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What's up everybody? Welcome back to the All Things Croatia podcast. I'm your host,
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Stanko Zovak, and I'm bringing you the best of Croatia from around the globe.
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either modalia and let's get started. Alright, welcome back to the podcast everybody. Today
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we have a very special guest, Mitch Czuvalo. Mitch is the son of George Czuvalo, one of the
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greatest Croatian and Canadian boxers of all time. George has numerous accolades including
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five-time Canadian heavyweight champ and never being knocked down in his 93 match career,
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including in fights against Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, and George Foreman. Mitch is now a
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teacher and public speaker sharing his own struggles and triumphs as well as stories about
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his father. And in this episode, we're going to learn a little bit more about both him and his
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father George. Mitch, thanks for coming on the podcast. Thanks for inviting me, Stan Kozowak.
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Nice to be here. Yeah, and I appreciate you being patient with some of our technical difficulties
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earlier. We made it, we made it. We made it. You know, funny story before we kick things off here,
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but my dad actually interviewed your dad back in the day for the Croatian radio program back in
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LA that my dad was a part of. That's fascinating. Yeah, that's crazy. I guess not a coincidence,
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but you know, interesting that now here I am interviewing you. Oh, that's wonderful. And
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do you know what year that would have been? 60s, 70s? No. Okay. 80, I guess 80s. 80s,
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okay. I don't even know actually how old my dad was when he was involved in that. I would think
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maybe early 80s, maybe late 70s. Yeah, okay, wonderful. Wonderful. That's a great piece of
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information. Thank you for that. Yeah, I'll have to ask him and get back to you with that. But just
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to kick things off, Mitch, can you talk a little about, you know, your, you and your father's
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Croatian heritage, you know, so your father was born in Canada to Croatian immigrants, right?
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That's right. He was born, my father was born in 1937. His parents came from a small little place
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in Herzegolina called Proboy outside of Lubiski. And to my understanding, well, I think my
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grandmother came from the adjacent village now from Proboy itself. And I don't know what that is.
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But my grandfather is steep on Cuvolo, and my grandmother, Kata Kordic, she became Kata Cuvolo,
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of course. My grandfather came to Canada in 1926 and left his bride, you know,
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he'd only been married for a short period of time, a couple months, left his bride and came to
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Canada and didn't get reunited with her until 10 years later in 1936 because of the way the world
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was back then, and the capacity to make money he brought over his brothers first, and so they
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can make money. And then once he had the financial wherewithal to bring over my grandmother in 1936,
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can you believe that 10 years apart? My dad was born shortly thereafter in 1937, and my
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aunts are in 1938. So yeah, it was, you know, economics played a large part. My grandfather
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had an interesting life. He fell off a, I'm going to get into this a little bit because it's really
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a story as to why we're in Canada, as opposed to staying in Croatia or in Herzegovina. My
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grandfather fell off a donkey when he was, you know, a mug of nuts when he was six years old and
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he broke his elbow. So his parents took him to the only educated learned gentleman in the village
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and said, you know, what do we do with little steep on father? They took him to the priest and the
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priest said, and you know, this kind of tears at my heartstrings. He said, don't fix little steep
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in his arm. That way he won't get drafted into the army. So can you imagine my grandfather at
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six years old going to bed at night knowing that his arm would not be fixed the rest of his life
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in order to ostensibly keep him out of the army? Well, he got drafted into the army anyway,
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that's the crazy thing. And, you know, he did some time basically working as something akin to
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the to the Red Cross. But then after that, I mean, I think he had, because of that, a troubled
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relationship with his parents. And he wanted to get out and he came to Canada in 1926. He worked
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in the mines in Nova Scotia, then he built the roads and a very famous national park in Canada,
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a Gondolin park. Then he went down to Windsor, Ontario, which is close to Detroit, and worked
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in the meat packing plant. And when they switched their operations from Windsor, Ontario to Toronto
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to the West End of Toronto, to the junction, Canada Packers, and Swiss, who did all the meat
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processing, the abattoirs in the West End of Toronto, he worked there for 33 years. And I actually
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used to work there in the summer times when I was doing my undergraduate work at university.
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And I'll always remember, if you want to understand my family history, a gentleman came up to me and
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he said, are you in Canada? They don't say chuvolo, they say chivalro. Are you a chivalro? And I said,
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yes, I am. Now, I thought he was going to talk, of course, about my father, who was the athlete. He
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says, my first two years of working here were the last couple years of your grandfather's time here.
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And I got to tell you, he was the best worker of all time. He used to come in 45 minutes early to
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sharpen his knives. Can you imagine going to an abattoir 45 minutes in sharpening? I worked in
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there the summer times. And you can imagine the smell, the noise, you know, just, it was a crazy
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place to work. And he would go in early and sharpen his knives every day. And then here's the crazy
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part, Stalko, and this tells you about work ethic, right? Which is, I think, you know, endemic to
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the Croatian experience, like hardworking people. He would, on his holiday, his week holiday, he
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would go in and watch the two poor guys who were taking the place of him on the killing floor,
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like taking the hides off cattle with knives. And once he realized that they weren't going to
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outwork him, and his job was no way shape or form in jeopardy or threatened by being outworked by a
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couple of people, he would then go relax for four or five days. So that tells you the kind of environment
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that, you know, fighters are born in, right? That kind of mindset. So yeah, so I love my grandfather.
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He was a stern man. I was always semi-afraid of him. In fact, more afraid of him than I was of my dad.
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But I mean, in terms of the Croatian immigrant experience, I mean, he came to Canada and he
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always, he loved, he loved Croatia, being Croatian, and he was a proud Herzegobots too.
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But he always would say Canada gave him the opportunity, right? So, yeah, roots, roots,
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obviously, in the homeland, but he appreciated his life here. And, you know, that's basically the
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Tchuvolo story in Canada in terms of its origins, its origins story.
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Well, yeah, that's, I mean, those kind of stories are consistent, you know, throughout the
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diaspora, throughout the Croatian immigrant experience, or immigrant, I guess. You know,
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hard workers, I mean, that's, we would say a workaholic now, you know, today about your grandfather.
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That's crazy going in on his vacation just to make sure he's not getting outworked by the other guys.
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Yeah, and that he was such a story figure inside that, you know, that manual, hard manual later
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in the history of the immigrants, you know. I mean, you know, last, in the past, a lot of
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the immigrants inside the Abadagar and that a gentleman came up to me, I thought he was
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going to talk about my dad, but, and then I got, I got a sense there, in terms of family history
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of how highly regarded he was by the other people there, you know, in fact. In fact,
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back in the old days, they used to issue you a check every two weeks. And my grandfather,
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was was playing with him. So instead of doing the check, he kind of pulled it back like,
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you know, he was playing with him. I go, oh, you're not going to get it. And my grandfather
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knocked him to the ground. And I'm all telling you what he did with his with his steel-toed
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boots. And they were going to fire my grandfather. They were going to fire him. But because he
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was such, you know, a good union man and a hard worker, they basically said to the former,
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messed with Steve. He's not a guy to be messed with. And apparently he even he even he tried.
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He went to a boxing gym a couple of times when he was in Canada, but because of his,
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you know, restrictions with it with his arm capacity, no one ever took him seriously. And
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how my father got into boxing, you know, because it's all about I think that boxing and sport in
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general is a lot about fathers and sons. There used to be the outdoor fights in the summertime in
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Toronto at a stadium that no longer exists, Oakwood Stadium, not far from the Abattoir where my
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grandfather worked. And he used to take my dad to go watch the fights. And after watching a couple
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of fights, my father and my very young father at the time said, Hey, I think I think I'd like to
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try that. I'd like to try that one day. And my grandfather says, you get a bloody nose you in
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his beautiful Croatian accents, you get bloody, you get bloody nose you quit, right? So
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the rest of his life was proving to in some way in some ways, oops, sorry about that. In some ways,
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he was proven to his, his dad that he was tough enough to do it, right? So that's interesting.
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Yeah, crazy relationships, right? Because he was then, you know, became known as one of the greatest
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chains in boxing, you know, never, never being knocked down. Yeah. And I've got another story
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pursuant to that that kind of tells you about the mindset. My grandfather was a stern disciplinarian,
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obviously. And at the dinner table, it was just like, you know, they just eat, right? No, there
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wasn't. You know, foods on the table, like, let's get down to it, like, not like, hi, how you do,
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how was your day? None of that stuff. My grandfather eat and leave the table. And if you wanted to
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talk, you talk later, but you didn't talk at the dinner table. So my father and my, pardon me, my
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father and my aunt would continue to talk. And my grandfather would get, you know, upset and make
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them go downstairs and kneel on raw rice and pebbles until they promised to be quiet. So when
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you think about my father developing a pain threshold, right, that which you need to be,
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you know, a world class fighter, you have to have some ability to handle pain. He started pretty
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young in that regard. And so, so a lot of my father's experience, a lot of, you know, the
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origins of the of the Chuvila family in Canada. They all start with my grandfather, who was a
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character. Let's put it that way. Well, yeah, those old school Croatians, you know, definitely
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install a lot of discipline in their families and, you know, high patriarchy, I guess you could say.
