My grandmother was kosher, but my grandfather always sent me to get things for him; he would always say, ‘Go to Rakoczi, and fetch some sausages’. And he would put them in a case and when grandmother wasn’t within sight, he’d eat it.
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Gyorgy Preisz
Gyoma was an agricultural town with 14-15 thousand inhabitants but it was much wealthier than Nagykata because even in my childhood every larger street had one side covered with asphalt and the main square was completely covered with asphalt. It had very good soil; wheat, corn and barley was produced and many animals were kept: pigs, oxen, everything. About 80-100 Jewish families lived there as well. There was a beautiful synagogue, like that of Nagykata, and there was also a Jewish school with a teacher couple that was paid by the Jewish community. And there was a rabbi, though there was no cantor; he was brought from another place. There was a shochet who came to do the slaughtering every week and there was a shop where it was sold. But there was no permanent butcher’s shop.
Grandmother had another brother, Gyula, who was the managing director of the sugar-works in Szolnok. Once, when we went to a wedding in Jaszbereny, we left a day earlier and we went to Szolnok. A wonderful carriage with two horses and a liveried servant came to meet us at the railway station and took us to the sugar-works. I was seven years old, but I still remember that.
She attended the secondary school for girls in Mezotur and she graduated as well.
My grandparents went to the synagogue on Friday evenings, I remember that. My grandmother lit the candle every Friday evening, there was barkhes, but I know that it wasn’t baked by her. There was a kosher butcher’s shop. In Nagykata there was kosher housekeeping in the sense that there were separate dishes for dairy and meat products. My grandfather used to pray in a prayer shawl on Friday evenings. But they didn’t observe the Sabbath as such. They opened the shop because Saturday was market-day and it was double business. They managed to accommodate religion with work.
Jews didn’t live in one place, but all over the town. Three of my grandfather’s children lived in Nagykata, in three different parts of the town. They lived in nice houses, with yards and outbuildings, and the shops were also there where they lived. One part of the house was the shop; the other was the apartment. Margit’s family had a vegetable garden, even a vineyard, because they had a very big piece of land. Half of it was the yard. Near the house there was a flower garden, and in the back there was a farmyard, where they kept chickens, geese and everything. And it had another part where the vineyard was. When the grapes grew ripe, dad loved it; we always went there for the grapes. The furnishing of the houses wasn’t special; they looked like average middle-class homes.
Nagykata wasn’t a big town; it had about 10-12 thousand inhabitants. Nothing was covered with asphalt in Nagykata. Only on the main square, where there was a line of shops. Otherwise, a few streets were paved, but nothing else, only the mud, and eventually the dust. There were more than a hundred Jewish families, and a beautiful synagogue, with a gallery of course, a Neolog [4] synagogue.
Then he went back to the match factory and was there until 1943, when he was fired because of the third Jewish law [see Anti-Jewish laws in Hungary] [3]. He took it to heart so much – because, at first they said that somebody else would be fired, but then they introduced the anti-Jewish law and he was fired. Half a year later, as he was walking on the street, he collapsed. The ambulance took him to the hospital, but he never really recovered. He got cardiac asthma, so he spent more time in hospital than at home. He died in 1944 in Budapest.
My father graduated from high school. He finished a school of commerce, I don’t know where. After graduation, he was a bookkeeper at the Hungarian General Match Factory Inc. in Budapest. He then became deputy head bookkeeper. He was drafted into the army in World War I.
She was here in Budapest during the war, but not in the ghetto; her son was in forced labor but he came home, too. He was a violinist. He graduated from the conservatory and used to play in orchestras.
He came home from forced labor in 1945. And then he and his father’s youngest brother, who was almost the same age as he, opened a textile shop in Budapest. This lasted until ‘buddy’ Rakosi [1] put an end to everything – until the nationalization. Then he and his wife left for Canada, where he became a trader.
Zinaida Leibovich
In 1909 Munya, my mother’s older brother, was born. Munya entered the Military Communications College after finishing school and became a professional soldier. When World War II broke out he held the rank of lieutenant and was sent to the front. He went through the whole war and finished it in as a major. His wife Fania and son Abram (Abrasha), who was born in 1938, stayed in Kamenets-Podolsk during the war and were shot by the Germans in 1941. Their bodies were thrown into the sewer. After the war my uncle married a Jewish woman from Novograd-Volynskiy. They had a son named Roman who lives in Germany now. In 1946 Uncle Munya entered the Military Academy. After graduation he got an assignment in Murmansk. He lived there until his demobilization in 1952. Then he returned to Novograd-Volynskiy, his wife’s hometown. He died in 1968.
