Steve Sylvia holds the critical job of maintenance supervisor for Southport.

Steve Sylvia is a member of a rare breed, the almost native Cape Codder. He was actually born on Martha's Vineyard, where his mother can trace her family back to the 1700s, but moved to Cataumet at the age of three when the telephone company transferred his father to the Cape.  

He grew up as the oldest of five children. Each time his mother was expecting a brother or sister for him, she returned to the Vineyard so that all of her children would be born on the island, but Steve's roots are firmly planted in the soil of Cape Cod.

Steve is a familiar sight around Southport. Maintaining the exteriors of the more than 500 condos that are no longer covered by warranties, opening the outdoor pool and ensuring the water quality of both the indoor and outdoor pools, keeping the various game courts in good condition and tending to the needs of the Village Center are all within his job description. In addition, Steve and his assistant Mark Kromelbein are responsible for setting up for all events and parties at Southport. Add to that his availability to work for individual homeowners on his own time and you have a picture of a very busy man.

But Steve's position at Southport still affords him more free time than his previous job. Before coming to Southport six years ago, Steve spent 12 years in the food distribution business, servicing all of the Shaw's Markets from Hyannis to Provincetown. He turned a floundering business into a profitable operation but it required working six days a week, 14 to 15 hours a day.  

Kathleen and the Sylvia  Sons

He gave it all up to be able to spend more time with his wife of 33 years, Kathleen, and their two sons. His oldest son is a student at New England Tech, where he is studying computer science, and his younger son attends the Chamberlain International School in Middleboro.

When an opportunity to work at Southport became available, Steve applied for the job of assistant to the superintendent of maintenance. He was hired and quickly moved into the superintendent's position.  

Steve is a "godsend," according to Village Center Director Sue Aitken. "He's a team player who always does the job correctly. He's dependable and organized and always has the best interests of the residents at heart."

As part of his responsibilities, Steve studied to become a Certified Pool Operator, which means that his name and license are on the line with the Mashpee Board of Health. The board has referred to Southport's pools as the "best kept pools in town," thanks to Steve and Mark.

When not busy at Southport, Steve likes to spend time in his workshop making cabinets and furniture for family and friends. He built a photography studio for Kathleen, who does portrait and wedding photography and also works as a pharmacy technician for Rite-Aid. Since he was a small boy Steve has also enjoyed drawing with charcoal and pastels, but his real passion is his Harley. He and Kathleen, who rides behind him, travel on the bike as often as possible. Last year they spent 11 days riding the back roads of Tennessee, Georgia, South and North Carolina.

Steve is an officer of the Cape Cod HOGs, that's the Harley Owners Group, an organization of Harley enthusiasts from all walks of life. The HOGs primary purpose is recreational but twice a year they participate in charitable rides. In May they ride to support Compassionate Care ALS and in November they collect Christmas toys for the Charter Home in North Falmouth.  

A serious bike accident in 2011 has not diminished Steve's enthusiasm for his Harley.

Several months ago, Steve and his bike fell victim to a serious accident. Returning alone on his bike to his Hatchville home after having dinner with Kathleen in Falmouth, he had to lay his bike down due to the poor decisions of a minivan driver. He suffered a separated shoulder and a concussion and was out of work for a month. He jokes that it took longer to fix him than it did to fix his bike.    

The outpouring of concern by the residents of Southport was overwhelming; he received over 200 cards and good wishes from his friends here. Even after this ordeal, however, Steve still loves his bike and would not think of giving up the freedom and pleasure it gives him.

Diane and Harry Ogasian are high-energy, fun-loving people who like to travel. Since moving here from Connecticut three years ago, they've spent two weeks in Provence, France, gone island hopping off the coast of Italy, zip lining in the Caribbean and sailing on a Southport repositioning cruise.

Diane & Harry Ogasian, high in the Andes, explored the 'lost city' of Machu Picchu, as well as the modern cities of Lima and Cusco, Peru.

In February 2011they flew to Lima, Peru to begin a 17-day Tauck tour: Peru and the Galapagos Islands--the first half emphasizing the history and culture of Peru and the second focused on the distinctive flora and fauna of the Galapagos Islands. In Lima, a bustling modern city of nearly nine million people, they met 40 fellow travelers and their Peruvian Inca guide, a handsome, charismatic young man fluent in five languages.

