At 14 I went to the dressmaking trade school. Trade schools were established in 1945. Students could complete their secondary education and get professional education. I got hot meals and a stipend of 75 rubles in this school. We also got food packages for weekends. I rented a room and I had to pay 100 rubles per month. I gave my landlady my stipend and sewed for her or her relatives for the remaining 25 rubles. Some of my schoolmates were girls from the country. They shared the food they got from home with me.
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Displaying 49111 - 49140 of 50826 results
Zinaida Minevich
I studied at the trade school to get a profession and in the evening school to complete my secondary education. I finished this evening school with a gold medal in 1951. In 1951 - 1952 I worked as a dressmaker in a shop in Kiev. In 1952 I tried to enter the Institute of Light Industry. This was the first time I faced anti-Semitism, although I didn’t quite understand what it was about. I didn’t have to take any exams, because I had a gold medal. They told me at the Institute that I failed to pass the competition of medallists. This was not true. All medallists were admitted without exams. I submitted my documents to the Institute of Food Industry and got the same response. There was an Institute of Silicates left where there was a shortage of students. I entered it in 1952. In 1953 this Institute became a Faculty of Kiev Polytechnic Institute. In this way I became a student of one of the most prestigious institutes in Kiev. Kiev Polytechnic Institute is still very prestigious.
I have one of the brightest memories of Seder diner at Pesach in this family in the middle 1950s. I was there and so was Isaac and his family and other relatives. Grandfather Matus sat ceremoniously at the head of the table. He said a prayer and we all drank some wine. It was a long ritual according to all rules. There was a big book on the table in front of my grandfather. He read an excerpt from it and we had to take a bite of greens or an onion or something else. Then they ceremoniously removed a beautiful cloth from the dish with matzah. Then we ate delicious dinner. I remember chicken broth with matzah and kosher chicken. Their daughter (my aunt Tsypa) bought chicken at the market and went to Podol7 where it was still possible to find a shoihet to slaughter the chicken. Matus and Riva would have rather refused from food than have something non-kosher. They kept kitchen utensils for meat and dairy products separately in their house. They had special dishes for Pesach. There was no bread in this house at Pesach. They checked and cleaned everything before Pesach.
Uncle Isaac had a great influence on me. He was so shocked by extermination of Jews in Kiev and other locations during Holocaust that he decided to dedicate his life to saving the memory and culture of these people. This occurred to him in one of his business trips to a small town near Kiev. He came into the yard of a local farmer (he wasn’t a Jew) and froze: the old man was sitting on the bench in the yard cutting tiny pieces from the scroll of Torah to upholster the inside of a big box with them. My uncle forgot all about why he came to this man and jumped on this man yelling at him “What are you doing?” He explained to the old man about the scroll and the man gave all pieces to my uncle. My uncle gave the Torah to the synagogue in Kiev and they buried it according to the tradition because it was damaged.
At that moment Isaac understood that it was his duty to find and buy such miraculously preserved pieces from people and save them in the memory of those who perished during the Holocaust. He began to collect pieces of Jewish art. When he saw a book of prayers or a Jewish picture that was sold at the market he asked the vendors where they got those. They usually replied “There was Jewish family living in our apartment before the war. They perished and this is what was left”. In many years my uncle collected many pictures, engravings, dishes, mezuzas, etc. He often went to small Ukrainian towns on business and brought many pieces from there. He kept and restored them. Every piece had a history of its own and my uncle remembered every single story. This became the essence of his life. His apartment was full of these pieces. He was writing a book. It was entitled ‘Collection” and contained description of many pieces from his collection.
At that moment Isaac understood that it was his duty to find and buy such miraculously preserved pieces from people and save them in the memory of those who perished during the Holocaust. He began to collect pieces of Jewish art. When he saw a book of prayers or a Jewish picture that was sold at the market he asked the vendors where they got those. They usually replied “There was Jewish family living in our apartment before the war. They perished and this is what was left”. In many years my uncle collected many pictures, engravings, dishes, mezuzas, etc. He often went to small Ukrainian towns on business and brought many pieces from there. He kept and restored them. Every piece had a history of its own and my uncle remembered every single story. This became the essence of his life. His apartment was full of these pieces. He was writing a book. It was entitled ‘Collection” and contained description of many pieces from his collection.
My aunt understood how dangerous it was to keep such collection at the height of anti-Semitism (my uncle started his collection in 1948 at the very height of anti-Semitic campaign), when a person could be arrested even if the authorities found a little book in Yiddish at home. She was afraid for her husband and children.
