My wife Lubov Neubauer at the River Uzh embankment, near the school where she worked. We were having a stroll and I took this photograph. This photo was taken in Uzhgorod in 1970.
My wife Lubov Neubauer was born in Savran in 1932. Her Jewish name was Liebe. Her father Moisey Kerzhner and her mother Meita Kerzhner were religious. They observed Jewish traditions. Their daughters of course, were no longer religious, but they remained Jewish. They knew Jewish traditions, Jewish culture and spoke Yiddish to one another and to their parents. Lubov finished a Pedagogical College and got a job assignment to a Ukrainian village. Finishing her 3-year assignment Lubov arrived in Uzhgorod. She worked as elementary school teacher.
We got married in 1957. We had a civil ceremony in a registry office on 18 June and when vacations began at school and teachers went on vacation we had a Jewish wedding. We had to keep it a secret. My wife was a teacher, and authorities watched teachers' ideology very strictly. If her management knew that we had a Jewish wedding she might have been fired with the comment that she 'was not fit to raise the young generation in the spirit of communism'. It happened so at the time. With this entry in her employment records book she wouldn't have found another job as a teacher, or even as a cleaning woman. Therefore, we secretly had a chuppah at home. My relatives and Lubov's sister were with us. Her parents also arrived at the wedding. Lubov and I always celebrated Sabbath and Jewish holidays visiting with my mother and stepfather. In 1959 our first baby was born. We named our son Avrum after my father. We had a brit milah ritual for him. Of course, this was also done secretly, but one of my wife's colleagues heard about it and my wife had problems. Her director and the town educational department called her and asked her one question: 'How could you do this?' Fortunately, it ended just with a reprimand. In 1968 our daughter Marina was born. We gave her the Jewish name of Meita after my wife's mother, who had died one year before our daughter was born. My wife and I spoke Yiddish for the most part.
Our children studied at school and were pioneers and Komsomol members. I didn't mid this. They were growing up in this country and it was better for them to be no different from others. Still my wife and I told our children about Jewish traditions and Jewish history, but we also told them to not discuss this with anybody else. We celebrated Jewish holidays at home. I didn't go to the synagogue, but I prayed at home. I had a tallit, a tefillin and a prayer book.
