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All Jewish children had to study Yiddish and Hebrew. I haven’t met an illiterate Jew in my life. At the age of seven I went to the Romanian elementary school in our village. It was a free school. My sister Haya also studied in this school. I studied five years in this school.
My parents wanted me to continue my studies and so I went to the Romanian lower secondary school in Rashkov. There was also a Talmud-Torah religious Jewish school in Rashkov and my parents sent me to this school, too.
My parents rented a room for me from a Jewish family. The mistress of the house cooked for me and did my laundry. I had classes at the Romanian school in the morning and in the Torah-Talmud school – in the afternoon. I didn’t have enough time to do my homework.
Our teacher at the Jewish school used to punish us punching or even slapping us. In the Romanian school teachers didn’t punish us for coming to class unprepared, but at the next lesson we were supposed to show them our homework for a previous class. We studied Hebrew and Yiddish and religious subjects at the Jewish school. At weekends I went home.
My parents wanted me to continue my studies and so I went to the Romanian lower secondary school in Rashkov. There was also a Talmud-Torah religious Jewish school in Rashkov and my parents sent me to this school, too.
My parents rented a room for me from a Jewish family. The mistress of the house cooked for me and did my laundry. I had classes at the Romanian school in the morning and in the Torah-Talmud school – in the afternoon. I didn’t have enough time to do my homework.
Our teacher at the Jewish school used to punish us punching or even slapping us. In the Romanian school teachers didn’t punish us for coming to class unprepared, but at the next lesson we were supposed to show them our homework for a previous class. We studied Hebrew and Yiddish and religious subjects at the Jewish school. At weekends I went home.
Location
Ukraine
Interview
Boris Slobodianskiy