Tag #119024 - Interview #100488 (Leya Yatsovskaya )

Shleime, Malka’s husband, was actually the head of our family. My father wasn’t a decision-maker but he said that there was a construction site of a paper plant, evacuated from Leningrad [today Russia], not far from us, and there were openings for workers’ positions. We decided to move to that construction site. In fact, we got jobs there. I worked as an accountant in the office of the plant. There was a small village not far from the construction site. It was the exile area for political convicts from tsarist times. We settled in one of the houses. The hostess, a tall and tacit woman, treated us well. Though, when we got our wages and decided to buy a jar of nanny-goat milk from her, as she had a couple of nanny-goats, she preliminary poured water there. My father could immediately tell that the milk was diluted. She didn’t sympathize with us maybe because we were Jews, or mere strangers, urban pampered people. The first winter was hard for us. We hadn’t taken any warm clothes with us and had hardly anything to wear. We were suffering from hunger and cold and our optimism helped us get over it.