Sunday, March 13, 2016

Betty MacDonald and difficult times

Author: Betty MacDonald



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

Betty MacDonald fan club fans,

send a birthday card with your thoughts of Betty MacDonald and her books to us and you might be our Betty MacDonald fan club contest winner.


Deadline:   March 15, 2016


You can win a first edition of Betty MacDonald's golden egg with a very cute dedication for one of her fans.

International Betty MacDonald fan club events are the best opportunity making wonderful friends.

Great Vita Magica news!

Wolfgang Hampel's new Vita Magica guest was a very famous TV lady, author and singer. 


Tatjana Geßler is an outstanding new Betty MacDonald fan club honor member.

Wolfgang Hampel  aldready introduced Betty MacDonald fan club honor member - artist and author Letizia Mancino -  in Vita Magica.

Other Betty MacDonald fan club honor members will follow.

The thrill of it all is that one and only  Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mr. Tigerli  is back.


Enjoy a new breakfast with Brad and Nick, please.

Betty MacDonald very beautiful  Vashon Island is a magical place.

I adore Betty MacDonald's Onions in the Stew.

Onions is Betty MacDonald best book according to many Betty MacDonald fan club fans.


Many ESC fans can't wait to come to Stockholm!
 

Yours,

Nadia  & Max


Don't miss this very special book, please.





Vita Magica
Betty MacDonald fan club

Betty MacDonald forum  

Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( English ) 


Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( English ) - The Egg and I 

Wolfgang Hampel - Wikipedia ( German )


Vashon Island - 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 groups 

Betty MacDonald fan club organizer Linde Lund 
 



 
 
 
 
Linde Lund shared Rita Knobel-Ulrich's photo.
Rita Knobel Ulrich - Islam in Germany - a very interesting ZDF  ( 2nd German Television ) documentary with English subtitles


The situation in Germany and Sweden with many refugees is rather difficult. 


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 2011/2016 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“!

German voters batter Merkel over migrant policy

Voters punished Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives in three German regional elections on Sunday, giving a thumbs-down to her open-door refugee policy and turning in droves to the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD).The result is a big setback for Merkel, who has led Europe's biggest economy for a decade, and could narrow her room for manoeuvre as she tries to convince her European Union partners to seal a deal with Turkey to stem the tide of migrants.
Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) lost ground in all three states - Baden-Wuerttemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate in the west and Saxony-Anhalt in the east - which were together widely seen as offering a verdict on Merkel's liberal migrant policy.
"These results are a serious rebuke for Merkel and the most pronounced protest vote we've seen so far," said Holger Schmieding, an analyst at Berenberg Bank.
The result in the two western states was the worst-case scenario for Merkel, who has staked her legacy on her decision to open Germany's doors to over 1 million migrants last year. But she still looks set to run for a fourth successive term as chancellor, with no real challenger for the right to lead her party into next year's federal election.
"The result will increase the noise within the CDU and constrain the government's options on migrants and Greece, but Merkel's chancellorship is not at risk," said Carsten Nickel at Teneo Intelligence.
Responding to voters' fears, she has promised to stem the flow of migrants to Germany, and is trying to convince Turkey to help - and other EU partners to share the burden. In the last few weeks, the numbers of migrants entering Germany have fallen.
AFD RIDES HIGH
With a high turnout in all the votes, the AfD, already represented in five of Germany's 16 regional assemblies, succeeded in entering three more.

Its support was strongest in Saxony-Anhalt, where it grabbed 24.2 percent of the vote behind a diminished CDU showing, surpassing even the Social Democrats (SPD), Merkel's coalition partner in Berlin, ZDF television projections indicated.
With campaign slogans such as "Secure the borders" and "Stop the asylum chaos", it was the first time the AfD had come as high as second in any state.
"We have fundamental problems in Germany that led to this election result," said AfD chief Frauke Petry.
The AfD's rise, which has coincided with strong gains by other European anti-immigrant parties including the National Front in France, punctures the centrist consensus around which the mainstream parties have formed alliances in Germany, and may embolden more European leaders to challenge Merkel on the migrant issue.
The CDU's leader in Saxony-Anhalt pointed the finger squarely at Merkel for his party's losses.
"The issue that has brought the AfD into parliaments across Germany can't be ignored on a federal level any more. We need solutions," Reiner Haseloff told ARD television.
Charlotte Knobloch, former head of Germany's Central Council of Jews, bemoaned a "massive shift to the right".
"If voters follow the call of right-wing populists and extremists to such an extent, it is a failure of the democratic parties," she said.
SPD SUFFERS
In Baden-Wuerttemberg in the southwest, the Greens for the first time became the strongest party in a state, with 31.1 percent of the vote, ZDF television projections indicated.
The state was a CDU stronghold for more than 50 years before turning to a Green-led coalition with the SPD in 2011 after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, and CDU support fell by another 12 percentage points on Sunday.
Also damaging for the CDU was the result in Rhineland-Palatinate, the home of former chancellor Helmut Kohl.
There, the CDU's Julia Kloeckner, who had positioned herself as a future candidate to succeed Merkel, failed to unseat SPD state premier Malu Dreyer.
It was the only bright spot for the SPD, the biggest loser overall. In Saxony-Anhalt, its support almost halved and in Baden-Wuerttemberg it sank by more than 10 percentage points.
Asked if the SPD's weak showing in those two states would trigger questions about SPD leader Sigmar Gabriel's future, deputy party chairman Ralf Stegner said: "No, not at all."
It is still unclear which coalitions will take power in each state, but the splintered vote opens the prospect of deep changes to the political landscape.