Open Thread

My mother’s family was from Odessa/Tolkin which isn’t part of Russia any longer, right Kens? My father’s family is from Minsk- but when they came to this country, the Russians weren’t letting Jews out. They had to escape via an underground.

Ringo, you’ll rent after selling? that was what I was about to do until I saw how pricey rent has become

I had a Ukrainian friend who could explain in great detail why she was not Russian.

Russians have the collective memory of getting screwed for centuries by government. Democracy, (i.e. YOU are in charge) doesn’t compute.

Another bike lane story. Should I go over there and get abused? Ummmm….. Nah.

Lech, tell him that another Belorussian told him that he is full of shit. Honestly I guess we’re different as it is a different country BUT we are way more similar then say someone from West coast US and East coast US. In Belarus (at least in the big cities) school was taught in Russian until 5th grade and only then you took your native language as a second language but your whole formal education was in Russian. I don’t speak a word of Belarussian as I left when I was in 4th grade but can understand a lot of it as it’s very similar dialect. Same with Ukrainians.

rf, it used to be the case in Brooklyn that most Russians were Jews as that’s they only way you could come to US legally (claim political asylum and come as a refugee). Now things have changed. A lot of Russians (not Jews) come here for work illegally and stay. Also a lot of Russians started to come through churches and religious organizations as well, claiming religious asylums (but mostly to upstate NY and not really to NYC). Not sure what the ratio is but if you meet a very Americanized Russian or someone who works in professional corporate world, I would guess more so then not they would be Jewish as the Non-Jewish Russian immigration in masses is fairly recent (last 5-7 years or so).