Trafika Europe 12 - French Bon-Bons

A Souvenir from New York

“He is not a Jew! He’s my grandson, a Belarusian! Don’t you see that, you damn drunk?!” And women in the line around us intoned, “He’s a Belarusian!” The bastard grunted, “Looks like a Jew.” But then he finally went away, thank God. On the way back Shimon wanted to be carried--he pressed himself close to me and became silent just like you when I had carried you from your Tata. And then I thought, it would be good if my little grandson also left this country, like all of his people, so he wouldn’t run into a bastard like that ever! I couldn’t sleep that whole night, and I kept thinking and thinking. And I was asking God... So maybe he heard me - and that’s why Lazar found you? Go, my son! If you go, then I’ll feel that my grandson has a future,” she said, covering her face, so we wouldn’t see her tears. A whole year was spent on getting the documents ready, and on all the correspondence, all the paperwork. That whole year I kept imagining how I would get together with Lazar, but our getting together wasn’t in the cards;​ he didn’t live to experience this joy-- he died a week before we arrived. Greta met us at the airport, and the next day she left for Houston to be with her son. We didn’t even talk properly: she knew just two words in Russian, and our

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