Identification

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Near Schweinfurt, Germany, February 26, 1949. Dad received this card shortly before he emigrated to the United States.

"Bonjour!"

River Forest, Illinois, November 1975. Here's another snapshot from my stint as a high-school yearbook photographer. The woman on the right is the Dominican sister who taught French. I enrolled in French-language classes after I completed my two years of Latin study. She was an amazing teacher: she never allowed us to speak English in her classroom. I felt nearly fluent in French after I completed the coursework.

This teacher's training was so good that when I enrolled in college, I tested out of the foreign-language requirement and earned the equivalent of four years' credit in French. I was so excited when I learned the news that I called her from my dorm room telephone to thank her.

(Does anyone still install terrazzo floors [distinguishable from "terrazzo tiles"]? The Venetian apartment in which I lived had them, too. I just love them.)

The waiting began.

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Seligenstadt, Germany, August 15, 1945. This is the card with which my paternal Grandmother, Tatjana, registered her intent to emigrate from postwar Germany. She sailed to New York three years later.

(Note that Tatjana recorded Lithuanian as her dominant language.)

The Life Box (Part 19)

It's been a while since I did a "Life Box" post.

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Suburban Chicago, 1963. Here's a memento from my Grandmother's French-language lessons.

(We used to sing "Frère Baci" to that lullaby melody when Baci was a puppy.)

Babos Receptai (Part 3)

My paternal Grandmother, Tatjana, was a Russian aristocrat. Her father, Pavel, served as one of Tsar Nicholas II's regional governors (Pavel also was a friend of Tolstoy's, but I'll leave that story for another day). Pavel was working in Omsk when Tatjana was born. Later, he served in Tambov. When the Russian Revolution erupted, the Bolsheviks executed Pavel and (we believe) one of Tatjana's brothers.

Tatjana's aristocratic roots crept through many corners of her life. She was proud of her lineage, and she drew sharp lines about what sort of behavior was appropriate for descendants of the noble class. For instance, before I went on my first "date" (an afternoon, picnic outing to Brookfield Zoo), she observed that only a prostitute would hold hands with a man in public.

Tatjana also, like other Russian aristocrats of her era, admired and monkeyed French culture. She insisted, for example, that I learn the French language, and she fluidly quoted French novels and poetry. Tatjana often spoke of Catherine the Great's mastery of French culture. Many years after Tatjana died, I worked with a fellow whose grandparents (or possibly great-grandparents) had found exile in Paris after the Russian Revolution. His experience made me wonder whether Tatjana wouldn't have been happier living in France.

Tatjana's love of French culture, however, did not influence her cooking. French food was rarely on the menu. The only French item Tatjana sometimes made was Pâte à Choux. When Tatjana made choux pastry, she usually filled the puffs with Jell-O Cook & Serve Vanilla pudding (because instant pudding is for unaccomplished cooks). When she made the filling from scratch, she used this recipe: 

Cooked Cream for "Petit Schout"

                        and for Napoleon

Melt one stick of butter with 2-1/2-3 tablespoons flour. Gradually pout in 1 cup milk and 1 cup half-and-half. Cook, mixing constantly (like you would for a white sauce), until everything is heated through and cooked.

Beat together 3 egg yolks with 3/4 cup sugar. Slowly mix this with the cooked cream mixture, and cook again, as you would ice cream, just until the mixture starts to show blisters. Then cool the mixture over ice, mixing well, and then adding vanilla, or orange rind, or almond extract.

[At the bottom of the page—in lighter colored ink—Tatjana added the recipe for the choux pastry:] 

Slowly heat 1 stick of butter and 2 spoonfuls (tablespoons) sour cream with 4-1/2 cups flour. Mix until the dough starts to hold together. Remove from heat and, mixing with your hands, divide the mixture into six pieces. Place in the refrigerator, then back at 400^oF until the pieces are cooked through.