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Yeah, absolutely. And out of necessity too, right? It was out of necessity. It was a harsh reality
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that, you know, most of them came over here. Many of them were unskilled and did a lot of manual
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labor. And even if they were skilled, sometimes wherever they went to, they wouldn't recognize
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their accreditation or their qualifications. So, you know, you have to be ready to work hard. And
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I think that that work ethic and that mindset is really the genesis of my father's success
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in the boxing world. Because boxing, as you know, as anyone knows, has been around for a while.
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It's a very harsh way to make a living, right? So every time, every time someone gets hit in the
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head, there's damage, right? So it's wonderful to watch. It displays all those things that we love
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about sport, like courage and hard work and team all those things. Fantastic. But it does take a huge
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toll. There's a price to pay because, you know, my dad now, at 85 years old, is essentially
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comatose. He just lies in bed without looking straight ahead. Unfortunately. And he was good
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up till 10 years ago. But, you know, the dementia kicked in. And of course, brain injury from boxing
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and the harsh reality is that, you know, it took its toll on him. So. I know up, you know, until
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10 years ago, people were, you know, saying how surprised how well spoken he was back then. And
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it didn't seem he was, you know, suffering any of the effects that a lot of the other boxers,
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you know, his age were. But yes and no. My father, and we noticed this about 10 or 12 years ago,
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if he was talking about something that was deeply embedded in his memory bank, something that he had,
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you know, spoken too many times before, like his fight with Ali or some of his great boxing
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victories, some of those kinds of things, he could recall those. But, you know, what he had for lunch
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or rape the keys or, or, you know, what city we were in when we were driving in the car.
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Oh, you could hear his, his short term memory falling apart, right. So I and athletes are great
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have great coping skills. So I think for, you know, I think he probably understood that about
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20 years ago, he was starting to fade. But, you know, ego and pride and the aforementioned
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coping skills. I think those really assisted him and, you know, portraying to the people
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who didn't know him that intimately that he was still okay. But boxing is a mean business.
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It, it, it, there's no one, no one gets out on skates if you've had a career of any,
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of any length or reputation. So it's a very tough game, right? It's a huge, tough game.
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It is, it is. Yeah. I want to bring up something that you mentioned about,
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you know, immigrants having to be tough and boxers having to be tough and, you know,
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having that common relationship there. And I wanted to point out, I don't know if, you know,
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Steve at mealchitch, the UFC. Yeah, I know a little bit of him. I don't follow the UFC,
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but I certainly know of him for sure. Yeah. For him, they often refer to his, what they call
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immigrant mentality as sort of, you know, thanks for your to like his toughness and his,
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you know, work ethic. And that sort of, you know, hit home when you started talking about that,
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like, yeah, you know, as an immigrant, as a Croatian immigrant going to another country,
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you know, having to start a new life, you know, that's definitely a mentality that you have to
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have. Absolutely. You know, sort of on that note, was your father and, you know, your grandparents
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involved in the Croatian community over there at all? Was there one? Yeah. Well, in Toronto,
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for sure, in the West End of Toronto, there's actually the Croatian church just off of
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Dufferin Street was a hub for, you know, all the weddings, things of that, you know, weddings,
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funerals, all the things that happened that involved the Croatian community. It's actually
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called Croatia Street now. So yeah, very, my father recalled, you know, great times he had
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when he was a young person in the Croatian community. And, but my father married a Canadian one. My
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mother was, you know, a fifth or sixth generation Canadian. So when that happened, I would say that
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there was not a split or, but just he was, he wasn't so tightly connected to the Croatian community.
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He kind of filtered into the Canadian community at large a little more, right? So, and that's,
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that's even representative with my not being able to speak any Croatian, right? So I'll tell you
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a neat little story about my grandmother, who I loved very dearly. She died when I was 10 or 11
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years old of cancer, unfortunately. And I think a lot of, you know, we talked when you told me,
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you asked me to come on, I said, I don't speak much Croatian. And he said, that's okay, it's in
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the diaspora, it's all going to be in English. But I remember being nine or 10 years old and going
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with my grandmother to the local grocery store and coming back with groceries. And I didn't know
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she was sick at the time. She would die a year later of cancer anyway. This story is going to
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shake me up a little bit. I was running with groceries up to her house. And she said to me,
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I'm going to open the door son, right? Now I couldn't speak Croatian at all really,
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but I understood what she said. And I opened the door and I always remember the gleam in her eye
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that I could understand what she said. So language being so important to making that
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connection to community, right? I've never had that. But I'll always have that beautiful
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memory of my grandmother that way. And that we could connect with that one instant. And then
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a year later, she was gone. So sorry, I got to gather myself a little bit.
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Yeah, no, take your time. Take your time. Yeah, that's a, wow, very powerful story.
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And I know a lot of a lot of people, you know, in similar situations, myself included, you know,
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I felt like I was missing something, not knowing the Croatian language and through the years.
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Yeah, I mean, through, it's a natural process. You move to another country, you know, you have to
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assimilate to survive, even let alone, you know, thrive in, you know, those communities where
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they're not speaking Croatian, you have to get a job. And, you know, if you're going to Canada
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in English, I mean, it's a natural progression. But, you know, I feel as the generations go on,
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you know, you always wish, I wish, you know, I would have learned more Croatian from my dad or
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from my grandfather or absolutely. Yeah, the stories, the way they're told when you hear them
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in their own language, you know, I mean, I was always fascinated by the Croatian language.
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And I wish I could speak it more. I remember people coming to my grandparents' house and they
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would sing, yeah, ganga, you know, ganga, right? When they get together and they sing that kind of
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communal to get and singing stories in Croatian. And I was, I was freaked out by like, wow, what,
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like, what is this? Right? It's just a way to communicate. And I was only a little kid watching
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this happen. I was, I was, I was shocked and not not shocked. I was, I was fascinated and somewhat
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scared about my, you know, inability to decipher what they were talking about. But you could hear
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the passion when they were singing to one another. So, I mean, I mean, when my grandfather would
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always refer to himself as Croatian, my father would refer to himself as Croatian Canadian.
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And I would refer to myself as a Canadian with Croatian background. So, I mean, just the sequencing,
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it kind of speaks to what happens to the generations when they come to a new country, right? And of
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course, like I said earlier, my mother was Canadian fifth generation Canadians. So it kind of,
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it didn't separate us, but it drew a kind of an uneasy line sometimes between the Croatian and
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Canadian experience. And that's why I welcome the opportunity to talk to you because it's,
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you know, you get, you get to go back and think about those things a little deeper.
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Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I want to get into your dad's, you know, boxing career a little bit at
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this point. I was going to ask, you know, sort of the genesis of that. And it sounds like, you
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know, it came from your grandfather, at least the mental part of that. Was there, was there maybe
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a certain point that, you know, your father decided, okay, I want to be a boxer? How did that sort of,
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how did that process happen? Well, he, my father recalls, in the west end of the junction, the
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west end of Toronto was called the junction, where that, where the abattoir that I spoke of earlier
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was located, my grandparents' home, my dad's home was not far from it. My father recalls
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going to a place called Morgan's Cigar Store on Dundas Street, west in Toronto, and those people
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in no Toronto know where I'm talking about. And seeing a picture of the great heavyweight champion,
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Joe Lewis, on the cover of Ring Magazine. And my dad looked at it. Now he'd been going to the fights
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with his dad. And he said, and he wanted, he expressed interest in doing that, regardless of
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what his dad said to him about not being tough enough. And saw a picture of Joe Lewis on the cover
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of Ring Magazine and said, man, that's for me, you know, athletes with muscles. It was kind of like,
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you know, that's what he wanted to do. And he pestered his mom, my grandmother, to get him a set
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of boxing gloves for almost a year. She eventually did. And when he got those gloves, he went to
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there was a church basement a couple miles away from where they lived. And they had a,
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there was a priest there at a boxing club. And they shut that down eventually. And then my father
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waited for a couple years, got into adolescence, I think early adolescence, and then started going to
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the Earl's Court boxing club in the west end of Toronto, where he started actually being trained
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by individuals there. And my dad was apparently quite the physical specimen as a young man. I mean,
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at 14, I think he weighed almost 200 pounds. So he got very strong, very fast. He recalls
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doing all kinds of calisthenics late into the night, you know, mom, sister and dad, shut up,
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can you make it too much noise? Good doing those pushups or whatever you're doing, you know. So,
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yeah, he was obviously obsessed early on. And I think that's a trait of any good athlete, whatever
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motivates you to be obsessive. And rose to prominence as an amateur. At 17, he became the
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amateur championship champion of Canada, the heavyweight champion of Canada. After 16 fights,
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there were no more amateurs to fight. And he was chosen to go to the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne,
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and opted not to because, you know, he needed money, right? He needed to make some money. He
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dropped out of high school in Toronto. Now, as I'm a teacher, and I used to tell my dad,
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dad, you know, you have two honorary, he went to St. Mike's High School in Toronto, which was a
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school that produced a lot of athletes, quit and worked in the abattoirs for a while, then went back
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to Humberside Collegiate in Toronto. Now, he's got an honorary high school diploma from both of
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those schools. Even though he didn't graduate high school, I said, dad, how did you get that? You
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got too long. You gained the system somehow. But I wish he would have gone to the Olympics,
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because I think he would have had worldwide exposure. But he opted not, he opted to turn pro.
