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"The Basketball Game" is a graphic novel adaptation of the award-winning National Film Board of Canada animated short of the same name – intended for audiences aged 12 years and up. It's a poignant tale of the power of community as a means to rise above hatred and bigotry. In the end, as is recognized by the kids playing the basketball game, we're all in this together.

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Tag: Lou Segal

A loving tribute to her father

A loving tribute to her father

Lou Segal being interviewed by his daughter, Ramona Josephson, 2019. (photo from Ramona Josephson)

A few years ago, the Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia contacted my dad, Lou Segal, to interview him, as part of their mission to record the history of South African Jews living in Vancouver. It planted a seed in my mind. Why don’t I interview my dad, and record his voice for my family? So, with tape recorder in hand, we began. My dad (Lou) loves to tell a story and soon I had literally hours of tape.

It wasn’t my intention to write a book. But how would future generations know Lou’s story, and the lessons he has to share? And so the book Who’s Lou? A Loving Tribute to Lou Segal was born.

This is a story of a deeply spiritual man who governs his life with love and integrity; a self-made man who wanted to help others and, in so doing, became a pharmacist and entrepreneur; a man who is a role model and mentor to his four kids, 11 grandkids and five great-grandkids; a man who remains in constant gratitude for all his blessings; a 94-year-old man still in love with my 92-year-old mom!

Born in 1925 Yanishki, Lithuania, home to some 900 Jews, he set sail as a young boy on the Adolf Woermann with his mother and younger brother to join his father in South Africa. His father had left earlier to create a better life for them, after being attacked selling wares from his horse and cart. After a turbulent journey, they arrived in Cape Town, but there was no one to meet them. His father had mistaken the date.

photo - Lou and Friedah Segal on their honeymoon, 1951
Lou and Friedah Segal on their honeymoon, 1951. (photo from Ramona Josephson)

“I remember my mother holding our hands, wailing in Yiddish: ‘Where’s my husband?’” said Lou. “We were told we’d have to sail back to Berlin if no one came. Just as the ship’s horn blasted, an angel came on board. She said she was my mother’s sister and we were able to leave the ship. She belonged to a Jewish agency that provided assistance for Lithuanian immigrants.” If not for her, how different this story would have been.

Lou’s childhood was difficult. “My first days of school were traumatic. I arrived late in the school year, wearing my tzitzit. I could only speak Yiddish and, even though I was 7, I was put into the equivalent of preschool. I was so embarrassed. Antisemitism was rife and I was ridiculed and beaten up often. I had no one to turn to.”

The family originally lived in a poor neighbourhood and many of Lou’s friends were black kids and they played soccer together. He learned to speak Zulu and, later, this would save his life.

As the years went by, his father’s business prospered, and the family moved to nicer homes. Their last home in Pretoria is today the residence of the consulate of Madagascar.

When Lou was 16, he first laid eyes on my mom, Friedah, at Muizenberg, a popular beach resort and meeting place for young Jewish people. Lou’s eyes always tear up when he talks about my mom.” To this day,” he said, “I am still so in love with your mother. The minute I saw her, she mesmerized me. But it wasn’t mutual. Mom would joke that, as the years went by, I was always looking at her, but she was looking the other way.”

One of Lou’s brothers, Charles Segal, recently received the Guinness World Record for most recorded pianist. Lou can’t claim the same, but he finally won my mom’s heart after she saw him playing the piano as a guest entertainer at a party one night. The next day, she called him … and the rest is history. They were married some years later in Cape Town, after Lou graduated as a pharmacist. They had four children, Basil, Ramona (me), Darryl and Janine.

But tragedy nearly struck when Lou had a fire in his pharmacy. His delivery boy lit a cigarette in the dispensary and a bottle of benzene erupted into flames. Lou tried to stomp out the fire with his foot. His pants went up in flames and his skin was burnt to the bone. A customer rushed him to the hospital. He needed skin grafts on both legs. A teaching professor came into his hospital room one day and told his students in Afrikaans, thinking my dad couldn’t understand, that he would likely never walk again.

