Notre -Dame- des-Neiges Cemetery

 On the way home from our outing last Saturday to Cabin de Sucre, we drove through the Notre Dame Cemetery in the center of Montreal.  It is the hugest cemetery that I have ever visited.  It is located on 343 acres of beautiful countryside on the top of Mount Royal.  It is full of chapels and huge mausoleums, lovely large tombstones and small markers.  There are large sections devoted to different countries.  We happened to drive through one that had many of the headstones engraved in Russian.  Another section was English, another oriental, and then French.  There were headstones from so many different countries.  All around are beautiful trees and lovely paths.

                                               At the very top is this gorgeous church.

                                              There are many entrances into the cemetery.

                                                 Fields and fields of graves.

These mausoleums look small in the photos, but in reality they are very large.

                             This one is build into a rock and the blue is a new one being built.

                                                See the statue of Mary in the crevice?

                 This is a tiny part of the University of Montreal that backs up right to the cemetery.

Just a photo of the contrast of old buildings and new ones right next to each other that we saw on the way back to our apartment.  Our apartment is actually not far from here at all, just about a 10 minute drive in traffic.

La Sucrerie De La Montagne

 Last Saturday we went to the Cabin de Sucre or Sugar Shack with the Conways.  We drove to the little town of Rigaud and drove up into the mountains where they have sort of an old fashioned little village. We drove through the beautiful maple grove and enjoyed the hospitality of a French Canadian pioneer era.  The 100 year old barn in which we ate is large enough to accommodate 650 guests.  The barn is divided into several rooms.  We were in a fairly small sized room.

 The walk up to the little village was pretty, but we made a mistake.  After parking we should have walked a little ways to the left and we would have had a nice ride on a wagon pulled by horses.  Instead, we followed a group of people who went to the right and we ended up trudging up a long hill with snow up to my knees.  I was wondering if I would even make it.  

It is traditional up here to celebrate the running of the maple sap.  The sap is collected and made into maple syrup.

 People were seated at tables family style and the meals was served family style too.

 The first course was a pea soup made from yellow peas.  It was delicious.  We also had bread and butter to go with that.

 At our table was a very nice and very fun family.  They live in Ontario and have attended this event for  many years.  They are both teachers.  Their two daughters were with them as well as a young man who is visiting them from England.

 When we first sat down to eat, there were jars of pickled beets, pickles and a relish/jam type of food which they called chili, but it wasn't hot.  It was very tasty.  They served these 3 things because in the days of the pioneers, that was what the bottled and ate during the winter months.

 Wonderful music was piped in throughout the entire meal.  I think the live performance was in the big room. I was sorry not to be in that room.

 The main course included Tourtiere, a traditional Quebcois meat pie, mashed potatoes with meat balls and gravy, wood-fired baked beans, smoked ham, sausage, and bacon.  Traditionally everything is soaked with maple syrup.  The syrup is very, very tasty and as unusual as it seems, the meals tasted really good with all of that maple syrup all over everything.  We all really liked everything a lot.

 The guy with the beard is the owner of the place.  He walked around and spoke with many of the diners.

 Dessert was pancakes and sugar pie.  The little piece on top is the slice of sugar pie that I took.  It is super sweet.  It kinda tasted like a really sweet Sugar Daddy.  I only was able to eat a couple of tiny tastes because of the sweetness.

 These troughs were filled with ice and then had maple syrup poured on top.  You could take a little popsicle stick and twirl it around in the snow to make a little maple popsicle.  Yummy.

 All of their bread is baked in these wood burning oven.  Papa remembers his Mom cooking in an oven just like this.  The beans and tortieres are also cooked in these ovens.

 This is the room where they boil the sap.  However it has been so cold lately that the sap has not been running.  It froze.  Normally this room would be filled with steam from the boiling sap.  For every 40 liters of sap, only 1 liter of maple syrup is produced.  No wonder it's so expensive.  I really loved the flavor of the maple syrup.  I will buy some before we leave Quebec.

                                       Another shot of the snow and the little popsicle stick.

                                                          The tiny gift shop.

                         This is the wagon that we didn't get to ride.  The horses were huge.

 This is how the sap used to be collected.  This particular place is one of the few that still collects their sap in buckets.  Now most places have pipelines that collect the sap and then it runs directly to the sap room.  It was fun to see all of the trees with their little buckets.   We had a really fun visit.

Baba Katya's purse.

