Never Give Up, Never Surrender

As is my mother. I grew up in a big northern city where plenty of people still had recent European immigrants in their families. But now I live in a small town at the far southern end of the Midwest, where European immigration basically stopped at the turn of the 20th century. I'm blonde and have a vaguely Nordic last name... when I tell people that my mom spent the first five years of her life in a refugee camp, they look absolutely baffled...

(I try not to discuss politics directly at work, but I do share personal stories when I think it might shake up people's assumptions. )