Wir Strebermigranten

Emilia was still Emilka when her parents set off with her - out of gray Poland, to West Berlin! That was in 1988. Just a year later, she had a new name, a new country, a new language: she was now German, and everything Polish was unwelcome. When her parents' new colleagues came for dinner, there were no pierogi, but mozzarella and tomatoes instead. And when Emilia brought home a German dictation with two mistakes, her mother was horrified: What had gone wrong? Emilia Smechowski movingly tells the personal story of a collective experience: a tale of shame and fierce ambition, of liberation and self-assertion.