Life is an Amazing Song

After the dark days of the Finnish-Russian war, having lived with my grandparents in North Finland and later in Sweden, I returned back to my Mother, sister and brother in the south, when the war ended.  We lived in poverty for several years.  Later a miracle took place at the internationally famous Hotel Aulanko, when mother returned to her previous position which she had held before the war. Us children also worked at the hotel as we grew older.

Who would have thought that a hotel bellboy in Finland, would become a successful Country Club Manager in America and finally the owner, with my family, of a renowned Italian restaurant south of Boston. Thinking back on my life, it was conducted by my Higher guide, God. Having experienced this amazing odyssey, my wife and I retired to the Charleston, South Carolina area, close to our daughter and grandchildren.  It has indeed been an intrepid journey.

FINLAND, 1942

He was smoking a shoestring in the bomb shelter while the Russians were devastating his grandparents’ city of Oulu, in Northern Finland.  Later they moved to their family farm away fromthe city, where even a Russian war prisoner became part of the family life.  This is the beginning of the exciting and refreshingly colorful memoir of the life of a Finnish boy growing up during World War II in Finland and Sweden and his eventual journey to America.

These memories are his story.  Life was bleak and raw for many years after the war when he moved back to South Finland to live with his mother, sister and brother.  He faced his mother’s harsh life.  His father’s absence during the war and later his desertion of the family made matters worse.  He left them without any financial help.  Mother struggled to raise two sons and a daughter by holding down a miserable job as a prison guard in an ancient castle.  She suffered in order to make sure her children never went without.

A few years later, they moved back to where they had lived before the war.  There they resided on the premises of the internationally famous Hotel Aulanko in Hameenlinna, close to Helsinki.  Mother resumed her old position as the food controller at the hotel and later, when the children grew older, they also worked at the hotel.  Life was beautiful again.  The hotel years were uplifting and exciting.

The book continues to the point when the boy at age seventeen steps off the ship SS UNITED STATES in New York.  A miracle had happened as he worked as a bellboy at the hotel.  He became friends with a businessman from Philadelphia USA, who became his benefactor in America.  He enrolled the boy into a High School in Philadelphia and took care of all the travel expenses and living expenses.  His mother and siblings had met the man and extended their blessings to the boy and heartfelt thanks to the gentleman.  This unbelievable dream became a reality.

The boy arrived in NewYork on January 11, 1955 to begin his life in America.
 
The book is a memoir in the tradition of Angela’s Ashes, the Swedish book My Life as a Dog, with also a hint of Tom Sawyer.

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