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And not long after that, 18 or 19, 19 years old, I think he was the heavyweight champion in the
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pro ranks in Canada. So we're talking, you know, 1957, 58, he was a young Canadian champion. And
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that was the notoriety was good, but they rushed him very quickly. He had a manager and a trainer
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who were older, getting old, and they didn't know how many years they had left. And they, my dad's
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third fight, he was fighting someone in the top 10. And like it was bizarre, it was nuts. So,
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Johnny Arthur, and if my dad beat him, but it's like it's such it was such a rush job. Now,
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Toronto, although it had a boxing history, it's not exact, it's not like, I know you're from
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Los Angeles, it didn't have like the boxing community in LA with a long story history and
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lots of great training and sparring. It's kind of like if you want to be a good boxer in Toronto,
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Canada, it's kind of like being a hockey player in Brazil. I've made that analogy before. You can
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do it, but the root's going to be tougher, right? So because it just, it's just not that many
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opportunities for you to get good training. So but that being said, my father did the best he
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could until he got very dissatisfied with his management team and his trainers. He bought
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out his contract, he moved to Detroit for a while. I remember being in Detroit with him when I was
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very young, very rough part of town and it wasn't an easy existence. I got hooked up with Teddy
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McCorder who became his trainer for the majority of the end of his career. That helped him stylistically.
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He got better management here in Toronto from Irv Ungerman who owned a poultry processing plant
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that my grandmother worked at, you know, plucking my grandmother plucked chickens for two cents of
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birds, you know. So there's always that, you know, hard physical labor component. And I think my dad
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was very much, he told me when he was young, he was attracted to the bright lights and the potential
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big money of boxing where he didn't have to go in and punch the clock every day like his dad did,
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like his mom did and he enrosed the promise till, you know, 1966. He fights 65 and 66. He fights for
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the championship of the world, right? So my dad's motivation was certainly a monetary and he didn't
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want to be, he didn't want to do what his dad did for a living or his mom. So, you know, boxing
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looked good to him. Yeah, that makes sense, I guess. Yeah. I mean, so then his, you know,
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rise to the heavyweight champion of Canada sounded, you know, very quick. You mentioned that the
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trainers were older and I guess, you know, they're rushing him how long until it's sort of his
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international career took on? Well, he's international. My father fought his first fight in Madison
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Square Garden in like 1958, 59, before I was born. And he lost a decision to a veteran,
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Pat McMurtry. And it was obvious to him then that, you know, he wasn't ready for the international
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scene. So like I said before, subsequently he got rid of his manager and his trainer and went to
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Detroit. But once 1963 and 64, that's when he really he took a couple of fights out on the
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short notice in Kentucky and New York and did super well, knocked out Doug Jones in 1964, knocked out
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or beat, I'm trying to remember the names, a fighter in Louisville, Kentucky, what was his name?
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It'll come to me in a second anyway. And then he started to get recognition again, you know,
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the new Chicago is here and his career took off and he started to get some big wins and which
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culminated in his fighting the fight of the year in 1965, the Ring magazine fight of the year in
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1965, a Floyd Patterson, which my dad lost a controversial decision to the former world
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champion Floyd Patterson in Patterson's hometown of New York. A lot of people thought my father
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won that fight, but you know, you're fighting the former champ in his hometown. Anyway,
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fighting the year. So my dad was on, you know, the names of any boxing aficionados lips when it
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came to those who could be potentially fighting for the world championship eventually, which he
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did in 65 against Ernie Terrell in Toronto. Again, controversial loss. A lot of people thought he
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won that fight. There was supposed to be some hanky-panky going on with the mob and people
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getting threatened and things of that crazy nature. But you know, that that's what was happening back
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in the 60s. And then taking the Ali fight on short notice, which most casual boxing fans know him for
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and fighting, you know, the greatest fighter, arguably the greatest fighter of all time at his
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physical peak. And my dad gave him one heck of a tough fight, right? So you know, Muhammad won
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that fight, but went to St. Michael's Hospital here in Toronto, urinating blood. And Muhammad told me
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many years later, maybe 25 years later after the fight, I met him at a boxing dinner in
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Brockton, Massachusetts. He said, the first time I fought your father, because they fought twice,
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the first time I fought your father, I couldn't sit down in his Kentucky accent. I'm not doing it
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very well. I couldn't, I couldn't sit down for two weeks. I peed blood for a week. But he said,
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the worst part, no koochi koochi with the wife for a month. So yeah, you know, people have this,
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this, this, this mental image of my father just like sitting there, people raining blows on him.
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But believe me, my father could dish out the punishment and did quite often. And he's got
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actually one of the highest knockout percentages of any fighter of his era, like he's got 63 or 64
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knockouts out of his 72 wins. So, you know, if my dad had a great knockout record, he wasn't just
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a guy who just took punishment. He was a great world class fighter. You mentioned that he took
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that fight on short notice. It was, I think 17 days I read, right? Right, right. There's a whole
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history to that. And those people who know Muhammad Ali's story a little bit, we'll be familiar with
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this. He Muhammad Ali had declared that he did not want to fight in Vietnam, that he changed
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his name from Cassius Clay to Muhammad Ali. He actually changed it twice. He changed Cassius Clay
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to Cassius X because of his friend Malcolm X. And he had a following out with Malcolm X.
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And then he changed his name to Muhammad Ali while Elijah Muhammad is his spiritual
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leader did, given that name. So then he declared that he wasn't going to fight in Vietnam. He, he
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was not, well, people don't know this, but Muhammad, he was dyslexic. And he was not even eligible for
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the draft because they thought that can you believe it? Can you believe it? They didn't think Muhammad
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Ali was smart enough. But they reclassified him because apparently a lot of black Americans were
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not volunteering for the draft, right? Not volunteering for the army. So they were getting
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drafted and conscripted. And they wanted Muhammad to be a symbolic person like Joe Lewis was in the
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Second World War, just go there and entertain the troops. But Muhammad, he danced to a different
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drummer and he thought the United States shouldn't be there in Vietnam and said that he had no quarrel
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with the Viet Cong and he wasn't going to go. So the box, he was going to fight Ernie Terrell in
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Chicago and the Chicago Athletic Commission said, you know, you have to take back your unpatriotic
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remarks. He goes, I'm not not, those aren't unpatriotic. They're true. We shouldn't be in
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Vietnam at all. And they then they then reclassified him from one Y to one A, making him an eligible,
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you know, for the draft. So the fight with Ernie Terrell, who was the number one contender at the
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time, the guy who had a contentious victory over my dad the year before, in order to get the fight
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off the ground, they went to try to do it in Montreal. And the American, there was a World's
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Fair in Montreal in 1967. This was 1966, mind you. And the American Legion said, well, if Terrell
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and Ali fight in Montreal, then the American Legion is going to ask Americans to boycott
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the World's Fair, which would have, or Expo 67, which was the equivalent of a World's Fair.
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So that would have hurt Montreal economically. So the mayor of Montreal said, we're not going to
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have this fight in Montreal. So they're scrambling the famous boxing promoter Bob Aaron. This was
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his first boxing promotion. They were scrambling. So they phoned the people in Toronto, those people
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who ran Maple Leaf Gardens, which was the venue in Toronto at the time. And they said, would you
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be willing to have Ali fight there? Who would he fight? George Chivalry. George, you and Achuval.
