We had Jewish, Russian and Ukrainian friends. We didn’t care about nationality. Unfortunately, our daughter’s condition didn’t allow us to meet with friends or invite them home often, but we celebrated Soviet holidays: 1 May, 7 November, Victory Day and the Soviet Army Day [21] and our children’s birthdays. I cooked and we had parties with guests. We danced and talked. On our daughters’ birthdays they invited their friends. Sometimes on weekends we went for walks with the family. My younger daughter loved these outings, though walking was hard for her. We wished we could take our daughter out of the town, but we didn’t have such opportunity. We didn’t have a car and we couldn’t generally afford it. Considering Galina’s condition we spent our vacations in Uzhhorod.
- Traditions 11756
- Language spoken 3019
- Identity 7808
- Description of town 2440
- Education, school 8506
- Economics 8772
- Work 11672
- Love & romance 4929
- Leisure/Social life 4159
- Antisemitism 4822
-
Major events (political and historical)
4256
- Armenian genocide 2
- Doctor's Plot (1953) 178
- Soviet invasion of Poland 31
- Siege of Leningrad 86
- The Six Day War 4
- Yom Kippur War 2
- Ataturk's death 5
- Balkan Wars (1912-1913) 35
- First Soviet-Finnish War 37
- Occupation of Czechoslovakia 1938 83
- Invasion of France 9
- Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact 65
- Varlik Vergisi (Wealth Tax) 36
- First World War (1914-1918) 216
- Spanish flu (1918-1920) 14
- Latvian War of Independence (1918-1920) 4
- The Great Depression (1929-1933) 20
- Hitler comes to power (1933) 127
- 151 Hospital 1
- Fire of Thessaloniki (1917) 9
- Greek Civil War (1946-49) 12
- Thessaloniki International Trade Fair 5
- Annexation of Bukovina to Romania (1918) 7
- Annexation of Northern Bukovina to the Soviet Union (1940) 19
- The German invasion of Poland (1939) 94
- Kishinev Pogrom (1903) 7
- Romanian Annexation of Bessarabia (1918) 25
- Returning of the Hungarian rule in Transylvania (1940-1944) 43
- Soviet Occupation of Bessarabia (1940) 59
- Second Vienna Dictate 27
- Estonian war of independence 3
- Warsaw Uprising 2
- Soviet occupation of the Balitc states (1940) 147
- Austrian Civil War (1934) 9
- Anschluss (1938) 71
- Collapse of Habsburg empire 3
- Dollfuß Regime 3
- Emigration to Vienna before WWII 36
- Kolkhoz 131
- KuK - Königlich und Kaiserlich 40
- Mineriade 1
- Post War Allied occupation 7
- Waldheim affair 5
- Trianon Peace Treaty 12
- NEP 56
- Russian Revolution 351
- Ukrainian Famine 199
- The Great Terror 283
- Perestroika 233
- 22nd June 1941 468
- Molotov's radio speech 115
- Victory Day 147
- Stalin's death 365
- Khrushchev's speech at 20th Congress 148
- KGB 62
- NKVD 153
- German occupation of Hungary (18-19 March 1944) 45
- Józef Pilsudski (until 1935) 33
- 1956 revolution 84
- Prague Spring (1968) 73
- 1989 change of regime 174
- Gomulka campaign (1968) 81
-
Holocaust
9685
- Holocaust (in general) 2789
- Concentration camp / Work camp 1235
- Mass shooting operations 337
- Ghetto 1183
- Death / extermination camp 647
- Deportation 1063
- Forced labor 791
- Flight 1410
- Hiding 594
- Resistance 121
- 1941 evacuations 866
- Novemberpogrom / Kristallnacht 34
- Eleftherias Square 10
- Kasztner group 1
- Pogrom in Iasi and the Death Train 21
- Sammelwohnungen 9
- Strohmann system 11
- Struma ship 17
- Life under occupation 803
- Yellow star house 72
- Protected house 15
- Arrow Cross ("nyilasok") 42
- Danube bank shots 6
- Kindertransport 26
- Schutzpass / false papers 95
- Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (1943) 24
- Warsaw Uprising (1944) 23
- Helpers 521
- Righteous Gentiles 269
- Returning home 1090
- Holocaust compensation 112
- Restitution 109
- Property (loss of property) 595
- Loss of loved ones 1724
- Trauma 1029
- Talking about what happened 1807
- Liberation 558
- Military 3322
- Politics 2640
-
Communism
4468
- Life in the Soviet Union/under Communism (in general) 2592
- Anti-communist resistance in general 63
- Nationalization under Communism 221
- Illegal communist movements 98
- Systematic demolitions under communism 45
- Communist holidays 311
- Sentiments about the communist rule 930
- Collectivization 94
- Experiences with state police 349
- Prison/Forced labor under communist/socialist rule 449
- Lack or violation of human and citizen rights 483
- Life after the change of the regime (1989) 493
- Israel / Palestine 2190
- Zionism 847
- Jewish Organizations 1200
Displaying 36361 - 36390 of 50826 results
Larisa Radomyselskaya
Neither my husband nor I were members of the Communist party. In his youth my husband was a Komsomol member and secretary of the Komsomol unit of his military unit, but when he overgrew his Komsomol age and was offered to join the Party Isaac refused. He believed it was a great responsibility and a big honor to be a communist and he didn’t deserve it as yet. It’s hard to say whether this had an impact on his career or it was his national origin, but he never got promotions when his time came and received higher ranks with big delays. I spent all my free time with Galina. Besides, nobody offered me to join the Party.
