From time to time, I have mentioned the name of my Swiss friend, Vreni Griffith. I first noticed her unusual name when I used to stick name labels on our music mailings for the Lutheran Church of Honolulu—that was probably in the early 90s. I later found out “Vreni” was a shortened version of “Varena” and at that time, she was still the Organist for St. George’s Episcopal Church near Pearl Harbor. Later, when she left that position, she called my husband, Carl, to ask if she could audition for the Lutheran Church of Honolulu choir, and to her surprise, he said, “Yes!” She became a faithful member of the soprano section.

Soon after, we learned that Vreni had been born in Switzerland but moved to Hawaii in the early 60s. For DECADES, she has always traveled back to Europe for three or four months out of the year, leaving around the time of her birthday in May, and then coming back for the choir season beginning in September. And she is a big early music fan and has been going to (dare I say) a total of hundreds of early music and baroque concerts in Europe every summer.

The three of us (my husband Carl, Vreni and myself) went to the Stour Early Music Festival in Wye, England, sometime between 1994-1996 to hear famed early music soprano Emma Kirkby sing Handel’s Gloria. Unfortunately I cannot locate any pictures on that trip; neither was it mentioned in any of our Christmas letters during that time. I only remember that we stayed in a great Bed and Breakfast farmhouse during the festival. I think I can safely say that Vreni is a true Emma Kirkby “groupie;” for many summers, she followed Emma’s concert schedule and managed to see her several times during a summer. She tells the story of meeting Emma in an elevator one day, and ever since, managed to greet her with a box of chocolate macadamia candies from Hawaii.

In 2002, we met Vreni in Germany, where we attended the Rheingau music festival together. I took this photo after ordering an apple streusel pie. What we found was that she is a GREAT travel companion and guide, and no matter what language you need in Europe, she can speak it! German (her mother tongue), Italian, Spanish, French, even Dutch and Greek! And she has taken those yearly trips to Europe to explore nearly every corner of the continent and has visited many tiny towns and villages.

That year was memorable because we had supposedly booked an airport hotel near the Frankfurt Airport where we would be taking an early morning flight to London. We decided we would find the hotel first to drop off our luggage then drive back to Rüdesheim where we had a concert on our last night in Germany. After driving around in circles for at least an hour, Vreni finally asked for directions in German and we were able to find it. We all drove back to Rüdesheim for the concert, and afterwards walked to the parking lot to retrieve our rental car. Already a small line was forming at the Kasseautomat (automatic cashier). All day long Carl had been careful to save enough coins to get out of the parking lot. The women in front of us were fumbling for change and asked if anyone had coins for 5 euros. Well, Carl offered him his coins, then realized he given away all his change. By the time Vreni and I came up with the right coins, we took such a long time that the line behind us had grown to nearly a hundred people! So much for being nice to strangers.

We dropped off Vreni at her hotel then tried to retrace our steps to drive back to the Comfort Inn, our airport hotel. That turned out to be an absolute nightmare as we didn’t recognize any of the highway numbers and made circle after circle in the forest surrounding the Frankfurt Airport. As it turns out, the “airport hotels” are located about 20 miles away and our rental car, which we were supposed to bring back empty, was getting dangerously close! We seemed to be miles from nowhere and there were no exits, only cutoffs to other roads on the autobahn. Finally, I spotted a sign for Walldorf, which was purely a matter of luck since we must have turned on about 7 different highways on the autobahn since driving out of the Frankfurt city center. By then the gas gauge was touching the red zone, as we had arranged to bring the rental car back empty. Even then it was another 20 kilometers to the hotel, and we arrived on fumes and it was nearly midnight. In those days, of course, there was no such thing as GPS!

If you think I remembered all these details, you’d be wrong—I’m looking at our Christmas letter of 2002! Just to let you know that Vreni was often part of our adventurous trips!

Soon after, Vreni became part of our holiday feasts (Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter) which we have celebrated with dear friends, Frank and Sue Haas, and others over the last forty-plus years.

Here are some other places in the world where we have met Vreni.

Yesterday was Cinco de Mayo, which is how I remember Vreni’s birthday. I took her to one of her favorite restaurants, Assaggio’s, an Italian restaurant chain here in Hawaii. It was a day of celebration on many levels:

1) It was Cinco de Mayo, which we learned is celebrated more in the United States than in Mexico

2) It was Vreni Griffith’s birthday

3) Vreni sold her apartment in Honolulu at the first open house a couple of days ago and will be moving back to Switzerland, having lived in Hawaii since 1963, with a few years sojourn in San Jose, CA. She gives her realtor, organist Karl Bachman, much appreciation and thanks! (Yes, it’s a career change for him!) This will be a HUGE change not only for Vreni, but for all her friends whom she leaves behind in Hawaii. I guess we will just have to plan a trip to Switzerland to see her!

4) And lastly, but certainly not least, it was a big and emphatic THANK YOU (¡Muchísimas gracias!) to Vreni for seven months of daily Zoom Spanish tutoring! When I started trying to learn Spanish on my own, (because of the fact that my daughter-in-law is Mexican and my grandson speaks mostly Spanish), the challenge I had was in not having anyone to practice with. It was my son who suggested that I call Vreni, and she said “yes” without hesitation.

However, guess where Vreni learned Spanish? Right here at the University of Hawaii! I mistakenly thought for sure she had learned in Europe, but nope, it was here in Hawaii! After she briefly left Hawaii in the 60s to attend San Jose State, she returned to UH where she became a graduate TA and taught four semesters of Spanish. Then she became a lecturer at UH Manoa and had one class at Kapiolani Community College. About the same time, there was a need for someone to teach German, so she kept the class in Spanish at KCC and was a TA in German for 5 semesters. After that she did 3 semesters of both until a financial crisis forced full professors to teach beginning classes so lecturers were not needed. From 1981-1984 Vreni had a position that paid like an assistant professorship but after three years, there was little to do. She went to work at Tradewind Tours where she was a tour guide for visitors from Germany and South America, plus a few from French speaking Canada. What a perfect job for a polyglot! However, Vreni went back to the University in 1986 where she was hired to teach Spanish, and retired in 1996. She complains to me that it’s been 25 years since she retired from teaching Spanish, and she sometimes forgets some vocabulary, but I have found her extremely patient with me.

She has refused to take any money, so from time to time I have treated her to lunch or made her cloth masks.

And here is the Cinco de Mayo birthday girl at Assaggio’s Ala Moana Center taken just yesterday.

¡Feliz cumpleaños y muchísimas gracias! We will miss you!