CLOSE-UP
Sam and Emily Valk: "The more established a person gets, the more he will get involved in community activity.
THE RUSSIAN COMMUNITY
Rebels, Not Slaves
Jews who left the Soviet Union bucked a system
which encourages dependence and conformi ty.
America has meant a rebirth for many
DAVID HOLZEL
Staff Writer
T
wo turnstiles faced Irina
Kovalsky when she arrived
at Chicago's O'Hare Airport
recently from a visit to Italy.
"One sign said 'American
Citizens Here, the other said, 'All
Others Here? I am so happy that I
could go the way American citizens
are allowed to go, and not the other
way."
Irina and her husband, Vladislav,
emigrated from the Soviet Union in
1980. Now living in Lathrup Village
with their 17-year-old son, Julian, the
Kovalskys recently . acquired U.S.
citizenship which allows them to take
that coveted inside track at the air-
22
FRIDAY, SEPT. 25, 1987
port. That right is only a symbol of
the freedom the family has found in
the United States: freedom of move-
ment, freedom of expression and
freedom to take pride in their own in-
dividuality and heritage.
Since 1966, over 92,000 Soviet
Jews have come to the United States.
Some 2,000 of them made their way
to Detroit. They did find freedom, but
not only in the abstract. They
discovered that freedom means choice
and that choices must be made daily
in America, not only to get ahead in
life, but in order to survive.
The freedom, and necessity, of
choice is alien to the Soviet system.
So self-reliance was perhaps the most
important trait the Soviet Jews had
to adopt in America. Depending on
the immigrant, attaining this
freedom was either like awakening
from a life-long slumber or like
shouldering a burden as oppressive as
the regimented communist society he
left behind.
By and large, the immigrants,
especially the younger ones, rose to
the challenge. "The immigrants must
be tough or else they would have
stayed where they were," observes
Lydia Kuniaysky, resettlement
worker for Jewish Family Service.
While sharing the experiences of
the many groups who immigrated
over the years — the need to start life
practically from scratch, to learn a
new language and new customs — the
Russians have certain distinguishing
characteristics: they are generally
well educated, highly motivated and
seek to assimilate into American life
as quickly as possible. Because of this
they have avoided geographic ghet-
toization and have not developed a
communal leadership able to ar-
ticulate their needs and views to the
larger Jewish community and general
community.
Even brief exposure to Detroit's
Russian Jews can dispel some long-
held notions about them.
"We were quite comfortable in
Russia," Irina Kovalsky says for a
start. "We had a car, for example. Peo-
ple asked, 'Why do you want to leave?'
But it's like a person who has retired.
Nothing else will happen in your life."
Irina and Vladislav are both
musicians: she is a violinist, he a