I don’t know any details of my grandparents’ life during World War I and the civil war. I don’t know whether there were any pogroms in their town – they never told me anything about it. What I do know is that my grandfather Haim Altman took part in the civil war and fought on the side of the Reds. I don’t know how he got to the front. He was there less than a year when he was wounded during one of the combat actions against the White Polish army. As a result, he lost his leg and returned home to Kamenets-Podolsk. This happened some time in 1918.
Afterward, as he couldn’t do hard physical work any more, he learned to make shoes and became a shoemaker in a shop. The family’s living standards dropped, but they didn’t get upset. They supported each other and did their best to survive. They continued to celebrate all the Jewish holidays and attend synagogue. On Friday my grandmother always lit a candle, and on Saturday her Ukrainian neighbor came to help around the house and take care of the poultry yard and cattle. My grandmother always made matzo at Pesach and even sold some to her Jewish neighbors. At home my grandmother and grandfather spoke Yiddish, and my mother knew Yiddish very well, too.
I don’t know any details of my grandparents’ life during World War I and the civil war. I don’t know whether there were any pogroms in their town – they never told me anything about it. What I do know is that my grandfather Haim Altman took part in the civil war and fought on the side of the Reds. I don’t know how he got to the front. He was there less than a year when he was wounded during one of the combat actions against the White Polish army. As a result, he lost his leg and returned home to Kamenets-Podolsk. This happened some time in 1918.
Afterward, as he couldn’t do hard physical work any more, he learned to make shoes and became a shoemaker in a shop. The family’s living standards dropped, but they didn’t get upset. They supported each other and did their best to survive. They continued to celebrate all the Jewish holidays and attend synagogue. On Friday my grandmother always lit a candle, and on Saturday her Ukrainian neighbor came to help around the house and take care of the poultry yard and cattle. My grandmother always made matzo at Pesach and even sold some to her Jewish neighbors. At home my grandmother and grandfather spoke Yiddish, and my mother knew Yiddish very well, too.
, Ukraine
My grandfather and grandmother on my mother's side lived in the town of Kamenets-Podolsk (Western Ukraine). My grandfather’s name was Haim Gershkovich Altman and my grandmother’s name was Haya-Surah Altman (I have no information about her maiden name). My grandfather was born some time in 1880, and my grandmother in 1885. They were both born in Kamenets-Podolsk and lived there all their lives. Kamenets-Podolsk was a very beautiful town on the bank of the river Smotrich. Many Jewish people lived there. They were involved in commerce and various trades: shoemaking, dressmaking, leather tanning, etc. There was a nice synagogue there, too.
My grandparents had a house of their own, a small wooden house with outdoor plumbing. The house had four rooms and a veranda. There also was a Russian oven that served for both cooking and heating. My grandfather and grandmother were good housekeepers. They had an orchard and a vegetable garden around the house, and they kept chicken, ducks, geese, goats and a cow. My mother told me that when it got cold in winter they brought their goats into the house. They always had enough milk. My grandmother made sour cream and baked milk in her oven and sold these at the market. She also sold eggs. My mother told me that they always had enough food, although my grandmother and my mother had to work hard for it. People from the neighboring villages often stayed at my grandparents’ house. They came to sell their fruit and vegetables at the market and buy whatever they needed. The Jewish and Ukrainian people got along very well. Many Ukrainians spoke Yiddish fluently.
My grandparents were very religious. My grandfather attended synagogue every morning and then went to work. He worked for a Ukrainian grain dealer, handling his grain. He was a very good employee, and his boss always gave him grain in addition to his wages, so they always had a lot of bread and baked goods at home.
My grandparents had a house of their own, a small wooden house with outdoor plumbing. The house had four rooms and a veranda. There also was a Russian oven that served for both cooking and heating. My grandfather and grandmother were good housekeepers. They had an orchard and a vegetable garden around the house, and they kept chicken, ducks, geese, goats and a cow. My mother told me that when it got cold in winter they brought their goats into the house. They always had enough milk. My grandmother made sour cream and baked milk in her oven and sold these at the market. She also sold eggs. My mother told me that they always had enough food, although my grandmother and my mother had to work hard for it. People from the neighboring villages often stayed at my grandparents’ house. They came to sell their fruit and vegetables at the market and buy whatever they needed. The Jewish and Ukrainian people got along very well. Many Ukrainians spoke Yiddish fluently.