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So that my father gets to call, do you want to fight Muhammad Ali in 17 days? And he says, sure,
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but let me check with my wife first. So he phoned up my mom, apparently he tells the story so
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beautifully better than I do. And he says, Linny honey, my mother's name was Linny honey, what
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are we doing in the next 17 days? Now my mom's got my mom's got four boys at the time, you know,
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my mother had me four days after she turned 16. She had four boys by the time she was 20. So she's
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like, I don't know what I'm I don't know what I'm doing in 17 days. Why are you asking me such a
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ridiculous question? So my dad says, you know, mark this on the date, you're coming to the
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fights, I'm fighting for the heavyweight championship of the world. So that's the way that
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that's the way the fight came off. And and on I remember that really important and seminal memories
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for me in terms of my dad and his career, I remember that 17 days, almost almost poetically,
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I remember his his effort, I remember everything he did to prepare. And, you know, my dad was
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ready to fight that night. In fact, if you watch the fight with Ali, the first fight with Ali,
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when they do the stare down before the fight, you watch my dad his in taste, his gaze is super
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intense. They try to wipe his brow and he shakes, he's ready to go. And, you know, all Canadians,
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all Croatians, people worldwide will always be proud of my father's efforts that night because
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he showed he showed you know what real effort in the boxing ring is all about. And, you know,
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at one time, my father was somewhat missed about people always talking about that fight because
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my father had other fights and other wins. Oh, if you went the distance with Ali, my dad would
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always say no, he went the distance with me. But as he got older, you know, he
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recognized that, you know, what mom, Muhammad went on to do in his career. He, Muhammad was at the
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height of his physical prowess before his license boxing license was taken away from him. And my
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dad gave him that my dad gave him the toughest, maybe arguably the best fighter of all time,
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his toughest fight in at the time of his life when he still had great physical skills,
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Muhammad still had great physical skills. And mom had said that that was that was the toughest
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fight he ever had. Up to that point, of course, Muhammad went on to have many other tough fights,
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too many that cost him, you know, you know, well, they say it was Parkinson's, but I don't believe
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that I believe he had something akin to Parkinson's perhaps, but the boxing certainly didn't do his
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brain very good. And my dad gave him his toughest fight when he was at his physical peak. So
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George ended up being George, I call him George, dad, my father ended up being very proud of that.
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So yeah, well, I'm sure at the moment, you know, at that time, you know, no one wants to just
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go the distance with someone. And, you know, that's the end result you're expecting,
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or you're hoping for. But, you know, over the years, you can now appreciate, wow, that's
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sure, sure. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, for sure. Great, great, great effort is always to be,
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you know, I'm a health and physical teacher. And, you know, as a teacher, you know, yeah,
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you praise the skill, you praise the outcome, but you also praise effort, right? Everybody
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recognizes effort, right? And that's when I think about what we spoke earlier about Stanko,
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about that Croatian mindset, like not going to be outworked. I think that's bedrock and parcel of,
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you know, my father being Croatian, he had that embedded into him, right? And he was going to display
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it when he was, you know, up for the biggest challenge of his life. Absolutely. Yeah. And
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to go one more quick, you know, Ali story with your father, I saw in an interview that you said,
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Ali respected your dad for a specific reason aside from his boxing. Yeah, well, yeah, sure.
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I'll tell that story. I mean, Muhammad respected my father for many reasons, of course, for his
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toughness and his, you know, just just my father was just kept coming, right? But he also respected
368
00:38:33,280 --> 00:38:38,720
him for the fact that he called him Muhammad Ali. He was my father was the first fighter of record
369
00:38:38,720 --> 00:38:49,440
to call him Muhammad Ali, right? And I'm speculating here, right? I'm speculating, but I mean, we're
370
00:38:49,440 --> 00:38:56,400
I mean, we're talking about the diaspora and the Croatian experience and my father's exposure to
371
00:38:56,400 --> 00:39:03,200
people who who practiced Islam and the Muslim faith, you know, a lot of Croatians, of course,
372
00:39:03,200 --> 00:39:10,480
in Bosnia Herzegovina converted Islam. But there was just, you know, a recognition of the fact that
373
00:39:10,480 --> 00:39:16,240
if that's, you know, there was nothing negative about that, that if that person desired if that
374
00:39:16,240 --> 00:39:20,800
was their faith and their belief system, that, you know, he was going to recognize that and
375
00:39:20,800 --> 00:39:27,680
acknowledge it and support it in any way he could. And, you know, I was always proud of that when I
376
00:39:27,680 --> 00:39:33,360
heard about it afterwards too, because it spoke of my father's kind of, you know, worldview mindset,
377
00:39:33,360 --> 00:39:39,040
right? It's not it's not an either or thing. It's we're all in this crazy struggle together in life.
378
00:39:39,040 --> 00:39:45,520
And after when people, boxers are retired, well, I always found this fascinating, when boxers retire,
379
00:39:46,480 --> 00:39:52,240
and they see each other at some kind of event, they always hug each other. I mean, they try to
380
00:39:52,800 --> 00:39:56,640
beat the heck out of each other in the ring. And even after a fight, they come over and hug each
381
00:39:56,640 --> 00:40:02,560
other. So there's that recognition of common struggle. And of course, the part of the world
382
00:40:02,560 --> 00:40:11,120
that he came from, you know, is steeped in struggle that way, right? So it was it was part of the
383
00:40:11,120 --> 00:40:17,360
world that my father's family came from Croatian, all of the, you know, the ethnic strife and the
384
00:40:17,360 --> 00:40:22,080
wars that have gone on there, that just that that sense of, you know, recognizing common struggle
385
00:40:22,080 --> 00:40:27,280
and having and just being able to put aside differences and recognize the beauty and the
386
00:40:27,280 --> 00:40:32,720
common alley between all people. I think that was, I think Muhammad recognized that when George
387
00:40:32,720 --> 00:40:38,080
called him Muhammad Ali, and he always respected him for it. Yeah, I thought that was an interesting
388
00:40:38,080 --> 00:40:44,160
little, you know, tidbit that I didn't know about before. You mentioned, you know, how tough your
389
00:40:44,160 --> 00:40:49,600
father was, he was finding some of the toughest guys, you know, that casual fans like myself know,
390
00:40:49,600 --> 00:40:55,920
probably Ali, Joe Frazier, and George Foreman, you know, probably the big three that someone like
391
00:40:55,920 --> 00:41:01,520
myself would know, or people, you know, may not even know or watch boxing, but you know, of course,
392
00:41:01,520 --> 00:41:08,000
you know, those three names, I get maybe that's a an American sort of view, but yeah, yeah, but
393
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:13,280
but heavyweight boxing was essentially American during the during the 60s, 70s and 80s, right?
394
00:41:13,280 --> 00:41:18,160
And only only recently are we seeing the prominence of heavyweight fighters from other parts of the
395
00:41:18,160 --> 00:41:25,920
world. But yeah, certainly, that's understandable. Yeah, that's true. You mentioned already Mitch,
396
00:41:25,920 --> 00:41:30,640
one of the memories of your, you know, during your dad's boxing career, about that 17 days,
397
00:41:30,640 --> 00:41:36,240
you know, watching him train, what other sort of, you know, memories stand out from his career for
398
00:41:36,240 --> 00:41:44,560
you? Well, I remember the I remember the Ali flight too, right? I was with my mother. And the fourth row,
399
00:41:44,560 --> 00:41:50,400
I always remember that and yelling and screaming for the referee to get out of the way. You know,
400
00:41:50,400 --> 00:42:02,960
so my father could, could hit him. Members of my dad's career. You know, it's such a psychological,
401
00:42:03,520 --> 00:42:09,440
like, strange psychology when you watch your father fight, you know, I never I believe my father was
402
00:42:09,440 --> 00:42:16,320
Superman. So I never, I never thought he could be hurt. You know, of course, he's only human and
403
00:42:16,320 --> 00:42:22,880
flesh and blood and of course, everybody could be hurt. I what I really enjoyed. And I've mentioned
404
00:42:22,880 --> 00:42:28,160
this a few times, when we would go to places in the United States, or even my brother and I went to
405
00:42:28,160 --> 00:42:37,760
Puerto Rico. And this was post boxing career. And Puerto Rico is a crazy, crazy boxing environment.
406
00:42:37,760 --> 00:42:44,000
They don't have a long history of great boxes. And, you know, I know my dad was a prominent fighter,
407
00:42:45,360 --> 00:42:48,800
you know, challenged for the heavyweight championship of the world. But the ovation,
408
00:42:48,800 --> 00:42:54,320
they gave him before a boxing match down there when he went to do the, when he was retired,
409
00:42:54,320 --> 00:42:59,840
went to do the commentary for TV. I just, yeah, I just, I remember that those are beautiful memories
410
00:42:59,840 --> 00:43:04,480
to have because, you know, we were so far from home, my brother and I, who went with him. And
411
00:43:04,480 --> 00:43:08,480
then just to see people from another country where they didn't even speak English, where they were
412
00:43:08,480 --> 00:43:14,960
speaking Spanish and just stand up and give him a huge ovation. I going to the International
413
00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:21,520
Boxing Hall of Fame, or going to the World Council Boxing Hall of Fame in California and the National
414
00:43:21,520 --> 00:43:28,960
Boxing Hall of Fame in California and seeing people line up outside and to have people reminisce
415
00:43:28,960 --> 00:43:34,400
and tell a story about one of the fights they were watching with their dad or brother. And what my dad
416
00:43:34,400 --> 00:43:38,480
did in that fight and be able to recall it and tell it to my dad and have that kind of, and my dad
417
00:43:38,480 --> 00:43:44,640
would stop and talk to them and that, that intimacy of shared experience, just to be a party to that
418
00:43:44,640 --> 00:43:50,720
and watch that, that, that would, that's beautiful stuff. Right. So yeah, I, I, I love my dad and
419
00:43:50,720 --> 00:43:56,480
watch them fight and bleed to do with Superman. No one, no one escapes without damage there.
