For @mariannewest in Freewriters
When I was five or six years old, I had my first real awareness about the spender of the United States and it happened because of beach towels. Some kind of old man came to our small room in Moscow. He spoke broken or rather half-forgotten Russian, and used ancient slang. He turned out to be my grand uncle, who came from America. As I found out later, he ran away from home at the tender age of thirteen and was hired as a ship's boy on a liner that headed to the United States. It was approximately 1912 or 1913. During those times, it was easier to immigrate, as the USA hasn’t been a Welfare state.
When he stepped out of the ship, he found a small sack with golden jewelry. Interestingly, he wasn’t surprised as at that time people said that in American gold “lays on the ground”.
But I digressed. He brought with him several suitcases filled with clothes and beach towels. The clothes were used and Abe (that was the name of the man) was often saying, “This is not a new item, but it is of good quality.” We weren’t inclined to look gift horse in the mouth especially considering that Russia at that time was still recovering after WWII and any kind of item was a real deficit.
As I mentioned, he brought with him many clothes and rolls of used beach towels. It was simply amazing. We used these towels for many years. They were of great quality indeed.
As it turned out, Abe used to work as a beach guard at some lake and for many years collected clothes and beach towels that people left on shores.
Thinking about it, he had an odd kind of frugalness about him as I think he had to pay quite a bit for these suitcases, traveling all the way from New York to Moscow.
Great story.
Love this phrase:
“This is not a new item, but it is of good quality.”
LOL. Really )))
Yes, I say it a lot ...
This blouse is 30 years old, but it is of good quality. LOL:-)
Ahahah !!!
Great job! I like the way you bring out memories to make up such interesting stories. Greetings and a big hug, buddy @mgaft!
Thank you, buddy! Glad you found this entertaining :)
Great story. I remember my uncle coming from America, it would have been the mid-60s, with a huge walking/talking doll for me and something equally amazing for my brother. It must have been a lot cheaper to transport stuff in those days.
Thank you! It's interesting how we keep the memory of those presents. Have you ever visit your uncle in the USA?
No, he's long dead. Besides, my father's profligate ways did not endear him to the extended family, so we fell out of touch.
Yeah. Interesting. Recently I was contacted by one of my second cousins, who termed out to be the grandchild of one of Abe's sisters. )
@mgaft1 good story, gold does lay on the ground in Florida but it is underwater from the 1715 shipwrecks.
That's a little too deep for my taste! ))))
Надо же, какая интересная история)
Спасибо! )
@mgaft1 good story, gold does lay on the ground in Florida but it is underwater from the 1715 shipwrecks.