# 12 questions to ask your grandparents about coming to this country

Who decided, what was carried, what the first year looked like, what got lost. The language question matters most. Ask each one "how did you meet?" separately first. Then together. The differences are the best part.

1. Where did your family come from before here, and who made the decision to leave?
2. What did they bring with them, and what did they have to leave behind?
   Objects carry whole chapters.
3. What language was spoken at home, and when did it stop?
4. What did the first winter, the first job, the first apartment look like?
5. What did people get wrong about where you came from?
6. Is there a place you still think of as home, even if you can never go back?
7. What was the journey itself like? How long, what did it smell like, who was sick, who was kind?
8. What was the first thing you bought here that felt like a luxury?
9. Who helped you in the first year, and did you ever get to thank them?
10. What did you change about yourself to fit in: your name, your clothes, your accent, your food?
   Every arrival is also a loss. Ask for both.
11. What did the people back home think you were doing here, and were they right?
12. Did you ever go back? What was the same and what was gone? (tender: ask once, late, in person)

## How to use these questions

Ask by voice, not by form. Record it. One or two questions a visit is enough; the follow-up ("who else was there?", "what did she say?", "what happened the day after?") matters more than the next question on the list. Tender questions are marked; ask them once, late, and with "or would you rather leave that?" in the question itself.

## About Tellforth

Tellforth asks questions like these by voice, remembers every answer, asks the next question a good listener would, and writes a finished book from what was said: a memoir in the person's own words, or a novel built on the true story. You own every recording. https://tellforth.com