Lima was founded in 1535 by the Spanish conqueror Francisco Pizarro and retains much of its Spanish heritage. On the day they spent there, Diane and Harry visited the Museo Larco (National Museum) where they viewed artifacts from the pre-Hispanic cultures that existed between 1400 BC and 1532. At dinner they enjoyed pisco sours, the national drink, and were entertained by dancers from several Inca groups, all dressed in tribal regalia. Diane said, "they looked like they had just walked out of the pages of National Geographic Magazine."

The following morning they flew into Cusco, 310 miles east of Lima, and then motored to their hotel in El Valle Sagrado, the Sacred Valley of the Inca. That afternoon they explored the ruins of the Inca fortress at Ollantaytamba, a National Archaeological Park. From there they were scheduled to board a train for a two-hour ride to Machu Picchu, but flooding on the river that borders the tracks delayed their departure for a day. (At the same time the year before, 2,000 tourists were airlifted out of Machu Picchu because the railroad tracks were completely under water.)  

Machu Picchu, nearly 8,000' above sea level, is thought to have been the royal estate of a 15th century Inca emperor. The modern world was unaware of it until a Yale University professor discovered it in 1911.

The train ride to Machu Picchu offered spectacular views of the river, the gorge and the Andes Mountains; then a bus ride that zigzagged up the mountain took the group to the entrance gates of Machu Picchu. From there, an hour-long hike brought them to the "Lost City of the Incas," a 15th century Inca site in the Andes, 7,970 feet above sea level.  

Archaeologists believe that Machu Picchu was an estate built for the Emperor Pachacutec and then abandoned about 100 years later, at the time of the Spanish conquerors, for reasons unknown. Although local natives knew about it, the site is so remote and well hidden that the Spanish never found it. Hiram Brigham from Yale University discovered it for the rest of the world in 1911.  

Machu Picchu has been restored and is now considered to be one of the 'new' Seven Wonders of the World. The city sits on top of a mountain, surrounded below on three sides by the Urubamba River and above by majestic Andean peaks. Built without the use of wheels or draft animals, probably by hundreds of men pushing large stones up the mountain, its almost vertical cliffs are terraced so that crops could be grown there. The stones of the topmost buildings, housing the emperor and his entourage, are joined so tightly that not even a blade of grass can peek through. As you descend the mountain, construction is less perfect; these were the homes of workers. Harry and Diane were astounded by the workmanship that went into the building of this amazing site and said that seeing Machu Picchu was an incredible experience.  

Inca Indians in traditional garb

The group spent its last day in Peru exploring Cusco, the political capitol of the Inca Empire in the 1400s. This city, about 50 miles from Machu Picchu, is also high in the Andes--10,800 feet above sea level. Walls built by the Incas with enormous granite blocks that have survived many earthquakes surround the city. At its peak, the Inca Empire ruled over twelve million people, who spoke 20 different languages. After the conquest, the Spanish dominated Cusco, and the city retains both Inca and Spanish charm. Many natives still dress in traditional Inca garb.  

Returning to Lima, the group said good-by to their Peruvian guide and caught a connecting flight to Guayaquil, Ecuador, that country's largest city and the gateway to the Galapagos Islands. The next morning they flew to the Galapagos Islands, a part of Ecuador that lies 600 miles off the mainland and straddles the equator. Their home for the remaining six days of the trip was the expeditionary yacht Isabella II, which had 22 cabins and a roof top observation deck. In addition to their guide, three naturalists accompanied the tour and explained what they were going to see each day.

The Galapagos tortoise is the largest living species of tortoise and the tenth heaviest reptile, reaching weights of over 880 pounds and lengths of more than six feet. With life spans of over 100 years, it is one of the longest living vertebrates.

The tour group, subdivided into smaller groups of 12-14 people accompanied by an Ecuadorean naturalist, explored a different island each day. Leaving the ship by 8:00 a.m. in a "panga," a Zodiac style raft, the groups would make either a wet (wade to shore) or dry (pull up to the beach) landing and then head off for a hike to view the flora and fauna of the island. Then it was back to the ship for a buffet lunch and a siesta, followed around 3:00 p.m. by another guided hike, snorkeling or swimming. Cocktail hour preceded a delicious five-course dinner and perhaps a lecture. Crossing the Equator was reason enough for an Equator Party complete with champagne toasts.  

Approximately 2,000 genetically distinct Magnificent Frigatebirds inhabit the Galapagos. They spend their days and nights flying, fishing in the ocean but never landing on the water.

The Marine Iguana, found only on the Galapagos, is the only modern lizard with the ability to live and forage in the sea. It can dive to depths of more than 30 feet.

