Not Live: Mariyana Spyropoulos (Ep. 15)

Today we are now live with Marianna Sporopoulos. Thanks so much for being here today. Thanks for having me, and thank you for saying my name correctly. Did I crush it? 10 out of 10, right? That was awesome. You cannot believe the different variations on my name throughout my whole life, so I'm grateful. Did you just spend your whole childhood just seeing substitute teachers panic when they got to your name? Yeah, they would say, Marianna, and then I'm not even going to try the last name. And I'm like, no, you've got to say it. I would help them, I'd coach them, find something that rhymes with it. So even on the campaign trail, Marianna Sporopoulos rhymes with metropolis. Everyone has their little saying, and that is such a good one. I'm sure you've said that a bazillion and one times. Absolutely. But it helped. Tell me a little bit more about growing up. My parents came over with, you know, the same immigrant story that so many people have had, you know, looking for opportunity, looking to provide for their families. So we came over. I was not born here. And my parents didn't have that much of an education. and didn't know, you know, English was not their first language. So a lot of challenges. But over time, you know, my dad was a hard worker, you know, sometimes worked seven days a week. His first job was pumping gas. And then he learned about cars and then started a part store, a part business, you know, auto part business and became successful at that. So, you know, I owe so much to my parents. You know, they sacrificed so much, leaving everything they knew and their families to come over to start, you know, anew. And so immigrant kids sometimes feel that extra responsibility to be a success in some ways, to sort of give back and say, you know, it was worth the sacrifice because we made it in whatever way, shape or form that means to people. How old were you when you came here? So I was eight months old. Okay. um but you always have a sense of uh you know your name is different your religion um i'm greek orthodox um you're you know the language that's spoken at home is different so and and sometimes as the kid and i'm sure a lot of people share this when english isn't the first language for your parents you as the child going to school here learning english you have to translate things you have to sort of help you know your parents through things that you might not if they knew english um a little better so it just makes you grow up faster um and maybe it makes you a little more protective of your parents because you're like you know they're depending on you in a way that um maybe they wouldn't have so you know it's it's my story um everyone's got their own story but i'm sure um other immigrant kids you know share that i think so many people hear greek and everybody thinks of the movie right my big fat greek wedding everybody loves that movie how accurate is that I think it's very accurate, which is why it was so successful. But I think, you know, I think there was conversation. I had heard that they wanted to make the movie about the Hispanic community in some way. But I think the success of the movie is because so many immigrant families can relate to that story. Right. You have like the lingo, the phrases that you say between family. The family is very close. You have the certain the food that, you know, you grew up um eating and you know everybody like italian families have that um spanish families you know Greek families certainly and you know I everything except maybe the Windex part um but I mean there was a lot you know there was a lot uh to that um and you know I've watched it a million times so I love that movie so from one to My Big Fat Greek Wedding where does your childhood fall maybe a seven that's such a great explanation though I've always been so drawn to the movie I think it's hilarious but I think that your explanation is spot on I mean I'm Italian on my dad's side but my mom was born in Cuba so I totally get the the immigrant kid thing I mean that's totally totally valid you think like it's unique to you but there's so many people that share that same experience what is your favorite scene from that movie I probably shouldn't say but when when they're telling where they're telling the American American boyfriend to say a certain phrase. I know people that have done that. And so it's just because of that, it was probably a little mean, of course, but I know a lot of people that have done that. What is your favorite Greek tradition? I think Easter is a really great Greek tradition in the Greek Orthodox community. On Saturday night before Easter, we go to a midnight mass where, you know, at the time when Christ has risen all the lights go down everyone has a candle in their hand and the um uh the flame is lit you know from person to person and then you have a church filled with individuals who are holding their candles that are lit and it's a very um you know it's very solemn experience um because that's the time when Christ has risen and we're all um you know praying um and it's a sense of community too sort of bringing everyone together it's always nice to look back at those memories you know from when you were a kid maybe traditions that you still carry on as an adult too yep i absolutely do um i married a greek american so we continue these traditions amazing after you learned so much from your dad i know that he has passed i am so sorry yeah thank you it sounds like you really was