Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
thousands of Germans had stretched an arm in allegiance and abeyance to
der füehrer
for
world domination forever . . .
“Nein! No, I was not a Nazi. I was too young. I was only Hitlerjugend. We was kids—
ve
vas kids
—younger than you. It was like camp. We didn't know what it was. Oh, today they all
tell you they didn't know how terrible—they all say they hid their Jews in the basement. They
knew. But we was kids. We didn't know. You ask these kids around here today about Nazi.
They will tell you,
Vas? Vas iss los? Nazi?
They know nothing about that. What? You think they
learn it in school? No. What is to teach, that we made a mistake of character and judgment?
No. We are taught that we went to war and we lost, and now it is over. My father was a tank
commander, but he wasn't a Nazi. He was a soldier. In the desert. You know.”
David stared.
I pondered Nazis and 33% tax and another eight hundred miles to Amsterdam and an-
other thousand miles to Middle America. That's when Gary Cooper walked up with his trade-
mark swagger and slow confidence to ask, “How much?”
“Where are you from?”
“Venice.”
Gary had shaggy blond hair and was clearly one of us. Dolph said, “You don't look Italian.”
“Venice Beach, man.”
“Five hundred.”
He nodded. “I'll give you five hundred if you can wait.”
“Wait for what?”
“Till I get home, man. I got two hundred I can give you now, but I'll have to save the other
three. Shouldn't take more'n a few months.”
“This you can do,” Dolph said. “Selling to another American has no tax. Who is to know?”
“But what about the title and registration?”
“Doesn't matter. You sign over the registration in his name so he can cross the border.
Then you work out the money with him.”
“You want to drive it?”
“Fuck yeah, man.”
So Gary Cooper, whose name sounded suspiciously like a Venice Beach bid for Phase II
stardom in Hollywood and an easy motorcycle hustle, roared up Schwabbing. That he turned
around and came back was the big surprise, as I realized when he pulled out that the whole
show could have been staged.
But it was a time of confidences. It was not staged. It was coincidence, or synchronous
convergence, similar as two paths crossing in a snowy wood without the snow but with the
same faith and trust. Yet again the age embraced the lyric.
The bigger surprise was the overwhelming relief when Gary Cooper pressed two hundred
dollars into my hand with a handshake and a promise to pay the other three hundred in the