“My heart dropped,” Lou recalled. “I asked Mom to bring my tefillin to the hospital, and I put it on every morning and prayed to G-d. Miraculously, over time, the grafts started taking. After six months, I was discharged, and was gradually able to go back to my usual activities. To this day, I lay tefillin every single day. I believe it is one of the most important of the 613 mitzvot in the Torah.”

photo - Lou’s family at the launch of Who’s Lou?
Lou’s family at the launch of Who’s Lou? (photo from Ramona Josephson)

Lou was a pharmacist but became a successful and respected entrepreneur. He was a branding whiz, was coined the ‘Man with Ideas’ and was so well known that the newspaper created a caricature of him.

“I always wanted to make a difference in people’s lives. I had a deep knowledge of pharmacognosy and could formulate products from scratch using plants and natural ingredients. As time went by, I realized I could manufacture most products and so I started to create my own brand lines.” His products became household names.

In 1948, apartheid was introduced in South Africa and black people were forced to carry passbooks to restrict their freedom of movement. In 1960, they took to the streets in protest; stores were burglarized and cars overturned. The police opened fire and the bloodshed that followed is called the Sharpeville massacre.

“Demonstrations in Cape Town passed my drugstore,” said Lou. “Several blacks entered and were about to jump over my counter to attack me when a black man shouted in Zulu that I was his ‘doctor’ and they must stop. Over the years, I had tended to many black people who had come to my drugstore bleeding from fights. They’d promise to pay me later but I knew they never would. I had grown up with them and just wanted to help. I believe this man saved my life.”

Our family considered leaving the country but, after Nelson Mandela’s arrest, there was a false sense of security and life went on.

By that time, we, like so many white South Africans, were enjoying a wonderful lifestyle in Cape Town. We went to shul as a family every Friday night, played tennis or lounged on the beach on weekends. Lou kept fit, swimming lengths in our pool, going to the gym, playing tennis. He was a Toastmaster and he and my mom had a large network of friends. They loved to party and took ballroom dancing lessons in our home.

But there was always an underlying level of tension and the turning point came in 1976, after the Soweto Uprising. Black schoolchildren took to the streets in the thousands, protesting the government’s insistence that Afrikaans be the official language in schools. It became bloody.

My older brother, Basil, and I felt there was no future for us in South Africa and we both independently immigrated to Vancouver. I recall, when Basil phoned to say he had arrived in Vancouver, Mom asked: “Vancouver? Where’s that?” Basil replied: “Look at the map. It’s as far north and as far west as you can go!”

photo - Plaque representing Lou Segal’s top 10 “commandments”
Plaque representing Lou Segal’s top 10 “commandments.” (photo from Ramona Josephson)

My parents learned that they could bring our younger siblings on their passport if they immigrated before either of them turned 21.

“I was just 54 years old and at the prime of my career,” said Lou. “I had a business partner, and we were under negotiations to merge with two other companies to be listed on the Johannesburg stock exchange. I owned several large property holdings, both residential and commercial. There were strict regulations as to how much money you could take out the country. If you violated the law you could lose everything. But we had this deadline to move to Vancouver and be together again with our four kids, and that is what we decided to do. Family first!”

Our home in Cape Town later became the residence of the consulate of Lithuania.

Lou came as a retired man but he never retired. He still goes into the office, where he works with my younger brother, Darryl, manufacturing the HerbalGlo line of hair and skin products. Darryl wants to retire, but he can’t, because Lou still goes to the office.

Lou is a man who never raised his voice, but his life lessons and strong moral values are heard loud and clear by all who know him.

Who’s Lou? is filled with loving tributes from family and four rabbis who have officiated over the years at Congregation Beth Tikvah. We are so grateful to Barbi Braude for the hours she put into the concept and design of the book, which was launched in honour of Lou on Sept. 7 at a Kiddush luncheon at the synagogue. It is available at the synagogue library, the Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia and the Isaac Waldman Jewish Public Library.

Ramona Josephson is one of Lou Segal’s four children and is married to Ken Karasick. Her two children, Jaclyn and Marc, have brought Lou and Friedah four great-grandchildren. She is a happily retired dietitian and nutritionist and author of HeartSmart Nutrition: Shopping on the Run.

