4. Travel Plans and Separation Anxiety

As the Spring semester of 1967 ended, I began making preparations for my trip abroad. Of course there was a passport to be acquired, my very first, which I obtained through the Federal Building in Manhattan. The boat ticket was arranged through the Honors Program.

There was also the question of lodging in Strasbourg: Traditionally, Fordham students stayed where Fordham students of previous years had stayed. I made arrangements with two upperclassmen (Mario Mendez-Penate and Bob Gilleran) to stay in the apartment of Ms. Erna Kraencher, at 1 Rue du General Castelnau, near the center of Strasbourg.

JUNIOR YEAR ROSTER:
The 1967-68 Junior Year Abroad contingent consisted of the following folks:
PARIS: Lance Compa, Peggy O'Kane, Rich Martin, Mike Gadbaw, Andy Cavanaugh, Rich Superty, Mary Ellen Curran, Hugh Grady.
STRASBOURG: Myself, Al Airone, Bob Golden, Maureen Fath and Mary Daly
ROME: Vincent Farenga
VIENNA: Joe Moss
OXFORD: Ron Berube
Plus Jack Williams, who arranged to spend a year in a Jesuit boy's home in Charleroi, Belgium.

SIDE TRIP TO MONTREAL:
Several weeks before we were to set sail, I was invited to join a group of friends driving up to Montreal to see the big cultural event of the epoch, Expo 67. This was my first and (until now) last trip up the Hudson to Canada. In fact, it was my first trip out of the USA, and a dress rehearsal to travelling in a French country. Our group, which included my friend from Brooklyn Paul Tapogna, and some of his friends from school, stayed in a two-bed hotel room (several of us slept on the floor) and spent two days in Montreal. We limited our visit mainly to the Expo, which was, for the time, a spectacular collection of international cultures, not too different from the New York World's Fair, which my family had visited in the summer of 1964. The biggest difference was the variety of countries participating - Expo67 contained a greater diversity of countries than New York, and especially the presence of the Cuban pavilion, which gave the whole event an air of danger and rebellion to us. It turned out that the Pavilion was not very rebellious at all, focusing on social welfare and international fraternity. The same was true of the Soviet pavilion as well.

The main feature of this trip which endures in my mind was that we spent just about all our money in the first couple of hours at the Expo. To penniless students, everything seems expensive, and all I can remember is how little we had left after buying some French gouffres (waffles). Montreal itself seemed just a tad dingy, not at all quaint or "foreign." After two days, we headed back for The City, and I continued my preparations for departure.

EVE AND DEPARTURE
Like so many events during college, the departure for Europe was preceded by a very late-night gathering at some classmates' apartment. The dominant image of that night was the music of Cream, Fresh Cream, a totally new sound for me (well, maybe not totally, as 1966-67 was the year that I discovered the Blues Project and Paul Butterfield - but Cream as much more a rock band than the others). I can never listen to this record without remembering Ron Berube telling me "Wait 'til you hear the lyrics on this song. Listen to these great lyrics!" while playing "Cat's Squirrel," which turns out to be an instrumental piece interrupted in the middle with "Alright alright alright alright alright alright // alright alright alright alright alright alright."

In the morning, we caravaned down to the pier in midtown Manhattan where the Aurelia awaited. A great party of our friends and relatives met us at the pier, and we boarded the ship all together. After loading our luggage in our tiny cabins, we went back on deck for what turned out to be about a 1-hour farewell party before the loudspeaker warned all non-passengers to leave the ship. About another 30 minutes or so later, as we crowded along the rails waving at our friends on the dock below, the ship began to inch away from land and out into the Hudson River, and little by little, as our farewell party receded into the distance, we passed Staten Island, the Verrazano Narrows Bridge and we were pointed to the Atlantic, headed to Europe.