One island boasted a post office established in 1793 by a shipwrecked Irishman. No building, just a collection of barrels where visitors leave letters, no postage required. Their guide picked up a handful of letters and read their destinations to the group. Anyone who was going near a destination took that letter to deliver. Diane and

Harry mailed a letter to a friend and took two others home--one was to a retired couple in Michigan, who later told them that their daughter had mailed the letter the year before.

 NEW IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD 

Sandy & Joe DiMartino

Sandy and Joe DiMartino arrived at 10 Sea Spray Avenue last October. Married for 54 years, they lived all 54 of them in their house in Needham and are now beginning to adjust to condo living. Joe immediately appreciates "no mowing, no shoveling." So far they have joined exercise classes, where you may meet them, but are going slowly and feeling their way on activity selection. They have two daughters: Sandra teaches high school in Lexington; Cindy and her husband Don live right next door. (Cindy and Don were interviewed in the May issue of Southport Village Voices.) 

JOE "I was born in Hyde Park. Went to high school there, then to Norwich University in Vermont and into the service during the Korea War, for two years. After this I went into the family construction business until 1992, when coronary bypass surgery made me retire. I'm a skin diver and used to help local police when underwater searches were needed. Summers in Scituate, I had to deal with the lobstermen's suspicions about skin divers as trap robbers. I made friends with the local lobstermen by bringing up their traps that had come unmoored. They gratefully gave me any contents from the rescued trap."

Joe also flew his own plane, "Up there is a good way to get away from things," he said. He and the family would fly, on weekends, to places like Lake George.

SANDY "I went to high school in Belmont, then to Emmanuel College for my undergraduate degree and to Tufts for a master's degree. Later I got an advanced certificate in gerontology at UMass. I have always enjoyed working with older people. My family was musical. My dad was an Irish tenor, my sister a folk singer and guitarist, and I studied piano, which, with my voice, my dad said was what I should stick to--and I did. I started with classical music but it was not my forte. I enjoyed the old standards and thought that I could bring more enjoyment to people with those songs."

Sandy formed a group that, with the help of her daughters, entertained at nursing homes and at Glover, now the Deaconess Hospital. She worked part-time as a music therapist at two nursing homes for 27 years and retired two years ago at age 82. Joe is a year younger and jokes about "marrying an older woman."

Sandy's dad was a dentist with an office in his home. The DiMartinos have some beautiful oriental furnishings, which once graced her dad's waiting room, and also a lovely rock collection, and oh yes, her piano. Sandy would love to start a sing-along group and thought she would try to get something started in the autumn. I'm sure that she would love to hear from interested people.

And, Joe says, "That's about it, we're just ordinary people."  

Bette and I are just back from a couple of weeks in Israel. This is our first trip there, although she has wanted to go for years. I, on the other hand, have always been a little reticent, not particularly wanting to be part of an exploding bus.  These are my impressions:    

• Contrary to my earlier thoughts, Israel is as safe as anywhere else in the world.
• Over a two-week period we were on the borders of Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt. It was an eerie feeling knowing that the people living just over those lines once (and in some cases, still) would have liked nothing better than to see Israel sink into the Mediterranean.
• Tel Aviv is like New York or any large cosmopolitan city that's never quite finished. They're building everywhere, cranes, cement trucks and construction barriers are all over the city.
• The Golan Heights is a semi-militarized area. Our guide explained that the Heights act as a barrier to Syrian aggression. Standing there, looking down into Syria about a mile away, it's almost surreal how you can see where Israel ends and Syria begins by the color of the land. Israeli kibbutzim (cooperative farming communities) have created a green agricultural line along the border, while on the other side there is the endless brown scrubbiness of untilled land.
• Although Israel is at peace at the moment, there is still an extremely active military presence. In the Negev Desert, we saw Hercules transports dropping paratroopers on a training mission. We also observed missile batteries there and were assured by our guide that they were pointed north, east and south at Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. Even though Egypt and Jordan currently are friendly toward Israel, the country's attitude is, "You never know..."
• Israel's economy is changing rapidly from agrarian to high tech. Huge communities of research, development and manufacturing have sprung up in major cities, such as Tel Aviv and Haifa. Haifa, of course, remains one of the major ports on the Mediterranean.
• Jerusalem is the cultural and religious center of the country. My sense of that city (before we got there) was that there was the old walled city, probably surrounded by some huts and shacks left over from the Ottomans. I couldn't have been more wrong. The city goes on and on with modern structures. Jerusalem is extremely hilly, resembling the topography of Seattle or San Francisco.
• What we Americans call a continental breakfast comprises a piece of pastry, a glass of juice and a cup of coffee. A continental breakfast in Israel is a buffet that offers eggs any way you like them, cereals, fruit, meat, vegetables, olives, figs, dates and some other things I still haven't figured out. One morning I came upon something I couldn't identify and asked an attendant what it was. (Here I should point out that nearly all Israelis speak some English, the service people less than others). In response, the attendant advised me the food was "peen." He hesitated and then asked, "Understand?" I repeated, "Peen?" He smiled broadly and said, "Exactly!" I still don't know what I ate, but it was good.
• Another time I came upon a cereal that had no obvious origin. A fellow diner was ladling some of it into his bowl so I asked him if he knew what it was. "Yes," he said, and walked away.
• I took 38 pages of notes on this trip and am working on a much expanded version of the above. If you would be interested in reading more when I get my notes transcribed, e-mail me at bob246oncape@gmail.com.  

