Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Betty MacDonald and very good advice

Winter Pictures's photo.

Betty MacDonald in the living room at Vashon on the cover of The Saturday Evening Post.

 

Betty MacDonald fan club fans, 


Betty MacDonald fan club newsletter February is available  with many more info on 70th anniversary of The Egg and I, new fascinating info on Dorita Hess and a Betty MacDonald quiz.

Thank you so much for your good advice.

I guess I know now who you are looking for.

Tell us the names of this mysterious couple please and you can win a very new Betty MacDonald documentary. 

We can't wait to read new Betty MacDonald Fan Club stories about Betty MacDonald, Robert Heskett, Donald MacDonald, Darsie Bard, Sydney Bard, Gammy, Mary Bard Jensen, Clyde R. Jensen, Sydney Cleveland Bard, Mary Alice Bard, Dorothea Darsie Bard Goldsmith, Alison Bard Burnett, Jerry Keil, Joan MacDonald Keil, Madge Baldwin, Don Woodfin, Perry Woodfin, Mike Gordon, Ma and Pa Kettle, Nancy and Plum, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and many others. 


Wolfgang Hampel's Betty MacDonald and Ma and Pa Kettle biography and Betty MacDonald interviews have fans in 40 countries. I'm one of their many devoted fans. 


Many Betty MacDonald  - and Wolfgang Hampel fans are very interested in a Wolfgang Hampel CD and DVD with his very funny poems and stories. 


Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mr. Tigerli got so many fans from all over the World. 


Mr. Tigerli is very busy around the World because of so many serious problems.

We can be very happy, grateful and proud indeed to have these excellent Betty MacDonald fan club honor members Monica Sone, Darsie Beck, Gwen Grant, Letizia Mancino, Perry Woodfin, Mary Holmes, Bernd Kunze, Tracy Tyne Hilton, Tatjana Geßler,  Thomas Bödigheimer and unique Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mr. Tigerli.


Thanks a million!!!

Betty MacDonald fan club honor members will be included in Wolfgang Hampel's new project Vita Magica.



Enjoy a new breakfast at the bookstore with Brad and Nick, please.

Betty MacDonald's Vashon Island is really a paradise. 

This is my ESC 2016 favourite! 

Have a nice Thursday,



Bengt 




Vita Magica

Betty MacDonald fan club

Betty MacDonald forum  

Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( English ) 

Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( German )

Wolfgang Hampel - Monica Sone - Wikipedia ( English )

Wolfgang Hampel - Ma and Pa Kettle - Wikipedia ( English ) 

Wolfgang Hampel - Ma and Pa Kettle - Wikipedia ( French )

Wolfgang Hampel in Florida State University 


Betty MacDonald fan club founder Wolfgang Hampel 

Betty MacDonald fan club interviews on CD/DVD
 
 

Betty MacDonald fan club items 

Betty MacDonald fan club items  - comments

Betty MacDonald fan club - The Stove and I 

Betty MacDonald fan club organizer Linde Lund






Merkel isolated as allies slam door on refugees

Published: 14 Feb 2016 08:43 GMT+01:00
Merkel is battling for a deal that will see refugees more evenly spread around the European Union after Germany welcomed 1.1 million asylum seekers last year. But instead, eastern European countries are planning new razor wire fences, and even Paris -- traditionally Berlin's closest EU ally -- has shown little enthusiasm for Merkel's welcome policy. French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said Saturday that the mood in France was "not favourable" to Merkel's call for a permanent quota system. "Europe cannot take in all the migrants from Syria, Iraq or Africa," Valls told German media. "It has to regain control over its borders, over its migration or asylum policies." US Secretary of State John Kerry praised Merkel for showing "great courage in helping so many who need so much" amid "the gravest humanitarian crisis in Europe since World War II".

But he also told the Munich Security Conference that the mass influx spells a "near existential... threat to the politics and fabric of life in Europe".


 


Another guest in Munich, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, took a far darker view, charging that "it's quite simply stupid to open Europe's doors wide and invite in everyone who wants to come to your country".


   


"European migration policy is a total failure, all that is absolutely frightening," he told the Handelsblatt daily.


 


A number of EU nations that were once in Russia's Cold War orbit seem to agree. Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia plan to meet Monday to discuss how to close down the main refugee route through the Balkans, reported Germany's Spiegel news weekly.


   


"As long as there is no common European strategy, it is legitimate that the nations along the Balkans route protect their borders," Slovak Foreign Minister Miroslav Lajcak told the magazine.


   


He also opposed Merkel's plan for an EU quota system, saying "quotas only increase the incentives for migration".    


 


At the other end of the route, Austria's foreign minister warned Macedonia on Friday that it should be ready to close its border to migrants coming up from Greece.


   


Vienna also plans to impose a cap on refugees and may start turning them away in the coming months.


 


Merkel, long dubbed the "Queen of Europe", has seen poll numbers drop at home, coalition members rebel and EU allies duck away as the refugee crisis has sparked deep discord and threatened the bloc's system of open borders.


   


She has pledged to reduce arrivals by more quickly turning away "economic refugees" and combating traffickers, including through a new NATO surveillance mission in the Aegean Sea.


   


Meanwhile, her government has urged fellow Europeans to remember their core humanitarian values.


   


"How can a continent of 500 million citizens see its foundations shaken... by 1.5 million or 2 million refugees?" said Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen in Munich.


