by Madeleine Kando
Leaving has played a constant role in my life. I got my first taste of leaving when I was four, when my parents left Hungary, the country where I was born, to settle in Paris.
Back then, I already considered leaving a place as something positive, like a soldier who adds stars to his uniform. The more places you leave, the higher you rise in the ranks. It was exciting and my age safeguarded me from seeing the risks that are always attached to leaving the familiar.
In a poem ‘le Rondel de l’adieu’, French poet Edmond Haraucourt writes the famous phrase ‘partir c’est mourir un peu’ (leaving is dying a little). It best describes the true meaning of farewell. Each time we say farewell, it is as if we die a little.
For me, even leaving on vacation feels a bit like dying. My old self is dying to make room for my new, yet undiscovered self. The thought of going shopping for a new self always brings a smile to my face, even at my age.
After moving from Hungary to France in my toddler years and from France to Holland when I was 11, I gave a much-needed new self another go when I turned 18. I lived in England for a while and I liked my new English self a lot, but like a run-away train, I couldn’t stop. Off to Spain I went.
The Mediterranean Madeleine didn’t appeal to me all that much, since I couldn’t really chop off some of my height, so my Spanish self never really took shape..
So, you see, I already had a lot of practice leaving. But compared to my previous little hops from one European country to another, moving to the New World felt like jumping off a high cliff, not knowing whether I would land on my two feet or my derriere.
The world is a small place for those who do not travel. It is safe. In the story of Flatland, the two-dimensional Flatlanders have nothing frighteningly big and three-dimensional to compare themselves to. Hence, they feel important. Although I probably would have morphed into a three dimensional being even without emigrating, by maturing, traveling and growing wiser,
So, you see, I already had a lot of practice leaving. But compared to my previous little hops from one European country to another, moving to the New World felt like jumping off a high cliff, not knowing whether I would land on my two feet or my derriere.
The world is a small place for those who do not travel. It is safe. In the story of Flatland, the two-dimensional Flatlanders have nothing frighteningly big and three-dimensional to compare themselves to. Hence, they feel important. Although I probably would have morphed into a three dimensional being even without emigrating, by maturing, traveling and growing wiser,
I still think that leaving all these places, including emigrating to America, helped the transformation.
Luckily, my parachute opened and I landed safely. I spent the next few decades crafting an entirely new self and am fairly pleased with the result. It was not love at first sight mind you, but I grew to like and even love America.
Still, since I settled here, I have been trying to bridge the gap between two continents, like a giant standing on two floating icebergs in the middle of the Atlantic. The great leap did not prevent me leaving part of me behind, even after all these years.
The Europe I left is the Europe of my youth, not the real Europe. It is like a daughter's relationship to her mother and as we all know, a mother/daughter relationship is very complex. It both contains love, hate and also competition.
Still, since I settled here, I have been trying to bridge the gap between two continents, like a giant standing on two floating icebergs in the middle of the Atlantic. The great leap did not prevent me leaving part of me behind, even after all these years.
The Europe I left is the Europe of my youth, not the real Europe. It is like a daughter's relationship to her mother and as we all know, a mother/daughter relationship is very complex. It both contains love, hate and also competition.
It is important, especially now, to convince myself that my decision to move here was the right one. The immigrant in me thinks that I did something significant, that I was the seed bearer of a strong new shoot in a vast, beautiful, unkempt garden.
But America is no longer the country I came to, a long long time ago. My new found lover has not kept his word, he is no longer taking care of me. America has given me many things, the need to be strong so I could survive, to be creative and inventive so I could fulfill myself. It has always given me the freedom that Europe never offered. But it gets harder and harder to stay in love with such a dysfunctional lover.
On the one hand, being an immigrant made me aware of how small and unimportant I am. After all, we all turn to dust, become food for the worms, immigrant or a Flatlander alike. On the other hand, it made me resilient and I am proud that I started out in the new world with just one suitcase and a few hundred dollars in my pocket and survived to write about it. And I had the most valuable asset one can have as an immigrant: I was young.
I hope my American children and grandchildren will one day again be proud of this country, like I was a long time ago and hope to be again… one day. leave comment here
On the one hand, being an immigrant made me aware of how small and unimportant I am. After all, we all turn to dust, become food for the worms, immigrant or a Flatlander alike. On the other hand, it made me resilient and I am proud that I started out in the new world with just one suitcase and a few hundred dollars in my pocket and survived to write about it. And I had the most valuable asset one can have as an immigrant: I was young.