My grandparents were very religious. My grandfather attended synagogue every morning and then went to work. He worked for a Ukrainian grain dealer, handling his grain. He was a very good employee, and his boss always gave him grain in addition to his wages, so they always had a lot of bread and baked goods at home.
, Ukraine
My father, Moisey Leibovich ,was born in Kiev in 1912. He only completed four years of primary school. He didn’t study any further, but he was a very smart boy. Later he helped my brother with mathematics when he was taking his entrance exams for the technical school. After finishing school my father, a 13-year-old boy, went to work at Transsignal, the factory where his mother was working. He was a laborer at the beginning and then he became a turner apprentice. My father was injured on the job before the war – the machine he was working on cut off a finger on his right hand.
My mother met my father in 1939 when she was in Kiev on vacation. They met in a theater in Kiev and fell in love. After my mother went back home to Kamenets-Podolsk, they started writing letters to each other and my father traveled there several times to see her.
My parents got married in 1940, and my mother moved to Kiev. They had no wedding ceremony, they just registered their marriage at the Registry office and started living together. My mother went to work at the factory as an assistant accountant. My mother told me that she didn’t want to live with my father’s parents and their family, so my father and mother rented an apartment.
My mother met my father in 1939 when she was in Kiev on vacation. They met in a theater in Kiev and fell in love. After my mother went back home to Kamenets-Podolsk, they started writing letters to each other and my father traveled there several times to see her.
My parents got married in 1940, and my mother moved to Kiev. They had no wedding ceremony, they just registered their marriage at the Registry office and started living together. My mother went to work at the factory as an assistant accountant. My mother told me that she didn’t want to live with my father’s parents and their family, so my father and mother rented an apartment.
, Ukraine
Evel and Hanna Leibovich, my grandfather and grandmother on my father’s side (I have no information about my grandmother’s maiden name), lived in Kuznechnaya (Gorkogo) street in Kiev. My grandfather Evel was born some time in 1885. He was an intelligent man. I don’t know exactly what kind of education he got, but during the Soviet time he worked as an accountant at a brick factory. I don’t know what he was doing before the Revolution.
My grandmother Hanna, my father’s mother, was born in 1890. She didn’t work before the Revolution. In the early 1920s she also went to work at the factory. She worked at the turning machine. My father’s parents were religious. They went to synagogue and observed the traditional Jewish holidays at home. Nonetheless, they didn’t follow Kashrut and worked on Saturday, as it was a workday at the factory. Besides, it wasn’t possible for Jewish people to be openly religious in Kiev in the early 1930s. That was why my father, along with his brothers and sisters, was not a religious person. My father was raised in a very intelligent Jewish family. He had two brothers and a sister. His older brother Leonid was born in 1907, his sister Rachel in 1917, and his younger brother Iosif in 1919. Neither my father, nor his brothers and sister got any Jewish education, and they did not know and did not keep Jewish traditions; in their youth this was not fashionable and it was even discriminated against by the authorities. But they always read a lot and learned a lot from people.
Leonid worked at a factory after finishing school. Later he studied at an institute and became an engineer. Iosif was a worker, and Rachel married Isaak Wainer and didn’t work after her wedding. All my father’s relatives were evacuated during the war and returned to Kiev after it ended. Rachel died in 1972, and Iosif in 1975. Leonid died in Kiev in 1977.
My grandmother Hanna, my father’s mother, was born in 1890. She didn’t work before the Revolution. In the early 1920s she also went to work at the factory. She worked at the turning machine. My father’s parents were religious. They went to synagogue and observed the traditional Jewish holidays at home. Nonetheless, they didn’t follow Kashrut and worked on Saturday, as it was a workday at the factory. Besides, it wasn’t possible for Jewish people to be openly religious in Kiev in the early 1930s. That was why my father, along with his brothers and sisters, was not a religious person. My father was raised in a very intelligent Jewish family. He had two brothers and a sister. His older brother Leonid was born in 1907, his sister Rachel in 1917, and his younger brother Iosif in 1919. Neither my father, nor his brothers and sister got any Jewish education, and they did not know and did not keep Jewish traditions; in their youth this was not fashionable and it was even discriminated against by the authorities. But they always read a lot and learned a lot from people.
Leonid worked at a factory after finishing school. Later he studied at an institute and became an engineer. Iosif was a worker, and Rachel married Isaak Wainer and didn’t work after her wedding. All my father’s relatives were evacuated during the war and returned to Kiev after it ended. Rachel died in 1972, and Iosif in 1975. Leonid died in Kiev in 1977.
