Hermina Vlasopolos - April 9, 1984
New Life in the United States
Did you have family here?
Yes, I had two, two sisters, my mother's two sisters.
I see.
And uh, I made a mistake, you know, because if I would have gone to New York or, I don't know--you, you couldn't really cha--I mean, choose very much, you probably know there is a sponsor who...
Right.
...but uh, I would have worked maybe, you know, in the movie industry...
Sure.
...continued to work. And like this I, I had to go back on my credentials as teacher to get a teaching position. I didn't know nobody. I, I had to, I have to say that the Jewish community didn't help me at all, at all, at all. They were, I don't know how--they are seeming to be much nicer today, Soviet Jews now. I, I cannot say too much but I was always given the feeling that I am a beggar. As many times as I came they were very insulting to me. And I really, really hated to, to go. And for seven months I didn't get anything, it was very hard. And uh, well, I know that they, they gave me, they offered me a job as a, as a cook helper in an old people's home. And when I said that I don't want it, even my aunts were very, very upset. They told me, "Here in America you forget what you were." And I said, "I don't forget what I was...
Yeah.
...and if I cannot get what I need I go back to Europe because I still can find a job in Europe and I don't stay here." So we had a little bit of disagreement. And then they moved to Kentucky because aunt's daughter remarried in Kentucky and they felt that they have to leave. And uh, I was stuck here because if it was, you know, a ???. She, she remained here and she got to help, you know, the Jewish community and he or she went to New York or another place and they found a job. I was with a child and it was very hard for me to, to just start all over again, you know.
Sure.
Actually I found a job only in Kingston, Michigan because nobody told me that there are hundreds of boards of education, you know. I went to the Detroit Board of Education thinking that it takes care of the whole area, because this was how it is in Romania. Go to Bucharest and even from the province towns, you know. It's much more centralized. And uh, nobody told me what I have to do. So I didn't apply...
Yeah.
...you know. Then somebody told me why I don't put an ad in a paper teaching, teacher's agency. And uh, I applied for this agency and they found me a job in Kingston, Michigan. Because this was at the end of August when everybody, you know, had already. In 1963 I went to Kingston, I stayed there for two years. And it was again, I--it was a very, very small community, I mean. And uh, my daughter went to school there, she was in the, I mean, for tenth and eleventh grade. And uh, she really ran out quite of subject because coming, you know, from Europe it was--so I felt well, she'll have to go to college. And we don't let our kids go to college be by themselves. It was a complete different. If you have to go to college I'll have to be with her. So I looked for another position and I found a teaching position in uh, in New Orleans. And I taught there for twelve years until I retired.
© Board of Regents University of Michigan-Dearborn