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1
Posted on 5/11/16 at 11:24 am to slacker130
Upstairs, Tim had heard the knock and the shouting, and his first thought was that the police could be after him for underage drinking: nobody at the party the night before had been 21, and Boston police took alcohol regulations seriously.
great story ...
great story ...
This post was edited on 5/11/16 at 11:28 am
Posted on 5/11/16 at 11:36 am to TigerRob20
ho-lee-fuk thats nuts. come to think about it my dad has done a lot of intl. traveling since I was a kid. Like 6-8 intl trips a year with most for 2+ weeks at a time.....
Posted on 5/11/16 at 11:43 am to tke857
Posted on 5/11/16 at 2:52 pm to TigerRob20
quote:
I raise the question with Tim, who would have been older. He remembers seeing his grandparents every few years until he was around 11, when they disappeared from his life. “Obviously, now when I think back on it, I kind of understand how it worked. If I had seen them when I was older, I would have realised that they don’t speak English – they don’t seem very Canadian.” At Christmas, the boys would receive gifts marked “from grandparents”. Their parents told them they lived in Alberta, far from Toronto, which was why they never saw them. Occasionally, new photographs would arrive of the grandparents against a snowy backdrop; it helped that the climates of Alberta and Siberia are not so different.
This part of the story is very fishy to me.
You mean to tell me that this family traveled all over the world but never went from Toronto the Alberta to see their grandparents and also didn't think it was weird that their grandparents didn't speak a lick of English despite the fact the "lived in Canada"?
These kids seem pretty intelligent so I have a tough time believing they would simply keep their heads in the sand like that. I think they knew a hell of a lot more than they're leading people to believe.
This post was edited on 5/11/16 at 5:03 pm
Posted on 5/11/16 at 4:50 pm to TigerRob20
Thanks for sharing OP. This was a remarkably well-written piece and a thoroughly fascinating story.
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:03 pm to upgrayedd
quote:
You mean to tell me that this family traveled all over the world but never went from Toronto the Alberta to see their grandparents and also didn't think it was weird that their grandparents didn't speak a lick of English?
Meh... all families are different, some radically, and most of what you know about how a family should be comes from your family. Nobody gives you a book that says "this is what your family should be like, check yours against it, maybe your grandparents are actually in Russia". This is what they knew, so this is what they thought was normal.
People who say they would question this are probably projecting based on their experience of growing up in the same town as their grandparents.
I had a set of grandparents we hardly ever saw because they lived far away and because my dad said they were assholes. To me as a kid, it was like "whatever". I pretty much have no experiences with them that I really remember. Unless you grow up around them, as a boy, you really don't have some innate need for time with your grandparents. No boy child begs to see their grandparents unless they are close to begin with. They exist. Great. Send me some Christmas presents.
This post was edited on 5/11/16 at 5:09 pm
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:08 pm to Cooter Davenport
quote:
I had a set of grandparents we hardly ever saw because they lived far away and because my dad said they were assholes. To me as a kid, it was like "whatever". I pretty much have no experiences with hem that I really remember. Unless you grow up around them, as a boy, you really don't have some innate need for time with your grandparents. They exist, great. Send me some Christmas presents.
Well, there was a reason you never saw them. Because "they were assholes". No such excuse was given here.
-Where is grandma?
-In Alberta
-Can we go see her?
-No
-Why?
-It's too far away
-Ok
-Now, let's talk about out trip to Austria
At age 11, how do you not find it odd that your Canadian grandmother doesn't speak anything but Russian?
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:08 pm to Cooter Davenport
dp
This post was edited on 5/11/16 at 5:08 pm
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:12 pm to upgrayedd
quote:
No such excuse was given here.
Actually, you don't know that. We don't know what the excuse was.
quote:
Where is grandma? -In Alberta -Can we go see her?
What normal boy WANTS to go to visit his grandparents? They're weird, they're old, their house smells strange, seeing them takes you away from playing with your friends. I never ONCE asked if I could go see my grandparents, even the ones that weren't assholes. Why would I want to go to Jackson or Winnfield? Same deal with frickin Alberta. They probably had no desire in the first place.
quote:
At age 11, how do you not find it odd that your Canadian grandmother doesn't speak anything but Russian?
Not if you are no longer speaking to or seeing her at 11. He said he never saw her after around that age and realizes now, in retrospect, as an adult, that they didn't speak English. He didn't say he thought it was weird as a kid. As a little kid he probably just accepted it as the way things were and didn't question it. For all HE knew as a little kid, that's how ALL grandparents are.
