Ferrara, 23 December 2004
Dear Santa,
My name is Valentiyna and I am an illegal immigrant living in Ferrara since 2001. I still haven’t seen any snow here. Where I come from it started snowing a month ago, and despite the cold there are people standing outside in the Square in Kiev to protest for a better life.
I have so many wishes I’d like to see come true: I could begin with peace, first of all for my country, for it to find the political stability that would unite the population and bring economic rewards, then for the whole world; I could continue with the hope of a job -- I, luckily, am working now, but I think of all the people from my country who hang around in parks or at our association headquarters, waiting for a call that takes too long to arrive.
At home the tree is already up, for the third year in a row my children have decorated it with my husband, without me. They’ve already told me which balls have been broken and how many …. What a pity! they were a part of my (happy) childhood.
Before long my children will open my package (ed: sent on the Ukrainian minibuses that regularly make these deliveries). I can imagine my 15-year-old son Arturo’s surprise when he sees the mobile phone, the only way to be able to speak to him whenever I want (when our lines are working). And what will Victoria’s expression be like when she sees the computer, and my husband’s when he sees his new watch! I can see them celebrating with our typical dinner of salami (the Milanese type), vegetable mayonnaise, caviar, pickles, sciuba (ed: a mixture of vegetables, mayonnaise, salted fish and red beets) and then all sorts of chocolates and a bottle of imported Russian champagne. Their joy in exchange for my hard work, my suffering and loneliness!
The family I work for also celebrates Christmas eve. They have put up a tree, too. I don’t recognize their ornaments, they aren’t part of my past. I don’t recognize their Christmas meal, either, though I must confess that I like it. But while the others are toasting, I’ll be in the kitchen washing the dishes and putting things away. And my thoughts will always be of home, my body will be there physically, but my soul will be sharing my the joy of my family, together with them, in my home. So then what should I ask you for? Maybe an amnesty that would legalize my presence here? The chance of having my children come to Italy for a month during the holidays? Or maybe that my employers could see me as a person and not only as a servant, and that the people walking next to me would greet me the way they would if I were Italian? I realize that there are too many things I need to ask you for, and I also know that for us, people who come from the countries of eastern Europe, wishes are fulfilled by "Died Maros and Sniegurochka"(ed: literally:"grandfather cold" and "the snow maiden"), but I thought that since in the Ukraine Christmas comes fifteen days late, and I know how good you are, you would have enough time to satisfy all the wishes of the Italians first and then dedicate yourself to making our “dreams” come true.
With my hope and best wishes for a better life and a better world, I embrace you warmly.
Valentyna
Kiev, 14 February 2005
Cara Valentiyna,
Today is your name-day, the holiday of lovers and your birthday. I am alone in the house and I’ve just put some wood into the furnace. Outside there is a metre of snow and it’s still snowing. The cold gets into the bones and I’m trying to get a bit of warmth from the fire, but there is another cold I can’t get rid of, the cold that’s always with me since you left.
The empty place in my bed, the silence in our house, freeze me inside. I have to confess that sometimes I look for comfort and warmth in my bottle of vodka, but it’s a temporary sensation, and after a few hours of stupor I get up colder than before. Our daughter Lyuba didn’t come back last night, she slept away from home. Yesterday evening we quarrelled about her hair, because she’s dyed it violet and blue, and I found out that she hasn’t been going to school for a week, and then because the money she has is never enough for her. But she left slamming the door behind her and shouting that at fifteen she can do as she pleases. She called me "drunkard!" and I didn’t have the strength to stop her. You’re the only one who can control her -- you know how stubborn she is, just like you, and she won’t listen to me any more. Our son Vladimir, on the other hand, is completely different. He studies hard, but almost never talks. He’s mature for his 11 years, but his eyes have the sadness of your being so far away, and maybe it hurts him to see me in this state. Sometimes I lose my temper and slap him, but then I am sorry because I know he doesn’t deserve it and that I’ve only taken out all my suffering and impotence on him. He’s with your mother now, she says I’m a bad example and that one day our son will be someone. It’s true, he gets excellent marks at school and his studies will make the money you send pay off.
The house is almost all paid up now, thanks to your sacrifices, just a few more years of the mortgage and then, I hope, together again. I often look at our pictures and relive the happiness of the first years of our life together. The photo of our graduation day, our wedding, the trip to Leningrad, do you remember the sea in Crimea? And the train trip we took to Moscow? The birth of our children. Happy times, today nothing more than snapshots, and I still see you young and beautiful with your silver hair and your complexion like majolica, and that short mini-skirt. I shut my eyes and dream of your body, but the image is fading. I try to smell your scent, the warmth of your skin, but the more time passes the vaguer it gets. Meanwhile another thought torments me: how can you live without a man near you? Who do you go out with? Who takes you by the hand? Who embraces you? I realize that jealousy is killing me, and only now do I understand what a mistake it was to let you leave. It was the height of my failure, as a man and as a husband. You know, the joy of your Christmas presents is already vanishing, only the coldness of solitude is left, along with a deep sadness in my heart. But I see that I’m making you unhappy on this lovers’ holiday, while what I want is to be near you and tell you how much I love you, on this day that for you is a triple celebration -- your birthday, your name-day and Valentine’s day. I only hope that at least your girlfriends are having a party for you and giving you a moment of happiness on this cold February 14th . I send you a kiss and my presence. Unfortunately, only in thought. But it’s cold, maybe my bottle of vodka will give me a hand, at least I hope so, maybe it will help me forget.
With all my love, your husband Igor.
Valentyna is a fictitious name for this woman, who was born in the Ukraine and now lives in a multi-ethnic cultural centre used mainly by eastern European women who are domestic ‘carers’ in Italy. During the Christmas holidays a tree was put up with ornaments consisting of various-coloured notes where the members of the association wrote their wishes. It was immediately named “the Wishing Tree”, and among the colourful papers there appeared a real letter to Santa Clause, written in Cyrillic. It has been translated into Italian with the author’s help. In just a few lines these two letters express many of the problems and worries of these immigrant women and their families.