varsovian
15.12.05, 16:31
After the revelation that Waldek lives in the US, I think we should discuss
the subject.
My roommate says that intelligent Poles are bound to feel bad in the US. His
experience (10 years in NYC) is that the happiest Poles in the US are those
who make little effort to adapt to the American way of life, muddle through
with substandard English and concentrate on material pleasures.
The highly educated tend to get treated like jerks from eastern Europe who
are only in the US because their own country is good-for-nothing. Moreover,
Polonia treats highly-educated newcomers as threats and they close ranks to
deny access to intellectuals.
As for my wife's experience in England, well - it varied. In snobbish Surrey
(south of London)she was looked down on by the other private school mothers
because she "had to" work, whereas their husbands were loaded. But at least
she could work there.
In the working-class North, she fluked a job by accidentally bumping into the
bloke who'd just turned down her job application. Otherwise she was blocked
at every corner by people who couldn't categorize her - European but not
French, not English but not Pakistani. And her good manners, cake baking,
exotic looks and church-going really irritated Yorkshire working-class women
because it was so un-them.