Chaim and Otylia Ejnesman in Ciechocinek

This is me and my second wife, Otylia Ejnesman, in Ciechocinek. The photo was taken in 2002.

During the time I was in Canada, I had no contacts with Poland. One day I got sick in Ontario [in 1990], they took me to the hospital with a stroke and I had to leave. There are no possibilities there. There you have to be rich when you fall ill. And I had a Polish passport, because I never gave it back. I never took Russian citizenship, or any other.

My wife brought me to Poland in 1992, to a sanatorium in Iwonicz. I was there for several months and I was getting better. A lot better. We even wanted to buy an apartment there, in Krosno. But they convinced us to move closer to Warsaw. I didn't care much. Because after this stroke, I was in bad shape for quite some time. So they got this house. And we're living here, in Podkowa Lesna. I wouldn't want to live in Warsaw, because there's too much noise. But this will have to be sold. It's difficult to maintain a house now. Our children are in Canada and we stayed here. They come here from time to time to visit us.

I registered as a war veteran in Warsaw, that's when we started going to the Jewish Theater, to TSKZ. People visited me from Spielberg's Foundation, they were making a movie. We celebrate Jewish holidays, because my wife likes that. She goes to the rabbi to get the matzah; by now he knows her better than he knows me. She's more involved, but because I can't walk, how could I get involved. And life goes on, thank God, we're living all right. I go to rehabilitation, they take me; you live as long as you can, don't you?