Tag #155481 - Interview #94697 (Larisa SHYHMAN)

My grandfather lived in Dymer. He was big, handsome, tall and broad-shouldered. He didn’t look like a Jew, perhaps, only his Jewish accent betrayed him. He spoke Ukrainian and Jewish. They said that during pogroms he pretended to be deaf and mute to conceal his accent. His friends plotted this disguise. They said: ‘You, Shlyoma, pretend that you are mute and we would talk for you’. So he was surviving. He had many friends in Dymer and they were Jewish and Ukrainian. They came to see him and sat at the table to have a shot of spirit, he used to drink spirit and smoked self-made cigarettes. I remember them sitting at the table recalling their youth. It even seems to me that my grandfather had more Ukrainian friends. In the past, at the time of Jewish towns, people didn’t have conflicts… There was no segregation, all were equal. However, my grandfather was wealthy and greedy. He was manager of a manor in Dymer and kept livestock at home: cows and goats…