Our neighbor sang fairly well: she appeared in concert halls with Jewish songs. I also sang delightfully, therefore she started teaching me to sing Jewish songs. And I knew the language, because I lived in a Jewish city.
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Displaying 33451 - 33480 of 50826 results
Emma Balonova
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In spite of the fact that Daddy was a Communist Party worker, we lived in a communal apartment. At that time party workers had no privileges in compare with benefits which appeared later on. We lived in a four-room apartment: 2 rooms were occupied by us, 2 rooms - by our neighbor.
Our rooms were very large; we also had a vast balcony. The apartment was very good. There was central heating, but we heated our bathroom with firewood. I remember Daddy chopping firewood. It is interesting that in our apartment there was a big Russian stove [5]. Mum always made very tasty pies, because Russian stove was very good for baking.
Our rooms were very large; we also had a vast balcony. The apartment was very good. There was central heating, but we heated our bathroom with firewood. I remember Daddy chopping firewood. It is interesting that in our apartment there was a big Russian stove [5]. Mum always made very tasty pies, because Russian stove was very good for baking.
My elder sister was a very active member of the Komsomol organization [3]. At the Officers’ House there was a local Komsomol organization.
Its members arranged different recreational events: dancing, choral singing, theater performances. Sometimes my sister took me there, and I enjoyed it very much. In summer my elder sister used to work in pioneer camps as a pioneer leader.
[Pioneer camps were out-of-town establishments for children - members of the Pioneer Organization [4].]
She always took me with her. But mum never allowed my younger sister to go with us, because her health was very poor: at the slightest provocation she immediately fell sick.
Its members arranged different recreational events: dancing, choral singing, theater performances. Sometimes my sister took me there, and I enjoyed it very much. In summer my elder sister used to work in pioneer camps as a pioneer leader.
[Pioneer camps were out-of-town establishments for children - members of the Pioneer Organization [4].]
She always took me with her. But mum never allowed my younger sister to go with us, because her health was very poor: at the slightest provocation she immediately fell sick.
Well, in 1927 two Italian communists Sacco and Vanzetti were executed because they were communists and were in touch with the Soviet government.
[Nikola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, Italians by birth were workers and revolutionaries in the USA. In 1920 they were charged in murder, brought in a verdict of guilty and sentenced to death penalty.]
In Minsk there took place a great manifestation of protest against that execution. I remember the large square in the central district of Minsk. It was overcrowded with people carrying banners and slogans. Leaders of the city mounted the rostrum, and my father was among them. He even made a speech. And he took me (what a mercy!) with him to the rostrum. It was impossible to be forgotten!
[Nikola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, Italians by birth were workers and revolutionaries in the USA. In 1920 they were charged in murder, brought in a verdict of guilty and sentenced to death penalty.]
In Minsk there took place a great manifestation of protest against that execution. I remember the large square in the central district of Minsk. It was overcrowded with people carrying banners and slogans. Leaders of the city mounted the rostrum, and my father was among them. He even made a speech. And he took me (what a mercy!) with him to the rostrum. It was impossible to be forgotten!
In Minsk I went to school, and studied there 5 years. We studied Belarusian language and loved that subject very much. As a result, we spoke it very well, we could read and write in Belarusian language. We were also interested in Belarus literature and knew many poems by heart.
I can’t recall very well our apartment in Minsk. For some reason now I can hardly recall our family life. I guess we rented a small house. Our neighbors were Belarusian families. We all lived in peace and friendship despite different nationalities. I do not remember anybody coming to oblige. Otherwise Mum would have not sent me to the kindergarten. I liked my kindergarten.
My father joined the Russian Social Democratic Worker’s Party of bolsheviks in 1919 and soon became a professional Party worker. [The Russian Social Democratic Worker’s Party (of bolsheviks) appeared in 1917. In March 1918 it was renamed the Russian Communist Party, in 1925 renamed All-Union Communist Party, and in 1952 - Communist Party of the Soviet Union.] He worked there almost all his life long, only in his later years he became a director of the Evening Pedagogical Institute in Gomel.
In Minsk he worked as the first secretary of MOPR [2].
In Minsk he worked as the first secretary of MOPR [2].