420
00:43:56,480 --> 00:44:06,080
Watching my dad, you know, on YouTube, I, I, it's kind of interesting because I go back on
421
00:44:06,080 --> 00:44:11,360
YouTube and I watch some of the fights and, you know, I'll be watching it. It feels almost like
422
00:44:11,360 --> 00:44:20,160
the first time, but then there'll be something that I remember from 1967, 68, 69, 70, 71, when I
423
00:44:20,160 --> 00:44:26,000
was a young man and glimpses will come back to me. So it's like your memory interacts with,
424
00:44:26,000 --> 00:44:34,240
with the now sometimes. I remember when my dad knocked out Jerry Corey in 1969, he had a very
425
00:44:34,240 --> 00:44:41,680
bad eye, but knocked him out in the seventh round. They said, said to him, George, your eye looks pretty
426
00:44:41,680 --> 00:44:46,560
bad. He says, I don't care what it, what it looks like. I feel pretty good right now. And Jerry,
427
00:44:46,560 --> 00:44:50,480
he knocked out Jerry Corey, who was a great fighter from California. And
428
00:44:50,480 --> 00:44:57,920
Corey got hit with a left hook and then he took a knee and he stayed down after the 10 count and
429
00:44:57,920 --> 00:45:04,880
bounced right up. And he goes, Oh, I wasn't hurt. I could have gotten up easy. And my dad said,
430
00:45:04,880 --> 00:45:08,320
I always thought this was kind of very good in the heat of the moment. That's what happens when
431
00:45:08,320 --> 00:45:13,520
you get hit with a good punch. You think it's nine, but it's really 10. So he had the capacity,
432
00:45:13,520 --> 00:45:20,480
like, you know, to say, say something very interesting and thoughtful and kind of cute and humorous,
433
00:45:20,480 --> 00:45:26,480
even, even in the heat of the moment. So yeah, quick thinking. Yeah, quick thinking. Yeah,
434
00:45:26,480 --> 00:45:31,040
the, those kinds of, my dad always, I always thought my father would have been a really good
435
00:45:31,040 --> 00:45:36,000
boxing commentator. And he did do a couple of things in the United States, but it was difficult
436
00:45:36,000 --> 00:45:41,360
for him to get a green card down there without moving down there. And my dad always wanted to
437
00:45:41,360 --> 00:45:48,320
stay in Canada and be around his family. So he didn't do that. So yeah, I've got memory. I just,
438
00:45:48,320 --> 00:45:54,800
I just remember my dad's workload capacity, you know, when he was, sometimes I remember the training
439
00:45:54,800 --> 00:46:00,480
more than the, than the actual fights themselves because I used to go with him when he ran in
440
00:46:00,480 --> 00:46:06,640
the local parks here, sprinting upstairs. There's a set of stairs near that that I live very close
441
00:46:06,640 --> 00:46:12,960
to now in high park in Toronto, 97 steps. My dad would run for a half an hour. And in that half
442
00:46:12,960 --> 00:46:18,960
an hour, he'd running around the park. He'd stop every once a mom do chin ups with arms around
443
00:46:18,960 --> 00:46:24,000
a branch of a tree. And then when it was all done, we go down to the bottom of the steps.
444
00:46:24,800 --> 00:46:29,600
And he'd sprint up and down the steps 20 times, you know, and I'd be, I'd be feeding chipmunks
445
00:46:29,600 --> 00:46:34,480
where my dad's working his buttocks up and down the stairs. Yeah, that kind of stuff. I love the,
446
00:46:34,480 --> 00:46:40,320
I love those memories, you know, I just, there is something pure about it. And I think, I think
447
00:46:40,320 --> 00:46:46,480
watching him train and working out like that and the joy you felt just being on top of your game
448
00:46:46,480 --> 00:46:52,560
physically. I think that's one of the reasons why I became a health and phys ed teacher and coached
449
00:46:52,560 --> 00:46:58,000
a lot of sport because I saw how that benefited him and how it made him feel so good and being
450
00:46:58,000 --> 00:47:04,160
on top of this game like that, you know, just that physical capability, which all goes back to what we
451
00:47:04,160 --> 00:47:09,040
spoke about earlier, right? Stonk on that work ethic, right? There are benefits to having a great
452
00:47:09,040 --> 00:47:15,600
work ethic, the outcomes, you know, they're pretty palpable. They're concrete. So yeah,
453
00:47:15,600 --> 00:47:18,560
just watching that. I don't have that kind of work ethic, by the way.
454
00:47:18,560 --> 00:47:29,440
No, not compared to my grandfather and my dad. No way. I'm gonna be honest. I like to relax a
455
00:47:29,440 --> 00:47:36,880
little more. Well, that's not so bad either. No, no, no, you got to take a break once in a while
456
00:47:36,880 --> 00:47:41,120
with joint life. Right? Yeah, I mean, everything is different, you know, over the years from,
457
00:47:41,680 --> 00:47:46,400
you know, say even 100 years ago, even 50 years ago till now, I mean, it's hard to really compare
458
00:47:46,400 --> 00:47:52,640
with just the technological advancements and the difference in, you know, even just how the world
459
00:47:52,640 --> 00:47:58,160
works and stuff. I mean, it's hard to compare things like that. And you sort of touched just
460
00:47:58,160 --> 00:48:02,240
now, Mitch, on, you know, the next question I wanted to ask, which is, you know, a little bit more
461
00:48:02,240 --> 00:48:08,160
about you, because you're now a teacher, you do public speaking, and, you know, I wanted to know
462
00:48:08,160 --> 00:48:14,880
a little more how did you get started, you know, on that path? I had, I was very fortunate when I
463
00:48:14,880 --> 00:48:23,920
was a young man, I had, I had great teachers in my life. And when thinking of a career,
464
00:48:23,920 --> 00:48:30,480
after I graduated from university, I took a couple years off, unfortunately, I had a brother die of
465
00:48:30,480 --> 00:48:37,120
suicide, I took a year off to travel the world, very fortunate that way, thinking about, and
466
00:48:37,120 --> 00:48:43,360
what I was going to do with my life. My father wanted me to be a lawyer, because I was a philosophy
467
00:48:43,360 --> 00:48:49,840
major. And my mother wanted me to be a teacher, because I had, after I graduated to pay awesome
468
00:48:49,840 --> 00:48:56,400
student loans, I've been working with young people creating youths, strength and conditioning programs.
469
00:48:56,400 --> 00:49:01,280
And a lot of that, you know, harkened back to watching my dad and watching what he had done
470
00:49:02,720 --> 00:49:11,760
in his training. And I became a teacher, listened to my mom in that that way, was a good choice for
471
00:49:11,760 --> 00:49:17,600
me because I thought about all the great teachers I had in my life. So I became a teacher in 1988,
472
00:49:17,600 --> 00:49:25,120
89. Right. So wonderful, wonderful experience for me. I've had, you know, 34, 35 years of teaching
473
00:49:25,760 --> 00:49:36,000
soon to retire, want to retire next year, hopefully. Thank you. And then I'm going to enjoy myself,
474
00:49:36,000 --> 00:49:43,040
probably do a little writing, perhaps about growing up in the two little family and talking about
475
00:49:43,040 --> 00:49:48,640
experiences like even what we're talking about today with regard to my grandfather. Like, I remember
476
00:49:48,640 --> 00:49:55,440
just a cute story, son. You know, I'm a health and phys ed teacher. And I remember my grandfather
477
00:49:55,440 --> 00:50:00,880
sitting down and saying to me, you know, again, in his beautiful creation accent, he had a tough time
478
00:50:00,880 --> 00:50:06,960
saying Mitchell, right? Or Mitch, he called me Mitchell, Mitchell, you want to live a long life.
479
00:50:06,960 --> 00:50:10,960
You want to live a long life. I said, sure, Graham. So like, I'm only like nine or 10 at the time.
480
00:50:10,960 --> 00:50:17,120
Sure, I want to live a long life. You got to do these things. Number one, you got to sweat every day.
481
00:50:17,680 --> 00:50:22,560
I said sweat every day, right? And I'm thinking about this now, many years later, sweat every day.
482
00:50:22,560 --> 00:50:28,640
You got to work hard because boost your metabolism, burns calories, it's exercise, get your heart
483
00:50:28,640 --> 00:50:35,520
and lungs going. I say, okay, that one makes sense to me. Second one is you got to eat garlic every day.
484
00:50:35,520 --> 00:50:43,600
I said, okay, okay, garlic. Well, you know, it's an antiseptic. It's good for your blood profile.
485
00:50:43,600 --> 00:50:50,080
Right. It's good stuff. And we realized that garlic, this is back in like 1969, he's telling me this, right?
