“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.” This part of a song would describe the Christmases spent by George Hermann. Could you imagine spending Christmas at the Foreign Service Institute, then Ghana, Korea, or New Zealand? Mr. Hermann had that opportunity as he served as a security engineering officer for the U.S. State Department. Hardwiring, installing cameras, and repairs were just a few of his duties while traveling throughout the world.
His love for serving this department showed as he took on tough challenges. Fortunately, those challenges never stopped him from making work and life better for others. Take a deep dive into Hermann’s collection of short stories illustrating life in the Foreign Service. In this “Moment in U.S. Diplomatic History,” Hermann shares his life experiences and favorite Christmas stories across the world.
Click below to experience Christmas time in Ghana.
Read Volume 2 of George Hermann’s short stories.
Read Volume 1 and Volume 3 of George Hermann’s short stories
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Excerpts:
“Each Christmas, FSI became a showplace. Christmas decorations from all over the world proliferated through the hallways, classrooms and offices. Doors were decorated with pictures, dried plants, colored ribbons and seasonal artifacts.”
Christmas at FSI:
Until the time we returned from Panama in 1986, the Foreign Service Institute was located a block North of the Rosslyn Metro Station. It was a large building, but it was overcrowded and some of the longer language programs had been relocated to SA-15 down the hill.
I was lucky enough to wiggle into two of the FSI language programs between 1975 and 1983 due to Department efforts to make Romance languages more available to Foreign Service personnel. I took the Early Morning French classes from 1975 until 1978, going in for an hour of instruction each day during the semester, and I took a 10-week Spanish immersion course just before my tour in Panama.
In 1999, my scheduled tour to Manila went up in smoke when Mount Pinatubo erupted. The ESC in the Philippines was down-sized, and DS had a difficult time finding me a base of operations. Many alternate locations were proposed: Seattle, Los Angeles, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, and Guam. Each of these sites initially looked promising, but one after another they were rejected. Guam was especially scary because it was an American Territory, and housing might not be provided by the government: would you buy a house there? (Wally Gilliam suggested that I hold out for Kwajalein.)
After several months of indecision, it began to look as if I was headed for Korea. I was told that it would be several months before the position could be formally established: possibly six months to a year. I expressed interest in attending the East Asian Area Studies course at FSI, followed by the formal Korean Language program they offered. I must have hit Greg Bujac on a good day: he approved the request and I began to see a light at the end of the assignments tunnel.
FSI was a fun place to attend. Each language area decorated its offices and classroom spaces throughout the year with travel posters, pictures of the countries where that language was spoken and small artifacts from the region. Teachers sometimes showed up in native dress or wearing jewelry from their country of origin. (I was particularly impressed by a teacher in the French course wearing a necklace of Mastodon ivory.) Coming in for coffee before class, you were surrounded by students learning different languages who were trying to converse with each other and with instructors to get the day started. It was literally a Tower of Babel.
Each Christmas, FSI became a showplace. Christmas decorations from all over the world proliferated through the hallways, classrooms and offices. Doors were decorated with pictures, dried plants, colored ribbons, and seasonal artifacts. There were Santa Lucia posters from Sweden, blown glass ornaments and paper cutouts from Poland, ceramic crèche scenes from Guatemala, wax candles in the shape of crosses from Jerusalem and foreign Christmas cards in every language I could think of.
As Christmas approached, FSI held an annual Christmas banquet that was not to be missed. Language teachers from all over the world prepared large dishes of ethnic food to be sampled on long, common buffet tables. There were perhaps twelve big buffet tables set out the year that I attended the feast, with pots and plates of food on both sides of each table. There were appetizers, main dishes and many desserts. There were many kinds and shapes of bread; there were brownies and galletas. Lebanese food, Greek food, Italian food, Arab food, Chinese spring rolls and Malaysian satay sat side-by-side as hungry students moved up and down the tables.
Many teachers attended this banquet in Native Dress. There were saris and huipils, embroidered Arab dresses, African robes, and Panamanian dresses with billowing skirts. Men wore guayaberas and dishdashas. The dining area looked a bit like a convention at the United Nations.
