by Ann Charney
In Gdynia we had a few hours before the boat sailed. We walked around aimlessly for a while. My mother stopped ahead of us in front of a hairdresser’s shop. I paused to see what she was looking at. The place was empty of customers. Inside, beside strange machines stood two young, bored looking women. They seemed unaware of our presence as they patted their tightly curled hair and examined their dark red lips in small hand-mirrors. I thought they were very beautiful.
Suddenly my mother turned to my aunt. “Come on, we’re going to have our hair cut.” I followed them inside, thrilled and shy. For the next two hours I watched in fascination as the two young women worked over my aunt and my mother. Their long braids were loosened—my aunt’s gold with white streaks, my mother’s still all dark—and then cut. Finally, when it was all over, my mother and my aunt left the shop with hairdos very similar to those of the two beauticians. I liked the styles less on my mother and my aunt. Their new appearance made me uneasy for some time. It seemed to me they had acquired disguises in preparation for their new life.
My last memory of Poland was my first sight of the sea. On the day we sailed, the sky and the sea were dark and grey. The boat seemed smaller than I had expected. Before we were allowed to embark we had to submit to a very thorough search by the immigration officials. They kept us for over an hour, stripped us, and searched us with great care. When they did not find any hidden money or jewels, they contented themselves with removing my mother’s watch, the last memento she had of my father.
This final gesture, and the humiliation of the search, must have made it easier for her to watch the coastline of her native land recede as the ship moved farther and farther from it. She never returned.
I stood next to my mother at the rail, understanding very little of what she was feeling or thinking. I wanted to go inside, to get away from the greyness, to see our cabins, but she held my hand tightly. I stayed with her until the coastline disappeared in fog and cloud.
Years later when I thought of that last vigil she had made me share with her, it occurred to me how similar it was to the watch at a graveside, when one doesn’t turn one’s back on the coffin until it is lowered out of sight. When there was nothing but sea and sky around us, my mother turned away and we went inside.
IV
My uncle permitted himself one last extravagance. Since we could not take any money out of the country he used all our available cash to book two first-class cabins for our passage to New York.
We sailed at the end of April. The sky remained grey and the sea turbulent. Most people suffered from seasickness. My mother, my aunt and my uncle lay weak and pale in their luxurious cabins, turning their heads away from the delicacies their steward brought them.
I, like most of the children, seemed to be unaffected by the heaving and swaying of the ship. While my family remained confined to their cabins, I was free to roam the vessel and do as I liked. The ship reminded me of the Hotel Bristol and I immediately felt at home on it. Here too there were companions approximately my age, with whom I could play games and explore the world where we would be confined for the next two weeks.
The Batory, a Polish liner, carried traces of its monthly contact with America. Naturally, it was these reflections of the civilization we were headed for that fascinated me. North America became the sum of these new experiences. For the first time in my life I saw a black man, tasted bananas and other strange foods, saw people swimming in a pool, listened to jazz, and discovered comic books and films.
Among the adults who were not seasick, there was one man who seemed to enjoy spending some time every day with us children. His name was Max, and he was an American citizen who had returned to his birthplace in Poland for a pre-war visit, to find himself trapped there by the war. Now, ten years later, he was making his return voyage to his home in Chicago.
Max first joined us one morning in the ship’s library. We were leafing through old copies of American magazines, making wild comments to ourselves about the pictures and the people. Often their meaning was entirely lost on us and we laughed, like the young savages we were, at their apparent absurdity. Max seemed more interested in us than in the newspaper he was reading, and after a while he came over to find out why we were laughing. We showed him the mysterious photographs we found so amusing and Max explained their meaning. From then on he became our tutor and guide to the new world.
When we had exhausted the magazines, Max entertained us with stories of our new homeland. In particular, we liked his stories about Chicago and his life there when he had first arrived. Like all good storytellers he was not constricted by reality, and the details he invented or rearranged ended in a picture of Chicago that held us spellbound for hours.
Somehow he left us with the impression that all Americans were physical giants. No people in Europe could match them in height and weight, we were told. Their feet and heads, in particular, were so large that when old clothes from America arrived in Poland, the hats and shoes would never fit the Poles and were kept instead as objects of wonder and amazement. I had read Gulliver’s Travels that year in Polish, and Max’s stories of America’s giants seemed to me entirely plausible.
