Tag #155367 - Interview #103735 (Nikolay Schwartz Biography)

When in the late 1980s perestroika [25] began in the USSR, I was indifferent to it at first, like I was to anything related to the Soviet power. I didn’t care about their promises of a better life. I had heard them since I returned from the camp in 1947. Later I realized that many things were changing to the better. Gorbachev [26] allowed private entrepreneurship that had been forbidden for many years in the USSR. Many people started their businesses working for themselves. Many of my co-prisoners imprisoned for private entrepreneurship became successful entrepreneurs and respected people during perestroika. The freedom of speech that Gorbachev promised became a reality. There was no need to listen to western radios to hear the truth about the situation in the USSR. Newspapers began to publish articles describing our present and past life. The ban on religion was gone. People could go to church and celebrate religious holidays. However, in the course of Soviet rule people got so much out of this habit that at first there were not enough attendants for a minyan at the synagogue. Only few knew prayers and how to pray. Then chairman of the Jewish community of Uzhgorod suggested that I attended the synagogue. At first I went there to socialize and of course, to enable them to gather a minyan, but then it became a habit with me that developed into a need. In my childhood religion was a significant part of my life. When praying I recalled my parents, my childhood, my sisters and my brother. Every year I recited the Kaddish for my dear ones who had perished in the camp and for my deceased brother.