It ended with “Can you help us?” but fortunately, for the ears in the walls, it started with “I have a friend who wants to find a job in America.” Their faces are always relaxed and anticipatory when the conversation starts. Then I have to tell them the truth. Unskilled workers with little to no English will find it very hard to live the stable life I lived in America. And no, the American Embassy won’t take bribes. No, not even for $3000. N___ and A___ sat across from me and showed more signs of actually taking the leap than anyone previous. They aren’t trying to leave in order to meet famous people or own a big car. They’re not running to, but away. They have less family connection and they have each other. My advice might be just what they need. Although A___’s brow wrinkles at any negative sign, he continues to ask. How much money would you need to start out? How possible is it to find a job?
Then there’s me. Do I encourage this dream? It is ethical, being in my position? I’m here to improve their lives, not move them away. Or am I here to improve the lives of Turkmen?
A few years back people were supposedly given a choice of citizenship if they previously had USSR or dual citizenship. My friend Nadia chose between Georgia and T-stan. A war or this. She chose this. N___ and A___ had no choice. I look at them again and ask, “But you’re Russian—why didn’t you leave with the Russians?” That being a moot point, I ask, “Wait, are you Russian?”
N___ tells me, “It’s so stupid! I am part German but from part of Russia where Germans lived before the war. My grandmother was so, so stupid, Kari. She left her village in Russia when things were bad there. She had two eggs and, I think, some bread. She wanted to go to Krasnadar, this beautiful, rich city in Russia, so she went to the train station and by mistake got on the train to Krasnavosk instead. So here I am!
I wonder if that grandmother has been torn out of a few family portraits over the years. A___ is the same. Germanish Russian. I think he blames it on a large deportation of people. T-stan is like the neighborhood of empty lots. You can picture good things happening so you stay put—but it can’t seem to get past what it has always been. A big, dirty, empty spot where people don’t feel guilty throwing glass bottles out the windows of their cars.
So I let them dream. I don’t normally allow it. I keep telling them obstacles upon obstacles until the furrowed brow is permanent, but N___ and A___ are real. Real people looking for reality. I can let them dream. I can bend my ethics just enough to visualize them teaching and buying groceries with a cart. The truth is—we wait and think and work and struggle and cry here. But all we want is to help with things the people actually need. If I give people computers, they’ll smile but their lives continue the same way. I can’t force people to educate themselves. They must ask for help.
Finally here is someone who wants help—just in a different light. N___ is a woman who wanted to study 2 subjects and receive 2 diplomas from the 2 or 3 year institutes and was told that you can’t get more than “one education” here. Perhaps there is still the “American Dream” in people’s hearts and minds. Perhaps it even exists for those who care enough. I always thought the American Dream was for dishwashers and waitresses, but I may have been wrong. I’ve had 10 years of music lessons from teachers with strong accents. Is there room for two more?
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