486
00:50:51,040 --> 00:50:56,560
The third thing he told me was you got to drink a little bit alcohol every day. Now,
487
00:50:56,560 --> 00:51:01,680
now, now, if for religious reasons, or you have, or you have, you know,
488
00:51:02,880 --> 00:51:07,840
addiction problems, of course, don't drink booze every day, but a little bit of alcohol every day.
489
00:51:07,840 --> 00:51:12,560
And we know that, you know, if you can control that, keep it under control, a little bit of alcohol,
490
00:51:12,560 --> 00:51:17,120
you know, it's good for your stress levels, you know, it's good again for your blood profile,
491
00:51:17,120 --> 00:51:24,480
for your hypertension. The next thing he said to me was you got to eat something green every day.
492
00:51:24,480 --> 00:51:30,000
And that, no, we didn't, we're not talking about green jello. We're talking about,
493
00:51:30,960 --> 00:51:37,280
you know, dark, leafy green vegetables. Just thinking like in Croatian cuisine,
494
00:51:37,280 --> 00:51:43,200
like Rastika, my grandfather used to grow Rastika in his backyard and make soup with it every Sunday,
495
00:51:43,200 --> 00:51:49,920
you know, that it's like collard greens, fantastic for vitamin A, fiber, just absolutely,
496
00:51:49,920 --> 00:51:56,400
like so good for you. And the last thing he talked about, which I never really understood
497
00:51:56,400 --> 00:52:00,240
too many years later, he said, you got to, you got to wash your feet every day vigorously.
498
00:52:00,960 --> 00:52:07,280
Now, that didn't, you know, make much sense to me, but what I was telling this story to
499
00:52:07,280 --> 00:52:14,240
at a party one time, and a doctor came up to me, a reflexologist, and said, Mr. Shavallo,
500
00:52:14,240 --> 00:52:20,960
that advice is absolutely fantastic, rubbing your feet, you massage your liver, your pancreas.
501
00:52:20,960 --> 00:52:28,560
I didn't know very little about reflexology, but that kind of, you know, wisdom that my
502
00:52:28,560 --> 00:52:33,360
grandfather had gotten from his grandfather, apparently, that that's old ancient wisdom,
503
00:52:34,480 --> 00:52:38,960
you know, got me thinking a long time ago about how to live a long and healthy life.
504
00:52:38,960 --> 00:52:43,760
And I think that manifested itself in my eventually becoming a health and disease teacher
505
00:52:43,760 --> 00:52:48,960
interesting me enough when I when I reflect on it. So, you know, I've got that, I've got that
506
00:52:48,960 --> 00:52:55,440
Croatian history in my makeup somehow too that, and I'm glad that my grandfather passed that
507
00:52:55,440 --> 00:53:02,480
those that kind of, you know, homespun and wisdom onto me. And that I tell that story to kids.
508
00:53:02,480 --> 00:53:06,960
And then I tell them, I say, you know, look at your families, look at where you came from,
509
00:53:06,960 --> 00:53:11,760
look at your successful ancestors, get three or four things from them in terms of how to live
510
00:53:11,760 --> 00:53:17,520
a long and healthy life. And chances are, you know, those are good things to adhere to in terms of,
511
00:53:17,520 --> 00:53:21,920
in terms of your value system throughout your life. They've got your genetic coding and they
512
00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:26,880
have your environment involved in them. So pay attention to them, right?
513
00:53:27,920 --> 00:53:32,240
That's a very interesting point. Yeah. Yeah, a lot of things, you know, your grandparents say
514
00:53:32,240 --> 00:53:36,240
advice, you know, specifically you when you're younger, you kind of brush it off. And then
515
00:53:36,240 --> 00:53:40,240
once you get older, you kind of start to realize, you know, that that makes sense.
516
00:53:40,240 --> 00:53:44,800
Yeah, that makes that makes sense. Grandpa and grandma were smart, right? They're smart people,
517
00:53:44,800 --> 00:53:50,240
right? And, you know, in my family, when I look and reflect, you know, there's,
518
00:53:51,040 --> 00:53:58,160
if you don't have an addiction problem, you have a good chance of living a long and prosperous life.
519
00:53:58,160 --> 00:54:03,200
So that's what we all want to do, right? And not only do we want a long life, we do not only do
520
00:54:04,160 --> 00:54:09,040
we want health inside that time frame too, right? So, and that was, that's what this was speaking
521
00:54:09,040 --> 00:54:13,520
to also, right? You know, you're getting a good health span and inside your lifespan. So
522
00:54:14,400 --> 00:54:18,880
Gramps is on top of that. And he lived to be my grandfather lived to be, you know,
523
00:54:18,880 --> 00:54:25,920
almost 94 years old. So he did very well for himself. Yeah, well, apparently that advice works,
524
00:54:25,920 --> 00:54:32,960
then. Yeah, obviously. Yeah. I mean, I just think about sweat, you know, pay attention to what you're
525
00:54:32,960 --> 00:54:40,320
eating, you know, eat some natural food like green vegetables, moderation in alcohol content. And
526
00:54:40,320 --> 00:54:44,880
then, and then, well, the washing of the feet, I have to do investigate that one a little bit more.
527
00:54:44,880 --> 00:54:50,720
I'll do that for retirement. Yeah, now you have something to look forward to in retirement. So
528
00:54:51,840 --> 00:54:56,240
I'll be talking to reflexologists all over the world. Hey, is there any truth to this?
529
00:54:58,160 --> 00:55:02,240
That's funny. Yeah, that sounded like the most classic old school Croatian advice,
530
00:55:02,240 --> 00:55:05,920
you know, from the grandparents, but there is truth to it, you know, it does that.
531
00:55:07,760 --> 00:55:11,680
I've told this guy the Croatian people and the Congress, wow, yeah, and they just,
532
00:55:11,680 --> 00:55:17,680
they, it goes, it just branches out. Yeah, you know, I know the Croatians love their, you know,
533
00:55:17,680 --> 00:55:23,280
the Raqqia a little bit of Raqqia every morning, a little bit of the alcohol. Actually, I did a video
534
00:55:23,280 --> 00:55:28,480
a couple, one was a couple months ago, I went and interviewed people, you know, in Zagreb asking,
535
00:55:28,480 --> 00:55:33,360
you know, do you think the Raqqia can, you know, as healing properties, do you think it's an important
536
00:55:33,360 --> 00:55:37,840
part of the culture? And it was just funny to see, you know, some of the older people, the one
537
00:55:37,840 --> 00:55:43,040
older lady I asked, do you drink Raqqia? She said, Oh, no. I said, Oh, no. She said, well, you know,
538
00:55:43,040 --> 00:55:47,600
once, maybe twice a week, you know, just when someone comes over or, you know, if I'm sick and
539
00:55:47,600 --> 00:55:54,160
then starts listening to all these reasons when she does drink it and, you know, a little bit of
540
00:55:54,160 --> 00:55:59,840
alcohol can help, you know, with your health, even, you know, if you're sick. Yeah, of course,
541
00:55:59,840 --> 00:56:07,280
purify the body and the spirit, right? Absolutely. They call it spirits for a reason, right? So,
542
00:56:10,000 --> 00:56:17,280
what is that great? Oh, my memory is fading. No, the plum brandy.
543
00:56:17,280 --> 00:56:25,040
The, oh, my goodness. There's a little bit. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I remember having,
544
00:56:25,040 --> 00:56:31,920
I didn't try that till I was 21. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, that sounds so strong. Oh, my goodness.
545
00:56:31,920 --> 00:56:36,480
You have to have a work ethic to drink it. Never mind. Yeah, for real.
546
00:56:39,280 --> 00:56:44,160
Oh, my goodness. I still stay away from that. It's just too, it's not enjoyable to me. It's,
547
00:56:44,160 --> 00:56:49,120
it hurts me. Yeah. I always opt out when I was some Croatian people and they offered
548
00:56:49,120 --> 00:56:56,320
two minutes and I'm too Canadian to drink that. I don't have your constitution.
549
00:56:58,240 --> 00:57:02,960
Oh, that's funny. That's funny. Have you ever been down there over to Croatia? Have you been,
550
00:57:02,960 --> 00:57:08,400
were you in, um, Rihbushki? I know your dad was there, what, maybe 10 years ago when they unveiled
551
00:57:08,400 --> 00:57:14,960
the statue, you know, he got a statue himself there. I'm both sad and embarrassed to report that I
552
00:57:14,960 --> 00:57:22,640
have only been to, um, what was then, what was then 1982, January of 1982, Yugoslavia.
