Tag #122923 - Interview #101186 (Leizer Finchelstein)

I went to the cheder as a child. There were no kindergartens in those days. Many of us weren’t too glad to go to the cheder, the rabbis who taught there treated us very harshly at times. The children were kept in check with the help of a cancichi [Yiddish], a sort of a whip with several strips of leather, and if you skipped the cheder or weren’t paying attention during classes you were flogged rather hard. That’s why I didn’t enjoy going to the cheder.