MEMOIR OF A FRENCH WAR BRIDE

      In the evening I looked outside and saw all those lights reflecting in the sky and I thought, “I am in America, I’m in New York, I’m in New York.” I thought I was in paradise. After five years of war, France was an empty country. It would take six or seven years to recover, and life had been really tough because of the war.  So you see, my coming to America was really like a dream come true.

      I told my boy, “You see, that’s your country. That’s America!”

      Then I thought, okay, I do not speak any English and a lot of people are trying to talk to me. There was another French girl who had twin babies, and she spoke some English, so they got us together and we could talk. 

      One day while we were staying at Ft. Hamilton, I was out looking around the base with my son and I was thirsty – really thirsty.  I did not know how to ask for a drink.  I saw a cafeteria; somewhere I could have a drink.  I saw the ice cream and told the man I wanted that for my son.  Everything was on a menu and I couldn’t understand a thing.  Then all the sudden I saw “root beer.”  I said “Beer!  I know what it is.”  So the guy sold me that.  Oh my God, I put my lips on that thing and I thought he was trying to poison me! It tasted like medicine, so I put it back.  I did not want it!  There was no way I could finish the root beer. So you see, I never drank root beer again.  To like the taste of that you have to be born drinking it in your baby bottle! 

      While I stayed about three or four days at Fort Hamilton in New York, I think the military was contacting my in-laws about my arrival. I was taken to the train station in New York to board the train. They told the conductor that I was going to Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, where the family would be waiting for me. 

      When I was on the train, the second amazing discovery for me was all those wooden houses!  In our country, houses are mostly all stone. I saw those wooden houses and I said, “What happened?  Did they have a catastrophe? Is this a way to build more houses?”  I couldn’t understand that either.

      In the States I discovered the supermarket, discovered all kinds of things.  It was an experience.

      I arrived in Wilkes-Barre and I saw a city with some houses like France