As the Democrats prepare to hold their convention in Chicago, please read this story of our encounter with someone who knows a lot about Chicago.
During a 2022 trip to Italy with our grown children, the Beautiful Wife reminded the kids “Dad talks to everyone.’’ On this past trip, for once, we had someone open a conversation with us and it turned out to be illuminating, very illuminating.
We were at the very end of the recent vacation traveling through the Balkans. We traversed seven countries new to us. We found most of them had English as a compulsory subject in their schools, making conversation easy and all were a pleasure to visit. We also found that few Americans visit them, especially on vacation.
It was the last night of our extended trip. We were at dinner in a restaurant recommended by a person from the capital city of Skopje, North Macedonia. The locals just consider it to be called “Macedonia” as Greece forced them to add “North” in order to join NATO. The country is also a member of the EU. The restaurant has a great view as we were up in the hills overlooking the entire city of Skopje, which sits in a valley surrounded by hills (mountains).
We were chatting away when interrupted by our neighbor. It was an unusual occurrence because I am almost always the one chatting up the adjoining table. The gentleman asked if we were Americans. We said yes, and he was off to the races.
He informed us that he is a native Macedonian who had relocated to America living in Chicago. He returns to Macedonia three times each year to visit family. We could see he was sitting with his very American wife. He asked why we were in Macedonia. We informed him we were there on vacation. He told us he had never met anyone from the United States who had come to Macedonia on vacation. It is a landlocked country. There are no people offloading from a cruise ship. He said there might be people who come for a conference, but he said he never met anybody who just came there to see his beautiful country.
Then he started to unload. He had no idea of our political proclivities. He just started to tell us his thoughts about what is going on in America. He starts by talking in broad terms about the ignorance of college students. “I lived under Communism. It was horrible. We all lived in fear, all the time. We were afraid to say anything to anyone. What are these kids thinking? Their ignorance of socialism is astonishing.”
I told him I had just finished a biography of Stalin. I expressed how everyone in the Soviet Union — even up to his Group of Five (sometimes seven) who were his top leadership team — lived in fear that Stalin was going to “cancel” one of them as he often did. After having a stroke in 1953, the leadership team was called and they would only go to his dacha together, afraid of getting blamed if he recovered. Then they were afraid to call a doctor because if he recovered, they were afraid to get blamed for calling a doctor if Stalin did not want a doctor. Everyone was afraid to say anything to anyone.
Our neighbor then shifts to ranting about Chicago. He said when he moved to Chicago many years ago to escape the aftermath of Communism, he was so happy. He stated now it is better in Macedonia. A shocking statement, but totally believable.
He then said, “Who votes for these people? What are they thinking?” I replied “Yes, you had the worst mayor in America, Lori Lightfoot, and somehow they voted for someone even worse, Brandon Johnson.” He was somewhat surprised I knew their names.
He starts talking about the crime. “They do nothing to stop the crime.” I referred to the chief prosecutor (DA), Kim Foxx. Using the term “chief prosecutor” in association with Kim Foxx is mangling the English language. I stated thankfully after eight years of pain and suffering she is not running for reelection. He replied, “They will probably find someone even worse like they did with Johnson.”
Here is a man who came to America, freed from the communist country of his birth, opened two high-end hair salons, and appeared to be living the American dream when the people who surround him in his chosen city elected some of the worst leaders in American history trying everything they can to destroy a great city and burden it with uncontrolled crime. Matters are so bad he states things are better in his former communist homeland than in Chicago. He tells us all this because we are the first people he ever met who vacationed in Macedonia.
Hopefully, the people in Chicago will wake up and hear his message. And then there are the ignorant college students who think socialism worked – anywhere. You never know what you are going to learn speaking to people in a foreign country.
Good luck to the Democrats on their convention in the Windy City. They are the ones who made it the disaster it is today.
