- Yablonovskiy and his family immigrated from Souther Ukraine because of the country’s state of living. Souther Ukraine was a heavily communist country that was losing its value everyday. The country’s culture was slowly disappearing and being forgotten. Apart from all the communism going on, there was also an extreme amount of discrimination going on against Jewish people. Yablonovskiy mentions how a show called, Nu Pogodi, was a very large part of his childhood and the childhood of many kids from his country. It was a show just like Tom and Jerry which is an American show. The show was created by the government as “propaganda” to spread communist ideologies in Ukraine. The show demonstrates how a citizen should behave in their country by showing a wolf disobeying the law somehow and him going to jail. It also show also depicts social events that involve art and culture to signify how children should be when they become adults. Many people used the show as a distraction from their very busy and hard lives knowing that most had no breaks. Most people worked Monday-Saturday having only Sunday as a “day off.” While children had to go to school from Monday-Saturday as well. It got very depressing for them, especially since they could not do anything about it.
- Yablonovskiy’s argument was straight to the point, he described his childhood while describing the childhood/adulthood of his grandparents and his peers. It was very rough for his family to live a normal life in a country that had such a strict government. I would understand why his family chose to move to Brooklyn, New York an area so different from Southern Ukraine that is not as communist as Russia. It was not only Yablonovskiy’s family who moved from Russia to The United States, hundreds of other family chose to do so as well for very similar reasons. Once a country starts to not value culture/beliefs as much as it used to people start to lose motivation and want change in order to gain that love back.
One thought on “Karen Leonardo Reading Response, 11/1”
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Thanks for this, Karen! Yes, it’s really striking to think that this silly little cartoon could be your only break or relief from a grinding, demanding, and exhausting life.