Motherland: Notes of a Persecuted Director, A Memoir about Jewish Life in the Soviet Union, Part I - Through Hunger and War

MOTHERLAND

Notes of a Persecuted Director:

A Memoir about Jewish Life in the Soviet Union

Part I - Through Hunger and War

NATAN GIMELFARB

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © by N. Gimelfarb, Ilia Gimelfarb, 2010.

All Rights Reserved.

For more visit http://natan.gimelfarb.com

FROM THE EDITOR (RUSSIAN EDITION)

The book you have in your hands was not created by a writer or a philosopher. What you have in front of you is a memoir of a man who, because of his intelligence, abilities, and work ethic, became the director of a large-scale industrial association, an inventor, and a scientist. The book’s language, style, and presentation lead us through the rise of a Jewish youth:

Through his difficult childhood, famine and deprivation, war, and the death of his family and loved ones;

Through the joy of love and the happiness of family life;

Through his infinite faith in the triumph of a bright Communist future, for which he lived and worked;

Through the ordeals and tortures of that life, the light and shadows of which gradually turned into a cancerous darkness from which he was able to escape;

Through the anti-Semitism which was present everywhere he turned.

You will read his life story, at times excessively burdened with details of family and everyday life. But let’s not be too strict with the author. He wrote primarily for them, his family, relatives and friends, but it turned out to be intriguing and instructive for a wider readership. And it is precisely this intimate background that gives life to the main events and achievements.

Not everything in the book is unquestionable. It’s OK to disagree. But at its core, this is the author’s honest evaluation of his life, his perspective on the events he witnessed and engaged us in. It’s an honest and sincere attempt to figure out the complex twists and turns of the epoch in which he lived.

Alexander Shapiro

FROM THE AUTHOR

If someone in the former Soviet Union, where I lived almost my entire life from birth to retirement and emigration to America in 1992, had proposed that I write my own autobiography, I wouldn’t have considered that person to be serious.

First of all, not everyone is talented enough to write books, and, at least at the time, I didn’t have the slightest bit of confidence that I could either. Second of all, the thought never occurred to me to get involved in literature as a writer. Even if the thought back then had entered my mind, I simply didn’t have the time. I was too busy and up to my neck in other matters.

Even the idea of grabbing a pen and writing a book about one’s life had to be dismissed back then as absurd and completely unrealistic. Any sane person, with minimal knowledge of book publishing practices in the USSR, would know that the personal desire of the author, if he wasn’t a professional writer, wasn’t enough to get a book to see the light of day there. At a minimum, the initiative and support of the powers that be would be required. This could only occur when an individual or an organization in the power hierarchy decided your book was necessary and useful for society. For example, something to benefit the upbringing and education of the younger generation in the spirit of communist ideals and loyalty to Marxist-Leninist teachings, etc.

I doubt that my autobiography, which contains numerous instances of State-sponsored anti-Semitism and discrimination based on one’s nationality and ethnicity, corresponds to those ideals. More likely the book points out blatant violations of the USSR constitution, which proclaimed friendship among different nations, equality, and the brotherhood of people of all nationalities as the fundamental principles of the Soviet state.

I encountered, saw, and experienced a lot in my time, but the thought of writing about it all only came to me in America, a democratic country where human rights are not only written into the Constitution, but are actually observed in real life.

Then, when I was able to freely express my thoughts, this idea began to seem more realistic than ever before, and I took to implementation. I devoted several years of my life in America to the completion of this book and gave it all my free time. This new type of creative work gave me great satisfaction. I can only hope you derive as much satisfaction from the result.

Friends and relatives helped me a great deal with the book. They became not only the first readers of each new chapter, but also my advisors. Today I would like to extend my heartfelt gratitude to my friends for their help: Evgeniy Shustorovich, Nelle Toporskaya, Leonid Paudi and Joseph Ermant; my wife, Anna Abramovna; my son, Vladimir and his wife, Rita; my daughter, Vera, and her husband, Vladimir; my grandchildren, Ilia and Natasha and my sister, Polina. My special thanks go out to the book’s editor, Alexander Shapiro, without whose help, this book would likely never have seen the light of day.

This book ends with our arrival in New York and, who knows, maybe I’ll find the strength in my old age to take a stab at writing a sequel that describes my life in the country that has become my new homeland.

