Two Countries -- One People

It took me a while to appreciate what I was seeing and hearing.  But after about ten minutes, I was all in.

On stage, Elvis, wearing a red velvet jacket and tight black jeans, leaned back and grabbed the microphone, his hips gyrating to the beat of "Jailhouse Rock."  Seventy-nine years ago, this performance would have been described as an attempt to rouse the sexual passions of a teenaged youth. "Sexual self-gratification on the stage," and "animalism that should be confined to dives and bordellos," wrote critics of his grunt and groin antics.  

Tonight, at a much more subdued roadhouse called Leo and Leona's, it was just another performance to a group of 60 year old's looking for a glimpse of Garry Wesley's Las Vegas act.

It was both entertaining and a little weird to listen to songs  I had loved and known all my life.  Weird because while the vocals and movements were Elvis perfect, I realized it was someone else who had dedicated years and years of his life imitating the persona of a much-loved performer who had died forty-seven years ago from prescription drugs and too many potato chips.

What possesses a man to wear a rhinestone jumpsuit and 70's glasses, dye his hair black, grow sideburns and modulate his vocals to sound like someone else?

I don't honestly know.  But maybe playing with the legendary Jordanaires, before a crowd of 30,000 in Santiago, Chile had something to do with it.  Or, -- in our case -- a crowd of maybe 30 die hard Elvis fans at a roadhouse located in tiny Newburg Corners, Wisconsin on a cold Saturday night in March.  Either way, it was entertaining and worth the price of admission.  Viva Las Vegas, baby!  Or as the song goes:

"There's a thousand pretty women waiting out there

And they're all living the devil may care

And I'm just a devil with love to spare

So Viva Las Vegas

Viva Las Vegas."

Joining us tonight were two visitors, enjoying Leo & Leona's for the first time.  They had traveled more than 4,365 miles (7,025 km) to spend time with Liz and me before continuing on their journey to better music and better weather than what they found in Wisconsin.

How we met stems back to our decision ten years ago to join La Crosse Friends of International Students, a cooperation with UW-La Crosse, Viterbo University and Western technical College to promote cross-cultural understanding between international students and La Crosse area residents.

I have posted about the students we have met through this program before.  It has turned into one of the best decisions we have made since our boys went to college and found jobs.  With more time on our hands, we got lucky when we decided to sponsor Jae Hyun, our first international student from South Korea, who eventually earned a four year degree from UW-L.  

It was such a fun experience, we decided to host more students from China, Sweden, Denmark, France, England and Japan, to name a few.  Most of these students didn't spend a year, much less four years on campus.  Many stayed only a semester, practicing their English and enjoying an American lifestyle and education.  Many traveled to Chicago, New York and Los Angeles -- but we did our best to highlight some of the simpler things Wisconsin has to offer, like local restaurants, football games, hiking on our bluffs or boating on the Mississippi River.  And the quintessential college necessity -- food.  Holidays, birthdays and gatherings around the table were some of our best times together.

During the fall semester of 2021, we met Katrin Latza, a student from Frankfort, Germany, who was an pragmatic young woman who flew around the world as a stewardess for Condor Airlines when she wasn't going to university to become a middle school physical education teacher.  She had many talents, but among those we enjoyed was carving a pumpkin, a healthy taste for beer and the ability to fashion together table linens that would be placed at tables much nicer than the one in our dining room. 

Like so many of our international students, she left after one semester.  But to our surprise, she returned twice to visit friends from college and to see us.  She even coordinated (with her mother) the purchase of an authentic German dirndl dress for Liz to wear at last year's Oktoberfest celebration in La Crosse.  Attired in her new dress -- surrounded by festive horses, bands, and floats --  Liz danced and drank with enough einsteelung to make her German connection proud.

And then last month, Liz received a message from Katrin that her parents were planning a trip from Chicago to San Francisco in March, and they hoped to stop by our humble abode for a visit.  They wanted to see where she went to school and lived while at UW- La Crosse.

Our initial reaction was "Great, it'll be like seeing Katrin, only older!"  Then on second thought, "What are we going to do?  It's March and everything we like to do and see looks like crap.  The only thing happening during their time here is March Madness, and they probably don't like basketball!  Why couldn't they come in June or July when we can show them how beautiful La Crosse is, and take them out on the boat?"  On top of everything else, Liz was recovering from her second knee replacement, and we didn't know how she would be doing.

After a shot of Jägermeister, we collected ourselves and told Katrin we would love to meet her parents, Guenther and Kerstin Latza.

Liz, with her usual enthusiasm for all things fun, sat down and searched the internet for what was happening in La Crosse the weekend of March 16th.  The options were sparse to say the least.

"La Crosse Events in March" showed nothing.   Nothing happening at the La Crosse Community Theatre either.  The La Crosse Center had announced the inaugural Pabst versus Old Style contest, with local bands playing (none of which we had ever heard before.)  I could only imagine a sparsely attended event by twenty year old's with bad hair and poor taste in beer.  Not the kind of thing you wanted to show someone used to Frankfurt's more sophisticated night life. 

