I never had much interest in going back to Russia. One of my friends went there for a visit and was incredulous that even though I was born there, I wasn't interested in returning to my "roots." I don't think it's so strange. Two thirds of my life has been spent in America. The only relatives I have is my uncle who lost his green card because of his stupidity, he was going back and forth all the time and missed an appointment, and my sister who's coming here soon anyway. There's my best friend, but it's one person and I pretty much lost contact with him at that time.
Recently, things have changed. One of my classmates from Sinai Academy invited me to odnoklassniki. Within two days I had forty friends. I found people from shul, classmates from Sinai that weren't on Facebook, my sister's family and, most importantly, my best friend. I also found half of my kindergarten and a few of my classmates. It was a blast getting in touch, after nineteen years, and finding out who's doing what, who got married, who has kids. Unfortunately, neither my parents nor my classmates have a photo of our class. After going through four schools I barely remember anything and would love to have a visual aid. Most people remember me and so do some of their parents. One girl remembers standing next to me during the initiation into Young Pioneers. I wish I had such memory.
Where am I going with all of this? Now, I'm actually interested in going for a visit. At the moment, this interest is purely theoretical because of the difficulty of actually making the trip. Where do we stay? Where do we get kosher food? Would I want to bring my son? Though the likelihood of me actually going for a visit is pretty low, now I'm genuinely interested in going. For now, there's always email and my webcam.
My father visited Kiev over the summer for the first time in like 28 years. He went with my sister. My sister says that when he passed by his old school building, and his old apt building he literally lit up and got all excited.
ReplyDeleteMy sister had alot of fun as well. Said the country is beautiful..just has really bad air. And she was born in the US (as was I), so she had no memories or anything.
However, my mom, who is from Moscow, has no desire to go back there. Though my father wants to drag her there, because he had no desire to go to Kiev (he went cuz my grandfather is buried there), yet he had fun. So he doesn't want my mom to pass up the chance.
Anyway, my point was...I had no point. Just tired and don't really have anything to write about on my own blog!
Well, my neighborhood changed a lot in 20 years so probably everything different. There's a group on Russian facebook with pictures and also some on Google Earth.
ReplyDeleteTalking to some of my classmates...doesn't sound like a safe neighborhood. When I lived there it was right on the border of the city. Medvedkovo, your mom should know.
My mom left when she was 11. She says she doesn't rememebr anything about Moscow aside from her own neighborhood and VDNX (she dictated that!)
ReplyDeleteOh...And a few things about Tiraspol because she went there over the summer to visit her grandparents.
And about google earth, funniest thing, my mom actually googled her neighborhood, and got all excited because "the pipes" were still there!! She said they put huge cement pipes in the middle of the forest when she was like 4 years old, and she remembers playing in them when she got older. She called literally all her relatives and was sooo excited on the phone while she was telling them. My family (mostly my dad :)) started making fun of her, like "OMG, lets go to moscow and visit the pipes!)"
haha...My family is a riot...
I was 10.
ReplyDeleteВДНХа = Ve De En Ha. If you lived in Moscow and didn't go there, your life sucked.