Natan Gimelfarb

DEDICATED TO MY CHILDREN AND GRANDCHILDREN

My dear children and wonderful grandchildren!

After we celebrated my seventieth birthday and the countdown began for the eighth decade of my life, I began to sense that I was approaching the finish line. As I look back over my past years, it becomes more and more clear to me that much of my life, life of my parents, and of our entire large, close-knit family, might be of certain interest for you and your children and grandchildren. It might also be interesting for other Jews scattered, as always, around the world. I think that my bitter experience has some value and I shouldn’t take it to the grave with me, nor do I want to.

If you also find it useful for yourself, then accept this memoir as my gift to you. It gives me great pleasure as I always want to make you happy.

I’ll tell you quite candidly; it wasn’t easy to take up the pen. After all, I’m not a writer and not a journalist (unless you take into account a couple of dozen technical articles). I suspect that what I have written will not become a literary masterpiece, but that was not the goal I set for myself.

A few of my friends, who have more literary talent than I, and who considered my autobiography a useful endeavor, offered me their assistance. But I decided to write it myself, since who knows my life better than I? Who else feels and understands all the subtleties and specifics of the events that took place? My decision also reflected my unspoken love for my parents, brothers, close relatives, and friends who died during my childhood and youth from hunger and cold, from beatings and violence of the Jewish pogroms during the Civil War, and during WWII. Those tortured and executed in the ghetto, dead from wounds on battlefields and from severe diseases.

May they always be remembered and honored!

The most important thing I want to assure you of is that my story is truthful and comes from the soul. Read it. And if it serves some purpose for you and your children in this life, if it teaches you something good then I will consider that I have fulfilled my obligation. For me that would be the best reward for my great love for you, for my half-century of service to people and to my family.

Your Father and Grandfather, Natan Gimelfarb

PART ONE

THROUGH HUNGER AND WAR

1

It is customary to think of the place you were born as your homeland or motherland. I don’t know who came up with that concept, and I’m not sure that it is absolutely accurate in all cases. If that were true, what would be the motherland of someone who was born on a ship crossing the ocean or in an airplane flying from one continent to another? Other things in my life also have made me doubt the veracity of that definition in general.

As far as my own motherland is concerned, I have absolutely no doubt that it is the tiny village of Krasilov, which is not far from the city of Proskurov, now called Khmelnitsk, in western Ukraine next to the old border with Poland.

I know that’s true because not only is there no doubt I was born there, but mainly because there’s no place on Earth where I feel more comfortable and that is dearer to my heart than Krasilov, which left familiar details of my early childhood and adolescence etched into my memory forever. Memories I cherish of my parents, older brothers, and numerous relatives who were so kind to me, to whom I remain in irredeemable debt, and to whom I never was able to express my gratitude, love, and devotion, are associated with Krasilov. I was never able to, because they died so early. Memories of my childhood friends who died during the war or who were executed in the ghetto; memories of my unforgettable school years, especially of my first years of study in a real Jewish school, are all associated with Krasilov.

Krasilov is the pain lodged in my heart that I’ve felt my whole life and which refuses to subside. That’s why this small village is so dear to me, and why I have every justification to consider it my only motherland. It’s precisely this little place that I associate with the term, motherland. Not with the Ukraine of which Krasilov was a part, or the country to which the Ukraine belonged, which was considered a Great Power, even a Superpower. I only associate the term with that tiny hamlet. I cannot consider Ukraine and the Superpower my motherland because from them I knew only suffering and because they betrayed me more than once.

It’s probably for that reason that they are associated in my memory more with the concept of a stepmother, since a real mother would not be capable of causing so much pain and inflicting so much suffering and harm…

Outwardly Krasilov had little to differentiate it from a multitude of other Jewish settlements which dotted Ukraine from west of the Dnieper River to the very borders with Romania and Poland. This was the so-called Pale of Settlement beyond which Jewish residence was not allowed and which had existed since pre-revolutionary times long ago. There was a time when it seemed to me that it was really Krasilov that Sholom Aleichem described in his stories under the name of Kasrilovka. It seemed that way to me not only because they were similar in sound, but mainly because the entire description of Sholom Aleichem’s Kasrilovka could also be attributed to our Krasilov.