This post was edited on 5/11/16 at 5:19 pm
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:18 pm to Cooter Davenport
quote:
I raise the question with Tim, who would have been older. He remembers seeing his grandparents every few years until he was around 11, when they disappeared from his life. “Obviously, now when I think back on it, I kind of understand how it worked. If I had seen them when I was older, I would have realised that they don’t speak English – they don’t seem very Canadian.”
Seriously, how do you not remember that your grandparents don't speak English? You're around your grandparents and parents at the same time. Your parents "don't speak Russian" and your grandparents don't speak English but nothing seems out of the ordinary?
I think his story is bullshite.
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:19 pm to upgrayedd
quote:
Seriously, how do you not remember that your grandparents don't speak English?
As I suggested above, as a little kid, he probably just accepted it as the way things were and didn't question it. For all HE knew as a little kid, that's how ALL grandparents are.
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:24 pm to Cooter Davenport
quote:
As I suggested above, as a little kid, he probably just accepted it as the way things were and didn't question it. For all HE knew as a little kid, that's how ALL grandparents are.
That's a very weak argument. There's no kid on earth that thinks its perfectly normal that parents and children unable to speak the same language, despite allegedly always living in the same country, isn't unusual. There's no way these kids were that insulated.
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:29 pm to upgrayedd
quote:
There's no kid on earth that thinks its perfectly normal that parents and children unable to speak the same language, despite allegedly always living in the same country, isn't unusual.
There are millions of kids on this earth that think it's perfectly normal that their grandparents speak another language. It's called "being from the old country" and in immigrant nations like the U.S. and Canada, it's common. In Central Texas all sorts of kids grew up with hard-arse Oma and Opa from the old country who still spoke German. Should they have been investigating to see if mom & dad were secret agents for the SS?
You are granting these kids a perspective they didn't have. They had zero perspective. All they knew was their own lives and what their parents told them, and would have eaten any lame excuse out of their parents' hand. They say "ahh, they're from the old country" and the kids would be like "ok." They weren't mini CIA agents.
This post was edited on 5/11/16 at 5:32 pm
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:33 pm to Cooter Davenport
quote:
There millions of kids on this earth that think it's perfectly normal that their grandparents speak another language. It's called "being from the old country" and in immigrant nations like the U.S. and Canada, it's common. You are granting these kids a perspective they didn't have. They had zero perspective. All they knew was their own lives and what their parents told them, and would have eaten any lame excuse out of their parents' hand. They say "ahh, they're from the old country" and the kids would be like "ok.
I have never seen a family where the parents "from the old country" could not communicate with their children. You expect me to believe that parents raise a child yet they don't speak a common language?
quote:
They weren't mini CIA agents.
I know. They were KGB.
Posted on 5/11/16 at 5:51 pm to Mac
quote:think about that for a second
. Is Germany really a potential alliance candidate with Russia
Posted on 5/11/16 at 7:42 pm to Cooter Davenport
quote:
There are millions of kids on this earth that think it's perfectly normal that their grandparents speak another language. It's called "being from the old country" and in immigrant nations like the U.S. and Canada, it's common. In Central Texas all sorts of kids grew up with hard-arse Oma and Opa from the old country who still spoke German. Should they have been investigating to see if mom & dad were secret agents for the SS?
Back in the 60s I knew a number of other kids from south Louisiana who had grandparents that spoke only Cajun French and not a word of English, they were teenagers and had never had a conversation with their grandparents.
Posted on 5/11/16 at 11:45 pm to TigerRob20
Loved this read thanks for sharing
I wish they'd release the audio/video of the "salute to Mother Russia" though lol
I wish they'd release the audio/video of the "salute to Mother Russia" though lol
Posted on 5/12/16 at 10:25 am to EA6B
quote:
Back in the 60s I knew a number of other kids from south Louisiana who had grandparents that spoke only Cajun French and not a word of English, they were teenagers and had never had a conversation with their grandparents.
Thank you. That's exactly what I am saying. If you are from that kind of family it is not weird to you. It's all you know. No way these kids should have harbored deep suspicion for their parents just because their grandparents spoke Russian.
Posted on 5/12/16 at 11:06 am to Cooter Davenport
quote:
What normal boy WANTS to go to visit his grandparents? They're weird, they're old, their house smells strange, seeing them takes you away from playing with your friends.
You must have had shitty grandparents. I wanted to visit mine all the time, because they took us on vacation, fishing, ballgames, etc. Not everyone's grandparents are decrepit vegetables.
My kids (a boy 9 and a girl 7) love going to their grandparents house. Maybe just don't assume everyone's experience is the same as yours.
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