Although the Wampanoags had been self-governing for over 10,000 years, from the beginning the white men did not feel that the Indians were competent to rule themselves--a form of anxiety that seems to come over many a conquering people when they have taken over the land of others. The Indians of Mashpee were held in the legal status of paupers. They were governed by white overseers, and they had no voice in the selection of these men. And they complained against many practices which their spokesmen said were "insufferable." Their children, they said, "were taken by the authorities and put out to work, with an understanding that they need not be schooled, and they were badly fed, badly lodged, badly clad, and were constantly subject to the accusation of being degraded."

Cape Cod Pilot, by Jeremiah Digges

For nearly a century the Mashpee Wampanoags repeatedly sent petitions to the colonial government in Boston, describing their grievances and demanding the right of self-government. Their demands went unheard, so in 1760 the Wampanoags sent tribal member Reuben Cognehew to England to present a petition of grievances to the newly crowned King George III. Cognehew boarded a ship in New Bedford bound for London. In the 1700s crossing the North Atlantic was a potentially dangerous undertaking and, after a few days at sea, the captain looked closely at his passengers and realized he could make additional money by selling some of them, Cognehew included, as slaves in the West Indies.

Fortunately for Cognehew and a few other survivors, the ship sank in a violent storm and a British man-of-war rescued him along with his valuable petition. He and the rest of the crew were impressed into service in the Royal Navy at Jamaica. Cognehew must have been a very persuasive person because he convinced the ship's captain to allow him to present his case to the admiral of the fleet. In turn he convinced the admiral that, since he had a petition for the King, it was in the admiral's best interest to place him on a merchant ship headed for London.

After such an odyssey, Cognehew must have found it relatively easy to plead Mashpee's case to a government that was already tightening control over its restive colonies. He described to the King how the colonial government oppressed his people. In 1763, the King ordered an investigation (See Note Below) and sent Cogenhew back to Boston with instructions to the colonial governor to look into the charges. In June 1763, Massachusetts incorporated the "Marshpee District" as a self-governing body. The Indians were finally able to manage their own resources, hold annual meetings and elect some of their officers. However, the treasurer was always a white man. 

In the Revolutionary War, "Marshpee District" gave more generously, in proportion to its population, than any other town on Cape Cod. Twenty-two tribesmen enlisted in the first Continental Regiment; 21 died in action. When the war ended, there were 70 widows in the little community. But now Massachusetts was no longer taking orders from King George and, in 1778, the colonial government revoked Marshpee's right of self-rule, putting it back under the overseer system. After helping America to win her freedom, the tribe lost its own.

NOTE "June 18,1761. A Complaint of Reuben Cognehew and Others, Indians of Mashpee representing divers hardships and inconveniences they suffer by means of the English. In the House of Representatives; Ordered That this Complaint be committed to the Gentlemen appointed to repair to Mashpee Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket, to consider thereon and make report. And that the Committee appointed to bring in amendment of the Laws for the better regulating the Indians defer the same till such Report be made. In Council Read and Concurred." Council Records, vol. XXIV, p. 51

• Cape Cod Pilot, by Jeremiah Digges. American Guide Series, Modern Pilgrim Press, Provincetown, MA, 1937. This work was underwritten by the Federal Writers Project, Works Project Administration (WPA), for the State of Massachusetts.  
• Mashpee, the Story of Cape Cod's Indian Town, by Francis G. Hutchins, 1979  
• The Scratch of a Pen: 1763 and the Transformation of North America, by Gordon Calloway, 2006  
• Transatlantic Encounters: American Indians in Britain, 1500-1776, by Alden T. Vaughan, 2006