In fact, when you actually read in Sholem Aleichem’s stories about the bazaar in Kasrilovka with its host of Jewish shops, stands, market stalls, tables, and booths, overflowing with piles of fresh fragrant apples and pears, cherries and plums, with various dairy products, meat and live fowl, there’s absolutely no doubt that this great author was describing our own Krasilov bazaar.

Or, for example, his description of the synagogue. It seemed that it was a copy of one of our synagogues in Krasilov. I don’t know how many there were in Kasrilovka, but in our small village there were five. When they, along with the only Jewish school, were closed almost simultaneously in 1936–1937, I often wondered why were there so many in such a small village?

The public bath in Krasilov, it seemed, was no different from the one in Kasrilovka described by Sholom Aleichem. I still remember the barker drumming up business every Friday, walking along the village streets and calling out in Yiddish, Come to the public baths!

We also had the same unnamed stream where we would bathe, play, learn to swim, and have a wonderful time.

And our Krasilov, just like Kasrilovka, was full of venerable villagers who barely made ends meet by haggling in their stalls and crafting homemade goods, but did so with great dignity. And each of them had his own place in the synagogue. Just as in Kasrilovka, we had exactly the same Jewish cemetery where Jews were buried in accordance with Jewish laws and customs and where our ancestors rested from time immemorial.

Just like Kasrilovka it was possible to walk the length and breadth of our little village in a half hour and it was very beautiful – trees everywhere and full of charm.

But nonetheless, I came to the conclusion that Krasilov was not Kasrilovka….and not only because it wasn’t located in the Poltava province near Pereyaslov, but rather in Kamenets-Podolsk province, nowadays called the Khmelnitskaya Oblast in Ukraine….and not because Kasrilovka didn’t have a railroad and Krasilov did, and every day the train left and went to Zhmerinka where you could make a connection and get to Odessa, Kiev, or even Moscow. The most important difference between Krasilov and the Kasrilovka described by Sholom Aleichem and the many other Jewish settlements scattered across Ukraine was the fact that Jews were not its only inhabitants and didn’t even constitute a majority. Besides Jews, there were Ukrainians, Poles, Russians, and gypsies living there and this left a certain imprint on life in the village. Why? I’ll tell you, but the answer didn’t make it any better for the Jews. In the neighboring villages close to Krasilov, where the overwhelming majority of inhabitants were Jews, you didn’t hear during peacetime of any flagrant instances of discord based on nationality or ethnicity. In Krasilov, however, where the Jewish population was less than half of the total, the Jews’ relations with the non-Jewish population were complicated and tense. These relations on occasion became exacerbated and led to outbursts of animosity and hatred and, in some cases, to violence and vandalism.

The Jews there had numerous overt enemies and those whose hostility was concealed. It’s hard to explain the main reason for their enmity and malevolence. Perhaps it was anti-Semitism, passed down from generation to generation, or envy, or something else, or all of it combined. I often asked myself that question and never could come up with a clear answer.

I remember, for example, how they intentionally burned down several Jewish shops in the old bazaar, how someone smeared tar on the doors of the two main Jewish synagogues, and how hooligans desecrated graves in the Jewish cemetery.

There were no Jewish pogroms when I was a child and adolescent. The Soviet government did not allow it. After all, the inviolable friendship among different nationalities was being demonstrated for the whole world. But I knew from the stories of my parents about the Jewish pogroms in Krasilov during the Civil War which involved many local residents – anti-Semites. Witnesses told me how actively local Ukrainian policemen participated in the mass killing of Jews in Krasilov during 1941–1942. In Krasilov, Jews were taken care of sooner than in other Jewish settlements, where the majority of the population was Jewish.

It’s possible, of course, that all of this happened not only because of the ethnic composition of our village. Maybe it was encouraged by some type of historical circumstance or the particular qualities of the non-Jewish portion of the Krasilov population, but one thing was certain: our village was among the leaders in anti-Semitism among Jewish settlements not only in our province, but probably in the entire western Ukraine.

2

Now, dear reader, that you already know something about my motherland, about my native village of Krasilov, where I was born and raised, it’s probably time to tell you something about my parents, about my father and mother, may they rest in peace.

