And PS, please subscribe to this incredible news source, The Counteroffensive, if you haven't already. News about the war in Ukraine from inside Ukraine.
I'd totally buy Neko as Baba Yaga flying through space and time in an iron kettle - the google AI thingy says "She can create tempests as she flies" well that's right out of the Neko Case songbook indeed!
I wish I knew the America that my immigrant ancestors dreamed up...I don't think it ever truly existed.
Thank you for sharing <3 My great grandparents came to Finland from East-Karelia, lost to Russia latest in the 1940's. This immigrant story of my family has never been talked about, I know there has been a lot of pain and losses. Our name is holding a path to the past and that's how I've been able to find out something. Not much but at least a little. Still I am not sure if it's okay for me to talk aloud that I have a piece of Karelian in me. Probably for the same reason, because they killed the Karelian, translated their name, language, culture.
You put into words something that I have been struggling with. My surname is Spanish. My genealogy is mainly from the Iberian Peninsula, but I have no records of my people immigrating here. I think they combined with the indigenous people who were already here when the Spaniards invaded this land.
The line, they obliterated us in one generation, felt like what happened to us. My parents didn't teach us to speak Spanish; I have no heritage.
Right? I suspect it may have been a language thing. The clerks who kept records didn't speak Spanish, my people probably spoke broken English, so I end up with:
I too, get nowhere when asking family about leaving Punjab during partition- it’s like it never happened!! Only it did and one million people died and my dad only has two memories, so bloody they make him cry. But, nope! Silence!!
Side note, you knew my dad once, Prakash who lived upstairs above George Reed Harmon in Tacoma. I think you used to play drums in the basement sometimes. I was pretty little, but I sure thought you were coool! Still do!
My paternal grandma’s maiden name was Serova, and she was born in 1920s somewhere in Saratov region too. But guess what. My dad told me the name used to be Sirenko, and when the grandma’s parents moved to Saratov from Cherkasy region, they essentially russified it. Mind you, this was early XX century, i.e. they moved within what was then Russian Empire, yet they felt they had to change the name. Quite telling.
Oh Neko, I completely relate to this. I am descended on both sides from “Germans from Russia.” My father, his parents, and grandparents were refugees from Bessarabia, which bordered Ukraine. My mother’s paternal grandparents lived in a village near Odesa; her maternal grandparents were from Saratov.
What got passed down? Food, little else. Not the languages—my Opa spoke 7! Not the history. Little culture. For the past several years, I have been researching and writing a novel set in Ukraine in 1932. A dark time. It has been horrifying to watch the news the past three years and see history repeat itself.
This is so true for so many of us. My grandmother was from Spain. She kept the family story a secret, but after she died, one of her brothers let it slip at a family barbeque. That was more than thirty years ago and I am still obsessed. I learned the language. I have visited her village twice. I've met distant relatives. I found my great-grandfather's arrest warrant for murder. Oh.
You and I started learning Russian around the same time (I gleaned this from your memoir), and I'm still learning it. I just started learning Ukrainian, too, and I am smitten. I'd spent a year in Prague and became a Slav-o-phile. Something I like is that neither the Czechs, nor the Ukrainians, let the Romans influence the names of their months. November is "Listopad" for example, in both languages. That means "falling leaves." Their months correspond to the season and not some megalomaniac. I thought you might like that.
Neko, if you can, continue learning the language. It's not too late. I started learning Portuguese in my 50s and it's one of the best things I ever did. It doesn't come as easy as it used to when we were younger and we might never get fluent. But it's so rewarding. You'll be able to listen to Ukrainian Music and Radio. Who knows, maybe your new favourite band is gonna be Ukrainian! You'll be able to read books or watch TV shows. You might even make new friends as it happened to me. It's like getting access to a whole new world.
Something else: when you talked about slavic tales in your book, I remembered the kid's movies by Alexander Rou. Check them out, I think you're gonna love them.
I'm one of many descendants of Ukrainian immigration to the Canadian prairies in the 1910s. Today, my son's school division has many Ukrainian immigrant classmates and someone working part-time as a translator to help them integrate. One came to visit one day and I showed him an Ukrainian ABC book from my great-grandparents, he thought it was quite funny.
I know this feeling. I was in my teens already before anyone in my family told me we were Lithuanian Jews -- my dad always said his people were from Russia. I suspect that's all he'd ever heard, but in reality, we aren't Russian at all. It's just that the Soviet Union grabbed the place our recent ancestors were from. On the other side, although I'm "German" and "Polish," it turns out that those two villages were about 45 miles apart from each other, and they were both in Prussia. So I'm confused, but I guess I'll just say I'm ethnically northern European, half Jewish and half Catholic.
