Mina Gomberg's parents Ilia and Surah Roitman with a friend

My father Ilia Roitman is sitting on the right, my mother Surah Roitman is in the center, and one of my mother's friend's is on the left. The photo was taken on my mother's birthday in the 1930s in Kiev. My father was born in Kiev in 1909. He finished cheder and a Russian secondary school in Kiev. After finishing school he entered some technical college, but he only studied there for a short time. The family was pressed for money, and he had to work to support them. My father worked as a laborer wherever he could find a job. In 1939 he was recruited to the army and involved in the Finnish campaign. His service lasted for about a year, and he returned home afterwards. My mother was born in Belaya Tserkov in 1912. She studied at the Jewish primary school and then went to the Jewish lower secondary school named after Sholem Aleichem. She finished school in 1929. In 1930 she moved to Kiev, where her sister Vera was living at that time. My mother went to work as a laborer at the Kiev radio plant. In 1931 my mother became a Komsomol member, and in 1932 she became a Communist Party candidate. She also became a Komsomol public propagandist at the radio plant. She propagated the Komsomol among young people, explaining its ideas and goals to them. I don?t know when and how my mother met my father. They got married in 1937, and my mother moved to her husband's apartment, where his parents were also living. As far as I know they had a civil registration ceremony and no wedding party.