just such an inspiration in your life yeah i mean i was pretty lucky parents give up so much when they they leave another country everything they're familiar with to go take a chance. And, you know, he worked really hard because he was like, I think immigrants don't leave their country to fail. They leave to succeed. And he certainly did that. So I'm grateful. In what ways do you think his spirit maybe lives on through you? What qualities of his do you see in yourself? I definitely am a hard worker. So I think people are getting a good value with me as, you know, a public servant in Cook County. He definitely was, you know, about family and about hard work and i you know i definitely carry those through with me and i know you're also a proud auntie yeah are you the responsible aunt or the fun aunt or maybe a combo probably a combo um i am a godmother to two and an aunt to five um so you know they're now at the stage of having graduated or almost graduated college so they're getting a little older um you know one just got married um so they're all great kids and um they've all gotten their education and um you know they've turned out pretty well so i give full props to their parents having that relationship with them is just so so special it's so different than any other relationship right like you obviously care so much about them and you want to see the absolute best for them yes you can also have a lot of fun with them you know they're adults now so um you know we they can make up make their own decisions but the fact that they still want to hang out with us is you know it's a nice feeling at family parties i know that you guys have got to be eating pretty good talk to me about the food at some of these parties in easter greeks i think like mediterraneans um food is sort of a thing um it's hospitality it's about gathering it's community it's family it's bringing people together um and uh sharing a good meal is the way that you know that we do it and Certainly Greek food is, I'm a little biased, of course, so I love Greek food. Definitely having a lot of food is the way that a lot of Greek Americans celebrate. What is your favorite dish? And maybe explain it also if someone hasn't heard of it or if someone's not familiar. I've made this a couple of times. It's called pasticcio. It's a Greek version of lasagna. So, you know, you'll just have the noodles and the meat sauce and bechamel on the top and you'll cook it for an hour. It's sort of like a cozy, you know, comfort food, like a Greek comfort food. So I definitely like that. And it seems to be a crowd pleaser. So I try to make it if people ask for it. Mouth is watering already. Yep. Maybe next time I come, I'll bring it. You're invited whenever you want to come back. Thank you. Plenty of good Greek food in Chicago. You grew up on the South Side. You're a CPS kid. And then you came back to live in Chicago, too, and to go to school. I mean, law school, John Marshall, UIC, MBA from Loyola. I mean, it doesn't get much more Chicago than that. Definitely Chicago, for sure. What do you think going to school here helped you learn about Chicago? Why do you think you have maybe a different or a better appreciation for the city because of that? Well, I know that John Marshall, which is now UIC Law, has definitely graduated a lot of prosecutors, a lot of judges, a lot of defense attorneys, and who I see all over. so it makes it it you know adds that connection to a community to the legal community i know that those people are solid because it is oftentimes a school where people would go when they had to work as well as go to school so they're very committed and you have to work extra hard to be able to get through law school while you're working you have a high proportion of people who are working so So I know that those people are very committed to, you know, the legal profession. And what was your first job ever? Take me back to, like, middle school, high school, very, very first job. Baby sitter. Yeah, I think a lot of people did that, you know, because you could do that when you were, like, a little kid. Yeah, right, yes. And I probably wasn't great at the discipline part because I'd sort of let the kids do whatever they wanted until, you know, it was bedtime. Okay, now you got to go to bed. and um but no complaint i'm sure that's why they loved you hopefully yeah nothing's come back to haunt me so that's a good thing was this for family or was this for friends or other family the other kids on the block okay sure sure younger kids on the block um a few times you know i think you learn a lot though by being a babysitter right you learn leadership you learn how to take care of kids and responsibility yeah for sure for sure did you have siblings growing No. Okay. I'm an only child. So that has to be kind of fun for you then. It was kind of like having little siblings. Yes, it was. When did politics get into the picture here? So I have always been interested in politics. I know that, you know, sort of history and civics and government were always interesting topics for me. Other people were good at math, maybe, or English or science or something. But my thing were those, you know, history and civics and government. My dad was always interested in politics as well, you know, getting involved on a local level and in the Greek American community. I've always had that sort of sense of it being there. So then going to school, got a BA in politics and government. Then I always thought, well, you know, I want