Exchanging Portraits (Part 3)

Schweinfurt, Germany, December 25, 1946. This is the UNRRA administrator with whom my paternal Grandmother, Tatjana, organized the cultural exhibit. The woman wrote her Christmas greeting in French, of course. Recall Tatjana thought every cultured person should be fluent in French. That wasn't an idea she picked up in the DP camp; it was a belief that sprang from her upbringing as a Russian aristocrat.

Language Lessons

My paternal Grandmother, Tatjana, tried to teach me her native Russian language. It was a struggle. I learned only a few phrases (blue-tongued insults and foodie terms), and I now regret that Russian is not among the languages I understand fluidly.

Perhaps my disinterest in the Russian lessons stemmed from the books Tatjana used to teach me:

The only thing familiar about this book cover is the set of bows in the girl's hair.

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The boys wear the mandatory red neckkerchiefs.

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Tatjana thought my understanding would improve if she penciled in the meaning of the words above them in Lithuanian.

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The last pages of the book remind children about what's really important. Look! The right-hand page is torn out. Was it a picture of Stalin that someone ripped up?
  

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A later edition in the same series is not more inspiring.

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It, too, has lessons for the little comrades.

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Here's the 1959 French language book with which Tatjana had much more success.

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That's one lurky wolf!

A Frightful Day

My Mom had a full-time job, and before I enrolled in kindergarten, my paternal Grandmother, Tatjana, took care of me when Mom and Dad were at work. A babysitter came over to the house late in the afternoon so Tatjana could cook dinner. For the rest of the day, however, Tatjana watched over me. I don't remember how we passed the morning. But at lunch time, we often ate large-curd cottage cheese swimming in canned, heavy-syrup, cling peaches. We took naps every afternoon. When the nap ended, we watched General Hospital while Tatjana ironed in the Rec Room. Sometimes she turned on WTTW-TV, the Chicago PBS affiliate, because the station aired a program designed to teach children the French language. Tatjana would practice French with me regularly because she believed every cultured person should be fluent in French.

My Parents and Tatjana decided it would be a good idea for me to attend a nursery school for a few days each week. That would free some time up for Tatjana: she was, after all, in her early sixties.

I don't know how my Mom learned about the nursery school, but it was not too far from our home. It may have been in Elmwood Park. On a Tuesday morning, Mom and Tatjana dressed me in a teal, bouclé coat and handed me my Raggedy Ann doll. I think they chose that doll because I didn't like it, and they knew I would not be inconsolable were I to lose it. We waited on the sidewalk for the owner of the nursery school, a woman, to pick me up in her pale yellow, Buick station wagon.

I don't remember the ride to the nursery school, but I recall feeling panicked from the moment I arrived at the place. The furniture was plastic and painted in bright, primary colors. At mid-day, the teachers served graham crackers (I hated graham crackers) and milk (I was lactose intolerant).

When the long day ended, I sat in the back seat of the pale yellow, Buick station wagon for the ride home. The woman dropped the other children off at their houses, one by one. Finally, I was the last one in the car, and the woman was lost. I repeated the name of our street, but she seemed incredulous that a street could have such a name. I remember repeatedly telling her that I lived near three landmarks: Kiddieland, Polk Brothers, and the Forest Preserve.

When she pulled into our driveway—one hour later than the time Tatjana had expected me to be home—I was in tears. I could not believe that an adult had not been able to find my house.

That was the end of my nursery-school career.

Suburban Chicago, November 1960. I don't look too happy about going to nursery school.

Translations

After World War II, the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) largely was responsible for the administration of the Displaced Persons camps. UNRRA appointed a French woman to oversee the Seligenstadt DP camp that became home to my Mom, Jake, and my Father-in-Law. The administrator spoke French and English, but she did not know Lithuanian, Russian, or any of the other languages spoken by the DPs.

My Mom became the camp translator. Mom translated information from Lithuanian to French for the administrator, who then converted things from French to English. Bureaucracy is historically inefficient.

Mom spoke and read six languages by the time she was a DP. English was not among those languages.

Seligenstadt, Germany, 1946. My Mom, on the far left, stands with the U.S. Army official serving in the DP camp and the French woman who served as the UNRRA administrator. Pantsuit!