In 1926 my grandmother and grandfather and their youngest daughter emigrated to Palestine on religious motives. They left their other children here. My father was 22 years old and Sarra was a teenage girl. As far as I know none of the children had any contacts with their parents. I have no information about them.
My father’s younger sister Sarra graduated from the College of Journalism in Novosibirsk or Krasnoyarsk.
, Russia
My father and his brothers and sister were convinced communists. Of course, none of them was religious or observed Jewish traditions.
Her husband was a military doctor. He served in Chop [700 km from Kiev, 30 km from Uzhhorod] near Uzhhorod.
My friend Ada Trudler also got a job assignment to Uzhhorod. We became friends when we were first-year students. We went to work in Subcarpathian regional construction trust where we received a double room in a hostel.
I liked Uzhhorod very much: it was a quiet, beautiful and cozy town. It became part of the USSR after World War II. It belonged to Austria-Hungary before 1918, then Czechoslovakia and in 1938 it became apart of Hungary. Since I grew up and was brought up in the USSR I was amazed to hear Hungarian in the streets. Jews were not afraid of speaking Yiddish or demonstrate that they were Jews.
I and Ada met few local Jewish guys who began to take care of us. One of them was Wolf and the name of another was Misha. They introduced us to their friends and families. They invited us to celebration of Jewish holidays where they told us about Jewish history, traditions and customs. This was all new and amazing to me. For the first time in my life I identified myself as Jew. There were many Jewish employees in the construction trust where I was working. The local Jews were surprised that neither I nor Ada knew Yiddish or received at last elementary Jewish education.
The big synagogue didn’t operate by then. It housed the Philharmonic. There was a small synagogue in Mukachevskaya Street and prayer houses where men got together to pray.
At Pesach women made matzah. Later they began to supply matzah from Hungary.
At first we socialized with Jews only, but then we began to make other acquaintances. Many people moved to Uzhhorod from the USSR after World War II. I didn’t face any anti-Semitism in Uzhhorod at that time. I think it emerged a little later and that those that had moved from the USSR were its carriers for the most part.
We evacuated from Kharkov by the last train in September 1941. German troops were approaching Kharkov. There were three of us leaving: my father’s sister Sarra, I and my grandmother. We went by a train for cattle transportation. Our carriage was overcrowded. People slept on their suitcases and bags. We had little luggage and food with us. Our train was bombed almost every day on the first half of our trip. There was no water and toilets didn’t work. I remember that when the train stopped all passengers ran to the toilet at a railway station and then hurried to get some water. Sometimes we managed to get some food, but there was not enough to eat. Later hunger became our habitual condition.
We arrived in Sverdlovsk region [approximately 1,000 km from Moscow]. The train stopped at a small station. There was a woman who said that she could accommodate one family in her house. My grandmother was very weak at the time and we decided to get off. It was a district town. I don’t remember its name. We accommodated in the house of this woman. Her husband was at the front and she lived with her old mother and two daughters. They welcomed us and supported with whatever they could. They were poor, but they shared their clothing and food with us. They had a log house with two rooms. They gave one room to us. I remember that all residents of this town seemed different to me. All men and women were big, fair-haired and beautiful. There were many children in every family. There was a family with 18 children. I remember that children often gathered to listen to me telling them about life in a big city. They couldn’t imagine many-storied houses and trolleybuses and trams commuting in the town. I told them about our apartment and that there was a balcony in it. My stories were like a fairy tale for them.
Kharkov turbogenerator plant evacuated to this town and my aunt went to work in a shop there. It had nothing to do with her profession, but workers received almost three times more bread for their food coupons and this became a decisive factor. My grandmother and I had dependants’ coupons receiving 300 grams of bread per day while aunt Sarra received 1 kg of bread. This bread was baked with bran and sawdust and it was heavy. 300 grams made a 2 cm thick slice. We had to stand in lines for days to receive bread. My aunt returned home from work late at night and went to sleep immediately. She left early in the morning. My grandmother was our housekeeper. She knitted socks, mittens and sweaters for sale and her customers paid her with food that was much more valuable than money at the time. Of course, we never had enough food, but we didn’t starve either. From spring till late autumn my grandmother worked in a local kolkhoz [7]: pricking out, weeding and harvesting. After school I ran to the field to help her. They paid with agricultural products for work. I remember that I had a dream when in evacuation to have a whole crispy fresh loaf of bread just for myself.