to put this into practical use. So I went to school in Washington, to DC and i uh interned um on capitol hill and some other think tanks and then came back to chicago went to law school um and you know i thought like why not run for office and try to see you know is this something that i'll be good at can i make a real contribution um and so you know it's worked out so far and now you are the clerk of the circuit court of cook county Tell me what you do all day. So before I became clerk, I was the commissioner at the Water Reclamation District, which is sort of an unknown agency that treats wastewater, manages stormwater, but has a really big impact on the environment, and especially with water issues right now. It should be playing a bigger and bigger role. And I was in various capacities there. I was the chairman of finance. I was on the pension board for 10 years. I was the president of the organization for four years. But I've been an attorney for over 30 years. And there was an opportunity to run for clerk. And I thought, you know, I can bring some real change to this office. It was an office that needed some of that professionalism of the office, organizing, technology. So I said, you know, let's give that a try. It worked out. And so there is no regular day. I do try to meet, I have an executive team. I try to meet with each member of that executive team, like the head of our technology department, our finance person, our legal department, HR, try to meet with them at least once a week, hear what some of the outstanding issues are. Then we all meet together so that people have a sense of what's going on in the office. I don't want someone to not know what the office is going through. I don't want them to read it in the paper. so we try to brief each other on what are some of the issues that we're facing and then there's a lot of requests outside the office to have meetings or talk to different groups about what we do. We develop a lot of programs like our Second Chance Summit which is an expungement summit that takes a lot of hours of organizing and putting together so we'll have meetings on that we put together also um a mental health summit which is uh convening a lot of experts in the mental health field we've done three of those so far um and so there would be a lot of meetings around that um and we just passed some recent legislation so we had a lot of meetings about that so there's a lot of meetings a lot of discussions a lot of emails you know as you can imagine i'm sure you deal with a lot of emails as well so i never thought there's just a constant you know, going back and forth, developing either legislation or new programs or responding to questions. We deal with multiple government agencies. So as you can imagine, for example, in our traffic division, we have to report everything to the Secretary of State's office. They're responsible for driver's licenses. They need to know if someone has been, had a second conviction for a DUI. We send that information to the Secretary of State, and then they take whatever action they need to do so this is a daily on a daily basis there's like thousands and thousands of cases that are are happening every single day um and that's just part of it i could go on and on sure oh i bet you could would little baby Mariana imagine that you are doing this today i don't know i don't know if i would think you know i'd be doing that for sure i probably didn't even know the you know the office existed um but uh you know there's a lot of, I think that we're making an impact. I think we're making a lot of change, a lot of good change. That's the feedback that we're getting. So I'm hoping that we're improving the office. That's the goal. When you were little and people would ask you that question, what would you say? What would your answer typically be? Probably like a dancer or something like, you know, something, you know, maybe a typical thing that kids say. But my dad was always saying, you know, you got to go to law school. And I was like, oh, dad, I don't want go to law school but he was right and so I did and here I am and it all worked out the rest is history what do you hope is next I mean what do you hope maybe comes after this you want to be in this job forever well I'm always open for opportunity you know to opportunities like I did before um from my previous job but I want to make sure that we deliver on the promises we said we're going to do a b and c making sure that we're implementing those we've got the right people in place. We have the processes in place. Um, so, you know, there was a lot of work to do. We still have some work to do. Um, so, you know, we'll see. You had mentioned your job with Chicago's Water and Sewer. Is there something that you learned from that job that you wish that you could unlearn? I mean, it did teach me. So this is the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District that treats wastewater, manages stormwater. It's a countywide agency. Um, and so we had to work with nine commissioners um and uh it there was 1800 staff so we had to you know work with a lot of different people which is always a good thing to learn um how to do because you you know you deal with people that are think differently than you you know some smarter than you so you know you want to be able to um uh utilize what's important um and you know maybe some of the processes in terms of how they treat wastewater maybe I could try to unlearn those yeah that's what I was thinking it's a