Selected text
I hardly remember my childhood. But one of the few recollections I have is about how I got lost, when I took my cousin to my father's workplace. I was three years old then and my cousin was about five. My father worked as the director of a greengrocery on the corner of Kreschatik [main street in Kiev], near Roofed market. We lived in Shuliavka, near former Kerosinnaya Street. From there my cousin and I were walking to my father's workplace. We came to Kreschatik, and from there I didn't know the way. We stopped in the middle of the road and burst into tears. A crowd gathered around us. This was at the time when the film 'Foundling' was showing, and right away there was somebody who wanted to adopt me, and someone wanted to adopt my cousin, but the militia interfered. They took us to the militia office, started asking questions and found out from the little information they could get out of me where my father worked. They called his workplace and someone came and picked us up.
My father's younger brother, Lyova, was born in 1908. He was a very active Komsomol 4 member, one of the organizers of the Komsomol unit in Skwira. My mother's sister, Aunt Golda, was also an active Komsomol member. My father also had three sisters: Aunt Rosa, born in 1907, Aunt Mania, born in 1911, and Aunt Etlia, born in 1914. Aunt Rosa stayed in Skwira during World War I and II. She died there along with her children in 1941, when Skwira was occupied by the Germans. Etia evacuated to Alma-Ata during the war and survived. She had a good life. Her husband was very lucky - he was in captivity, in the encirclement, but he was rescued and survived. Later they emigrated to America. Aunt Mania lived in Moscow all her life. She married a Russian and any relationships with the family were terminated, as my father rejected her for doing so. Once, before the war, my father went to Moscow to take her and her two children away from her husband. He brought them to Kiev, but her husband took them back. Only after the war they started writing to each other and she came here.
My mother's name was Bluma Fridelevna Slobodskaya, nee Tsyrulnik. She was born in Skwira on 8th July 1905. There were 14 children in the family; ten of them survived. I don't know anything about the other four. In the early 1920s two sisters and two brothers went to America and took with them my grandmother at first, and, later on, also my grandfather.
The departure must have been illegal, they might have used somebody else's documents, as they lived under a different name in America. In Skwira my grandfather was called Fridel Tsyrulnik, and my grandmother Sarra-Rukhl Tsyrulnik. In America they lived under the name of Segal, and my grandmother's first name was Amy. At that time only single people could leave, and later they closed the border. That's how it happened that six children are here and four children in America. I visited the USA and went to the Jewish cemetery in Philadelphia where my grandparents were buried.
My father's younger brother, Lyova, was born in 1908. He was a very active Komsomol 4 member, one of the organizers of the Komsomol unit in Skwira. My mother's sister, Aunt Golda, was also an active Komsomol member. My father also had three sisters: Aunt Rosa, born in 1907, Aunt Mania, born in 1911, and Aunt Etlia, born in 1914. Aunt Rosa stayed in Skwira during World War I and II. She died there along with her children in 1941, when Skwira was occupied by the Germans. Etia evacuated to Alma-Ata during the war and survived. She had a good life. Her husband was very lucky - he was in captivity, in the encirclement, but he was rescued and survived. Later they emigrated to America. Aunt Mania lived in Moscow all her life. She married a Russian and any relationships with the family were terminated, as my father rejected her for doing so. Once, before the war, my father went to Moscow to take her and her two children away from her husband. He brought them to Kiev, but her husband took them back. Only after the war they started writing to each other and she came here.
My mother's name was Bluma Fridelevna Slobodskaya, nee Tsyrulnik. She was born in Skwira on 8th July 1905. There were 14 children in the family; ten of them survived. I don't know anything about the other four. In the early 1920s two sisters and two brothers went to America and took with them my grandmother at first, and, later on, also my grandfather.
The departure must have been illegal, they might have used somebody else's documents, as they lived under a different name in America. In Skwira my grandfather was called Fridel Tsyrulnik, and my grandmother Sarra-Rukhl Tsyrulnik. In America they lived under the name of Segal, and my grandmother's first name was Amy. At that time only single people could leave, and later they closed the border. That's how it happened that six children are here and four children in America. I visited the USA and went to the Jewish cemetery in Philadelphia where my grandparents were buried.
Location
Ukraine
Interview
Zina Kaluzhnaya