553
00:57:23,440 --> 00:57:30,560
At that time, my dad got a call at the last minute to bring over some fighters. They were
554
00:57:30,560 --> 00:57:37,040
interestingly running a professional boxing show in 1982 in the then Yugoslavia and my dad said,
555
00:57:37,040 --> 00:57:42,320
well, don't pay me. Just I'm going to bring my sons and, uh, he brought, pardon me, myself and
556
00:57:42,320 --> 00:57:49,600
my younger brother, Jesse, uh, to, um, we flew to Belgrade, then we went to Zagreb and then the
557
00:57:49,600 --> 00:57:54,800
fights were in Sarajevo. And unfortunately, I was only there for three and a half days. I didn't get
558
00:57:54,800 --> 00:58:01,840
the opportunity to go. I would have, it's on my bucket list in the retirement. I have, um, this,
559
00:58:01,840 --> 00:58:08,240
this sense that I want to, you know, uh, go to the village. My grandfather was born in
560
00:58:08,800 --> 00:58:14,720
and feel the blood in my feet connect with, with the ground underneath me and feel what it was like
561
00:58:14,720 --> 00:58:20,800
to have a little, you know, Turskakavl in the afternoon and maybe be convinced to have a glass
562
00:58:20,800 --> 00:58:27,280
of shaleevits and talking in my, you know, bring a relative with me who speaks better Croatian
563
00:58:27,280 --> 00:58:32,240
and or somebody speaks a little English and just, you know, soak up the atmosphere and feel what it
564
00:58:32,240 --> 00:58:38,160
was like to be, you know, one of my relatives, uh, a long time ago and just, just look around and just
565
00:58:38,160 --> 00:58:42,800
soak in the atmosphere. I want to do that. And, and, um, as promised myself, I'm going to do that
566
00:58:42,800 --> 00:58:49,520
before I, you know, leave this earth. I want to do that for sure. Absolutely. Yeah. I mean,
567
00:58:49,520 --> 00:58:53,920
absolutely. That's, I think definitely something you should do. And just hearing you talk about it,
568
00:58:53,920 --> 00:58:58,960
you know, I can sort of relate to a lesser degree, I think, because I mean, it was always a big part
569
00:58:58,960 --> 00:59:03,680
of my identity, but now even more so, you know, through the years I've sort of grown in that,
570
00:59:04,480 --> 00:59:09,520
that aspect. But yeah, it's definitely something to, I mean, you phrase it perfectly. I can't even
571
00:59:09,520 --> 00:59:13,440
think of how you say it, but you know, feel the ground under your feet. Yeah, you want to watch
572
00:59:13,440 --> 00:59:17,760
the steps of your ancestors, right? You want to feel, you want to, you want to walk the path that
573
00:59:17,760 --> 00:59:22,640
roads they walked and get a sense of what it was like to be them. It's the connection piece we're
574
00:59:22,640 --> 00:59:29,040
all looking for, right? So yeah, yeah. When you do that, yeah. I mean, you know, I dream about it
575
00:59:29,040 --> 00:59:35,600
sometimes crazily enough, right? So, and I'm a, I'm a, I'm not a great cyclist, but I cycle every
576
00:59:35,600 --> 00:59:41,120
day for health and fitness. So just to get a bike and just toot around the village and, you know,
577
00:59:41,120 --> 00:59:46,560
the, the, you know, in her to go where my relatives are from, it's like, it's hard, scrabble land that
578
00:59:46,560 --> 00:59:52,400
they, they, they work the land hard and eat out a living there and just, just to go and just, and
579
00:59:52,400 --> 00:59:57,360
just to hear the music, to hear the language, right? You know, you know, to hear, to hear people
580
00:59:57,360 --> 01:00:06,480
say, open the door, like just, you know, just to hear that it will bring back memories to me,
581
01:00:06,480 --> 01:00:10,960
and it will probably connect me to memories I never even knew I had. So yeah, that's what I,
582
01:00:10,960 --> 01:00:15,520
that's what I want to do. Oh yeah, I'm just hearing you talk about it. I'm excited for,
583
01:00:15,520 --> 01:00:18,960
you know, that to happen hopefully in the next couple of years, you know, when you're
584
01:00:18,960 --> 01:00:24,720
Yes. After your retirement. And you know, my, my grandparents are from Veliazzi. I don't know if
585
01:00:24,720 --> 01:00:30,240
you know where that is, but it's only maybe five minutes from Throboy, 15 minutes from Lewiski.
586
01:00:30,240 --> 01:00:34,240
So just last week I was over there with some friends from LA that came out and you know,
587
01:00:34,240 --> 01:00:40,480
we drove through Throboy. Actually, I got lost on the only road from there to Lewiski because I was,
588
01:00:40,480 --> 01:00:45,280
I kept seeing signs for Throboy and I'm thinking, oh, I think I've gone too far. Like this can't
589
01:00:45,280 --> 01:00:49,840
be right. I've been driving for 15 minutes and I'm not in Lewiski yet. I just needed a little bit
590
01:00:49,840 --> 01:00:55,120
further. So I turned around and never, never made it to Lewiski. I was supposed to pick my
591
01:00:55,120 --> 01:01:00,000
sister and aunt up at a bus station over there. But yeah, I mean, it's a small world, you know,
592
01:01:00,000 --> 01:01:04,080
that's, and especially over there that Lewiski, here's the going that area, you know,
593
01:01:06,080 --> 01:01:11,040
love to do that. And I'm not going to lie. I'll probably sneak, sneak over to Damatzi and,
594
01:01:11,040 --> 01:01:15,280
you know, hit an island or two, you know, because that looks rather inviting too, I think.
595
01:01:16,240 --> 01:01:20,400
Yeah, you should definitely, I mean, the islands are amazing. The coast, you know,
596
01:01:20,400 --> 01:01:25,680
Split, Dubrovnik, all of Croatia really, Zagreb is, you know, amazing.
597
01:01:25,680 --> 01:01:31,680
Everywhere is Istria. That's the one place that I need to explore a little more. I haven't been
598
01:01:31,680 --> 01:01:38,640
around. Yeah, up and down the coast. I'll tell you a very interesting story. Okay. Now this might
599
01:01:38,640 --> 01:01:42,480
be a little politically correct. I don't want to offend anybody that's not the intention. I'm just
600
01:01:42,480 --> 01:01:48,400
going to tell you the story. So, so because I know there's like a bloodied history in that part of
601
01:01:48,400 --> 01:01:56,080
the world. So in 1982, when I went with my brother and my dad, and we brought a fight over a fighter
602
01:01:56,080 --> 01:02:00,560
over from Buffalo, New York, because they needed fighters. And we brought a couple of two guys.
603
01:02:01,120 --> 01:02:04,720
But there was a fighter from Buffalo, New York with us. We were in
604
01:02:04,720 --> 01:02:14,560
Zagreb. And we went for a little lunch. So in this small tavern, right? So we had some grape
605
01:02:14,560 --> 01:02:18,640
food. I forget what we had some Kapoos there, whatever it was. It was lovely. But there were
606
01:02:18,640 --> 01:02:25,120
these guys who'd obviously this and this was midday, they were drinking rather heavily, right?
607
01:02:25,120 --> 01:02:32,400
And then they broke out into song. Now this is 1982, remember? And so they broke it into song.
608
01:02:32,400 --> 01:02:37,920
And I said to my dad, what are they singing about? And he said, they're singing odes to the
609
01:02:37,920 --> 01:02:44,000
Communist Party. I said, wow, that's kind of crazy, right? Middle of the day drunk singing
610
01:02:44,000 --> 01:02:49,520
odes to the Communist Party. So my dad took a couple of pictures of them, right? And they get
611
01:02:49,520 --> 01:02:55,120
drunker and drunker. And my dad takes another picture of them. And then they get they start
612
01:02:55,120 --> 01:03:01,280
heated talk between them. And then they look at my father. And they say, give me the camera because
613
01:03:01,280 --> 01:03:06,800
they wanted the film. They want didn't want a recording of my dad taking a picture of them
614
01:03:06,800 --> 01:03:11,360
while they were drunk during the middle of the day. And, you know, not doing what they were
615
01:03:11,360 --> 01:03:16,320
supposed to be doing. So my dad said, in Croatian, no, I'm not going to give you the,
616
01:03:16,960 --> 01:03:22,880
give you the camera. And the guy opens up his, his jacket and he shows a gun.
617
01:03:24,880 --> 01:03:30,560
And my dad said, my dad said, just turn the corner, I'm going to hit him and then we'll run.
618
01:03:30,560 --> 01:03:36,720
I said, dad, you can't hit me, buddy. Everybody knows who you are. They'll know you can't do that.