Format ImagePosted on December 13, 2019December 12, 2019Author Ramona JosephsonCategories LocalTags entrepreneur, HerbalGlo, immigration, Lou Segal, pharmacognosy, South Africa
Looking younger, naturally

Looking younger, naturally

Father and son team, Lou and Darryl Segal, of Herbal Glo. (photo from Darryl Segal)

It’s difficult enough to start and build one successful business, let alone two. But Lou Segal and his family have done just that.

Segal began his career as a pharmacist working in Cape Town, South Africa. Having received his formal training in Pretoria, South Africa, he had also started blending natural products to help his customers with their ailments. He was one of a few pharmacists who specialized in pharmacognosy, the study of how plants or other natural sources can be used for medicinal purposes.

The course of his career took a dramatic change when he took a safari vacation in Mozambique. It was during this trip that he noticed an interesting phenomenon. “The people of one particular tribe had incredibly thick, full hair and younger looking skin as compared to the people of the other tribes,” said Segal.

With help from the chief of the tribe, Segal learned that, for certain ceremonies, “these particular people would gather plants, roots, flowers, leaves and the extracts from the barks of trees and mix these all into a paste form. Then they would apply this mixture to their face and heads.”

Segal took some of the mixture back to Cape Town, where he added various percentages of it to his own products; scalp formulas, shampoos and conditioners, as well as to his anti-aging skin care products. With encouraging feedback – his customers reported less hair loss, thicker hair growth and that they thought they looked younger – the products did very well.

As a teenager, Segal’s son, Darryl, became interested in his father’s business, in how natural ingredients can help people overcome all kinds of hair and skin care issues. But, before he could become more involved in the business, the Segal family decided to leave South Africa, given the political situation.

Lou, his wife Friedah and their adult children Darryl and Janine headed to Vancouver, where their other children, Basil and Ramona, had moved earlier. The family couldn’t take much with them, so they arrived in Vancouver in 1979 with little money – but they had all their formulations.

“It is never easy when you build a life and business in one country, then realize that you have to give that all up, move to a new country and start all over again,” Darryl Segal told the Independent. But his father was confident that they could start again and achieve success. And they did.

Based on their earlier work, the father and son team were able to rebuild the family business in Canada. Also a pharmacist, Darryl Segal first had to re-qualify at the University of British Columbia (having come from another country) and then spent seven years at Shoppers Drug Mart in Kerrisdale; he also researched and added to his father’s formulations. In 1986, the Segals established Herbal Glo, making products with “natural essential nutrients” that “contain none of the harmful chemicals like parabens, formaldehydes and phthalates,” said Darryl Segal.

It was a rough start, admitted the younger Segal, as nobody knew them in Vancouver. But he and his father helped “boost each other even when things got rough,” he said.

At first, the Segals relied on a manufacturer to make their hair-care products. Six years ago, they opened their own factory in Richmond. “We expand as we need and as space becomes available,” said Darryl Segal. Herbal Glo products are manufactured, bottled and labeled here, before being sold both locally and worldwide.

The Segals have three brands: Herbal Glo, which can be found in health food stores; Segals Solutions, available in beauty salons; and Feels like a Facelift, which is sold in drugstores, like London Drugs. They have also written a book, called Hair for Life, which is on its fifth edition.

In addition to their own endeavours, Darryl Segal enjoys helping others create their own brands. Herbal Glo offers a “one-stop shop” that helps people choose and manufacture formulations, as well as design logos and handle packaging. “We persevered in the fiercely competitive world of the cosmetic industry. Now I am able to give back by helping others,” he said.

Herbal Glo, which has a staff of 10, recently earned the company its third National Nutrition Award. In addition to not using harmful chemicals in their products, the Segals do not test their products on animals, their products do not contain any animal ingredients, they are gluten-free and they contain organic ingredients whenever possible.

Almost 40 years after coming to Canada, the Segals are still working together. Lou Segal, who is 92, said he still enjoys coming to work, and offers advice where he can. Said Darryl Segal of his father, “He is still passionate about helping people all over the world to see and feel results with his formulations.”