My Grandpa Gherman was a very kind and very learned man.  He was Russian and of course spoke Russian.  He also fluently spoke 5 oriental languages.  He later learned and spoke perfect English.  While Grandpa Gherman, or Deda, as we called him, was working in China and Mongolia in the diplomatic service, he also did work for the Japanese Emperor Hirohito.  He did diplomatic work, translation work, and other missions whose origins we don't really know because he kept them secret.
At that time Japan had been in Manchuria for a long time since 1905 or so.  They had established a protectorate and had a puppet king.  From there they started invading the rest of China (Northern and Eastern).  Finally, they were repulsed by the communists under Mao Tse Tung and the Nationalists under Chiang Kai Shek.  The work that he did for Emperor Hirohito was very valuable and very pleasing to the Emperor.  He wrote several letters of thanks and commendation to my grandpa and he also awarded him quite a large gold medal in the shape of the Japanese Sun.  My grandfather treasured that medal and later gave it to my brother.

My grandparents were traveling across the Gobi Desert to a destination that I do not know.  My grandmother had all of their important papers including the letters and the medal from Emperor Hirohito in her purse.  Their company stopped for the night in a Chinese inn.  They ate dinner and were relaxing for the evening.  Baba Katya was sitting on a rocking chair and was knitting as they were all chatting together.  Suddenly they heard a huge racket outside; horse hooves beating, loud shouting and yelling and the clanging of metal weapons.  Baba Katya told me she didn't know why, but she picked her purse up off the floor next to her, sat up a bit, and put the purse under her.  She was now sitting on the purse.  The horses stopped and the Chinese communist troop jumped off them and slammed open the doors and barged into the inn.  They searched the entire inn, every room, they looked through all the things and everyones baggage, and they bodily searched every person except for her.  While they were there, she just sat there with her knitting in her lap and watched and waited.  The men never touched her, never told her to get up and move, never said a work to her.  When they were satisfied, they left as quickly as they came.  When everyone was sure they were gone, my grandpa asked here where all of the documents and medal were.  She pulled her purse out from under her and said, "Here they are.  I was hiding them."  What a huge relief came over the entire company.  Had those papers been discovered and had that medal been seen, they would have all been killed.  I know my grandparents were being protected by God.

The Chest

My mother's mother, my grandmother, Ekaterina (Katherine) Pavlovna Popoff was my favorite person in the whole wide world.  She was a tiny little woman, barely 4 ft 10 inches, but she was mighty in her deeds.  Her husband used to call her his pocket wife, because she was so little.  He also used to always tell us that good things came in small packages.  Katherine was the mother of 2 girls.  She was always busy working and doing something.  She devoted her life to her family, her children and grandchildren and to helping others who were in need.   At the end of her life when she had so little, she still collected  money and made things for those who were worse off than her.  At one time she collected money and clothing to send to families in Europe who had nothing.  When people donated clothing that was not very nice, she would repair and fix the clothing until they looked like new.  She always taught me that it is important to help those who have less than we do.  She was patriotic and always voted in all of the elections.  She was proud to be and American and wanted to support her new government.  Baba Katya, as we all called her,  because Baba is the shortened form of grandmother in Russian and Katya because that is the affectionate way of saying Katherine in Russian, always taught us to never judge people and to love people from all walks of life and from all countries.  She always said that you will find both good and bad people in any group or country.

She led an interesting life with many stories.  I will write about one tonight.

Baba Katya's husband, my grandfather, Gherman Simonovich Popoff, was working in Mongolia.  He was in charge of a very large operation and had many workers under him.  When it was time to pay the workers, he was to pay them in gold.  A large chest was filled with the gold and it was to be taken by a group of Chinese men in a caravan, through the Gobi desert, to the area where the men were working.  Gherman asked his wife to go along and to oversee the caravan.  This brave,  little woman agreed to do it.  The trip was not easy.  She was the only white woman in a caravan of many Chinese men much bigger and stronger than her.  They would be traveling through the desert for many days.  The first day the leader of the caravan told her that she would be solely responsible for guarding the chest.  Katya agreed and did this by riding in the wagon with the chest in it.  At night she slept on the chest to keep everyone away from it and to protect it from robbery.  It is hard to imagine that she did that and that it actually protected the gold.  The men had so much respect for her, that they would not have dreamed of touching her or harming her in any way.  Imagine how easy it would have been for anyone to get rid of her and to take the gold.  And yet, they did not.  She delivered the gold safely to her husband and to the workers.