It would be best, of course, to tell you something about my genealogy, about my grandfathers and grandmothers, great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers. But I won’t do that in detail, first of all, because I myself don’t know much about them and, secondly, I don’t think you’d be very interested. They lived in the last century and were ordinary Jews who worshipped God and considered it life’s main purpose to bring God’s children into this world and raise them so that they in turn could create families to begin the next cycle of life. There was no one like Karl Marx or Albert Einstein among them, nor even lesser luminaries. Nor did I have rich ancestors. None of them, including my parents, had sizeable fortunes, which could have created problems in deciding how to divide their property among their children and relatives after their death.

Consider yourselves lucky. I won’t tire you with long stories about our ancestors. However, I would like to tell you that my grandfather on my father’s side, Solomon Gimelfarb, was well known in Krasilov as a talented medical specialist. If you consider the fact, that there were no real doctors with higher education and experience in the village back in those days, and that the local inhabitants did not trust the young doctors, it becomes easy to believe the stories of the old-timers about how much authority and respect he enjoyed from the locals with respect to treating literally all types of illness. He did not refuse to treat patients from the surrounding towns and villages either. My grandfather was also valued for healing with various herbs, in use of which he was very knowledgeable. The old men who knew Solomon Gimelfarb related that he was a kind and sympathetic individual who never took money from the poor for his advice.

I never knew Grandfather Solomon personally, since he died in 1926, when I was one and a half years old. But I do remember my Grandmother Pesya a little. She was very devout and prayed constantly. She was very poor and tried to be economical and frugal in everything. I recall how she would manage to butter several slices of black bread with a small strip of butter without the bread changing color even on the buttered surface.

After the death of my grandfather, as my mother used to tell it, my grandmother in her sorrow completely withdrew into herself, and it was rare that even the slightest smile could be detected on her face. She died in 1930, still grieving, when I was about six years old.

I almost don’t remember at all my grandfather and grandmother on my mother’s side, even from the stories of my parents and relatives. They lived in Staro-Konstantinov not far from Krasilov and rarely came to visit. I only know that my grandfather was named Zindel and that he taught in a Jewish school, and that my grandmother, Musya, ran the household and raised the children her entire life. My grandfather’s last name was Moverman. They died at the beginning of the 1920s before I was born. Their daughter, Aunt Sutsya, my mother’s sister, used to come visit us in Krasilov when my mother was ill. I was ten years old at the time. She would come with her children – Manya and Izya. They miraculously survived the war and I’ll tell you about them later.

My grandmother Pesya had two younger sisters. Khava lived in the old bazaar with her deaf husband, Avrum. Their only son who survived the revolution, Benjamin, left for Palestine in 1920. They knew almost nothing about his fate, and they would often cry when they reminisced about him. I remember Aunt Khava well. I used to call her Mima (grandmother) Khava and loved her very much for her kindness and the attention she paid me, my younger sister and older brothers, especially after the death of our parents. Mima Khava always treated us with great warmth and would often invite us to her place on Saturdays to eat stuffed fish, potato pudding, and a variety of delicious sweets, something which always pleased us to no end. For Hanukkah she gave gifts of money to us (Hanukkah gelt) in sums that significantly exceeded the monetary gifts from our other relatives.

Grandmother Pesya’s other sister, Sheyva, was not as kind to us and we rarely visited her. She lived nearby with her daughter Khavale and her husband, Uncle Isaac, a chemistry teacher. They had a son, Borenka, a handsome and very gifted boy. Not only his parents, but all our Krasilov relatives were proud of him. Everyone thought that they were watching a Wunderkind grow up. Everyone loved him very much, but none as much as Grandmother Sheyva.

Perhaps I should stop here and limit my narrative about our relatives and tell a little about my parents. I say a little not because I didn’t love them very much and wasn’t grateful to them as a son should be, but because the happy years, when, like other kids my age, I could enjoy a mother and father’s love, their care, and the security from hardships, affronts, and dangers which we so frequently encountered as children, were few and short-lived.

There’s a reason that it’s said that people tend not to appreciate what they have, and that they take the good in life for granted. That was the case with me as well.