   


Merkel said Friday there was "a group of countries" that may voluntarily accept more refugees in exchange for redoubled efforts from Turkey to tackle illegal immigration.


   


She did not name the members, but at a EU summit in December, Germany gathered officials from Austria, Belgium, Finland, Greece, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Sweden.


   


Merkel is planning to bring together what the media have dubbed a "coalition of the willing" on the margins of a two-day EU summit in Brussels starting Thursday.


 


She suggested its members could help Turkey's refugee effort beyond the three billion euros ($3.3 billion) already committed by the EU. Turkey, which is hosting over 2.7 million mostly Syrian refugees, has voiced deep frustration with the EU as a fresh wave of Syrian refugees mass on its border.


   


Angry over calls that Turkey should do more, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said last week that his nation could throw out its existing refugees, threatening to fly and bus them to Europe.


   


"We do not have the word 'idiot' written on our foreheads," he said. "We will be patient, but we will do what we have to. Don't think that the planes and the buses are there for nothing."


 
For more news from Germany, join us on Facebook and Twitter.
AFP/The Local (news@thelocal.de)



Betty MacDonald Fan Club proudly presents:

The amazing, very witty, charming, intelligent story written by our brilliant Betty MacDonald Fan Club Honor Member - artist and writer Letizia Mancino.

WHEN YOU DREAM, DREAM BIG

Copyright 2011/2015 by Letizia Mancino
All rights reserved
Translated by D. Tsiaprakas

Betty, I love you! Your books „Anybody can do anything“ and „Onions in the Stew“ are really outstanding! I take them into my hand, and at a stone's throw I am right away in America ! Columbus and the egg: The great discovery!

Your bestseller „The Egg and I“ the greatest discovery. And you and I! I know America: It's true what you are writing: That's America: Absolutely right! No, even to the least detail! The landscape and the passion: Do you know the country where pistols blossom? Brava, Betty, you are describing the Americans vividly, genuinely, insufferably, brushed upon paper. If I like to read your works? To read doesn't even express it! I can even hear and see everything: Nature, culture, subculture.

America has almost remained unchanged! O those cool Americans! Calculating, stockmarket, Wall Street, the financial crisis (even back in 1930), the gamblers, the bankruptcy of companies! The swarming of dodgers and cheaters. People left without money. Dispair und hunger! A terrible „Worst Case“ (when I knew but little English I thought it is sausage with cheese).

Still how impressive is the ability to adaptone self of the Americans: They know how to enjoy life, acrobats of survival! In the twinkle of an eye they achieved to adapt themselves and effect the work of pioneers: In the morning you are a cleaningwoman, in the evening a brothel woman! No problem!

„The insufficient, here it's becoming an event; The indescribable, here it's done;“ Mary Bard Jensen, your sister, was the treasure trove of procuring work: My word, what a power woman with unlimited imagination! She has recommended you everywhere: Betty can do everything, also write novels! Go ahead, sister, hurry up! The editor wants to see your manuscripts! Up to that point you had not written a single line! Wow! And if still everything goes wrong? No problem: When you dream, dream big!

Just look, you have become famous.The Egg and I You know that, Betty? I'll slip into „The Egg and I“ and come and be your guest! I want to get to know your chickens. I hate chickens! I'm a chickens slave from North America! O Betty, without these damned animals, no chance of you becoming famous! „The Egg and I“ you would never have written! How many readers you have made happy!

Your book is so amusing! Your witty fine (almost nasty) remarks about your family members and roundabout neighbours made me laugh so much! You have been born into a special family: Comfort was not desired: I can't but be amazed: What did your father say to your mother? After tomorrow I am going to work elsewhere: Thousands of miles away...He sent her a telegram: LEAVING FOR TWO YEARS ON THURSDAY FOR MEXICO CITY STOP GET READY IF YOU WANT TO COME ALONG – That was on Monday. Mother wired back: SHALL BE READY, and so she was.That's America! Improvisation, change, adventure. You show no weakness: Let's go! Your descriptions, Betty, about the tremendous happenings in nature have deeply frightened me.

Continent America, I'm terrified by you! I feel so small and threatened like a tiny fly before an enormous flyswatter! Your novel is very many-sided! The reader may use it even as a cook book! „The Egg and I“ starts straight away with a recipe: „Next to the wisdom that lamb meat doesn't taste good unless it has been roasted with garlic“. Do you enjoy the American food?

O Betty, it's too fatty for me and I hate garlic! (Betty is presently cooking lunch for Bob. She's continually talking to „STOVE“: STOVE is Bob's rival; in the beginning I thought it was being himself). She turns round and says: Well, so no garlic for you. No lamb either, Betty. I don't eat any meat! I'd actually prefer only fried eggs. Betty, let me make them myself. Then you try it!

Blow! „STOVE“ out of order! I don't succeed in turning it on! Damned! It's got more of a mind of its own than „STOVE“ of my friend, Hilde Domin! Bob's coming! He must eat directly! „Men eat anything, the swines! Says your grandmother Gammy“. Is it true? Do you like my chickens? Bob asked me without introducing himself. Yes, Bob (rude) I love them! I'm vegetarian. Do you want to clean the henhouse with me tomorrow? A, you're always getting up so early at four o'clock! Bob, that's not a job for me! He looked at me disdainfully! A Roman cissy! You need a reeducation at once! Help, Bob's attacking me! I rather change the novel immediately and move to the „Island“! 


 Bildergebnis für Betty MacDonald Mary Bard