Archive for May 2017
“I Am,” I Said: Thoughts on Borders and Refugees
Shifting Borders When I read about the history of Eastern Europe, I realize how changeable national boundaries and concepts of nation are. I live in a very young country, America, which nevertheless has been highly successful in forming a self-concept that seems essential and timeless. Its sense of surety likely is rooted in the concept…
Read MoreAny Other Name
A Temporary Peace My grandmother was an immigrant from Eastern Europe. She was born in 1910 in the town of Svalava, which was part of the Kingdom of Hungary at the time but joined Czechoslovakia in 1920 by decree of the Treaty of Trianon, which ended WWI. Now, the town, with no remaining Jewish population,…
Read MoreAcross the Forest
In the region of Transylvania, in Eastern Europe, so many structures are painted one particular shade of blue that it is widely known as Transylvania blue.
My family, particularly my grandmother, her siblings, and her predecessors, come from areas within and neighboring what we know as Transylvania.
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