Tag #155733 - Interview #103724 (Faina Saushkina Biography)

My mother, Sarah and I came to Warsaw where my mother’s father Isaac lived. Our grandmother Leiba died about two years before we came to Warsaw. Our grandfather remarried. His wife’s name was Mirrah. Our arrival was a surprise for them and my mother didn’t know that her mother had died either. We were welcomed cordially. Mirrah was very nice to us and I began to call her ‘grandmother’.
​I was about 4 years old then and I do not remember much about the town or place where we lived. It was a 3-room apartment in a big house on the 3rd or 4th floor, simply furnished: a big wooden table, chairs, cupboard and a wardrobe. There were also wooden beds. My grandfather had his desk where he cut pieces of leather and sewed his crafts with a sewing machine in a big room. We also had meals at this table. Another, smaller room, was my grandparents’ bedroom and our mother and we settled down in the smallest room. My mother had a sister – Tsylia. Her husband Aron was a shoemaker. Her family lived in the neighboring street. I remember that we went to see them and I played with Lyonia and Rieva, their children. In the morning my grandfather put on his thales and twiln and went to the synagogue. He was a very religious man. I liked Friday when my grandmother Mirah and my mother made delicious dinner: chicken broth, veal stew and sometimes Gefilte fish. In the evening my grandmother Mirah lit candles in an ancient silver candle stand, my grandfather said a prayer in Hebrew and we sat down to a meal. On Saturday my grandparents went to the synagogue and my mother and I stayed at home – it was difficult for my mother to walk due to her pregnancy.