Katrin had made her own list of things to show them -- Grand Dad's Bluff where you can see three states and the Mississippi River basin.  A walk along Riverside Park with a view of the Mississippi, Black and La Crosse rivers.  The Bodega Brew Pub with over 400 bottled beers and 20 taps.  And The Pearl, her favorite ice cream shop on Pearl Street.

We finally decided on a full day of ordinary things,  determined to make the best of it.  La Crosse is lucky enough to have a small museum downtown called the Dahl Auto Museum, which is really a cool place if you liked vintage cars.  The Dahl family has been in the automobile industry for over a century, and inside, we were able to learn about the evolution of Ford cars through the last ten decades.  I've been in the museum a number of times, and I still enjoy seeing the Model T's from the early 1900's, the Fairlane's and Thunderbird's from the 1950's and the awesome Mustang GTO's from the last decade.

From there we drove to the lookout over Grand Dad's Bluff, where they could see the entire city of La Crosse, the river and bluffs that are key to our Driftless Region.  Our distinct topography represents a small piece of the Upper Mississippi Region that  was miraculously left untouched by glacial erosion and deposits.  As a result, our area has become a destination for people looking for examples of the natural, rugged terrain that once spanned the upper Midwest.

Our next stop was the University of Wisconsin- La Crosse, which -- because it was spring break and empty of all students -- resembled the aftermath of some terrible catastrophe that decimated humanity.  Walking through the empty campus and their vacant buildings, left me wondering if one misstep would unleashed hundreds of zombie students from a locked, basement laboratory.   Equally disturbing was the realization that UW-L's chancellor had been fired recently, after it was discovered he was making porn films on campus with his wife (as far as we know, no students were involved).  I still don't know if Guenther or Kirsten believed us -- somethings get lost in translation, and I wasn't about to act it out.

We finally stopped for a quick drink at the Bodega Brew Pub, where you can always find a beer you will like.  Unfortunately, we didn't have time to get one of their special Bavarian twist pretzels.  But we did have the time to watch the Wisconsin Badgers and Purdue Boilermakers battle it out to an overtime win for Bucky in the Big Ten Tournament.  My joy was short lived, however, as the Badgers quickly lost the following week to the lowly James Madison.  But it was great while it lasted, as was the Harp beer on tap.

Our final choice was a concert Saturday night at Leo and Leona's where some guy named Elvis was performing his greatest hits...

I took my spoon and carefully cut the small apricot-like fruit which was soaking in Jack Daniel's Winter Jack liqueur.  Moments before Guenther, Kerstin, Liz and I had raised our wobbling little fruits in a toast to a resounding "Prost!" before taking a bite and sip.  The sweetness of the fruit and the warmth of the whiskey was the perfect contrast to the sting of the Jack Daniels.

Earlier in the day, Kerstin had informed us that this was known as mispelchen, a popular digestif served in certain Frankfurt cider houses at the end of meals.  It was usually served with apple brandy, but we improvised with the Jack Daniels they had picked up at Festival Foods in the village.  It's a  drink that is served with a small loquat fruit at the bottom.  It was new to Liz and I, but apparently it is quite popular in Germany, even though the fruit is not native to the country.  Somehow it made its way from Asia to Spain and France to Germany, where it is enjoyed by many.

All I know is that it WAS tasty and the perfect ending to our meal of  scalloped potatoes, carrots and pork tenderloin and another German favorite -- semmelknodel, or bread dumpling.   We never know what to serve our international students, and Guenther and Kerstin were no different.  Hopefully they enjoyed it as much as we did the mispelchen and semmelknodel.

In fact, we hope they had enjoyed their time in La Crosse.  

We found out that our conversations were more important than the things we were doing.  Guenther -- like Katrin --was never one without words.  Over a few beers, I discovered his view on immigration, schooling and raising children are the same as ours.  The same problems exist in Germany, as they do here in the United States.  The solution is never the government, but the everyday people who have to work for a living.  

Other things we agreed on -- Nazareth, Def Leopard, Bon Jovi and Billy Idol.  When traveling to other countries, the strangest things are the bathroom and kitchen.  And the bedroom, where we discovered the answer to marital fighting over who gets the bed covers is two single-sized duvets.   America has a lot to learn when it comes to the bedroom, but it's not the sex.

We also talked about their trip.  At least we were able to give them a few nights not spent sleeping in a hotel or camper.   We discussed their plans for stops in Denver, the Grand Canyon (and other national parks within reach), Las Vegas, and San Francisco.  In the place where Tony Bennett lost his heart, they were meeting their daughters for a trip down scenic Highway 1 to Los Angeles before flying back to Frankfurt.

I always believe that if I am having a good time doing something, the people I'm with usually do, as well.   And even though we were worried about showing them a good time, we quickly agreed that despite being from different countries and speaking different languages, our similarities were far more numerous than our differences.

The world would be a better place today, if we could all spend a weekend together -- especially if it included a whole lot of shakin' down at the local roadhouse.

Danke für eine gute Zeit!