Tag #134170 - Interview #78178 (jemma grinberg)

In 1937 I went to school. My sister was in the 3rd grade at this same school. There were Jewish children as well as children of other nationalities in my class. I remember my first teacher. She was a very nice Russian woman named Maria Vassilievna. She gave us our first lessons on internationalism. Yemelianov, my classmate, called me “zhydovka” once, and she told him to leave the classroom. Maria Vassilievna wanted to have him expelled from the school, but since this was the only school in the village, there was no other place he could go. The administration hushed up the incident, and nobody ever called me names again.