619
01:03:36,720 --> 01:03:42,400
So my brother and the fighter, my dad gave him a couple of American dollars and said,
620
01:03:42,400 --> 01:03:46,640
go take a taxi and meet us back at the airport because our hotel was near the airport. And,
621
01:03:46,640 --> 01:03:50,640
and, and my dad and I said, come on with me. So the guys that started yelling and screaming. So
622
01:03:50,640 --> 01:03:56,400
my dad and I sprint out and we're running through the streets of the Zagreb. These guys behind us
623
01:03:56,400 --> 01:04:01,040
yelling and screaming. And I remember running. It was like a cold January day. I don't think it was
624
01:04:01,040 --> 01:04:06,000
snowing. It was like cold, wet rain. And I read, you know, those, those beautiful, the color of the
625
01:04:06,000 --> 01:04:12,160
orange slates on the top of the roots and running through these little alleyways for these people,
626
01:04:12,160 --> 01:04:16,080
all this kerfuffle behind looking at us and we're running anyway, they, they were drunk out of their
627
01:04:16,080 --> 01:04:20,480
minds. They couldn't keep up with us. And we lost them. And anyway, we all, we all met back at,
628
01:04:20,480 --> 01:04:27,920
at, at the hotel near the airport. It's a bizarre story, but it's one I have to tell. Yeah. And I
629
01:04:27,920 --> 01:04:32,000
remember some of the women who were like hanging the laundry, even though it was a wet day, they're
630
01:04:32,000 --> 01:04:36,320
hanging out on the, on the, on the verandah porch in the apartment. And they're looking at us like,
631
01:04:36,320 --> 01:04:42,960
what are these guys doing? We're just sprinting, sprinting down the small streets. And yeah,
632
01:04:42,960 --> 01:04:48,160
it was quite amazing. Actually, it's like something you'd see in a movie. Yeah, that's like out of a
633
01:04:48,160 --> 01:04:55,280
spy movie or a caper movie. It was nuts. It was nuts. I've got other stories from that trip too,
634
01:04:55,280 --> 01:05:01,680
that are quite amazing. It's really etched deeply in the cinema of my mind. Like,
635
01:05:04,080 --> 01:05:12,720
we took this kid Kenny Northrup to fight, Mary on Benish, who had just lost an opera, he lost
636
01:05:12,720 --> 01:05:18,640
his fight for the world title. He was a strong middleweight, very strong Croatian fighter,
637
01:05:18,640 --> 01:05:25,520
Mary on Benish. And Kenny Northrup, the guy we brought over was going to fight Mary on Benish.
638
01:05:25,520 --> 01:05:32,960
So my dad says to Kenny at the weigh in, I noticed something with Benish's eyes. He's, he's got a
639
01:05:32,960 --> 01:05:38,320
weak left eye, something's wrong with his eyesight and his left eye. So every time you fight him,
640
01:05:38,320 --> 01:05:45,200
move to your right. Right. So the fight starts and I'm working the corner with my dad. All right.
641
01:05:45,200 --> 01:05:53,520
And Kenny does really good in the phrase jabbing, he's moving well, right. He's moving to his right,
642
01:05:53,520 --> 01:06:00,640
avoiding Benish's big right hand because he was a tremendous puncher. So fights a great first round,
643
01:06:00,640 --> 01:06:05,760
comes back to the corner. Now in the corner, you give the individual water, you put Vasily on.
644
01:06:05,760 --> 01:06:12,560
So the card girls come up into the ring. And my being a young man at the time, I had to take a peek
645
01:06:12,560 --> 01:06:19,200
at the card girl, right. So he holds up the cards for round two. Now, now, Stanko, you got to remember
646
01:06:19,200 --> 01:06:26,080
the mindset. I'm just a young guy from North America, right. In Bosnia Herzegovina, we're
647
01:06:26,080 --> 01:06:31,840
in Sarajevo where this fight is taking place. The card girl, beautiful gal, dressed scantily,
648
01:06:31,840 --> 01:06:40,080
holds up the card for round number two. And she has underarm hair sticking out, right. And that
649
01:06:40,080 --> 01:06:46,160
was a European thing, right. In North America, everybody's saying, so I start laughing. So the
650
01:06:46,160 --> 01:06:51,280
fighter, Kenny looks at me and says, what are you laughing about? I said, look at the card girl.
651
01:06:51,280 --> 01:06:57,040
And he starts laughing too. So my dad says, what are you doing? Concentrate, shut up, you're in a
652
01:06:57,040 --> 01:07:04,080
fight, right. So the bell rings, we get the stool out, all the buckets out. And Kenny goes to fight,
653
01:07:04,080 --> 01:07:11,120
right. And my dad goes, move to your right. So Kenny is fighting, doing well. He makes the
654
01:07:11,120 --> 01:07:18,160
cardinal sin, the cardinal error of moving to his left. Benish hits him, whack, bone on bone,
655
01:07:18,160 --> 01:07:26,480
out cold, out foot twitching, the crowd erupts. My dad and I sprint into the ring, throw water on.
656
01:07:26,480 --> 01:07:31,200
Kenny, Kenny, you all right, you're all right. Get him up, get him up. He's all dazed. He's on the
657
01:07:31,200 --> 01:07:35,920
canvas. He goes, what happened? I said, you're knocked out. He goes, no, I'm not. I go, you're
658
01:07:35,920 --> 01:07:39,520
knocked out. Look what you're where you are. You're on the ring apron, looking up into the lights.
659
01:07:39,520 --> 01:07:43,200
Everything, and it's wild. It's pandemonium in the ring. He turns at me and he says,
660
01:07:43,200 --> 01:07:50,160
it's your fault. You made me laugh. He blames me for getting knocked out because he was looking at
661
01:07:50,160 --> 01:07:55,040
the card girl because I was laughing at her underarm hair, which was a very European thing. And
662
01:07:55,040 --> 01:08:01,760
for a North American boy, very funny. So yeah, that's a weird story, but totally true.
663
01:08:03,120 --> 01:08:08,240
The culture shock that caused the knockout. That's right. I should have had my head to get,
664
01:08:08,240 --> 01:08:14,640
I should have been more culturally understanding. Oh my goodness. Oh man. That's funny.
665
01:08:16,320 --> 01:08:21,920
I was going to ask you at the beginning of the interview if you had any funny stories to share.
666
01:08:21,920 --> 01:08:28,240
Yeah, I wasn't expecting something like this. That's one for sure. Absolutely. Yeah.
667
01:08:29,440 --> 01:08:34,640
I felt bad for Kenny, but it's a heck of a story years later. Right? So yeah, true.
668
01:08:34,640 --> 01:08:37,600
And Benish was a great fighter. He was a great fighter.
669
01:08:39,040 --> 01:08:42,720
That's classic. Mitch, you know, we were coming down here to the end of the interview.
670
01:08:43,360 --> 01:08:49,200
I really appreciate you taking the time and of course dealing with our technical issue earlier.
671
01:08:49,200 --> 01:08:56,880
But man, you've been great. And I wasn't expecting you to have these sort of stories to share.
672
01:08:56,880 --> 01:09:01,920
And I wasn't sure how connected you were to the Croatian community, but it sounds like,
673
01:09:01,920 --> 01:09:05,760
I mean, you as well as, of course, your father and your grandfather. I mean,
674
01:09:05,760 --> 01:09:09,280
those are some great stories about them you shared and about yourself.
675
01:09:09,280 --> 01:09:17,200
Thank you. Thank you. Well, listen, our family histories make us in part who we are.
676
01:09:17,200 --> 01:09:24,560
So I'm always, I'm always proud of my Croatian heritage and always, always will be,
677
01:09:24,560 --> 01:09:30,320
always will be proud of it. It's like I said, it's part and parcel of not only your DNA,
678
01:09:30,320 --> 01:09:36,400
it's part of your mindset too. And I'm always proud of that because those are strong, tough people
679
01:09:36,400 --> 01:09:42,480
who came over here under duress, of course, and they made a goal of it. And I will always be proud
680
01:09:42,480 --> 01:09:50,080
of them. As the bloodline, like I married a woman from Latin America and my children are more
681
01:09:50,880 --> 01:09:55,120
Latin American than anything else, but they'll always have that last name and they'll always
682
01:09:55,120 --> 01:10:00,240
have that reference point and they'll always have that thread of Croatian history and bloodline
683
01:10:00,240 --> 01:10:04,640
through them that they're always to be proud of. So I thank you for the opportunity to let me talk
684
01:10:04,640 --> 01:10:11,040
about that. I appreciate it, Mitch. Thank you so much. You're doing a great job. I love story.
685
01:10:11,040 --> 01:10:15,840
I'd love to hear people's, you know, individual stories about their personal history and background
686
01:10:15,840 --> 01:10:21,680
and now I'm going to go back into the collection of your podcast and listen to other ones too.
687
01:10:21,680 --> 01:10:27,920
Thank you for the opportunity. That's it for today's episode of the All Things Croatia podcast.
688
01:10:27,920 --> 01:10:32,560
Thanks for tuning in and I hope you all enjoyed it. You can subscribe to the Patreon and check out
689
01:10:32,560 --> 01:10:37,360
the All Things Croatia Instagram page to stay updated. Feel free to reach out to me with any
690
01:10:37,360 --> 01:10:42,960
questions, tips or ideas and make sure to tune back in to the next episode. Thanks again and...