Author Description

In the first few years of her life, four-year-old Sandra Schmidt endured TB, the death of her mother and the abandonment of her father. It is 1938: Hitler runs Sandra's homeland and soon much of the homelands of Germany's neighbors. She is raised in the safety of her grandparents' home until the Americans and British start bombing Germany and her village. Sandra is struck by a piece of shrapnel and almost dies from infection. Her lifelong friend and Sandra wonder what the "Jewish Solution" is all about when her beloved grandfather is sent to a concentration camp for hiring Jews in the market he manages. He escapes with the help of a former employee who now is a warden there. After Sandra's grandfather dies she lets an American GI trundle her off to New York, but doesn't like it there and runs off to California. But being beautiful doesn't guarantee you a job there. She struggles for a while, and after a few mishaps she lands a job as a Tour Manager to India. The tour company's management is impressed with her and offers her a permanent position. She always told her grandmother that: "someday I will travel the world". Oddly enough, this will be her new profession, and she travels with American tourists for many years. The dream she had of traveling with the rich and famous had finally come true.