, Ukraine
My younger brother Efim was born in Tashkent in 1944, and that same year, when he was only one month old, our family returned to Kiev. We settled down in my father’s parents’ apartment in Gorky street, where he had grown up. It was a poor communal apartment, and our family lived in one room. My father’s brother Iosif and sister Rachel’s family lived in the room next door. We had another neighbor: Ida Kotlar, a Jew. They all tried to support and help each other. When we arrived, our Ukrainian neighbors gave us some bed linen and furniture, as we didn’t have anything at all. The toilet and water were in the yard. We cooked our food on kerosene stoves.
My father went to work at a factory, and my mother stayed home with us kids. Later my mother also went to work, leaving us in the care of our elderly neighbors. Ours was a multinational courtyard – one could hear a mixture of three languages: Russian, Ukrainian and Yiddish. I remember that we were always hungry. There were ration coupons for bread. Sometimes my father brought lumps of sugar from his work that he got as food rations for the employees. We used to sit at the table and my mother broke these lumps in pieces, saying “Here is a piece for Zina, this one for Fima and this is for Daddy and Mommy.” Of course, those lumps for Daddy and Mommy were tiny, purely symbolic. My younger brother would eat his sugar quickly and then ask me to share mine with him. I felt so sorry for him that I would give him some of mine no matter how much I wanted to eat it myself. When my parents left for work, all that we had at home were onions and some bread. I used to cut a slice of bread, then I fried some onion with a little piece of pork fat and made a sandwich with this fried onion. Mommy told us to divide what we had, so when we ate we pushed some of the onion to the side, to leave it for the next meal. One of our neighbors had a vegetable garden in the yard, where she grew corn and various vegetables. We stole onions, carrots and cabbage from her garden and ate them raw to keep it a secret from our parents. We also stole corn and cooked in on the fire. Some people kept chicken, geese and even goats. Sometimes older boys caught a chicken and roasted it on the fire. I was scared to look at them killing it, but then I enjoyed having a piece of chicken when the boys gave me one. Of course, our parents had no idea about this “business” of ours. If they had found out it would have caused a terrible scandal, because they always taught us to be honest and never steal. But we were doing this because we were so hungry. Later we were sent to kindergarten. Our tutor was Musia, the daughter-in-law of my father’s brother Leonid. Life became easier in kindergarten, as we had meals there, even if they were scanty.
My father went to work at a factory, and my mother stayed home with us kids. Later my mother also went to work, leaving us in the care of our elderly neighbors. Ours was a multinational courtyard – one could hear a mixture of three languages: Russian, Ukrainian and Yiddish. I remember that we were always hungry. There were ration coupons for bread. Sometimes my father brought lumps of sugar from his work that he got as food rations for the employees. We used to sit at the table and my mother broke these lumps in pieces, saying “Here is a piece for Zina, this one for Fima and this is for Daddy and Mommy.” Of course, those lumps for Daddy and Mommy were tiny, purely symbolic. My younger brother would eat his sugar quickly and then ask me to share mine with him. I felt so sorry for him that I would give him some of mine no matter how much I wanted to eat it myself. When my parents left for work, all that we had at home were onions and some bread. I used to cut a slice of bread, then I fried some onion with a little piece of pork fat and made a sandwich with this fried onion. Mommy told us to divide what we had, so when we ate we pushed some of the onion to the side, to leave it for the next meal. One of our neighbors had a vegetable garden in the yard, where she grew corn and various vegetables. We stole onions, carrots and cabbage from her garden and ate them raw to keep it a secret from our parents. We also stole corn and cooked in on the fire. Some people kept chicken, geese and even goats. Sometimes older boys caught a chicken and roasted it on the fire. I was scared to look at them killing it, but then I enjoyed having a piece of chicken when the boys gave me one. Of course, our parents had no idea about this “business” of ours. If they had found out it would have caused a terrible scandal, because they always taught us to be honest and never steal. But we were doing this because we were so hungry. Later we were sent to kindergarten. Our tutor was Musia, the daughter-in-law of my father’s brother Leonid. Life became easier in kindergarten, as we had meals there, even if they were scanty.
, Ukraine
My mother was born in Kamenets-Podolsk in 1919. They gave her the name Shprintse. The local rabbi issued her birth certificate, and we still have it. My mother went to a mixed kindergarten with both Ukrainian and Jewish kids in it. The teacher treated all the children very well. My mother told me that later she began to work around the house, helping her mother.
