lying position. All the sensible telephone numbers, however, were in the nice directory which I keep in my little study next door to the bedroom. No chance of getting any of those, as I could not move. For that reason, I dialled the only number I know by heart. It will surprise no one that that is the number of WHO. I spoke to one of my colleagues and managed to convey the message that I was in agony and that somebody had to do something. She looked up the number of my doctor in Versoix in the telephone directory and put me through to one of our medical officers, because I wanted to ask if there was any way I could possibly make myself move enough to open a door for someone when they came. John Clements, whom I spoke to, told me very firmly to stay where I was and said he would take action and come to my rescue and ring me back. Was there anyone who had a key to anything? Yes, I said, there is a key to the house in my desk drawer, but it is no good, because the keys are in the lock on the inside. My neighbour (for those of you who know, from the blue house) had a key to the garage, because one of her boys often mows the lawn for me in the summer and I had once given him a key to be able to do that while I was not there. However, to get from the garage into the house, one had to open the connecting door, and as said before, the key was in the lock on the inside. Clem rang the neighbour anyway, I think, and he rang me back to say he would come together with Nicholas Cohen, another of our medical officers.
In the meantime, I rang the doctor and told his assistant I could not move, I was in agony, and could he come. She said, very sorry, he is on a sabbatical, but his replacement will come as soon as she can, but not before twelve. I had no strength to argue and had no idea what time it was anyway.
Then Clem and Nicholas arrived. They found the ladder in the garage and climbed up on the balcony so that they could at least see me and talk to me. All of a sudden Nicholas was there, which was a great comfort, because it had seemed hours to me, and the pain was excruciating. Someone (to this day I have not yet found out who) had the brilliant idea to ring the pompiers (fire brigade) to help to get into the house. The pompiers must have arrived very quickly because I remember Nicholas giving me a running commentary from the balcony as to what they were doing below. All the time, almost with every breath I took, I had the most awful cramps in my back and prayed for some sort of relief. Death seemed a gentle idea at the time. All of a sudden, I heard a terrific noise, as if they were breaking the house down. Later I heard that Clem had been walking around the house with two of the three pompiers to see which window could be broken easiest without doing too much damage, while the third pompier, with an enormous crash, broke out the connecting door between the garage and the house, complete with frame and all. All of a sudden, there were Clem and Nicholas and three enormous pompiers and Mme Bardout (the neighbour) all in my bedroom. Nicholas was on the phone to hospital to get me a place. Clem got the keys out of the lock. He brought them upstairs. They also phoned the doctor again and told her to come immediately. One of the pompiers was sent to the corner of the main road to wait for her and show her the way. How long all this took I don’t know.
All I remember is that she came and gave me an injection of some sort, which was supposed to kill enough pain so that they could move me. The pompiers had brought an inflatable harness which they called couette. They wanted to lift me on it and then pump air in it so that I was totally mummified (arms crosswise over the breast) and could not move. All in aid of me not having too much pain when I was lowered down my most uncom