You did well, under the circumstances, Neko. And I want to keep thinking you have a tie to the famous poet. I am half Ukrainian, my dad spoke it. I tried to learn how to read it but could not. Dad kept us close to the 10 aunts and uncles, in Winnipeg and across Canada. And Baba and Geta, who came over in the early 1900's and were sent to farm up in the frozen tundra. Later in Winnipeg, the kids became engineers, teachers, a model, a surgeon, an inventor, an architectural draftsman. The men fought in the war. Baba was from Eastern Ukraine, Geta from a central town wiped off the map in the 30s, by which side I'll never know. In your voice I do hear the songs we used to sing at Xmas. All gone now.
I can relate to a lot of this. My parents are immigrants. My father is from Mauritius, with his family being taken as ‘indentured labour’ from the South of India & my mother is from Spain.
When I was little my mum would send us on a plane every summer to stay with my aunt & uncle to experience the culture etc As a child, as years passed I began to notice I lost the Spanish over the course of the year & then within in a day or two, it would seep back. Within a week or so I’d be dreaming in the language.
At 15 I picked up ‘100 years of solitude’ & could understand everything, but by 21 it seemed as though I lost it altogether… It felt a bit like an invisible muscle , I knew it was there & it caused me a lot of grief to not have it. I started to go to Spain a bit more & read, listen & it did come back, though I ll never feel fluent in the way you are when you’ve lived somewhere, I find my connection in other ways like the habits that sustain me… I would definitely say follow that thread to anyone who feels they want to, it’s a beautiful journey.
And PS, please subscribe to this incredible news source, The Counteroffensive, if you haven't already. News about the war in Ukraine from inside Ukraine.
https://www.counteroffensive.news/p/newsflash-trump-halts-aid-to-ukraine?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1547592&post_id=158344624&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=false&r=gb7i2&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
I'd totally buy Neko as Baba Yaga flying through space and time in an iron kettle - the google AI thingy says "She can create tempests as she flies" well that's right out of the Neko Case songbook indeed!
I wish I knew the America that my immigrant ancestors dreamed up...I don't think it ever truly existed.
Go on Finding Your Roots. Seriously, I bet it would be a trip. A scary one, for sure, but a grounding rooting one.
The only reason I would ever want to be famous is to have the chance to be on Finding Your Roots!
Thank you for sharing <3 My great grandparents came to Finland from East-Karelia, lost to Russia latest in the 1940's. This immigrant story of my family has never been talked about, I know there has been a lot of pain and losses. Our name is holding a path to the past and that's how I've been able to find out something. Not much but at least a little. Still I am not sure if it's okay for me to talk aloud that I have a piece of Karelian in me. Probably for the same reason, because they killed the Karelian, translated their name, language, culture.
You put into words something that I have been struggling with. My surname is Spanish. My genealogy is mainly from the Iberian Peninsula, but I have no records of my people immigrating here. I think they combined with the indigenous people who were already here when the Spaniards invaded this land.
The line, they obliterated us in one generation, felt like what happened to us. My parents didn't teach us to speak Spanish; I have no heritage.
But at least you have that beautiful name. :)
Thank you ♥️.
It's a great place to start looking.
I have the same problem that you have. My great-grandfather and his four brothers all spelled their last names a different way.
Such a BIZARRE thing to do!
Right? I suspect it may have been a language thing. The clerks who kept records didn't speak Spanish, my people probably spoke broken English, so I end up with:
Roybal
Ruybal
Ruibal
Ruival
Etc.
I too, get nowhere when asking family about leaving Punjab during partition- it’s like it never happened!! Only it did and one million people died and my dad only has two memories, so bloody they make him cry. But, nope! Silence!!
Side note, you knew my dad once, Prakash who lived upstairs above George Reed Harmon in Tacoma. I think you used to play drums in the basement sometimes. I was pretty little, but I sure thought you were coool! Still do!
Gorgeous and compelling writing. This is the story of so many Americans, undergirded by their own unknown ghost worlds. Thank you, Neko!!
My paternal grandma’s maiden name was Serova, and she was born in 1920s somewhere in Saratov region too. But guess what. My dad told me the name used to be Sirenko, and when the grandma’s parents moved to Saratov from Cherkasy region, they essentially russified it. Mind you, this was early XX century, i.e. they moved within what was then Russian Empire, yet they felt they had to change the name. Quite telling.
