The big day had
arrived. It was Tuesday, October 28, 1969 --the day that
I arrived in the United States. We had a direct flight
with the American PAN AM Airline from Rome, Italy to
the JFK International Airport in New York. Since at that
time we belonged to no country and thus had no passports,
each immigrant refugee traveled with an Italian document
entitled "Permit to Reenter" containing a "Conditional
Entry" Visa to the United States good for two (2)
years.
That "Permit to Reenter" document with the "Conditional
Entry" Visa was an extremely humane and considerate Visa
that was designed to work in this way:
If, for whatever
reason, an immigrant refugee could not adjust to life in
America, he or she, within two (2) years could have
had the possibility of returning to Italy and picking
another country for immigration. If, however, the
immigrant refugee stayed for these two (2) years in
America that would have indicated that the respective
immigrant accepted America as his or her new adopted
country.
Each immigrant
refugee in the plane carried a huge envelope with the
person's Chest X-Ray. In the plane we were told that the
first thing that we needed to do upon arrival at the JFK
Airport was to show our Chest X-Ray to the Immigration
Official in order to be cleared that we do not have
tuberculosis. I remember going down on the ramp of the
plane with my big Chest X-Ray envelope. As I was about to
open this big envelope, an Immigration Official (a man in
his fifties with all white and curly hair) approached me
and stated:
"You
do not have to show me your X-ray. I know that YOU
DO NOT HAVE tuberculosis"
Then, after a brief
pause looking straight into my eyes, he said:
"Welcome
my friend, welcome to your new country THE UNITED
STATES!"
Those were the very
first words spoken to me in the United States. My face
was all red. I was overwhelmed with emotions.
As we left the
customs inspection in the airport, a man was waiting for
our group. We could easily be recognized as each of us
carried, on the lapel of our garment, a large HIAS
button. In addition, all of us had a small black handbag
with the HIAS insignia. (That handbag was a present from
HIAS containing in it a bar of soap, toothpaste with
toothbrush, shaving cream and a razor bundled in a small
towel.) The man, an American, said that he was from HIAS,
and that arrangements were made that everybody would
sleep that night in a nearby hotel and that on the next
day each of us would continue with his or her flight to
our final destination. (Because my guarantor in the
United States was the Jewish Community for the City of
Pittsburgh, next day I was scheduled to fly
there.)
The man from HIAS
took us in a minibus to the nearby hotel. There, in the
lobby, he said something very fast that I could not
completely understand. Soon after that, he gave everyone
from the group a $10 bill and he left. Since I did not
know what that money was for, I assumed that it was for
that evening while we were staying at the hotel. Nearby
in the lobby of the hotel, I saw a rather unpretentious
restaurant so I went in. I ordered a big juicy steak with
lots of French fries and a coca-cola drink. It was
heaven! I enjoyed that meal tremendously. With the tip
and everything, it came to $8. With my $2 left I went to
the lobby to buy a pack of the famous Pall Mall
cigarettes. (At that time they were 49¢!)
[Pall Mall
cigarettes with no filter were, by far, the most famous
American cigarettes in Romania. Later in the story you
would be able to find out why that was
so!] As I
gave a dollar bill to the woman from the lobby, I saw the
HIAS man coming towards me and saying:
"Don't
waste your ten dollars as you will need it tomorrow
for the taxi."
"What ten dollars?", I replied. "I have only one dollar
left!" To this, in disbelief, the HIAS man
said:
"Here
is another ten dollars. Do not spend it. It is for
tomorrow for your taxicab. Is this clear?"
Nodding my head in
the affirmative, we left saying "Good Night" to each
other. For me it was a particularly good night --it was
after all my first night in America! I could not have
been happier.
[Years later,
to my surprise, I was able to learn from reading an
article on the history of the Statue of Liberty in the
National Geographic magazine, that October 28 --the day
of my arrival, was also the official day when the Statue
of Liberty was inaugurated by President Grover Cleveland
in 1886! What an incredible coincidence and what a
tremendous symbolism this day carried for
me!]