Shanghai to San Francisco

 I have decided to write my story, on my blog, for my own remembrance and for the benefit of my children and their children and their children and so on and so on.  These photos are not my own, but they represent exactly what I want.
Like Nephi of old, I was born of goodly parents.  I had the BEST parents that anyone could ever have or want.  They were always kind and good to me and to each other.  In all of my days with them, I never heard a quarrel or an argument.  I never heard them raise their voice.  I only saw and heard them do good things for each other, for their children and grandchildren, and for everyone they knew.  They were loved by many and many of my friends, as we were growing up, wanted them to be their own parents.
 My father George Alexis Skopichenko (Scope after he became a US citizen) was born on February 13, 1913 in Samara, Russia.  His mother was a Countess and his father was a General in the military.  His grandfather Zavadovky was the Military Governor of Warsaw at one time.  When the communists took over Russia, about 1917, his parents and siblings together with my father, fled Russia via the Trans-Siberian railway.  They had to leave quickly and without anything.  They had to burn any identifying papers or documents because if they were found with anything that tied them to the royal family, they would have been immediately executed.  No questions would have been asked.  They did take some money and jewels with them that the ladies had sewn into the hems of their coats.  This is all they had to start their new life in China.  In fact, my family later had self-imposed memory loss.  They couldn't remember dates of birthdays, anniversaries, or other important events.  They "forgot" places and things.  They were afraid of being found out and executed.  They fled because they did not want to live under Communist rule.  My mother, Olga Germanovna Popoff was born on June 5, 1913 in Harbin, China.  She was born to Russian parents who lived in China because her father worked in the diplomatic service.
I was born in Shanghai, China on June 25, 1944 in St Mary's Hospital.  At this time, my father was a businessman.  He was the owner a very nice delicatessen/import/export store.  They had a lovely home on Rue de Soeurs in the French Concession. Life was very good for them.  They were quite wealthy and so they could have a "boy", a maid, and an Ama, nursemaid, for each of their children, my brother Nikita and myself.  They lived a life of fun and leisure.  The women and children took their vacations in Harbin because it was too hot in Shanghai.  The husbands traveled there on the week-ends and worked during the week.  They had many friends and many good times.  All of this changed as the Communists began to take over China.  Wanting freedom and a good life for his family, my father booked first class passage to the USA.  We were to travel with my mother's parents and were ready to begin a new life.  Suddenly my parents received a letter from an uncle in Seattle, Washington warning them not to wait, but to book passage on the General Gordon.  He told them that this would be the last ship to leave China for the USA because American Lines would be striking.  My father did just that, but now we had third class passage.  That is all that was left.  The ship was packed. All of the women and children traveled in the hold where all of the cargo usually goes.  I remember seeing wall to wall bunk beds with 2 people per bunk. My grandmother and brother were on top and my mom and I were on the bottom.  It was dark, crowded, and stinky.  Since my brother was just a  year old guy, my grandmother tied him to her arm so that he would not fall off the bed at night.  The men traveled on the passenger deck.  The trip was rough and many, many people were very sick and confined to their cots.  The women were given a bowl of rice each day for food and that was all.  The men had better treatment and more food.  I became very ill, but I was saved by my father and grandfather smuggling oranges to my mom and grandmother.  My father or grandfather would take an orange and have it between their pants and waist.  They would then go to the hole which the sailors use to slide down on.  They would wait for either my mom or grandmother, although they too were so seasick, to come and stand by the pole on the lower level.  Then they would release the orange and it would slide down their leg and down through the hole to the lower level where either my mom or grandmother would catch it.  They then fed those oranges to me and that it what saved my life.  I was told that they carried me very ill, listless and almost lifeless off the ship, but as we all know I survived.  My brother, however, was well and full of life and activity.  One of the sailors, a very large black man, took a liking to this lively little blond boy whose mom and grandmother were so ill.  Each morning he would come and get him and take care of him all day.  My mom said that at times he would let him climb the huge gate that covered the opening to the ocean.  She would be so scared, but was too sick to do anything about it.  Many spoke of the cute duo;  a big black guy and his little blond companion.  It was a blessing to have that dear man take such good care of my little brother.
                          This is a photo I found of  Shanghai in the 1940's.  We left in 1948.

                                                  This is a photo of the General Gordon.

As we came to the San Francisco Bay many of the passengers were allowed to go on deck to watch the ship go in.  I remember so many people thrilled to see the beautiful bridge and the blue sky and the beautiful white city by the bay.  They were sick and exhausted but so excited to begin a new life of freedom.  I remember many falling to their knees and kissing the deck and exclaiming gratefulness to God for their safe journey.

When we arrived we were greeted by my grandmother's sister and her family who lived in Oakland.  We stayed with them for about a month.  After one week my father found a job working for the shipyards.  After two weeks he bought a car and after three weeks he bought a little house.  We moved to Richmond Annex and our journey in a new country began.
When we left China, my dad left his business, his home, and all of his things with his sister and her husband.  They were to sell everything and send the money to him.  Unfortunately, during the time that we were traveling by ship, my dad's brother -in- law had a heart attack and died.  The communists came in and took everything away from his sister.  She was a woman, after all, and women had no rights in China.  And so, for the second time in his life, my father lost everything.

Another Snowy Day

  Last week we had another storm pass through, but it didn't last long.  By the next morning the roads were sorta clear and we had these lovely snow laden trees and bushes to look at on the way to the office.

                                     
                                      
                                                        In the office parking lot.

 Our little Pirus is a great car that looks good, is comfortable, and gets terrific mileage.  However, it sits so low to the ground that it is a terrible car for the snow.  We have gotten stuck several times.

Looking across the street, out the window, at my desk.