A third generation of the Segal family has begun working with the company. Darryl Segal’s son, Daniel, completed a qualification in cosmetic compounding from University of California, Los Angeles, in April of last year.

“I’ve always enjoyed working in my father’s factory,” said Daniel Segal, who has shown his passion for organic, natural ingredients – such as jojoba oil and shea butter – with the development of a new blend of moisturizer.

And so Herbal Glo continues to grow.

Shula Klinger is an author and journalist living in North Vancouver. Find out more at shulaklinger.com.

Format ImagePosted on February 9, 2018February 7, 2018Author Shula Klinger and Cynthia RamsayCategories LocalTags Darryl Segal, Feels like a Facelift, hair, Herbal Glo, Lou Segal, Segals Solutions

We walk a little taller

Karon Shear, left, and Marilyn Berger. (photo by Binny Goldman)

Moshe Feldenkrais is quoted as saying, “When you know what you are doing, then you can do what you want!” How appropriate that some of us who spent the two nights of the Passover seders sitting at the table – or reclining, as directed – were now being taught to sit properly.

On April 13, about 50 people gathered at the Oakridge Seniors Centre (OSC) to attend an event co-hosted by Jewish Seniors Alliance of Greater Vancouver to learn the helpful movements of the Feldenkrais Method.

Alexandra Henriques, manager of OSC, graciously welcomed the audience and called upon JSA president Marilyn Berger, who said how impressed she was with the surroundings and the newsletter put out by OSC, and said she would come back to sample some of the lunches being offered at the centre. Berger then acquainted those gathered with the aims of JSA, mentioning its advocacy for the betterment of the quality of life for seniors and the peer-counseling courses being offered.

photo - Feldenkrais instructor Vita Kolodny
Feldenkrais instructor Vita Kolodny. (photo by Binny Goldman)

Berger then introduced Vita Kolodny, a nurse and a movement educator, who gently eased the audience through the mindful movements that can be used to ease back pain. By a quick questioning of the audience, we learned that almost all in attendance had suffered from back pain at one time or another.

We all sit so much during the day, doubling the stress placed on our back compared to when we stand, Kolodny explained. That is why we may prefer to stand when experiencing back pain.

Kolodny led those gathered through the correct way of positioning our bodies and ways of strengthening the skeletal muscles. It is important to reeducate our brains to the new ways of sitting by repeating the movements we learned, slowly and with awareness of how our whole body participates, with a rest in between the exercise.

A question was asked by Lou Segal: “Is it better to train one’s body to sit in the new and correct way, even while resting, so it becomes our natural way of sitting?” The answer was yes.

Dr. Norman Doidge’s book The Brain’s Way of Healing was recommended reading if attendees cared to learn more about neuroplasticity and the Feldenkrais Method.

Some constructive and supportive suggestions were made during the demonstration. For example, sit forward in a chair with feet flat on the floor. A pillow may be placed behind your back, remembering to maintain the arch in your back. As well, it helps to sit on an armless chair, stool or exercise ball while maintaining good balance.

Gyda Chud of JSA thanked Kolodny, using her penchant for alliteration, saying “Vita was vital, vivacious and vibrant in her presentation,” echoing the feelings of the audience, all of whom were visibly sitting upright, already making the changes suggested by Kolodny that afternoon.

Not only were our hearts smiling – as suggested in the theme – but our spines were, as well.

Discussions followed over dessert and hot drinks.

Berger, in thanking “the gregarious Gyda Chud and our ever incredible Karon Shear,” reminded everyone of the JSA Spring Forum on April 26, which will take place at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. The theme is YOLO: You Only Live Once.

So, let’s live it tall!

Binny Goldman is a member of the Jewish Seniors Alliance of Greater Vancouver board.

Format ImagePosted on April 24, 2015April 23, 2015Author Binny GoldmanCategories LocalTags Alexandra Henriques, Feldenkrais, Gyda Chud, Jewish Seniors Alliance, JSA, Karon Shear, Lou Segal, Marilyn Berger, Oakridge Seniors Centre, OSC, Vita Kolodny
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