Page 39 - My Memoirs - Max Kurz

My health was deteriorating, albeit I tried my best to cover it up at work. I was in and out of hospital with asthma attacks. The health problem climaxed in 1969 when I was admitted to Prince Henry Hospital emergency in a critical state and managed to survive a very traumatic life-threatening process. My respiratory specialist Professor Gandevia put me on notice that if I continued to ignore the treatment recommended, I should not bother to return to the hospital if I had a recurrence. He was referring to the need for exercise and cortisone medication as opposed to relying on and only using relief medication tablets and puffers.
I heeded his advice and went on a food and exercise regime, peeling off a lot of weight with a noticeable improvement in health. I do not know to this day why it took so long to get the message through, however I did it.
Renee’s parents joined my business in the early seventies, firstly Elsa my mother- in-law who worked as our bookkeeper. She was a gem not just as a mother-in-law but as a trustworthy reliable assistant at work. Her employment was by design. Whereas my father-in-law talked his way into my business as a real estate salesperson. That was by circumstances not by design, they both needed employment. Mark was not an easy person to work with; we employed 5 real estate salespersons and we needed to create a team environment. Mark was not a team player; he was very demanding insisted on having his own private office, created havoc with the other members of the team and difficulty for me and my partner. We managed to get through it and learnt to live with it. The outcome was that he did well enough to be able to buy their first home unit in Dover Heights.
1970 saw Renee and I on our first trip overseas. Our itinerary was to fly to Japan for the world trade fare in Osaka then onto Los Angeles, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Seattle, and home. Our children were being looked after by my sister Sabine and her husband Reno. It was hard to imagine that it was just 3 years earlier that I commenced my own business on borrowed funds as a single owner operator and now I am holidaying overseas.
In 1973 we had our second holiday overseas. It was my attempt to go down memory lane, back to Manchester to revisit my home, my father’s grave, and try to unravel some of the unanswered issues surrounding my father which had always plagued me. Our itinerary was to fly to Rome via Hong Kong then onto London and Manchester.
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