Everyone ate. A few of us students went back for seconds, then moseyed on over to the dessert table for Indian pistachio Ras Malai and a little American Apple Pie. The variety of food, color, costumes, food odors and mingling foreign languages made for an unforgettable experience.
New Zealand
In November of 2005, we brought our two children out to New Zealand to spend Christmas with us. We took our kids (young adults, by that time) around the city, showed them the fabulous Te Papa national museum, sent them down by ferry to South Island to see Milford Sound at the Southern tip of the island, and brought them back through Christchurch and the vineyards of Marlborough.
The Kiwi-Feather Cape:
In 2005, we were living in New Zealand. While there, we were exposed to the Maori culture in many different ways. The Kiwi National Anthem, for example, is always sung in two languages, with the verses in Maori traditionally sung first.
Shortly after we arrived, personnel from our Embassy were invited to attend a short three-day course on the Maori language at Victoria University in Wellington. As a retired spouse, I had lots of time for that, and signed up for the program. Our classes met in a Marae (tribal meeting house) on the campus of VU, with the interior filled with carved pillars painted red, each of which explained the lineage of a distinguished member of the tribe. We spent some time in Rotorua, the Maori homeland set among volcanoes and geysers on the North Island. I became interested in Greenstone (Maori Pounamu ) a form of nephrite jade which comes from the South Island. In an environment without metals, this stone was used for weapons and jewelry before the Europeans arrived. Finally, I studied the traditional shapes into which the Maori laboriously carved their Pounamu to form necklace pendants and earrings.
Near the Ambassador’s residence in Wellington, there was a local tribe of Maori that had set up an art gallery to show off the work of native artists. There was often something new to see there, and Gail and I went by the gallery every two or three months. Painting, sculpture, new jewelry designs in nephrite and carvings in whale ivory, bone and Abalone shells were usually on display.
In November of 2005, we brought our two children out to New Zealand to spend Christmas with us. We took our kids (young adults, by that time) around the city, showed them the fabulous Te Papa national museum, sent them down by ferry to South Island to see Milford Sound at the Southern tip of the island, and brought them back through Christchurch and the vineyards of Marlborough. One afternoon in December, I was running some errands with my son when I decided to show him a little Maori culture. We had become friends with the Maori lady who ran the gallery, and I wanted to show Andy the art work.
When we reached the Marae, they were preparing an exhibit on the Maori way of life, with oars from war canoes, wooden spears and clubs, ropes made of bark strips and Maori clothing made in traditional styles. A former Marine, my son sports a number of tattoos, including a “sleeve” on his left arm. Maoris of past years were heavily tattooed, and those in recent times are often inked as well. The lady in charge of the gallery looked at Andy’s tattoos appreciatively, and invited us into a back room. There, she invited my son to try on a Kiwi feather cape.
If you look at old sketches and pictures of the Maori, you will see that the tribal chiefs and their wives are nearly always shown wearing rough-looking capes. These were traditionally made out of the feathers of the Kiwi, New Zealand’s national bird. A Kiwi is about the size of a big duck; they are nocturnal animals that don’t fly and depend on running and hiding for protection. When the Europeans came, they brought a number of invasive species with them, primarily cats and rats. Ground-based Kiwis stood little chance against these animals, and many of New Zealand’s native birds were decimated by the feral animals. Today, it is a crime in New Zealand to shoot a Kiwi, but birds that die naturally belong to the Maori and their feathers can be used for cloaks.
We looked at the cape, which was beautifully made, and were surprised at its very light weight. It was made of a thin cloth to which overlapping layers of Kiwi feathers had been tightly sewn, forming a garment that was strong, warm and waterproof. Its color was a light greyish brown. The cape did not fit me, but it was a good fit for Andy, and a rare opportunity to experience firsthand an important native garment from the times before Europeans arrived.
