Personal Statement: Ap World

Ap World Final Project I am Nadia Ivanhoe, and I am from Soviet Russia. I was born in October, 1940. When I was only a year old, my city, Moscow, was bombed by Germans. My mother was a medic during the war, we lived in central Moscow, which is largely why we survived. Well, my mother and I did, my father fought for the Red Army. I was five when the war officially ended, we learned soon after that my father died in a German prisoner of war camp. I have few memories of the war itself, but I do remember having a few Jewish friends as a child that have long since vanished, Jewish culture and Jewish people have largely disappeared from the city since. I was raised by a single mother during the cold war. Thankfully, in Communist Russia women had …show more content…
But Moscow was no rich city, if you needed something, even the bare necessities, you had to be patient. I remember waiting in lines almost daily, for food, clothing, and toiletries, the lines stretched for many city blocks. I would go right from school to the store to begin waiting to purchase that nights dinner, we didn’t have a refrigerator, very few people did, so food needed to be bought often and in small quantities. Primary and middle school were free and mandatory for everyone, I started my education at an all-girls elementary school, but Krushchev’s Desalinization meant that I was soon moved to a co-ed school. I remember that the older kids were unhappy with this, the parents too, but I was glad that I did not have to wear the uncomfortable, and rather ugly, school uniforms anymore. I was lucky enough to attend a medical institute, my mother taught me from a young age how to care for people and I enjoyed a long career as a medical specialist, though not the most lucrative one. I married young as most Russians do, had a child at twenty-four, and like my mother before me and like most mothers in Moscow, I became a single mother shortly after marriage. The alcoholism in Russia makes …show more content…
I attended the 1980 summer Olympics in Moscow when I was thirty-nine years old, I brought Oleg, he was sixteen at the time. We watched Vladimir Salnikov break the world record for the 1500 meter freestyle. The celebrating filled the streets, it was by far the most exiting part of my adult life. I was nearly fifty when the soviet union broke apart. The tensions that had been present for my entire life began to dissolve. The fighting stopped as eastern European countries gained independence and there was no longer a threat of nuclear war. I participated in the first presidential election in 1991, I retired just four years later. In my retirement I’ve enjoyed the warm, short Moscow summers, when it only gets dark close to midnight and everyone stays out late at outdoor cafes, Oleg moved out of Moscow after studying to become an accountant, but he visits me often. Traveling opportunities have been fairly limited, there are many bans on traveling here, but because I do not work for the government or in security, I have more opportunities than most. I went to the International Banquet in Jakarta for instance, it was wonderful, I tried the most interesting foods. When I got back I spent my last few months living with Oleg and his wife before having a stroke after

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