American Gypsy
eBook - ePub

American Gypsy

A Memoir

  1. 384 pages
  2. English
  3. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub

American Gypsy

A Memoir

About this book

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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Yes, you can access American Gypsy by Oksana Marafioti in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Social Sciences & Social Science Biographies. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Dedication
  4. Epigraph
  5. Author’s Note
  6. Contents
  7. American Cheese
  8. Bringing Down the Wall
  9. Crossfire
  10. Surviving America
  11. When in Doubt, Cook!
  12. Running Away
  13. War and Not So Much Peace
  14. Journal Number 1
  15. The Curbs of Beverly Hills
  16. A Premium Idea
  17. No Joan of Arc
  18. Honeylambshank
  19. Coffee Bean
  20. What Do You See?
  21. Cher and I Have Things in Common
  22. The Miss
  23. Blatnyak
  24. The Maverick
  25. At the Deli
  26. What’s in the Bag?
  27. Just Having Touched
  28. Mama Lola
  29. Viva Las Vegas
  30. Converting Sherri
  31. Black Magic
  32. Leaving Lexington
  33. Things Unseen
  34. To Magnet or Not to Magnet
  35. Exotic
  36. The Hunt
  37. Citizens of No-Land
  38. How Much for the Virgin?
  39. Endings and Beginnings
  40. Chasing Friendship
  41. On the Roof
  42. Kentucky Fried Chicken
  43. Where Olga’s Secret Is Revealed
  44. The Wedding
  45. Stevart Hopeland
  46. Comrade Pushkin
  47. Pavel
  48. Where I Finally Say It
  49. Signs
  50. Pieces of Me
  51. Acknowledgments
  52. About the Author
  53. Copyright