My mother attended secondary school for eight years and also attended music school. There was a piano at my grandfather’s house. Mother had a very good sense of music and used to sing very well. She had quite a few friends – both Russian and Jewish. Her Jewish friends Genia and Donia (I don’t know their last names) were not evacuated during the war and were killed. Donia died in Lvov and Genechka – in Kamenets-Podolsk. Sonia, another friend of my mother’s, also was also killed in Kamenets-Podolsk. My mother graduated from music school and worked as a kindergarten music teacher. Actually, she had several professions. She completed a short-term course for medical nurses in 1936 and worked as a nurse in hospital for some time in 1936 – 1939. She also completed studies at an accounting school in the 1940s and got a job of assistant accountant at the Tractor Manufacture and Sales Company.
My mother attended secondary school for eight years and also attended music school. There was a piano at my grandfather’s house. Mother had a very good sense of music and used to sing very well. She had quite a few friends – both Russian and Jewish. Her Jewish friends Genia and Donia (I don’t know their last names) were not evacuated during the war and were killed. Donia died in Lvov and Genechka – in Kamenets-Podolsk. Sonia, another friend of my mother’s, also was also killed in Kamenets-Podolsk. My mother graduated from music school and worked as a kindergarten music teacher. Actually, she had several professions. She completed a short-term course for medical nurses in 1936 and worked as a nurse in hospital for some time in 1936 – 1939. She also completed studies at an accounting school in the 1940s and got a job of assistant accountant at the Tractor Manufacture and Sales Company.
, Ukraine
The war began on June 22, 1941. At that time my mother was pregnant with me. The factory where my parents were working was converted to a military plant and promptly evacuated to Tashkent. My parents were evacuated with their plant. My father’s parents were also evacuated - but some time later. They also lived in Tashkent, but not with us. I remember that both of them died in 1943. My grandfather died first and my grandmother followed him few weeks later.
My parents lived with an Uzbek family. These people sympathized with them, especially with my pregnant mother. My mother had suffered very much during the long train journey to Tashkent. When I was born the doctors didn’t think I would survive. I was born with many lesions and bleeding sores. In fact, nobody believed that I would live, and the doctors didn’t want to take the responsibility for my treatment. My mother was discharged from the maternity hospital and sent home. But then our Uzbek landlords took over. The landlady went to her home village to see the healer. She brought back some ointment and herbs and they nursed me to health. So I owe my life to these Uzbek people. I don’t even know their names. I don’t know why, but after returning to Kiev my parents did not keep in touch with this family, but I remember that my mother always spoke with gratitude about their kindness and cordiality.
My grandfather Haim and grandmother Haya-Surah, my mother’s parents, stayed in occupied Kamenets-Podolsk and my mother didn’t know anything about their fate. But at that time it was already common knowledge that the Germans left no Jewish people alive in the occupied areas, and my mother had no hope of finding her parents alive. However, she kept praying for them and hoping for a miracle. But no miracle occurred. My grandfather Haim and grandmother Haya-Surah Altman were shot along with all other Jews in town including their daughter-in-law, Uncle Munya’s wife Fania and their three year old grandson Abrasha. We found this out after we returned from evacuation.
My parents lived with an Uzbek family. These people sympathized with them, especially with my pregnant mother. My mother had suffered very much during the long train journey to Tashkent. When I was born the doctors didn’t think I would survive. I was born with many lesions and bleeding sores. In fact, nobody believed that I would live, and the doctors didn’t want to take the responsibility for my treatment. My mother was discharged from the maternity hospital and sent home. But then our Uzbek landlords took over. The landlady went to her home village to see the healer. She brought back some ointment and herbs and they nursed me to health. So I owe my life to these Uzbek people. I don’t even know their names. I don’t know why, but after returning to Kiev my parents did not keep in touch with this family, but I remember that my mother always spoke with gratitude about their kindness and cordiality.
My grandfather Haim and grandmother Haya-Surah, my mother’s parents, stayed in occupied Kamenets-Podolsk and my mother didn’t know anything about their fate. But at that time it was already common knowledge that the Germans left no Jewish people alive in the occupied areas, and my mother had no hope of finding her parents alive. However, she kept praying for them and hoping for a miracle. But no miracle occurred. My grandfather Haim and grandmother Haya-Surah Altman were shot along with all other Jews in town including their daughter-in-law, Uncle Munya’s wife Fania and their three year old grandson Abrasha. We found this out after we returned from evacuation.
