Trip to Italy true memory-maker

Vina Geraci Musgrove was able to do something most genealogists would give their eyeteeth to do - and she's not even a genealogist. She found her grandfather's ancestral home, and seven cousins to boot. She wanted to walk the streets where her ancestors walked, see the sights as they saw them. Vina (pronounced Veena) and her husband Bill went searching for her grandfather's roots in Piana Degli Albanesi, near Palermo, Sicily. She feared her failing eyesight would soon leave her blind, and she wanted to create memories of the beautiful countryside she'd heard about from her grandfather's stories and taste the food he told her of so many times.

So last November the couple took the adventure of a lifetime.

Her grandfather, Guiseppi Geraci, an Albanesian living in a small town, wanted to leave his native home because of the Mafia's ever- increasing invasion into Sicily. So in his mid-20s, he and his bride, Vita Mandala, immigrated to Louisiana, where they lived the rest of their lives.

The Musgroves were thrilled to find themselves in the Sicilian town that Guiseppi had fled so long ago.

The couple started their quest at the town's municipal building. The paper-search for birth and marriage records tugged at the heartstrings of some municipal employees who went without lunch to help locate the documents. They even worked past closing time.

And finally, the all-important papers surfaced.

"Everyone was crying for joy," said Vina.

Her new best friends in this town across the Atlantic also provided a translator so the family of two languages could understand one another.

The couple and Maria, their interpreter, were soon knocking on the door of a grandchild of her grandfather's sister. When Maria introduced the three of them, and said that Vina was a cousin, an immediate "reunion" took place. "We hugged one another," Vina said. They were made to feel most welcome.

When she showed her cousins the marriage document of Guiseppe and Vita Mandala, they were surprised to read the date, Oct. 21 - the same date on which a great-granddaughter would be married, exactly 100 years later.

They went to the cemetery to find the graves of Vina's ancestors, only to learn that because burial space is so limited in Sicily - and other European countries - the interred must eventually share their spot of not-so-eternal rest.

The Musgroves located the house where her grandfather was born. She was just as thrilled as any genealogist would have been.

The food she'd heard of from her grandfather was fantastic, she said, all except olives picked right from the tree. She remembered a special dish her grandfather told her about, made with squash and tomatoes, and a newfound cousin cooked it for her. It was a different taste from any other she's experienced.

There's the possibility of a return trip, since Vina also found her maternal grandparents. And while looking at a map, they discovered a nearby town named Geraci. Looks like a good carrot to follow to find the link between the grandparents' name and the name of the town. There may even be more cousins waiting to be identified.

Sounds like Vina could be a genealogist-in-the-making. (Oh, yes, Vina's eyes. She has diabeticretinophathy, which causes blindness in diabetics. But she's since had the fluid changed in her eyes; sight in one eye is gone, but the other eye appears promising.)

Quip: On the tombstone of an ancestor of mine: "In memory of Elijah Fuller who died April 8, 1799, Aged 75 years. Is this the fate that all must die? Will death no ages spare? Then let us to Jesus fly and see our refuge there."

Copyright 2000 Cowles Publishing Company
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