New In the middle of 1960s my uncle was summoned to the KB office several times. He understood that he might be arrested and he stopped to collect things openly. However, these calls had nothing to do with his collection. He was called to the KGB office because they had found his phone number in one of their suspects’ notebook. This suspect was charged for theft, but my uncle couldn’t even remember his name at first. However, he got frightened for his family. It was the time when collection of the Jewish cult pieces could lead to no good, because even for things of less importance people could vanish in Stalin’s camps and prisons.
Stalin’s death in 1953 was a holiday for this family.
I was far from policy at that time, but Stalin’s death was a big shock for me and I even cried a little. I had a friend. She was a Jewish girl named Greta. I often visited her at home in 1950s. They had many interesting books and many interesting people were coming to them. They spoke about Stalin, about Jews and their life and about Israel. Only then I came to understanding that many things we read in newspapers or heard on the radio were lies. I turned into a dissident in my heart.
I was far from policy at that time, but Stalin’s death was a big shock for me and I even cried a little. I had a friend. She was a Jewish girl named Greta. I often visited her at home in 1950s. They had many interesting books and many interesting people were coming to them. They spoke about Stalin, about Jews and their life and about Israel. Only then I came to understanding that many things we read in newspapers or heard on the radio were lies. I turned into a dissident in my heart.
I graduated the Institute in 1957. My profession was Mechanical engineer. I got a job assignment at the brick factory in Daugeliay, Lithuania. I worked there for a year.
I lived with my mother all this time and worked at the Giprochlor design institute as a mechanical engineer. It was very difficult for a Jew to find a job in Kiev at that time. I was lucky. When I came to this institute looking for a job it was an affiliate of a big Russian institute in Dzerzhynsk near Gorky. Its management wasn’t anti-Semitic and didn’t report to the Ukrainian Communist Party district committee. Ukrainian party committees were watching the percentage of Jewish employees not to exceed 5 % very strictly. And the management of this institute was interested in qualified employees. They employed many Jews that couldn’t find a job anywhere else. I remember very well how the human resources manager in Kiev processing my employment documents on the basis of an order from Dzerzhynsk murmured wickedly “Uh, this Haimovich team” (Haimovich was a popular Jewish last name; it was used as curse).
In 1963 I married Vitaliy Polisskiy, a Jew. We met when we were students at the Institute. He had graduated from the Polytechnic Institute few years before me.
We read a lot, including underground publications of Bulgakov8 and Solzhenitsyn9 that were forbidden by the Soviet censorship. We were interested in all world news. We listened to Western radios to hear the truth about Israel, trying to understand the real situation there. We often had gatherings with friends at home. We celebrated birthdays and Soviet holidays. We were discussing the latest news and shared our impressions about the books we read. We liked New Year celebrations. On the Soviet holidays we got together with friends to go out of town or just stayed at home. My husband or I had never been members of the Communist Party. We went to parades, because it was mandatory to go there. One might have problems for missing a demonstration (a reprimand at work or even dismissal).
My grandmother hated the Soviet power. She used to say “How dare they kill people only because they are rich. Poor people are poor because they are lazy”.
In 1964 our son Anton was born. We were far from religion and didn’t observe any Jewish traditions. Our son wasn’t raised Jewish.
Revekka Mexina
Their family was quite wealthy. My grandfather owned a small store. It was the store where they were selling both food and clothing. My grandfather often went on trips to purchase goods and during his absence my grandmother worked at the store. And during such periods they had a housemaid coming – a local Jewish girl. When my grandfather was back at home, my grandmother managed without a housemaid. They lived in a big wooden house, as my father recalled. One half of it was where they lived. There were 4 rooms: a bedroom and two children’s rooms for girls and boys. There was also a big dining room where the family got together in the evenings. My father didn’t remember the furnishing, but he remembered a huge cupboard with carving. Besides everything else my grandmother used to keep jars with jam and candy in this cupboard – that was probably why my father remembered it so well. In the 2nd half of the house there was the store. It was open from early morning till late at night. It often happened so that there was a late customer knocking at the door when the family was about to go to bed and my grandfather went to open the store to sell goods to a night visitor. We didn’t have a kitchen garden, but there was a big orchard behind the house and a flower garden in front of the house. It was the responsibility of my grandmother to look after them and she didn’t let her housemaid or her daughters to look after it.
Their family was religious and they celebrated Jewish traditions in the house. On Saturday parents went to the synagogue. Their sons also started going there when they grew older. All of the boys studied in the cheder. The girls got their education at home. They spoke Yiddish in the family, but the children knew Russian, too.
