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had been assisting Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice during her official meetings in the Ukrainian capital and was heading home, exhausted from the frantic pace that is usual for such high-level work ing visits. I needed to clear my head of discussions of Euro-Atlantic integration and cooperation on proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, so I started reading Kira-Kira while waiting in the lounge at Boryspil airport. The next 11 hours were a blur. The story transported me to the Midwest in the 1950’s, and I was mesmerized by the experiences of a Japanese- American family and their two young daughters, Katie and Lynn. It was this book that brought me to tears as Lynn dies of lymphoma and young Katie must continue without her beloved sister. Some where over the Atlantic—midpoint in the book as well as midpoint in my journey back home—I wished I had the power to divert the plane straight to New York. I couldn’t wait to hear what Kalyna would say about the ethnic discrimination that the Japanese family faced. Could she even relate to this concept? After all, her school is as diverse as could be, with children from Morocco and China and Greece and, yes, from Japan. Their differences are what unites them rather than sets them apart from each other. And when our book club finally met, this theme led to an interesting set of comments from the older members on what it was like being different—i.e. being Ukrainian in America. We also talked about the question of death, which I feared would be very disturbing to Kalyna. Turns out it didn’t have nearly the emotional impact on her that it had on the rest of us. The most recent meeting of Kalyna’s Book Club took place just a few months ago, when the whole family gathered for Christmas in the pic turesque town of Hunter, New York, in the Catskill Mountains. We discussed The Giver, whose author created a future utopian society in which all dif ferences between people, their genuine feelings and emotions, have been bred out of them. They see in black and white, they have no memories of war or suffering, all their needs are taken care of by a committee of “elders” which assigns jobs to people and children to parents. Old people undergo a sup posedly joyous ceremony during which they are “released” (read “euthanized”). This book elicited an engrossing conver sation about the very essence of life: Is it better to live a life without pain, suffering, and want of any kind if that life lacks emotions and free will, or is it better to suffer through the normal “slings and arrows” human beings endure while having the right to choose, the right to see colors and shades of gray (literally and figuratively), and the right to pleasur able and even painful memories? But it’s not just the books and their content that make Kalyna’s Book Club so interesting. For one thing, our meetings are very democratic. Every one has a chance to speak; everyone’s opinion is equally valid; the voice of the 11 year old is just as attentively listened to and considered as the voice of the 50 year old. Mother may not interrupt daughter, and great-aunt must sit quietly while the grand- niece speaks. In fact, our age differences almost disappear and something remarkable happens: We become, quite simply, eight interesting women, each with a distinctive take on life, enjoying each other’s company. In the two hours that we discuss the book du jour, we have a-chance to step outside our usual roles as the middle child, the matriarch of the family, the “mama,” or the “teta.” We cast aside the well-worn familial and behavioral relationships that we have become accustomed to (or, perhaps, burdened with) for decades and relate to each other as unique human beings. We feel free to express our opinions, and are—in turn—enriched by the variety of ideas expressed. Funny what a book about a mouse in love can lead to. Marta N. Zielyk holds the post of Senior Diplomatic Interpreter in the U.S. State Department. All thoughts expressed in this article are her own and do not reflect the views of the U.S. government. Ms. Zielyk welcomes comments and observations from readers about her articles and can be reached at martaz@rcn.com.
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