International House Berkeley

42 things. When I was a widow, and the youngest was one-year old, every Sunday Miss Carneiro used to come – she didn't drive a car, but Miss Markley, she was in the Library School, she used to drive the car. And every Sunday, they used to come and pick up the children and take the children to Durant where they lived, and they said, "You take the day off." So Sundays, I used to take the day off. I used to go to I-House, the coffee house, and meet Lottie. What else did people do for fun at I-House? Every Friday there was folk dancing. And Sunday suppers. And we had language tables. Did people sit according to their country? Yes and no. People would mix up. There were a lot of people who had served in the Army. And then there were a lot of Jewish people, like Lottie from Czechoslovakia. And Marlene Dietrich from Germany, actually from Prussia – no, not the actress. Were there any political tensions between people? Sure. Jews and Arabs were always fighting, and then sitting at the table together. And at the time, women were not allowed in Law School, and when the first women were permitted, there was a big celebration. Then, we were there when Israel was accepted, and when Truman signed. And Mrs. Gandhi had been at I-House, and Mr. Truman and Mr. Adlai Stevenson had been at I-House. They visited. Benazir Bhutto's father lived in I-House. And he lived in I-House at the time I lived there. Would I say that I-House influenced the path that I took? I think so. I come from a very small country. We had been occupied by Russians, and all kinds of things like that. For many, many years, Lithuania was a very big country, because Lithuania included a lot of Russia. So when Lithuania became an independent country, our President told us we had to learn about all the religions that were in the country. We had to take exams to graduate from high school in religions, because it is said, "If you learned about something, knew about something, you respected it. And if you didn't, you suspected it." And so I came already prepared to accept anything. When I met all the different people, I didn't feel they were different. I was just trying to learn more. Taken from interviews by Jeanine Castello-Lin and Tonya Staros in April of 2010.

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