My grandmother used to wear a wig when she was young. I knew her when she was an old woman. She lived in our family for some time. At that time she used to wear a dark shawl on her head.
They strictly followed the kashruth in the family. My grandmother used to light candles for Sabbath. She made Saturday meals on Friday. They went to bed early when it was getting dark. My grandmother never turned on the light. In winter when they had to heat the house their Ukrainian neighbor came to make a fire and put some wood in the stove. The family celebrated all Jewish holidays. That’s all my father told me about it.
My grandmother used to wear a wig when she was young. I knew her when she was an old woman. She lived in our family for some time. At that time she used to wear a dark shawl on her head.
They strictly followed the kashruth in the family. My grandmother used to light candles for Sabbath. She made Saturday meals on Friday. They went to bed early when it was getting dark. My grandmother never turned on the light. In winter when they had to heat the house their Ukrainian neighbor came to make a fire and put some wood in the stove. The family celebrated all Jewish holidays. That’s all my father told me about it.
When the war began Elena’s husband was recruited to the front. Doba was trying to convince Eva to evacuate, but she refused. She was waiting for Elena to come and evacuate together. Elena perished in the first days of the war in Byelorussia and Eva perished in October 1941 during the German occupation of Kharkov.
In 1940 he was arrested2, accused of espionage for Germany and sent to a camp in Siberia where he spent 10 years. His friends and the party leadership of Kharkov region petitioned for him. Lyova was released in 1950, but he didn’t have a permission to live in Kharkov. He lived in Byelorussia and worked as a foreman at a construction site. Lev was rehabilitated after Stalin died in 1953. He died shortly afterward in 1956.
In the 1920s, pogroms began3. There were few pogroms in Novo-Ukrainka as well, but they didn’t touch our family. We had a deep cellar in our house where we were hiding during pogroms. When another gang attacked our village my parents, my father’s bother Lyova and we, children, hid in the cellar. Abram sent his wife, their 3 sons and a daughter to their acquaintances, a Russian family, and was going to join them later with their two sons. They wanted to lock the house and take their valuables with them. Their neighbor from across the street (he was director of the grammar school) offered them shelter in his house. I don’t know whether he betrayed them or they were just found, but Abram and his two sons were killed. His wife and three sons (Yan, Syoma and Lyova) that were hiding in the house of their acquaintances survived.
My grandfather was a housekeeper for Count Bobrinsky. He lied in the village of Tsvetnoye, Cherkassy province. My mother never told me about their house. She had hard memories about it – her mother and two brothers were killed there during a pogrom. My grandfather had to travel a lot. Railway employees used to joke that ‘Balahosky had business wherever the trains went”. This was true. Although my grandfather lived at the count’s estate, his family led a traditional Jewish way of life. They strictly observed Jewish traditions, celebrated Sabbath and Jewish holidays. My grandfather wore common clothes and a hat outside, but at home he put on his kippah. He had a beautiful, well cared for beard.
My grandfather proposed to her the moment he saw her although his surrounding was against his marrying a beggar. This happened in 1882 when my grandmother Feiga was 17 years old. Her parents gave their consent to this marriage. They had a traditional Jewish wedding with the huppah and kleizmers.
I don’t know what kind of education my grandfather received or where he studied but he was a very educated man. He knew German and French and was good at bookkeeping.
Theirs was a wealthy family. Besides the housemaids that were helping my grandmother around the house they had nannies to look after the children and a governess when the children grew older. My mother told me that at Pesach my grandmother cooked all festive food by herself. When her daughters grew older they began to help her with the cooking. There was a synagogue in Tsvetnoye. There were not many Jews living there, but they had a good choral synagogue. My grandmother and grandfather went to the synagogue every day. Their children went with them when they grew up a little. When the boys reached 13 they had Barmitsva and the girls had Batmitsva. All of their children got religious education. My mother could read and write in Yiddish and Hebrew and knew prayers by heart even at her old age.
My grandfather understood how important it was to give education to the children. His children had teachers at home. At 9 the children were sent to the grammar school in Cherkassy. Tsvetnoye was relatively close to Cherkassy – in about 20 kilometers and the children went to Cherkassy by an open cart. All of their children finished 8 years of grammar school. My mother finished grammar school in 1902. After finishing grammar school the boys continued their studies at the university.
In 1904 my parents Mendel Mexin and Hana Balahovskaya got married. They were introduced to one another – there were special matchmakers that had files of all young people of the marrying age. They had a traditional Jewish holiday with the huppah and there was a rabbi present. After their wedding my mother moved to Novo-Ukrainka. They rented half a house. My father worked for a timber dealer and my mother was a housewife.
