This was the time when we brought back our three young children to the United States from our original country, Hungary. The adjustment was the hardest on Danny, our middle child. He started his second year of preschool here while not speaking any English, and not being familiar with the American superheroes. He had to leave Hungary after the

So how could we replace all those losses? McDonalds quickly became our amusement park. Sesame Street on Public Television provided both entertainment and an excellent tool for learning. Nevertheless, that program didn’t help ease Danny into group participation at school. He was still the loneliest of all. So if the school activities didn’t make our middle child happy, how could we support him?

We had to accept the inevitable. We felt that we didn’t have a choice but to give up our resistance to something that was foreign to us, that didn’t exist in our culture. And that was the American pop culture of young children. So on our regular trip to the grocery store we ended up paying a visit to Woolworth. There we got acquainted with many four-year-olds’ best friends, the ninja turtles. Soon after came Batman, Superman and Captain Planet at al. Those strange looking plastic heroes saved our forlorn son.

It didn’t take long, and we understood how much benefit these figures carried. If you wanted to become well informed, you had to learn all about the characters in order to communicate with your friends. That is exactly what happened. We were impressed how much information our preschooler was able to collect when it came to his favorite toys. But most of all, these inexpensive products were invaluable for Danny who dreadfully needed playmates. His vocabulary expanded very quickly, his communication skills improved day by day, and new friendships were launched.

Our household became more acceptable for play dates since we had many of the toys American children would play with.

Meanwhile, I learned basic etiquettes, like inviting the parents and siblings for birthday parties, and handing out goody bags at the end.

Further promoting our kids’ sense that they belong to this culture, we also made sure that they saw the most popular family movies at the theatre while they were still discussed. Getting the classical Walt Disney videotapes that we enjoyed watching with them helped to introduce another American “tradition”, the Friday pizza-movie-nights.

Since we decided to raise our children on this side of the Atlantic, I also had the obligation to adopt new skills, like how to bake cupcakes, how to “decorate” our house for Halloween, and cook the right dishes for Thanksgiving.

Did we embrace everything our children encountered in this country? No. We always dismissed expensive toys, and rejected all violent and horror movies.

And bending to this new civilization never meant to me that I had to give up making chicken paprikash on Sundays; nor did it mean that I had to stop singing my much loved Hungarian folk songs to the children; nor did it mean that I had to stop reading them the fairy tales I grew up with.

However, it was not always easy watching my children being “Americanized.” Witnessing their successful assimilation to the new world was gratifying and painful at times. After a few months, Danny stopped answering me in Hungarian. When it happened the first few times I swallowed my tears, and kept trying to talk in my native language. As they grew older I detected an uncomfortable tension when their friends came over. Right after the kids left, my beloved offspring repeated to me all the mistakes I had made while trying to be friendly with their classmates. Not being able to keep up with the pace hasn’t just been a generational issue for me. It has been a cultural one as well.