Tag #121053 - Interview #102138 (Sura Milstein )

The custom on Purim was to prepare sweets and various dishes, and guests would come over – family friends – in the evening, wearing disguises. The adults wore disguises, the children didn’t. The disguises were simple, modest, people only wore masks. The main thing was to have one’s face covered. Those wore good times, I believe it was in the 1930’s. When I was at my grandfathers’ place, I also saw musicians come over on Purim – they were gypsies who came and played music, and they were paid for it. They played traditional music, Jewish and Romanian. They even spoke Yiddish, they lived among Jews.

And there was a feast organized on Purim. Regular dishes were served, but there were also humantase [hamantashen] and honigleicheh. Honigleicheh is a flat bread with rose jam filling and walnut, it was sliced in little squares. The rose jam is made from rose petals, it has small scraggy leaves. Its color is pink to red, it smells a little of roses. Especially in the north of Moldavia, they still sell roses for making jam, mainly during spring. And people still prepare jam – the elderly housewives.