, Ukraine
Our family didn’t suffer from the “struggle against cosmopolitans” because we were very poor and nobody cared about us. Because of anti-Semitism, though, we couldn’t be allotted an apartment for a long time. We lived in terrible conditions. The Housing Department conducted numerous inspections to confirm that the conditions were bad and promised that we would get an apartment soon. But when the time came, it was always somebody else to get the apartment - somebody who was not Jewish. Nevertheless, we did move to another apartment in 1957. It was a communal apartment, too, but with a toilet and running water in it. Only in 1967 was my father allotted an apartment for the four of us. But although my father was an invalid of group I (he could hardly walk), we got an apartment on the fifth floor without an elevator! My father filed all kinds of requests to get an apartment on a lower floor. On the very day he died (in 1979) we received documents for an apartment on the 3rd floor. We didn’t move there, of course, as we were busy doing other things.
My mother worked as accountant after the war. She became seriously ill after my father died and retired. She had cancer and was confined to bed for over 10 years. She died in 1990. I had to take care of her all these years and couldn’t possibly think about trying to arrange my own personal life.
After graduating high school I wanted to enter the Institute of Culture. I passed my entrance exams but I didn’t find my name on the lists of those that were admitted. The administration explained to me that the reason was that my pass mark was not high enough, but the real reason was that I was a Jew.
It took me a long while to find a job – as soon as people saw my name and nationality in my passport it turned out that there was no vacancy. Finally I found a low paid and non-prestigious job as assistant accountant at the Housekeeping Department.
Later I took a course to become a “Variety Show Dispatcher” at the Institute of Culture and worked at the “Ukrconcert” (a concert agency in Kiev) as administrator for many years.
My mother worked as accountant after the war. She became seriously ill after my father died and retired. She had cancer and was confined to bed for over 10 years. She died in 1990. I had to take care of her all these years and couldn’t possibly think about trying to arrange my own personal life.
After graduating high school I wanted to enter the Institute of Culture. I passed my entrance exams but I didn’t find my name on the lists of those that were admitted. The administration explained to me that the reason was that my pass mark was not high enough, but the real reason was that I was a Jew.
It took me a long while to find a job – as soon as people saw my name and nationality in my passport it turned out that there was no vacancy. Finally I found a low paid and non-prestigious job as assistant accountant at the Housekeeping Department.
Later I took a course to become a “Variety Show Dispatcher” at the Institute of Culture and worked at the “Ukrconcert” (a concert agency in Kiev) as administrator for many years.
, Ukraine
I started school in 1950. It was an ordinary Russian school for girls. I remember the children teasing me. They called me “Leiba Muhamed – kerosinschik” instead of calling me by my name Zina. Leiba was from my last name Leibovich, Muhamed – because I had been in Tashkent (it is a very popular name in Uzbekistan), and kerosinschik – because we lived not far from and kerosene store. I took this teasing in my stride. But later, if somebody called me “zhydovka”, I found it offensive and ended any communication with those people. Quite often I faced anti-Semitism in my life, but it was at a later period, not while I was at school.
We had a wonderful Russian teacher at school. She was Ukrainian and her name was Anna Vassilievna. She was the first person to tell us about Babi Yar. She asked whether we children, had any relatives that had been exterminated there. I asked my mother and she told me that every town or village in Ukraine had its own Yar [Yar in Ukrainian means a pit.] and that my grandmother and grandfather perished in Kamenets-Podolsk. This teacher was different from all the others. Nobody ever mentioned Babi Yar1 in those years – it was as if it had never happened. There was no monument or place where people could go to mourn for their lost ones. When I was 11, my mother and I went to Kamenets-Podolsk, my mother’s hometown. It was a small provincial town, very clean and nice. There were hardly any Jews left - most of them were killed in 1941 and the rest of them moved to other towns. There was a small monument to the Victims of the Holocaust, and I found the names of my relatives on it.
In 1953 Stalin died. I remember everybody around crying, and I cried, too, although I couldn’t understand or explain why, but as everybody else was crying, I couldn’t help crying either.
We had a wonderful Russian teacher at school. She was Ukrainian and her name was Anna Vassilievna. She was the first person to tell us about Babi Yar. She asked whether we children, had any relatives that had been exterminated there. I asked my mother and she told me that every town or village in Ukraine had its own Yar [Yar in Ukrainian means a pit.] and that my grandmother and grandfather perished in Kamenets-Podolsk. This teacher was different from all the others. Nobody ever mentioned Babi Yar1 in those years – it was as if it had never happened. There was no monument or place where people could go to mourn for their lost ones. When I was 11, my mother and I went to Kamenets-Podolsk, my mother’s hometown. It was a small provincial town, very clean and nice. There were hardly any Jews left - most of them were killed in 1941 and the rest of them moved to other towns. There was a small monument to the Victims of the Holocaust, and I found the names of my relatives on it.