When he was a child, he used to sing at the synagogue because he had got a good voice, but when he grew up, at the age of 19, he broke with religion and became a communist. He always told me and my sisters that there was no God. And it went without saying that our family members could arrange no bar mitzvah for newborn boys.
Having got married, my parents lodged in a small town in Belarus (I’ve forgotten its name). Soon they moved to Minsk. And I was born on April 17, 1920 in Vitebsk. Mum did not want to give birth in Minsk, because she was afraid that father would not allow arranging bar mitzvah for the newborn boy (she was sure a boy would be born). But it was me who was born, and our family remained in peace: I already told you that my father was an atheist.
My father served in the tsarist army. I know no details about his service, but once father's photo in his uniform stroke my eye. He told me that he took that photograph before leaving for the army. By the way, during his service in the army father had been ill with typhus and lost his hair. Since then he had to cut his hair close to the skin. People thought that he did it in conformity with the latest revolutionary fashion of those years.
You may consider their marriage to be a shotgun one, but they lived in harmony all life long. I guess they got married in Belarus. I do not know exactly, but Mum and Daddy left for Belarus as a groom and a bride. I guess my parents did not marry in the synagogue: by that time Daddy already was a bellicose atheist.
Riga was a big European city. There lived very rich families, most of them were German. Many girls, including mother’s sisters, worked for rich German families making clothes for all family members. My mother-in-law and her sisters did the same when they were young. They also lived in Riga.
I married the son of my mother’s brother, i.e. my mother's nephew or my cousin.
My daddy left home when he was very young, and began to earn his living. He was not educated: finished only cheder, but he was a person of capacity. He had very good memory, and he was gifted in general. He coached pupils from rich families, helped them to get prepared for school, and then to span gaps in their knowledge.
His name was Mendel Kalmyk. He was born in 1897 in Vilno region. He died in Gorky in 1943 in evacuation.
His name was Mendel Kalmyk. He was born in 1897 in Vilno region. He died in Gorky in 1943 in evacuation.
He had payes and a long beard. And he never was bare-headed. His name was Israel Kalmyk.
Family of my paternal grandfather was very religious. My grandfather held a post in the synagogue. I do not know how it was called, but I know that he assisted rabbi.
Parents paid for their children’s studies, but only those parents who were able to do it. The total sum was beggarly, because all Jews there were poor. But my father’s father and grandfather had no other profession. Well, and my great-grandmother kept their house.
According to father, they lived very poorly, almost in abject poverty. If my memory does not fail me, my father’s father and grandfather taught Jewish children in cheder.
Minna Birman
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My daughter Yekaterina finished school in 1964. She tried to enter the Chemical Faculty of Odessa University four times and only the fifth time she was successful. She is sure that these failures at the exams were not incidental. Yekaterina managed to enter an evening department. She never got married.
However, the state level anti-Semitism became stronger during Khrushchev rule. My husband and I did face it. He left his job and it took him a month of searching before he managed to get another job. Nobody was employing him! The human resource manager of one Odessa plant, who formerly worked in a labor camp employed him and his director asked him ‘How come you you’ve employed a Jew?’ and he replied ‘I had a vacancy of an engineer and he is an experienced engineer! I didn’t look at his passport, I don’t care about his nationality! There were Jews and Ukrainians in my camp and they were all equal!’ Later somebody told my husband this story.
In 1953 in Kaspiysk we got to know about Stalin’s death. The only thought I had had about Stalin was “Let him die!’ I lived with a constant oppressive feeling as if the sky was on my head. When Stalin died I felt as if this sky lifted up. I felt so happy! However, my husband cried. He easily subdued to influences.
Thus, I heard some Uzbek talking about ‘zhydy’ [abusive word for a Jew] behind my back on a bus. I turned to them and said that in that case they were ‘sarty’, abusive for Uzbek people. They were about to beat me.
I faced anti-Semitism for the first time in my life during this trip. I was sitting on a platform at the railway station in Kropotkino when a train from Caucasus arrived. Some recruits came onto the platform. They asked me: ‘What’s the news?’ I began to tell them about the situation when one of them asked all of a sudden: ‘What’s your nationality?’ I said: ‘I am a Jew’ and he said: ‘Can’t you hear that she burrs her ‘r’?’ I felt like doused with boiling water. Nobody ever said anything like that to me. At that moment a young man, a Russian blond with blue eyes, came up to me and said: ‘Don’t listen to this idiot. He cannot talk himself. Don’t be afraid. We shall beat Germans and you will go back home. All the best to you!’ and he shook my hand. I shall never forget this.