It was only after the death of my parents (I was not quite nine when I lost my father and two years later my mother died), that I understood clearly what they had meant to me. That was not only because of the fact that nobody can replace parents. It was mainly because my parents were truly remarkable. I often compared them to the parents of my friends, kids my age with whom I interacted and whose homes I often visited. And each time I came to the conclusion that none of them had such loving, kind, and affectionate parents. I never remember a harsh word being spoken to me. My parents taught us a sense of responsibility and diligence in our work and studies, honesty, truthfulness, respect for one’s elders, and kindness without raising their voices and without coercion and punishment. They served as an example for us in everything. And since we saw only consideration, concern, kindness, a desire and readiness to help in the way they treated each other, their children, relatives, friends and even complete strangers, we had no choice but to view their lives as something to emulate.

Diligence, honesty, decency, and kindness became hereditary values in our family. My father inherited them from our Grandfather Solomon and passed them along to his children. It was these qualities that set apart my brothers and my sister from other children their age. In fact, they were so radically different that many people thought that they were simply not normal, very special and not even of this world. That’s how people in our village viewed our father as well.

As I’ve already told you, my Grandfather Solomon had a secondary level medical education, worked as a medical specialist and highly valued folk medicine in particular, treatment with herbs from which he prepared various teas and other concoctions. Because he was deeply convinced that the treatment of many diseases lay in precisely this direction, he decided to give his favorite son Moisey, my father, an education at any cost and make him a disciple to his cause and ideas.

I say at any cost because at that time it was not a simple matter to send a son to study at the institute or in a university. This cost large sums of money which my grandfather obviously never had enough of. Besides, in Jewish families of that time it was generally customary to teach children, especially boys, a trade which could provide more rapid assistance to the family in their struggle for survival. That’s why boys in Jewish settlements more often than not became tailors, shoemakers, barbers, butchers, milkmen, and merchants. My grandfather was advised to do the same.

But Grandfather Solomon stuck to his guns. He got the money together and sent his son off to the institute. That son returned to Krasilov with a degree in pharmacology and worked in the town pharmacy his whole life. Even though he was the only specialist with a higher education in the village, it didn’t help him advance in his career. He worked his entire life as a pharmacist.

Nobody tried to replace him in his position, because not only was he the best educated man in the field of pharmacology in the village and knew better than anyone else how to do the job, but also because he was extremely conscientious and loved his work. He would often stay until late in the evening at the pharmacy when, as he would say, there was an urgent job to do. He was often called in early in the morning or even at night when it was required. Friends, and even people he didn’t know well, constantly turned to him for help and advice. For him strangers simply did not exist. Everyone in the village knew him. He never refused to come in to work when he was called upon and never refused to help people when they needed it.

There was very little time left for him to devote to us children, but he used every hour, every minute away from his main job to spend time with us, to play, to teach us something, or just to take a walk with us. Even though these times were limited, those short hours of contact with him were enough for me to feel the full measure of his fatherly love, concern, and care. Therefore, it’s not surprising that my brothers, my sister, and I loved our father very much. It was surprising that each of us wasn’t jealous of our father’s affection to the other. As far as I was concerned, I’ll admit that for some reason I always believed that he loved me more than the others although I was neither the first-born nor the baby of the family. Maybe my brothers and my younger sister felt the same way in their hearts . My little sister was justified to think so if for no other reason than that she was the youngest of all the children and even more so because she was the only girl.

Although I took his love, kindness and attention to me for granted and therefore don’t remember many details, certain manifestations of my father’s feelings towards me were etched into my memory forever.

I remember how he taught me to play chess when I was very young. In those days hardly anyone played chess. Papa played well, loved and appreciated chess, and considered it the most intellectual and useful game ever invented by man. He taught us, all three brothers, how to play. Maybe he would have taught our sister as well, but at the time she was very young. He was pleased at his sons’ success in mastering chess, but most of all he was pleased at my success. Maybe because I was the youngest of the three brothers, but maybe also because I was his favorite.

Despite being extremely busy, he found time to organize family chess tournaments and played the role of judge and participant. When the tournament was over, Papa would hand out awards to the winners. Simple and inexpensive gifts like a notebook, an album for drawing, or a package of colored crayons brought forth the competitive spirit in the participants in the tournaments and great joy in the victor.

For me, chess was my favorite pastime and, perhaps if it hadn’t been for the untimely death of my father and the resulting hardships which descended on our family, I might have achieved notable successes in the game.