really important important process to have it really contributes to the health of the community so but you know sometimes the things you see especially when you take a tour of a plant maybe you don't want to you know remember that I was going to ask you to dive into that but you know I think we'll skip that part we'll go to the next next question And your resume really is so impressive. I would love for you to go through some of the other jobs, titles, roles that you've had and tell me something that you wouldn't see on your resume in that job. Like, for example, I can say I worked at a different station in northern Michigan and in that job as a reporter, I got to skydive for a story. That was pretty neat, but you wouldn't see that on my resume. So I'd love some interesting stories from some of your other jobs. I did work in London for two years, and I worked for the research arm of an investment bank called Nomura. It's a Japanese-based bank, and they did research on Eastern European countries. And one of the things I got to do was, so investors would come in and try to see what companies or countries to invest in. They would want to see what are the industries. So, for example, the Czech Republic has beautiful crystal companies, which I didn't know at the time, but apparently they do. And one of the investors would want to get involved in that. So we'd have to go to the Czech Republic, do research on the company and the country itself to see if it was something that people would want to invest in. And so that was an interesting trip. I don't think I would have gone to the Czech Republic if I weren't involved in it. I love that. That was a good one. Interesting, yeah. What do you miss about living in London? It's very international. You know, every, where you go, you're going to meet people from different countries and, you know, different experiences. So I think that's, you know, adds a real vibrancy to the city. New York is similar in that way, but New York is much larger. But, you know, I miss that part of it. Have you gone back to visit since you've lived there? A few times, yeah. What is it like going back? You've got to make sure that you're looking both ways because they do drive on the other side of the street, so you want to make sure you're careful. Okay, talk to me about that adjustment. That has to be the wildest adjustment to make. I think they're very used to tourists coming over because on the road, they'll say look both ways or they'll say look this way so that people are not just, you know, because we have a tendency, we're just supposed to look a certain way, but they're the opposite, so you want to make sure that, you know, you're looking the right way. I can't even imagine having to drive on the side to take a trip. Yeah, seriously, seriously. Was it weird to adjust when you came back to the U.S., or did it just feel totally normal? That part felt normal, yeah. But the, you know, the international part, Chicago's changed a lot since then. This was a few years ago. This was before I went to law school. So Chicago has become more international, I think. But at the time, it wasn't. Nowadays, you spend a lot of time around judges, so I want to play a simpler game of guilty or not guilty. I just want to know if you have done some of the things that I'm going to ask you, okay? Whether you've done it or not. Have you left your shopping cart in the middle of the parking lot? Only in those cribs. Okay, so you've put it away. Yeah, yeah. Have you ever told your family and friends that you're five minutes away, but really you haven't even left yet? No. I usually stay, like, where I am. okay you're a good friend yeah i try i should swap you into my friend group because my friend group is over my nonsense but a lot of friends i have a lot of friends who do do that but i know exactly what they're doing so whatever you know that they just got out of the shower it's actually going to be another 20 minutes yeah taking your shoes off on an airplane have you done that i may have loosened the uh the laces um let's especially if they're sneakers but i don't think i've taken them off okay good yeah i feel like loosening the shoes is totally totally fine yeah taking them totally off that's crazy but on some international flights they'll give you like slippers sure sure a little bigger for that yes so i guess yes canceling plans for no other reason than you just have to stay home yeah i think so a few times yeah sometimes you just your energy is just not there and you're like you know i'm not gonna be you know this is not worth it yeah you're not feeling it at times you have to not do something if you know you need to reserve your energy it's hard to say no sometimes that's true that's true especially you know when you're campaigning you know you got to be everywhere but if you can i think it's a good idea just to lay low yeah when you are laying low what does that look like for you usually it's just hanging out um you know i used to have a dog um and you know just making a nice dinner and hanging out watching TV. Oh, making a nice dinner. What are we making? Oh, anything, you know, from when I say nice, I mean, like nutritious, you know, like you're going to have some fish and some vegetables, some rice, you know, nothing like, you know, very glamorous or anything. Are you a good cook? I'm a decent cook. People eat what I make. So I'll take it as a compliment. Yeah. Oh, what else do you like to make? Like what is your signature dish? Your dish that you