English Audio Request

“My grandfather, Isaac Berlin, left his nativetown in Russia in 1890. He was the first of six brothers to leave home. He was going to America, the land of abundance, because he lived in terrible poverty, and also because there was religious persecution. After all, he
was the son of a rabbi. With only the money for his ticket and his food, he took a train to Hamburg. Then he travelled by sea to Liverpool, where he boarded a transatlantic liner bound for New York. At last, after twenty days, they sailed into New York Harbour. Grandpa was only just seventeen. He cried with joy when he saw the Statue of Liberty, but before he was allowed into America, he was taken to Ellis Island, the immigration station. It was a morbid place filled with five thousand other immigrants like Grandpa. For three days the officials checked his papers, gave him medical inspections and asked him questions. Grandpa did not speak any English, so an interpreter was called to help the immigration officer. Once it was all over, he got on a ferry to Manhattan. There a Jewish charity took him to the Lower East Side, where he earned his living as a sales boy. At night he slept at the back of the shop on potato bags. He worked long hours for very little money. Because he wanted to learn English, he bought Shakespeare’s Complete Works, which he recited at night without understanding a word. He once told me that the music of the verse sounded like Russian to him. Grandpa married my grandma, who was a hat maker, in 1906. They lived in a two-room apartment without any heating, so in winter they were often cold. However, they were very happy. In 1912 they both took American nationality. When my father was born the following year, Grandpa and Grandma felt really American. They loved New York and Grandpa was fascinated by the great bridges and skyscrapers that were being built. He said to my father: “I want you to become an architect and build skyscrapers that reach for the sky. So you must study hard and go to the university.” And that’s just what my father did, but he did not become an architect. He became a university professor instead, and he specialized in Shakespeare. In the end it was I who became an architect, and who fulfilled Grandpa’s wish.”