I also remember how I would sit on my father’s knees as a small child at dinner. There was an unchanging order at the dinner table for everyone in our family. We would have dinner when Papa came home from work. Usually this was at the same time, but even if Papa had to stay late at work, we all waited for his return. Wherever we were at the time, whatever we were doing, we all came home on time for dinner. There was no coercion required for this because each dinner for us was a holiday and we anxiously awaited each meal no matter what was being served.

Mama, of course, played the main role in organizing the family dinners. She drew up the list of dishes, purchased the necessary groceries, cooked, set the table and served each meal. The food was varied and what she prepared depended on the days of the week, holidays and our financial possibilities. The table was set with a fresh tablecloth and served with care. Papa sat at the head of the table: so distinguished, handsome, freshly shaved and smiling, his hair combed with a patch of barely visible gray on his temples. He seemed like some kind of a king to me. Maybe not a real king like I would see in paintings, but our family king nonetheless. He always commanded our attention. Each of us accepted his suggestions and advice without a murmur. Besides our reciprocal love for him, there were other powerful reasons for this. He was an extremely clever, highly educated, cultured, and tactful man.

Papa would usually sit the smallest of the children on his knees. Each of my older brothers got his turn when he was the smallest, but I don’t remember that. My mother told me about it. But I do remember myself very well in that position which I appreciated so much and of which I was very proud. I don’t know what my other brothers felt at the time, but our mother obviously didn’t take to it. That was almost the only reason for disagreements between them. Our diminutive, kind and quiet mother, obedient to the head of household in everything and, gazing at him with such devoted and loving eyes, would suddenly transform. She would openly protest and demand that our father put the child back where he belonged. But then our father, so accommodating and agreeable with her on everything, trying to always satisfy her every desire, would not yield. Wordlessly and without arguing he was able to calm Mama down with only his kind and affectionate gaze, and the child would remain on his knees. With time this became part of his normal behavior, and he gained enough experience to comfortably manage all of his dinner table obligations. He himself ate with gusto and made sure the child had food, praised Mama for the tasty dishes, passed on the news from the village, and would even tell a joke or funny story which made our entire family group gush with friendly laughter. Dinner usually lasted a rather long time, and we did not hurry to leave the table, trying to extend our pleasure from the food and, most importantly, from the contact with our wonderful parents.

One incident, however, occurred which gave Mama an excuse to prohibit feeding the youngest member of the family on Papa’s knees for a time. And, although it was my fault, Papa suffered more than anyone from it. I was five years old at the time and as usual was eating while sitting on Papa’s knees. Mama served a plate with hot chicken broth which I managed to spill on Papa, seriously scalding his knees and my left arm which to this day bears traces of the burn. There was so much noise and so many tears because of what happened, that Papa had to give up his habit for a while. But only for a while. When my arm healed I was back on his knees for dinner, and when my sister Polechka grew a little, the special place by right passed on to her.

I also remember this story. Papa was given a voucher for a vacation in Pushche-Voditsa near Kiev in gratitude for his diligent work in the pharmacy which was unanimously appreciated by both the local medical authorities as well as all his patients. His preparations for the trip were lengthy and thorough and two days before he left, he announced that he had decided to take me with him. Mama objected. Our relatives tried to talk him out of it, but he insisted. I was about seven years old at the time. Of course, I liked Papa’s decision and I couldn’t conceal my delight. It was the first time in my life that I was heading out on such a trip. I went with Papa to the train station in a horse-driven cab for the first time in my life and rode on a real train for the first time. Even though we traveled in the train at night, I couldn’t sleep and peered out the window all night, where absolutely nothing could be seen besides the bright lights of the occasional station and whistle stop. Only in the morning, when the sun appeared on the horizon were we able to see fields and forests, small streams and lakes and white, straw-covered peasant huts that flashed by the window. It was all very interesting.

But it was even more interesting in the resort itself where we ended up as evening fell. The small pavilions where the sleeping quarters were located were nestled in the lush green vegetation of a beautiful park. Paved pathways led to a large two-story building where the club and dining facilities were located and to a square with sculptures and a small fountain in the center. The sports complex was nearby and was equipped with volleyball, basketball, and gorodki courts and canopies to protect the ping pong and billiard tables. A movie theater, library, and special area for dances and games were located in the club. All in all, the place had all the prerequisites for a thorough and complete vacation.