His stories were usually mixed with practical lessons. He had taken it upon himself to teach us some facts about our new home. For a start, we were greatly impressed to learn that there were never any queues in America. Incredible as it might seem, Max assured us, there were enough goods to keep the stores constantly stocked. They never ran short.
Another feature of American life he promised we would all enjoy was the plumbing. Max described this with such care that his own appreciation of this great invention was deeply impressed on us. We followed every detail of his explanation and speculated among ourselves about this marvellous mechanism which flushed clean water, at will, as if by magic.
Max’s talent lay in turning everything he talked about into something extraordinary. In the beginning I had timidly interrupted him to say I had seen a gadget in the Hotel Bristol similar to the one he described. I was treated to a withering look of scorn. Then he continued as if he hadn’t heard me. At the end I agreed with him. Nothing I had ever experienced was like the marvellous objects in Max’s stories.
From the toilet we moved to the telephone. Again, I had seen one in the lobby of the Hotel Bristol, but it was an insignificant instrument compared to the magic boxes Max described. For hours he held us enthralled as he described how they worked. Every home in America, we were told, possessed this invention. Sometimes there was more than one in a house. Max decided it was essential for us to learn to use the telephone. We gathered around him and he began his lesson by making a drawing of a telephone, complete with every detail: dial face, letters, numbers. Next, each one of us was given an exchange and number by which we could demonstrate our proficiency with the telephone.
I remember dashing into my mother’s cabin after one of these lessons, eager to impress her with my new sophistication. My mother was as unpredictable as always. My story set her off into a long laughing spell, and weak as she was in her seasickness, she could not stop. Finally, when she had regained her control, she pulled me over to her. Patting my hair gently and fighting to control the laughter that surged just beneath her words, she explained to me that she was quite familiar with the object I described. My grandfather had been one of the first people in Dobryd to have a telephone installed, and she and my father had also had one.
My mother’s information robbed the telephone of some of its marvellous qualities; it was more commonplace than I had thought. Still, it seemed to me quite remarkable that we would live in a house where such a machine would exist totally at our disposal.
On the thirteenth day out we were told that we would shortly see the North American coastline. Along with this promise, the weather changed for the better. The sun shone steadily and the sea grew calm. Everyone on board recovered quickly. The next day, when the Batory sailed under Brooklyn Bridge and headed for its midtown dock, all the passengers wer
e out on deck, lining the railings of the boat. Feelings of emotion and excitement were very intense. People ran about, laughed, clapped each other on the back, lifted up their children for a better view of the New York skyline. Members of the ship’s band came out on the deck with their instruments and they entertained us with rousing marching songs. We were all dizzy with the sun and the excitement of the moment.
When the boat docked we remained on board and waited for the customs officials. Some minutes later we were instructed to line up in front of desks set up by immigration officers and there to wait our turn to be processed. I found this delay particularly disappointing. Hadn’t Max told us that there would be no more queues?
Fortunately, our wait was not long. Our turn came, our papers were stamped, and a young man wished us a pleasant stay. We were on our own.
We entered the passenger shed lost and confused. All around us people were embracing with obvious emotion. I knew that there was no one to meet us, but suddenly I wished desperately that one of these strangers would come though the crowd towards us and claim us.
I watched our fellow passengers leave with their baggage, presumably for new homes. Our journey, however, was not over. We were going on to Canada by train. My family had decided that their chances for political asylum were more favourable in Canada than in the United States.
We boarded the train for Montreal a few hours later. The amazing landscape of New York soon gave way to small towns of neat, compact houses. When night came we were out in the open countryside. Fields, hills, forests, train stations flashed by. There were few houses. As we moved farther north the land became more and more deserted. I looked in wonder at the lush views and the vast emptiness that seemed endless.
In the early morning hours we crossed the border into Canada. The countryside remained unchanged but a new feeling overcame me. I knew we were close to Montreal. The scenes outside my window mattered in a special way. Somewhere, in the midst of them I would begin a new life.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
Copyright © 1996 by Ann Charney
ISBN: 978-1-5040-0978-2
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