Smile!

travel 1 Minute

The line for the passport control in ORD was the worst I ever stand in – I am not even going to estimate how long it was, but I was walking and walking, and still couldn’t find it’s end! To give the authorities a credit – they quickly put additional officerss to work, so it took me about 1 hour 15 min to reach the passport control (otherwise, it would be at least twice longer).

The office took my passport and asked: how are you doing? I replied as optimistically as I could: fine, I made it! It was clear, however, that nobody in felt happy after more than an hour wait. He lifted up the camera: let me take your picture! I looked into the camera, trying not to look super exhausted as I usually do on these entry photos. He said: smile! And since I kept staring into the camera, he repeated: smile! On the third time, I realized, that he actually wanted me to smile, and I smiled, first just a little bit, and then broadly, and heard ihis reaction: “Here we go! Good girl!”

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Published by Hettie D.

My name is Henrietta (Hettie) Dombrovskaya. I was born in Saint-Petersburg, Russian (actually, back then – Leningrad, USSR) in 1963, and immigrated to the United States in 1996. I love Saint Petersburg, the city I was born and raised in, and I think it’s one of the most beautiful places in the world. Similarly (but differently) I love Chicago, and can’t imagine myself moving somewhere else in the observable future. I have three children, Igor, Vlad and Anna, all adults living on their own, and one (so far) granddaughter Nadia. I also believe that my children are the best thing that happened in my life. As for my professional life, I am working in the field of Information Technologies. When I was twenty, I’ve declared that the databases are the coolest thing invented and that I want to do them for the rest of my life. Thirty plus years later, I still believe it’s true, and still, believe that the databases are the best. These two statements together imply that I think a person can have it all, and indeed, I think so! Keep reading my journals to find out how I did it.

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