Papa and I were lodged in a cozy room with all the conveniences and with a balcony. There weren’t any children at the resort and I kept wondering how Papa had managed to negotiate my presence there. Papa kept me close to him the whole time. We took strolls together through a pine forest, took spins in a row boat and in a motorized launch, went swimming and basked in the sun, saw movies and played chess. We ate delicious food in the cafeteria and there was a wide variety of different dishes. We enjoyed beautiful weather, the kind that Ukraine has at the end of summer. I enjoyed myself thoroughly in Papa’s company and it all seemed like some kind of fairy tale.

The time flew by quickly and when it came time to return home, it suddenly turned cold and started raining. Papa tried everything to keep me from catching cold. He tried, but it didn’t work.

Krasilov met us with a cold, drenching rain and by the time we got home, we were soaked to the bone. They say you have to pay a price for enjoying yourself, and I paid a steep one for the delights that Papa had provided for me.

The trip cost me a cold, pneumonia, and bronchial asthma which could have fatal consequences. My illness cost my parents even more dearly. They literally were deprived of sleep and ran their legs off as they searched for ways to save me. They brought doctors from Proskurov and carefully following all of their admonishments, ensured the ideal care and feeding regimen for me and miraculously averted what seemed like certain death.

My parents’ touching and selfless love, their giving of themselves, unbelievable capacity for work, and courage in carrying out their parental obligation remain in my memory to this day.

And, if on top of everything else, you consider that in those days we lived in poverty, and that the hardest thing for my parents was to turn to someone for help or borrow money, then you can only wonder and delight at their brave and self-sacrificing fight for my survival.

I would like especially to say something about our mother here. In comparison with Papa – a handsome, educated, and very capable man whom everyone loved and respected and of whom our entire family and our many relatives, friends, and, I won’t be wrong if I say, all the inhabitants of our village, were proud, our mother in everyday life seemed unremarkable. She was short, unassuming, and quiet with a perpetually sad and worried expression on her face. That’s how I remember her from my childhood.

She never tried to play first violin in our family orchestra. She voluntarily gave that role to Papa whom she loved with her whole heart and unabashedly worshipped

In reality, despite all the indisputable qualities of our father, it’s difficult to say categorically to whom we, the children, owed more for our happy childhood which imbued in us a hereditary devotion to parental duty and industry that stayed with us our entire lives and will remain until our death. Probably, we owed both of them in equal measure.

Of course, you could say that this wasn’t surprising at all. All parents love their children in their own way and care for them. But allow me to disagree with you. As a child I knew quite a bit about the relationships my friends had with their parents, including families with greater material resources than our parents had for raising their kids and ensuring that they had a happy childhood. I am absolutely certain that despite our parents’ poverty, we were the objects of more affection and love than all of my peers.

I’ll go further and say that, to my shame, I can’t say that my own children, whom I love very much, received as much attention and affection from me as I did from my own parents. The realization that I didn’t give as much to my children when they were young has caused me relentless remorse. Now is not the place to explain the reasons that led to this and I mention it only to emphasize my own feelings towards my parents, and I stress that my feelings were for both parents in equal measure.

They somehow complemented each other creating, in my opinion, an overall ideal and harmonious balance in the relations between parents and children. Mama occupied herself more with keeping house. She cooked, washed clothes, ironed, cleaned house, repaired clothing, sewed a little herself, bought groceries, fed and clothed the entire family. And she did it all as conscientiously as Papa did his work. Her work began early in the morning and ended late at night. And the fact that family life was perfectly ordered and organized was no less her accomplishment than Papa’s.

So, our family lived in peace, love, and harmony and we took it all for granted. It seemed that’s how it would be forever. It probably seemed that way because life was good to us and we wanted it to last eternally.

But, unfortunately our happiness was short-lived or perhaps more accurately – fleeting. It all began with the famine…the same famine which broke out in Ukraine in 1933. It now has finally been officially recognized that at least five million people perished as a result. I wasn’t yet nine years old then and in the second grade of the Jewish school. It’s impossible to forget the horror. You don’t forget something like that. It surprises me that I still remember so clearly everything associated with those terrible years right down to the smallest details. I remember even the thoughts and doubts which possessed me in that long ago time.

You can ask what thoughts about the state and social framework of a country could possibly possess a nine year old boy. The question is reasonable. But believe me; I remember clearly the arguments and discussions on