In 1953 Stalin died. I remember everybody around crying, and I cried, too, although I couldn’t understand or explain why, but as everybody else was crying, I couldn’t help crying either.
, Ukraine
My brother Efim Leibovich finished school in 1961 with excellent grades. He passed his entrance exams to commerce school but didn’t find his name on the lists. It turned out that a Deputy Minister’s son was admitted instead of him. My brother kept filing complaints with the Ministry and finally he was admitted. After he graduated, he entered the Department of “Refrigeration equipment” at the Institute of Commerce and Economy. Then he worked as chief production engineer for refrigeration equipment at the Kiev blood transfusion facility. He works there to this day. My brother has a family: a wife and two sons – Mikhail and Dmitriy.
I have no family of my own. I had close relationships with a few men, but I never got married. When I realized that I would probably never get married, I decided to have a baby on my own. My daughter was born in 1983 when I was over 40 years old. Her name is Maria, Masha, and she is a very smart and beautiful girl. When she was in kindergarten she was chosen to study at a modeling school. She also finished the school of applied art and went in for gymnastics. Masha graduated from the Jewish school in Kiev and went to study in Israel under a program organized by the Kiev Rabbi Yakov Bleich.
She has also been in America and visited the Lubavitch rabbi. He gave her $1000 to continue her education. Unfortunately, I deposited this money into a commercial bank, and this bank went bankrupt like many other banks in Ukraine in the 1990s. We lost all our money. Nowadays Masha is married to a Ukrainian man. He doesn’t support her interest in Jewish life and keeps her away from it.
As for me, I feel my Jewish identity as never before. I go to the synagogue and services each Saturday. They have opened a synagogue at the Transsignal plant – the one where my father’s parents used to work. I’m so happy that the time has come when one can openly go to synagogue, study Hebrew and go to Jewish concerts and performances. I try to read Jewish newspapers. I go to the Hesed Jewish center “Hesed” where I can get charity meals and other assistance. Sometimes I hear anti-Semitic statements in the street, but this happens rarely and doesn’t feel as offensive as it did before, when we couldn’t lead a Jewish way of life and heard such statements about Jews everywhere: in the traffic, in stores or in the street. Everyday expression of anti-Semitism still exists, but it has nothing to do with state policy and I hope there will be no more anti-Semitism in Ukraine. Unfortunately, I have never been in Israel. It was impossible in the past, and then, when they opened the border in the 1990s I never had enough money for the trip. I would love to see this country and visit its holy historical places.
I have no family of my own. I had close relationships with a few men, but I never got married. When I realized that I would probably never get married, I decided to have a baby on my own. My daughter was born in 1983 when I was over 40 years old. Her name is Maria, Masha, and she is a very smart and beautiful girl. When she was in kindergarten she was chosen to study at a modeling school. She also finished the school of applied art and went in for gymnastics. Masha graduated from the Jewish school in Kiev and went to study in Israel under a program organized by the Kiev Rabbi Yakov Bleich.
She has also been in America and visited the Lubavitch rabbi. He gave her $1000 to continue her education. Unfortunately, I deposited this money into a commercial bank, and this bank went bankrupt like many other banks in Ukraine in the 1990s. We lost all our money. Nowadays Masha is married to a Ukrainian man. He doesn’t support her interest in Jewish life and keeps her away from it.
As for me, I feel my Jewish identity as never before. I go to the synagogue and services each Saturday. They have opened a synagogue at the Transsignal plant – the one where my father’s parents used to work. I’m so happy that the time has come when one can openly go to synagogue, study Hebrew and go to Jewish concerts and performances. I try to read Jewish newspapers. I go to the Hesed Jewish center “Hesed” where I can get charity meals and other assistance. Sometimes I hear anti-Semitic statements in the street, but this happens rarely and doesn’t feel as offensive as it did before, when we couldn’t lead a Jewish way of life and heard such statements about Jews everywhere: in the traffic, in stores or in the street. Everyday expression of anti-Semitism still exists, but it has nothing to do with state policy and I hope there will be no more anti-Semitism in Ukraine. Unfortunately, I have never been in Israel. It was impossible in the past, and then, when they opened the border in the 1990s I never had enough money for the trip. I would love to see this country and visit its holy historical places.
