American Gypsy: A Memoir
Oksana Marafioti
Language: English
Pages: 384
ISBN: 0374104077
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
A vivid and funny memoir about growing up Gypsy and becoming American
Fifteen-year-old Oksana Marafioti is a Gypsy. This means touring with the family band from the Mongolian deserts to the Siberian tundra. It means getting your hair cut in "the Lioness." It also means enduring sneering racism from every segment of Soviet society. Her father is determined that his girls lead a better, freer life. In America! Also, he wants to play guitar with B. B. King. And cure cancer with his personal magnetism. All of this he confides to the woman at the American embassy, who inexplicably allows the family entry. Soon they are living on the sketchier side of Hollywood.
What little Oksana and her sister, Roxy, know of the United States they've learned from MTV, subcategory George Michael. It doesn't quite prepare them for the challenges of immigration. Why are the glamorous Kraft Singles individually wrapped? Are the little soaps in the motels really free? How do you protect your nice new boyfriend from your opinionated father, who wants you to marry decently, within the clan?
In this affecting, hilarious memoir, Marafioti cracks open the secretive world of the Roma and brings the absurdities, miscommunications, and unpredictable victories of the immigrant experience to life. With unsentimentally perfect pitch, American Gypsy reveals how Marafioti adjusted to her new life in America, one slice of processed cheese at a time.
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fortune-teller who’d revealed a secret of his that no one could’ve possibly known. It compelled me to load the silence with chatter. “I’ve been thinking of moving to Vegas after graduation. Maybe take Brandon’s advice. College sounds like something I could do.” I didn’t tell him that most likely I’d have no choice. My mother would never let me forget our agreement, and besides, someone needed to be there to intercept the liquor bottles. “Isn’t that kind of like running away?” he said, tossing
thing. PIECES OF ME The morning of my departure basked in the sublime weather that made California so irresistible. It was late May 1993. Palm trees murmured in the breeze and the distant buzz of traffic reassured all that Hollywood was being worshipped right on schedule. Mom was driving in from Vegas to pick me up. I had only a few more hours before I’d be gone from Los Angeles for good. Earlier that day Olga, the wicked witch of every direction on the compass, had tried to make
and dashing into the spotlight, an open-winged sparrow. It had been almost a year since I left the old country, and I was starting to miss the Romani of my childhood more than my one-page list could fit. I longed to hear their songs again and to feel the pulse of their performance beneath my feet. At the end of the school year I signed up for my first recital, which also served as a rehearsal for the big year-end talent show that attracted talent scouts from all over L.A. I picked Mark
read the address Roxy had scribbled in chunky print. “Apparently we live in Mos Angeles.” “It’s one letter. I can fix it,” Roxy said, pressing her pen over the typo. “The mailman will think we don’t know what we’re doing,” Mom said. “What if he throws it away?” “Roxy’s right, Mom. No one will notice.” Mom mumbled something dire about her luck and went to the counter, where she tied a bay leaf, a few twigs of dill and parsley, and some peppercorns in a cheesecloth pouch and dropped it into a
geek. I have something with less pollution if you’re picky.” In my parents’ line of work, almost everyone got high on something. I remember during one concert, Dad came out of the dressing room already late for his stage entrance. “Dad, you have sugar on your mustache,” I said. He wiped it and shambled past. Behind drawn curtains, the MC was announcing the song, trying to stretch his words until one of the guitar players signaled him that Dad had caught up. When the curtains opened, my father