To restore their avian populations, the Government of New Zealand has been gradually acquiring uninhabited islets around the two main islands of the country. They trap and poison any feral animals remaining on these islets, then gradually restore bird colonies when they are free from predation. Visiting these islets is a hoot: check out “Kapiti Island Nature Tours” on the web. You leave the North Island in a strange ferry on wheels, zip out to the islet and receive a briefing near the beach. Then you climb a small mountain. Different birds seem to populate different elevations of the islet; they are waiting for handouts as tourists climb through their respective areas. When you get to the top, the views are memorable, as is the trip back down the mountain on aging knees.
“During our second Christmas in Seoul, our kids found a big, round celadon vase for us with a repeating diagonal pattern of tiny white flying cranes which were painted over the iron-rich slip and then fired with it.”
Buying Celadon In Seoul:
Korea has many fine arts: carpentry, calligraphy, embroidery, the manufacture of bows of exotic woods and animal horn for archery and exquisite jewelry based on deep purple amethysts, to name a few. As we became familiar with Seoul, we began to encounter a lot of celadon, and gradually learned to appreciate fine pieces and unusual glazings.
Celadon is a form of Asian pottery that originated in China during the Northern Song dynasty. It usually begins with a fired white porcelain vase or dish, over which an iron-rich glaze is applied as a slip. The porcelain is fired again and the brown ferric oxide (Fe O 23) becomes ferrous oxide (FeO). In the process, the glaze changes color, emerging from the kiln in a light shade of green. The firing can cause the glaze to form fine little cracks. Over time, in China, the potters using this technique pushed the coloring of the glaze towards a jade-like blue-green. During the Yuan Dynasty in China (13th -14th century) celadon from the Longquan kiln achieved an icy blue-green color with a fine crackle finish visible under a smooth outer glaze. China treats Longquan kiln celadon pieces as national treasures.
Korea emulated many of the fine things of China, including celadon. Korean potters mastered celadon glazing in the 10th and 11th centuries and continued their craft into the Goryeo dynasty of the 12th and 13th centuries. The Korean craft suffered after the Mongol Invasion in the 13th century, but was resurrected in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Today, there are a number of stores throughout Korea selling objects made with a celadon finish, from dinnerware sets to decorative bowls and vases.
Land in Seoul is very valuable, and businesses establish themselves wherever they can. An important resource to a seller of porcelain is a continuous flow of customers: this is why there are bridal registries at major department stores in America. Seoul is also very congested and heavy with vehicular traffic. In some areas, there are ugly bridges built so as to allow pedestrians to cross the street without slowing traffic. In other areas, there are underground passageways linking several streets at intersections. Near the East Gate, my wife found a major dealer of celadon who had set up both his store and a warehouse underground at the juncture of two busy city streets.
Once we found his store, we used to visit Mr. Song periodically on weekends, looking for gifts and novel objects. Just about every piece of celadon sold in this store was packaged in shredded wood within a finely-made wooden box. We bought some vases, we bought some bowls, but the best pieces from my point of view were chopstick holders shaped like little animals and glazed with celadon. We have a box with chopstick holders for eight guests that are shaped like crocodiles, very lifelike and slightly curled, all in a light blue-green. We also have a little pitcher for ink-stone water that is shaped like a lop-eared rabbit.
Once in a while, with a visitor in town, we would go visit Mr. Song with our guests rather than taking the visitor through our more regular Button Alley tour. (Story number 159) Our guests could usually find some gifts to take home in this shop for a reasonable price.
During our second Christmas in Seoul, our kids found a big, round celadon vase for us with a repeating diagonal pattern of tiny white flying cranes which were painted over the iron-rich slip and then fired with it. The birds seem to fly above the green crackle finish beneath the clear glaze overcoat. The vase is nearly the size of a basketball, and it is a great holder of poinsettias at Christmas time.
TABLE OF CONTENT HIGHLIGHTS:
Joined the Foreign Service Office 1975:
Copenhagen, Denmark—Security Engineering Officer, 1975
Frankfurt, Germany—Security Engineering Officer, 1975
Panama City, Panama—Security Engineering Officer, Officer in Charge 1983–1986