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We lived in Marazli Street, then in Engels Street, in a big communal apartment with a common kitchen and primus and kerosene stoves. Aunt Tuba and her son Isaak also lived in this apartment. Tuba was a real Odessan. She spoke mixed Yiddish, Ukrainian and Russian. She taught me many Yiddish songs, like "Don't waste your time coming here, Arnchik, you won't get Zhenia, 'cause you don't deserve her, and you'll go back home a fool." Both my parents worked. My mother worked as a research assistant at Odessa's historical archives. I attended the kindergarten at the House of Doctors where my grandfather worked. From our apartment in Marazli Street, we moved to a new two-room apartment . And there I began to get acquainted with the world of music. An elderly couple lived in another apartment on our floor. Rachil Abramovna was a music teacher and David Abramovich was a mathematician. Although we didn't have a piano at home, Rachil Abramovna gave me lessons. In 1931 I went to secondary school and also to the Glazunov Music School. By this time we had obtained a piano, and music became my main hobby for the rest of my life. My music teacher Maria Lvovna Rogovaya-Filshtein, a Jew, cultivated the love of music in me. I corresponded with her for many years after. I spent a lot of my time studying music, but I was also an active young Octobrist and then a Pioneer at school.
Our family was like many other Soviet families of that time. We lived a poor but exciting life. My father worked very hard. He was Director of the paper-bleaching factory. Mama also spent a lot of time working. They had many friends of various nationalities. They got together to party on Soviet holidays and on birthdays. We always had parties at home. We had an exemplary Soviet family. We never talked about nationalities, or about our roots. I remember the disastrous year of 1933, when famine ravished Ukraine. Mama disappeared with a silver spoon or fork every now and then, and returned with food products from Torgsin. I remember Mama bringing home a big box containing lollypops. She put it in the cupboard. I was not feeling well that day and stayed at home. After Mama left for work, I ate half of these lollypops. For many years afterward I couldn't even look at the sweets.
In 1934, the Ukrainian government moved from Kharkov to Kiev. My father got a job assignment at the Polygraphy Department in Kiev. Ten apartments were constructed on Saksaganskogo Street for the management. We received a two-room apartment on the fourth floor, and lived there until the beginning of World War II.
When we moved to Kiev, my parents arranged a meeting for me with a professor from the Conservatory who told them that I should attend a special school for gifted children. I enrolled in a school in Muzeiniy Lane that was built by the order of Narkom (minister) Postyshev. Postyshev often visited our school. In 1935 he organized a New Year's party with a New Year tree. Before 1935, New Year trees were not allowed in the Soviet Union. They were thought to be a bourgeois vestige. Postyshev talked with us at this party, where there was food on the tables and waitresses in white aprons carrying ice cream. Around 1938, Postyshev was repressed and shot.
Our family was like many other Soviet families of that time. We lived a poor but exciting life. My father worked very hard. He was Director of the paper-bleaching factory. Mama also spent a lot of time working. They had many friends of various nationalities. They got together to party on Soviet holidays and on birthdays. We always had parties at home. We had an exemplary Soviet family. We never talked about nationalities, or about our roots. I remember the disastrous year of 1933, when famine ravished Ukraine. Mama disappeared with a silver spoon or fork every now and then, and returned with food products from Torgsin. I remember Mama bringing home a big box containing lollypops. She put it in the cupboard. I was not feeling well that day and stayed at home. After Mama left for work, I ate half of these lollypops. For many years afterward I couldn't even look at the sweets.
In 1934, the Ukrainian government moved from Kharkov to Kiev. My father got a job assignment at the Polygraphy Department in Kiev. Ten apartments were constructed on Saksaganskogo Street for the management. We received a two-room apartment on the fourth floor, and lived there until the beginning of World War II.
When we moved to Kiev, my parents arranged a meeting for me with a professor from the Conservatory who told them that I should attend a special school for gifted children. I enrolled in a school in Muzeiniy Lane that was built by the order of Narkom (minister) Postyshev. Postyshev often visited our school. In 1935 he organized a New Year's party with a New Year tree. Before 1935, New Year trees were not allowed in the Soviet Union. They were thought to be a bourgeois vestige. Postyshev talked with us at this party, where there was food on the tables and waitresses in white aprons carrying ice cream. Around 1938, Postyshev was repressed and shot.
Location
Ukraine
Interview
Larissa Khusid