I hope my American children and grandchildren will one day again be proud of this country, like I was a long time ago and hope to be again… one day. leave comment here
10 comments:
Madeleine, I have appreciated many of your columns, but I can’t say I will be sorry to see you leave, and I certainly hope you convince Tom to go with you. You see, I am also a 1950’s immigrant to America, and I remain in love with America for the opportunities it has given me and for the rugged individualism it stands for. So for all of you that strive to Europeanize this country, please return to your mother countries before you do anymore harm here!
Dear anonymous:
I appreciate your unconditional allegiance to America, but remember that it is immigrants that have shaped this country. This includes immigrants who can step back and evaluate their new home with a healthy dose of objectivity. That, in fact, is what makes this country great; its ability to change when change is needed. It's called pragmatism. Otherwise, it will go down the road that other great Empires have taken and destroyed themselves because of their inability to adapt.
No Madeleine, you are wrong. It is not immigrants who have shaped this country, it is this country that has shaped immigrants, immigrants that were willing to forsake the old ways and culture and within two generations adapt a new language and common American culture. It is the Balkanization of this common culture and tribalism of other invading cultures that tears us apart. Diversity is not our strength, it has become our weakness.
I assume that by ‘this country’, you don’t want to include the Pilgrims, the Dutch settlers, or any other ‘immigrants’? Then we are left with the Indians. We could have shaped outselves to to their way of life but we didn’t. We killed them. So, depending on how far back you want to go, I still think it is immigrants that have shaped America.
Immigrants didn’t establish America; English colonists created a “New England” colony, not a new nation, just an expansion of the British empire It wasn’t until 1757 through 1789 that the concept of an America came into being, prompted with the writings of Aristotle, Locke, Paine, Jefferson, Franklin, Madison, and Hamilton that subsequently provided the framework of a new constitution stressing freedom, a means of governance limiting powers, a new culture, and a new frontier for expansion. This framework was implemented for the most part by established families that had been here for generations, not by immigrants. As to Dutch immigrants, they typically get only one paragraph (rightly so) in history books, referring to their claim to fame of swindling the Indians out of New York.
I have followed the exchange between Madeleine and anonymous. Since I am mentioned in it, I’ll chime in:
Cowardly as he has been for a long time, today anonymous revealed that he is an immigrant.
Regarding immigrants, anonymous is of course totally wrong. Every single American who is not an Indian is an immigrant or a descendent of an immigrant. Immigrants and their descendants made this country, shaped this country, created its culture, its laws, its institutions, and every single thing that is “American.” The Founding Fathers were also either immigrants or the descendants of immigrants.
As to the nasty “go back to where you came from:” I have become used to this ugly insult, of which I have been the recipient a number of times over the years. To it, anonymous adds his claim that he loves America (and its rugged individualism) more than we do.
But the difference between anonymous and us is not who loves America more. It is WHAT KIND OF AMERICA do we wish for? Anonymous loves the flag, the “idea” of America, but he does not love the American people.
We, on the other hand, love and care for the American people. We don’t want thousands of Americans to be homeless, millions to be poor and sick while billionaires spend $50 million to fly into space for 10 minutes. The difference is that we want Americans to have a better life, whereas anonymous doesn’t care. If anonymous truly loved America, he would be progressive and try to make life better for all Americans, rather than support a system of extreme privilege for a few and harsh lives for most. He would try to protect Americans and prevent their violent deaths due to the out-of-control spread of guns. He would support Medicare for all. He would support a minimum wage of at least $15 an hour. He would support easing the voting process instead of suppressing it.
We want to make life better for Americans. Anonymous’ vision leads to more dysfunction and more misery for millions.
Anonymous does not own America any more than we do. If he doesn’t like our emerging diversity and other emerging trends, I’ll return the favor and urge him to leave the country.
And amazingly, the broken record continues to play on...but it is fun to continue to pull the chain.
I love this and I think it is an excellent piece of writing and very moving. I beg to differ with one part: where you describe how mother/daughter relationships are. I would like you to qualify it and say "some mother /daughter" because there is no absolute one way that all mother/daughter relationships are. Each is unique and different. Otherwise I love reading your blogs and I think you are a terrific writer.
Anonymous, why are you anonymous??? Is it because of the rugged individualism you stand for?
As most unimaginative people, when short of ideas, you pull the chain of broken records, that in your case date back to 1950.... go kiss Orban.
Ironikus! I looked up "Csaba" in my Hungarian dictionary, and see that it translates to "anonymous".
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