I went to the first form of a local Russian school. About half of my classmates were children in evacuation. I don’t know whether there were Jews among them. At that time issues of this kind didn’t matter. There was no anti-Semitism. The local population sympathized with those who were in evacuation in their town. Local children used to bring a potato or a pie to give them to evacuated children. I studied well and had no problems at school. In the first form I became a Young Octobrist [8]. I became a leader of a ‘little star’: an Octobrist unit of 5 children. I remember that ‘little star’ group went to help one old lady whose only son was at the front. We fetched water from a well and washed the floors in her house.
At first we didn’t know about my father. In February 1942 we received his first letter and from then on we corresponded regularly. My father found us through a search bureau that had information about those in evacuation. I don’t know at which fronts my father was. All I know is his field post number.
In 1944, when we heard that Kharkov was liberated grandmother began to pack to go back home. She and I went home together. My father’s sister Sarra decided to stay in Sverdlovsk where she was working at the plant. Sarra was hoping to build up her personal life. So my aunt and I rifted apart.
I don’t remember our trip back home. All I remember is that the train was too slow while I was eager to get home as soon as possible.
I don’t remember our trip back home. All I remember is that the train was too slow while I was eager to get home as soon as possible.
My grandmother’s home was ruined by bombing, but the house where my parents’ apartment was there. My grandmother and I moved in there.
I remember 9 May 1945. In the morning our co-tenant came by to tell us that the war was over. My grandmother turned on the radio and we heard an announcement about complete capitulation of Germany and that the war came to an end. Strangers in the streets hugged and greeted each other. Many were crying. In the streets and squares people were dancing, and signing and there were fireworks in the evening. Everybody was happy hoping for a happy life in the future.
In late May 1945 my father returned home. The three of us shared one room.
My grandmother was very concerned that my father was single. She kept telling him that he needed to get married and that I needed a mother and that he was too young to be living alone. My grandmother introduced my father to her niece, her sister Sonia’s daughter Ghita. Ghita was my mother’s cousin. Her surname in marriage was Wainshtein. Ghita’s husband perished in Sevastopol on the first days of the war. Ghita’s son Edward was born in March 1941. Ghita was in evacuation in the Ural and from there she moved to Kharkov. My father and Ghita registered their marriage in a registry office and Ghita and her son came to live with us.
We didn’t observe any Jewish traditions or celebrate Jewish holidays. We, children, didn’t even know anything bout such. We celebrated Soviet holidays: 1 May, 7 November [commemorating the October Revolution Date] [9], Victory Day on 9 May [10]. We celebrated these holidays at home and at school.
My parents tried to avoid any mention of Jewish subjects or Israel. Now I understand that they were just frightened. Between 1948, campaign against cosmopolitans [11], and until Stalin died in 1953, Jews were arrested. Jews lost their jobs and there were continuous article in newspapers stating that Jewish cosmopolitans were enemies of the Soviet power. I think my father was afraid that they could somehow figure it out that his parents and a sister lived in Israel [it was dangerous to keep in touch with relatives abroad] [12]. We, children, thought that it was shameful to acknowledge our Jewish identity.
My grandmother worked as janitor at a military storage facility and occasionally we received short letters from her.
I studied at school hazardly and my teacher had many complaints about my studies. I couldn’t wait to become independent from my father and his wife. After finishing the 7th form I began to consider getting a profession. I didn’t want to think about finishing school and entering a college afterward since this option meant few more years of dependence on my father. There was a Construction College. I passed my exams successfully and entered the Faculty of Civilian Construction. There was anti-Semitism at that time and I was aware of it. Some of my friends told me that some of them got a refusal to admit their documents and some were plucked at an exam. However, I didn’t face anything like that. My co-students and teaches had a friendly attitude toward me.
When I was the first-year student I joined Komsomol [13] and I was very serious about it. I dedicated much time to Komsomol activities: I was an agitator and propagandist and participated in all Komsomol events.
There were few Jewish students in our group and there was unprejudiced attitude toward them. Even the Doctors’ Plot [14] that began in January 1953 did not impact these attitudes. I was a Soviet child raised in patriotic spirits and with strong belief that Stalin or Communist Party could not make mistakes. I believed that those doctors who wanted to poison Stalin were guilty.
When in March 1953 Stalin died it was a terrible shock for me. On the day of his death I stood in guard of honor by his monument with tears pouring down my cheeks. I couldn’t hold back my tears for several days. All people around were crying. They were not ashamed of their tears. I remember my stepbrother Edward sobbing on the sofa ‘Why him? I wish I had died rather than he’. We believed in Stalin, this was how we were raised. His death was a terrible tragedy for millions. All of them kept asking one question: how we were to live on?
A big shock for me was Khrushchev’s [15] speech on the 20th Party Congress [16], when he denounced the cult of Stalin and told about the crimes committed by Stalin’s regime. It was hard to believe what I heard, but I couldn’t help believing what the Communist party was saying. In general, I believed piously radio broadcasts and was convinced that radio could only tell the truth. Few years later I learned to live with the thought that my idol was a criminal.