Tsylia Shapiro with her husband Natan Shapiro

My husband Natan and I, Tsylia Shapiro. This photo was taken in Lvov on 12th December 2002.

Perestroika came as fresh wind for my husband and me. My husband wasn’t a devoted communist and by that time he wasn’t a party member any longer. Actually, he joined the Party to have no obstacles in his career. After he became a pensioner he lost his party membership certificate and never recalled it.

We are very enthusiastic about the possibilities for people to travel and chose a place of living. There is freedom of speech. It is good that people got to know about the tragedy of the Jewish people during the Great Patriotic War. There were books published that were not allowed before. The Jewish life has revived. Synagogues were opened and Jewish communities were established. We can state proudly now that we are Jews.

My husband and I often attend Hesed – a car picks us up to take us to the Daytime Center. Hesed provides a lot of support and assistance to us. I stopped singing Jewish songs after my daughter died, but now I find myself smiling at concerts in Hesed.

We have friends in Hesed and we’ve come back to our historical sources: we celebrate all Jewish holidays, buy matzah and read Jewish newspapers. We even submitted our documents to go to Israel, but then we changed our mind because of the terrorism and unstable situation there. I wish we could move to Israel with our son’s family.