, Ukraine
Erika Izsak
The two boys weren’t religious already from a very young age, the fact that they were Jews didn’t have any significance for them, and during the war they were in touch with the leftist labor movement. They pulled through forced labor luckily, they ran away and hid together. Bela learned to become a textile technician already during the war, and Fredi learned the tiler trade after finishing four years of high school.
Aunt Ilus and her family weren’t kosher, but they observed Sabbath to some extent. Aunt Marcsa lit a candle on Friday evening, and as far as I remember the shop was closed on Saturday.
This was the case on 19th March 1944 [16], too. I recall we had a mathematics class. One of the teachers called Mr. Rieger to the door, then he told us in a very serious voice to immediately go home, on the shortest possible route. I called my father on the phone – there wasn’t a phone in the apartment, but there was one in the office – and asked him whether I should go home or to one of the relatives, who lived near by. He told me to go home, but not on the usual route, by train, but by tram. And this, although he didn’t know that they had arrested several persons at the Keleti railway station. One month later, on 21st April, the Eastern Front Comrades’ Association occupied the gardener training grounds, and the dormitories of the HICAA as well, dispossessed it all of its fortune. We also had to move, we could take our own things, and we could leave the furniture we didn’t have a place for, and several boxes full with stuff in the cellar. We found and got back most of these a year later.
I don’t know whether the anti-Jewish laws directly affected the situation of the HICAA already at that time, but they sure affected the financial situation. I know that my father’s income became smaller, and apart from this, we had to live more modestly.
The situation was different outside of school. In the spring of 1938, when I was on my way home, three boys, whom I didn’t know, attacked me, said nasty things about me being Jewish and hit me. It didn’t hurt me very much and I didn’t get very frightened either: I saw many Arrow Cross [14], anti-Semitic inscriptions on the walls and fences those days. It hurt me more that my classmate, with whom I was on quite good terms, even though she was Christian, and we were together at that time, too, got frightened and ran away immediately. I completed the 3rd grade there, but in the 4th grade I was a private student again on Bezeredi Street. I went to religion class to a religion teacher in Sashalom [district]. He was the first one who made me a little bit interested, even if not in religion, but in the Bible and Hebrew letters.
Grandma transferred the shoe store to a trustworthy shoemaker who worked there [see Strohmann system] [20] already at the beginning of the German occupation, before they took the shops of the Jews with an order. I don’t know the details, but I know that they helped in the following months, his wife often came and brought all kinds of food and items we needed in the household. Grandma once asked her, she gave her money, of course, to bring us some cookies from the cake-shop near by, because Jews couldn’t go there anymore. The woman quietly remarked that even though she could always go in, she never had enough money to buy something for her children.
My favorite holiday was Pesach, especially because of the food made with matzah. We took out the Pesach dishes from the bottom of a dresser, but there wasn’t any ritual. We didn’t eat anything made with leaven for eight days, but as far as I remember the bag with flour remained in its place, in the pantry. There were only the three of us on seder evening, because of the distance we couldn’t walk anywhere, and nobody could come to our place. I said the mah nishtanah enthusiastically. We always lit Chanukkah candles. At Chanukkah I always got many presents until I became a high school student, just like the Christian children did for Christmas. But my most memorable ‘holiday’ memory is of a completely different nature. When I was 13 or 14 years old, at Yom Kippur, behind the curtain, which divided the men’s and women’s room a boy, who was a couple years older than me, and I made a stand for being atheists…
My father was drafted into forced labor again, to a formation in Pest, at the beginning of June. He came home from time to time for a couple hours, he sometimes sent word. This was a great security for us. Otherwise we didn’t know how unsafe we were…We had no idea what happened to the Jews in the country. We didn’t have any relatives or Jewish acquaintances who lived outside Budapest. We heard some ‘rumors’ about ghettos in the country and about trains later, but we didn’t know what to make of them.
My mother lit a candle reluctantly on Friday evening, she didn’t have to light the fire and cook, because the maid of all works, while there was one, did it. But my mother wasn’t allowed to write in her diary, and couldn’t embroider, and I wasn’t allowed to draw and write. I was unable to understand why my father forbade what was entertainment for us, while religion forbade work on Saturday, why we couldn’t do what we liked on the day of rest commanded by God. And to this ‘philosophical’ problem the moral problem came. My mother told me: we could write, as long as my father didn’t find out, because it would hurt him.