When I came home I told my mother that we had to leave immediately. My mother made jute sacks for each of us to be able to walk with our luggage. My father couldn’t leave the town due to his orders. While we were waiting for him we found out that Germans had come to Nikolaev and Odessa was in encirclement and there was the only way out by sea. My mother’s acquaintance from the Party town committee gave us boat boarding tickets to Novorossiysk [700 km to Odessa by sea].
The first serious bombing was on 22 July. German planes were combing streets on a low level flight. I was going along Grecheskaya Street to my friend when I heard explosions and jumped into an entrance of a house. There were trams #23 moving along Grecheskaya Street. Streetcars rushed up and down the street at full speed so that sparks were falling from wires. Passers by told each other that many young men and women perished in Primorski Boulevard. I ran home to make sure that my family was all right. On my way home I saw Pushkin’s house [A.S. Pushkin museum] on fire. There was nobody home. My parents were at work.
My father was arrested in 1938. He was accused of wishing to assist Hitler and Japan to attack the Soviet Union. What else could they accuse him of? Shortly before arrest our janitor Gidulian told my father that he knew very well who was the next to be arrested. Before arresting a person NKVD [18] officers visit a janitor under pretense that they intend to check a housing roster, but actually they ask questions about the tenant that interests them. The janitor said that they’ve come to see him and asked about our neighbor Rhubel, director of a recreation center in Kholodnaya Balka town, but this Rhubel was away from home. The janitor respected my father and advised him to leave home as well, but my father ignored it: ‘Where can I go? We don’t have money to travel!’ By that time he was fired from work. However, we moved to the dacha where he was arrested on 8 June 1938. Young NKVD officers came to arrest him.
Beginning from middle 1937 [Great Terror] [15] many of my classmates’ relatives were arrested. There were children of 12 nationalities in my class. Galia Panaioti, a Greek girl, had her mother and father arrested in 1936. Luba Turchenko, a Ukrainian girl, her mother was arrested. Her mother was chief of political department of Chernomorsk shipyard. Ania Gavrilchenko, Ukrainian – her uncle was arrested. Galka Dyomina, Russian, her father was arrested. Our Ukrainian teacher Polikarp Lvovich disappeared. Later he returned and continued teaching. He never mentioned what happened to him.
My mother didn’t do any housework. She couldn’t cook. Our housemaid did the cooking and served meals to us. Our first housemaid Emma was German. She came from a family of dispossessed German colonists [7]. Then we had housemaid Fenia. She was also German. Our neighbors used to say to my mother: ‘You pay your housemaid everything you earn’. My mother replied that she preferred to go to work and feel an active member of the community.
, Ukraine
For some reason my parents sent me to Ukrainian school #4 on the corner of Troitskaya and Preobrazhenskaya Streets. I was a miserable pupil since I didn’t know Ukrainian. My Ukrainian teacher used to say ‘Is this a girl? This is a boy and isn’t he a bad one!’ considering my short haircut and bad marks. Once my teacher told me to tell my mother to come to school for a talk. My mother was so busy that I decided to tell her nothing. Instead, I stopped going to school. I left home in the morning and went to walk along Alexandrovski Prospect where I played with cobbles. Then I went to Troitskaya Street and waited until schoolchildren began to leave school and I went home. This lasted for a month and a half.
My father was appointed chairman of the party committee at the shoe factory. Holding this position he took over the Brodskiy synagogue [Editor’s note: one of the biggest and most beautiful synagogues in Odessa. Its origin goes back to the arrival of Jewish migrants from Germany and Halitsia in the early 1820s in Odessa. They were called ‘Brodskiy’ Jews after the name of Brody town. The synagogue was open in 1940. This was the first choral synagogue in Russia. Construction of the building of the synagogue started in 1863 under supervision of architect F.Kolovich. It was funded by contributions. Since 1925 the Brodskiy synagogue housed Odessa regional archive] to make a factory club in it.