Semyon Tilipman and his wife Tatiana Tilipman

This is me Semyon Tilipman and my wife Tatiana Tilipman. This photo was taken on our wedding day in Odessa, 24 March 1939.

In 1936 I met my future wife Tatiana Krupnik who visited her older brother Moisey Krupnik living in our house. I liked her much. I kept looking at her. She fit a Jewish saying of being 'a kleine, a Schwartz, a springendik' [little, black and fidgety in Yiddish]. They usually say so about a flea, but Tatiana was little, well-fed, black-haired, vivid and very pretty. I was shy and had no experience with girls. Since I was an electrician I was helping with electrical maintenance of our house. My friends and I made a plot and I made a short circuit to get into Tatiana brother's apartment to meet her, but it didn't work. Finally I gathered my courage and approached her in the yard where she was with her one-year-old nephew. I didn't find anything better than: 'Have I seen you somewhere?' She studied at the vocational school at the Medical college. I've been to the morbid anatomy room there and lied that I had seen her there. Anyway, we made our acquaintance.

Tatiana was born in the Jewish town of Dzygovka, Vinnitsa region in 1920. She was the fifth daughter in her family. Tatiana had two brothers Moisey and Iosif and two sisters Ida and Rosa. Tatiana was the last and favorite one. Her parents Srul and Hana Krupnik were also born in Dzygovka. They were deeply religious. Tatiana was raised Jewish.

When Tatiana turned 15 in 1935, she went to Odessa to enter the Stomatological College. She failed and went to study at the vocational school. After finishing this school she entered the Medical College. We decided to get married in 1939. I was in my last year at the Communications College and Tatiana had finished her 2nd year. We got married on 25 March 1939. We had a wedding party for the family: my parents and Tatiana's parents Srul and Hana. We had a traditional Jewish wedding ceremony at home, but there was no chuppah. Our parents' acquaintance, an old religious Jew conducted the ceremony. I recited a prayer that I had written for me in Russian letters. After the ceremony we had a wedding party. A day later we had a civil ceremony in the registry office near the Opera Theater. After the wedding Tatiana and I lived with my parents. Tatiana got along with my mother very well. Tatiana likes to recall the way they met. My mother took her hands, pressed them to her chest and said 'I'm glad to be able to call you Tilipman'.