My parents were renting an apartment in Kirovograd. We had 3 rooms: a nursery, my parents’ room and uncle Lyova’s room. In some time my parents found out that there was a house on sale not far from where we lived and decided to buy it sharing the price with uncle Lyova. I remember this house well. It was a two-storied house in the center of the town in Bolotin street. There was a mezuza hanging at the entrance to the house. There were 3 rooms on each floor, a big kitchen, bathroom and a toilet. My sister and I had a nursery, my parents had a room and my brother Israil had a room, too. Uncle Lyova lived on the 2nd floor. My grandmother Tumer came to live with us from Novo Ukrainka in 1918. She lived in uncle Lyova’s apartment until she died in 1933.
Our parents talked to us in Yiddish and Russian and only Yiddish – to uncle Lyova. Therefore, I spoke two languages fluently since my infantry. My sister and I could only speak Yiddish, but my brother learned to write in it in the cheder. My Yiddish is still fluent.
As far as I can remember, the revolution of 1917 didn’t have significant impact on our routinely life. My father had the same job and my mother was busy with the housework and looking after the children. I don’t remember what my parents thought about the revolution because I was only 4 years old. But according to my later memories they were not very enthusiastic about it. Perhaps, their attitude would have been different, if we had been a poor family. My parents didn’t express their opinions openly in our childhood. It was late that they discussed things with us.
After the revolution pogroms still took place. Besides various gangs, the white guard armies – like Denikin army4 took part in them. In 1918 the Ataman Grigoriev gang attacked Tsvetnoye where my mother’s family lived. On this day my grandfather and his older son Nuhim went to Elisavetgrad on business. My grandmother Feiga and her two sons Solomon and Moisey were at home. Moisey was a student and came home on vacation. All three of them were killed during the pogrom. After my grandfather and Nuhim came back home they found their corpses cut with sables. My grandfather buried his wife and sons and moved to Kirovograd.
After the revolution pogroms still took place. Besides various gangs, the white guard armies – like Denikin army4 took part in them. In 1918 the Ataman Grigoriev gang attacked Tsvetnoye where my mother’s family lived. On this day my grandfather and his older son Nuhim went to Elisavetgrad on business. My grandmother Feiga and her two sons Solomon and Moisey were at home. Moisey was a student and came home on vacation. All three of them were killed during the pogrom. After my grandfather and Nuhim came back home they found their corpses cut with sables. My grandfather buried his wife and sons and moved to Kirovograd.
Our family was a traditional Jewish family. After we moved to Elisavetgrad my parents continued attending the synagogue every week. I remember my mother reading her prayer books. My brother also went to the synagogue with our parents, and my sister and I were just waiting for them in the yard of the synagogue. I don’t know why my parents didn’t allow me to go inside. They said I was too young and might not behave myself. On holidays, especially at Yom-Kipur we went to the synagogue to meet our parents to go home together for a festive dinner after the traditional fasting. There were two synagogues in the next street: one big and choral synagogue and smaller one just in a couple of blocks from the big one. Later, in 1925, the authorities took away the choral synagogue to house the club of metallurgical workers, but the smaller synagogue remained as it was.
My father had a tfillin and thales. My brother had a Barmitsva when he reached the age of 13. The only deviation from the traditions that my mother and father afforded themselves was the way they dressed. They were wearing ordinary clothing. My mother was very pretty when she was young and she loved light fancy dresses. She didn’t wear a wig or a shawl. She had long fair hair and she was making intricate hairdos. My mother wore a shawl only to go to the synagogue.
Our family was a wealthy one. Even though my mother didn’t work we had a housemaid to cook, go shopping and clean the apartment. My mother spent a lot of time with us, children. She read children’s books and the Bible to us in Yiddish. She also studied French. However, at Pesach Mother always cooked our meals. We celebrated all holidays at home. My mother kept special dishes for Pesach in a basket on the attic. If we were to have many guests, my mother koshered dishes additionally. My mother cooked stuffed fish, chicken broth, chicken neck stuffed with liver, made strudel and sponge cakes from the matsa flour. We always bought two or three bags of matsa at Pesach. We didn’t have any bread at home on these days. I remember looking for breadcrumbs on the eve of Pesach. Late I got to know that it was a ritual before Pesach. Mama was an older sister in her family and her brother Nuhim and his family used to visit us before Pesach. Uncle Lyova also always joined us. Uncle Lyova was the oldest of the men and he read the prayer.
The memory of Pesach is the brightest memory that I have about holidays.
The memory of Pesach is the brightest memory that I have about holidays.