After three years of blissful existence in London, where my time was divided between attending classical guitar and music theory classes at the Guildhall School of Music, and completing my M.A. in Linguistics at the University of Essex, Her Majesty’s Government informed me that I needed to get my butt out of the UK PDQ. I certainly didn’t want to go back to Israel. Czechoslovakian borders were hermetically closed to a refugee like myself - not that I had any desire to return to the Communist paradise run by strongman Gustav Husak anyway. One day, while cramming for my M.A. dissertation at the London University library, I saw an ad that intrigued me: “A teaching assistant needed at the Faculty of Slavic Languages at the University of Toronto”
And so, after successfully applying for the position, my brand new Icelandic wife and I departed for Toronto. I did not suspect I’d spend the majority of the following 30 years there: all I knew about the city was the perennially losing Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team (the most successful franchise in the NHL despite not having reached the play-offs in approximately 875 years) The other thing I knew was that the average January temperature was 26F. That’s AVERAGE. There are many days of 10 below zero. Snow is plentiful, though being on the north side of Lake Ontario, Toronto is not the Snow-maggedon like its sister city on the south side, Buffalo, NY.
My job at the University of Toronto was short-lived. I got into a bit of a tiff with my Department head and, overall, I disliked academic life - and still do. My first daughter was born on a lengthy side sojourn to Iceland. We returned to Toronto when she was 5 months old. My youngest daughter was born three years later at Toronto’s St. Michael’s hospital.
In 1989, after nine years of tedious suburban life in Mississauga (a Toronto bedroom community), where I played occasional gigs and taught bored suburban kids how to play the intro to Jimi Hendrix’ “Hey Joe”, we moved the family to Reykjavik, Iceland. The 4+ years spent in Iceland probably deserve a Substack of its own. For now, suffice it to say that I had a very successful band, a quasi-decent teaching career, I got divorced and fell in love with two Icelandic women (not simultaneously…but almost) and was nearly driven to lunacy by the rigors of Icelandic weather, the intricacy of its language, the beauty of its women, the magnificent yet insane 24 hours of daylight in June and July, the 3-4 hours of murky light in the winter and the sense of isolation on a rugged island in the middle of the North Atlantic - which has nevertheless carved out one of the highest living standards in the world.
I returned to Toronto in 1995 and after two years of licking my wounds from the divorce and the heart-rending love affair that followed. I finally got my head together - at the age of 44 and embarked on a full-time musical career. I was able to penetrate the various cliques of the Toronto jazz scene, played famous jazz festivals and - the pinnacle of my career - opened for jazz guitar legend, the late, great Larry Coryell at a prestigious concert venue. I taught scores, if not hundreds of students, and toured the province of Ontario and as far afield as Vancouver, BC and once to Cedar Rapids, Iowa - a memorable trip that would also deserve more than a passing sentence. In short, life was pretty good. My second Icelandic wife (!) and I lived in a beautiful condo in mid-town Toronto and later bought a house in the suburbs (I’m not sure what was he allure of suburbs to my ex-wives). Slowly it had dawned on me that I wasn’t ready to endure many more Canadian winters and in late fall of 2011, I was able to obtain a work visa for the United States. In early December that year, I moved again…to my 6th country and have been living in Florida ever since.
I am now married to an American gal, having finally come to my senses at the age of 61. We’ve been together almost 10 years and things are great. I have met some amazing people in the state of Florida and have never looked back, though I used to travel to Canada frequently prior to the Covidization of our world. I’ve worked at Disney with some of the best musicians in the world. I have worked as a session guitarist at Full Sail University in Orlando - the best job I’ve ever had. As of today, I am semi-retired, playing one or two gigs a week, because musicians are like soldiers: they never die, they just fade away.
I’ll be happy to answer any questions about any/all of my former countries: CZ, IS, UK, IL and CDN. Or about anything that’s of interest to you.
Back to more current issues in my next Substack. Or not!
I've never met Icelandic women so any insights based on your experience could be interesting, although perhaps not aligned with your usual Substack content. :)
I enjoyed your journey from communist Czech to Isreal, London, Canada, and USA. I would love for you to compare the quality of life from country to country. What do you miss the most from each country?