Oh Neko, I completely relate to this. I am descended on both sides from “Germans from Russia.” My father, his parents, and grandparents were refugees from Bessarabia, which bordered Ukraine. My mother’s paternal grandparents lived in a village near Odesa; her maternal grandparents were from Saratov.
What got passed down? Food, little else. Not the languages—my Opa spoke 7! Not the history. Little culture. For the past several years, I have been researching and writing a novel set in Ukraine in 1932. A dark time. It has been horrifying to watch the news the past three years and see history repeat itself.
I get it. I really do.
Slava Ukraini.
This is so true for so many of us. My grandmother was from Spain. She kept the family story a secret, but after she died, one of her brothers let it slip at a family barbeque. That was more than thirty years ago and I am still obsessed. I learned the language. I have visited her village twice. I've met distant relatives. I found my great-grandfather's arrest warrant for murder. Oh.
You and I started learning Russian around the same time (I gleaned this from your memoir), and I'm still learning it. I just started learning Ukrainian, too, and I am smitten. I'd spent a year in Prague and became a Slav-o-phile. Something I like is that neither the Czechs, nor the Ukrainians, let the Romans influence the names of their months. November is "Listopad" for example, in both languages. That means "falling leaves." Their months correspond to the season and not some megalomaniac. I thought you might like that.
Neko, if you can, continue learning the language. It's not too late. I started learning Portuguese in my 50s and it's one of the best things I ever did. It doesn't come as easy as it used to when we were younger and we might never get fluent. But it's so rewarding. You'll be able to listen to Ukrainian Music and Radio. Who knows, maybe your new favourite band is gonna be Ukrainian! You'll be able to read books or watch TV shows. You might even make new friends as it happened to me. It's like getting access to a whole new world.
Something else: when you talked about slavic tales in your book, I remembered the kid's movies by Alexander Rou. Check them out, I think you're gonna love them.
I'm one of many descendants of Ukrainian immigration to the Canadian prairies in the 1910s. Today, my son's school division has many Ukrainian immigrant classmates and someone working part-time as a translator to help them integrate. One came to visit one day and I showed him an Ukrainian ABC book from my great-grandparents, he thought it was quite funny.
My grandpa was from Wakaw and gave me his Ukrainian heritage.
I know this feeling. I was in my teens already before anyone in my family told me we were Lithuanian Jews -- my dad always said his people were from Russia. I suspect that's all he'd ever heard, but in reality, we aren't Russian at all. It's just that the Soviet Union grabbed the place our recent ancestors were from. On the other side, although I'm "German" and "Polish," it turns out that those two villages were about 45 miles apart from each other, and they were both in Prussia. So I'm confused, but I guess I'll just say I'm ethnically northern European, half Jewish and half Catholic.
You did well, under the circumstances, Neko. And I want to keep thinking you have a tie to the famous poet. I am half Ukrainian, my dad spoke it. I tried to learn how to read it but could not. Dad kept us close to the 10 aunts and uncles, in Winnipeg and across Canada. And Baba and Geta, who came over in the early 1900's and were sent to farm up in the frozen tundra. Later in Winnipeg, the kids became engineers, teachers, a model, a surgeon, an inventor, an architectural draftsman. The men fought in the war. Baba was from Eastern Ukraine, Geta from a central town wiped off the map in the 30s, by which side I'll never know. In your voice I do hear the songs we used to sing at Xmas. All gone now.
I can relate to a lot of this. My parents are immigrants. My father is from Mauritius, with his family being taken as ‘indentured labour’ from the South of India & my mother is from Spain.
When I was little my mum would send us on a plane every summer to stay with my aunt & uncle to experience the culture etc As a child, as years passed I began to notice I lost the Spanish over the course of the year & then within in a day or two, it would seep back. Within a week or so I’d be dreaming in the language.
At 15 I picked up ‘100 years of solitude’ & could understand everything, but by 21 it seemed as though I lost it altogether… It felt a bit like an invisible muscle , I knew it was there & it caused me a lot of grief to not have it. I started to go to Spain a bit more & read, listen & it did come back, though I ll never feel fluent in the way you are when you’ve lived somewhere, I find my connection in other ways like the habits that sustain me… I would definitely say follow that thread to anyone who feels they want to, it’s a beautiful journey.
дякую хтось
That's google Ukraine for thank you Neko.