know that you are not going to mess up i've baked bread um i have you know make a salmon um or a roasted chicken with potatoes you know just some of the go-to and that anything nothing fancy you said bread did you get into the whole sourdough situation okay no i'd like to i'd like to try that it looks interesting but you know the feeding of the the bread or the you know active cultures or something like that no i i didn't get into that but i did make some bread like banana bread or regular bread yeah please yeah the sourdough thing i mean that's like a part-time job yeah make sure you eat it if i want that responsibility but it does look interesting yeah those things are kind of feisty do you bake also or are you mostly just cooking i'll bake around christmas i'll do the christmas cookie thing um some friends and and uh get together and do like a cookie exchange thing we've been doing that for years so i'll try to contribute um so i do like to do it around them but not on a regular basis and are your friends mostly around the area still having grown up here and yeah i have a few that are um uh here in western suburbs um and a couple have moved out of of the city you know another state but most are around here how often do you get to see them not enough i would say uh you definitely need to you know make an effort to get together with friends and sometimes especially with campaigning i'm balancing family um with you know work um and taking care of my mom um so you know there's a lot of responsibilities but i definitely try to you know put the time into it to make sure that people know that i appreciate it yeah i'd love to hear more about your mom she's an artist um she had a couple strokes um a few years ago so she needs a little more help and uh i'm since i'm an only child i take care of her how nice to be able to spend that time with her though and really just be there for her it's tough for her because she was always uh you know an independent person and so it's hard uh you know when you can't do the things that you would normally have done um but i think it's important to take care of our parents if we can do that absolutely absolutely they've done like you said they've sacrificed so much for us and done so much for us the least that we can do for her yeah absolutely so if it's not hanging out with mom or cooking what else are you liking to do what other hobbies do you have exercising definitely need to do that um i like going to the gym um i like to do a variety of classes if i can you know anything from yoga um to a lot of cardio weight lifting um i think it's important to do that to just relieve stress um and it's you know you time where you can just listen to music or you know just work out i could not agree more with that I teach hot yoga and I always tell my students I say when you are on this mat this is all for you this is an hour or 45 minutes whatever that you can't do anything for anyone else you're not sending emails here you're not making lunches here right it's for you it's important and it's hard for us to detach from our phones because we're so you know I mean I find myself sometimes I have to purposely say okay put the phone away and just focus on what you're doing yeah it's too easy. It's like a magnet. My hand grabs my phone and then I'm on Instagram for three hours. But we manage our lives on our phone. So I think it's a natural thing. My last question for you before we get into some rapid fire, is there anything that you wish people knew about you? I've been an attorney for over 30 years and I have an MBA as well. And I could be, you know, probably making a lot more money in the private sector, but I'm doing this because I believe in public service. and you can see the offices that I'm running for are probably not the sexiest offices, but I think that they're offices that I've brought some real change to. So I hope that people know that I'm doing it for the right reason. All right, some rapid fire. I just want you to say the first thing that comes to your head, okay? What is the app that gets the most of your screen time? Probably Google, Google searches. Yeah, yeah. asking questions trying to find out more information about things, whether it's a recipe or history, or you know anything, what is one thing that's always in your purse, what is your most embarrassingly boring purchase that made you really happy, I mean I do have a um a bread maker, that's a good one what does that contraption look like? A big silver box with a lid, you just put the ingredients in there you get instant bread, would you rather have someone go through your phone or your credit card statement, probably my credit card statement and what is your favorite flower? Ranunculus, oh what do those look like? Huh, use Google, yes and search it, so they're they sort of look like an onion but they have very delicate like leaves and then they slowly open, it's you know that or peonies oh pretty, last question for you, yeah I would love for you to share some sunshine, I just do the news here, don't do weather, but I think that we can all share a little sunshine everywhere we go make the world a little bit better place, yeah so just it could be anything, maybe your favorite quote something you learned in a book, anything, don't burn any bridges the people that work for you may become your boss one day, you just never know, treat people with respect and dignity beautifully said, Ariana Sprackles, thank you so much for joining us on the live today, yeah you Bye.