The Little Immigrant, by Rani Sanderson

I look at my little mom, around ten-years-old, painted, in black and white, and all I can see is a little girl, this “little immigrant,” getting off an airplane– the first she’d ever been on– with her sister (my aunt), both in matching dresses and knee socks, and her parents (my grandparents). They arrived in 1950s Montreal in the January cold, after living in tropical Cuba for a few years, and after an unsettled few years in the displaced persons camps of Germany and France. I wonder what she was feeling, once again in a new country, a new climate, where she didn’t speak the language and knew no one.  

The painting of her, which I never actually saw until I was a teenager, when my mom was given a postcard of it, shows her sitting on a chair, looking very contemplative– as much as a 10-year-old can be contemplative– with her big, dark, sad eyes. I was always told it was called “The Little Immigrant,” -though it says Belka on the bottom of my postcard reproduction, her Yiddish name. I much prefer that.

They’d come to Montreal because my grandfather had a cousin with the same last name. This cousin lied, and claimed my grandfather as a brother, so my family could be brought into Canada. What would have happened if they’d stayed in Cuba? 

I look at that little girl and see a whole history, a whole family, in those eyes– a family who went through more than I will ever have to go through, so that I would never have to. A family I will never know. I’m angry that this family, this history, this future, was stolen from me. But I also see a family who was resilient, who survived, who kept their stories for me.

I tried to track down the painting about eight years ago, for a surprise 70th birthday gift for my mom. I even managed to find and speak to the artist shortly before she died. While she remembered my family (everyone always remembers my grandparents) and vaguely remembered the painting being sold in Winnipeg, that’s all she could tell me. The Winnipeg gallery no longer exists, and after pursuing a few leads, I got nowhere. I wonder whose wall it hangs on and what those people see, when they look at it.

It wasn’t until recently that I found out the painting is actually in color. What kind of colors? Maybe she doesn’t look so sad in color.