All Those Nice Cottages

Avi Kaner was sitting in the airport the other day, waiting for an overseas flight.

Avi is Westport’s Board of Finance chairman, but at that moment he was like any other traveler: killing time by chatting with a random stranger also waiting to board.

The man — Uwe — lives in Italy. but was raised in Germany. When Avi said mentioned his own home, Uwe said,  “I lived in Westport!”

Turns out Uwe was a member of the Wollmatingen Soccer Club, in Konstanz. For over a decade beginning in the early 1970s, Westport and Konstanz had an exchange program. I remember those days well.

One summer, Westport players and coaches would travel abroad for 2 weeks. We’d stay in host homes, and in the spirit of freundschaft the German families took us all around beautiful Lake Constance, throughout southern Germany, and into the nearby Swiss Alps.

The next year, we’d reciprocate. We’d open our homes to them, arranging cookouts at Compo and excursions to New York City and Mystic.

There was plenty of soccer too. (Yes, the Americans did fine.)

Clearly, Uwe remembered Westport fondly — to the point of saying he “lived” here.

Of course, he had a few questions for Avi. For example, he asked about “all those nice cottages spread throughout Westport.”

Time sure plays tricks on the memories of our youth.