Dora Slobodianskaya with her husband Boris Slobodianskiy

This is a picture of me and my husband Boris Slobodianskiy at our 50th wedding anniversary. The photo was taken in Chernovtsy in 2002. I retired in 1981 when my granddaughter Marina was born. In the late 1980s my husband and I organized a club for old people. This took place at the beginning of perestroika when we felt free. We wanted to take part in the restoration of Jewish life. There were 300 seats in our club, and it was always overcrowded. We arranged meetings twice a week. Poems by Jewish poets were recited and Jewish music and songs were sung. I sang Jewish songs I knew from childhood. There was still anti-Semitism, and my daughter was concerned about a possibility of Jewish pogroms, but we were alright. Our club existed until Ukraine became independent in 1991 and Hesed was established. We believe that the restoration of the Jewish way of life is our mission. In 1995 my husband established a radio program in Yiddish called 'Dos Yidishe Wort'. It's a monthly program and we get free broadcast time. I help my husband to collect material for this program. We invite many interesting people. About once every three months we broadcast a program on Jewish history. My husband and I take an active part in the work of Hesed. Once a week my husband conducts a meeting of veterans of the Great Patriotic War. Hesed is our big family. We celebrate holidays and birthdays at Hesed. I also try to do all I can to preserve the memory of the victims of the war. In 1990 I began to collect data about Holocaust victims. I send this information to the Yad Vashem museum in Israel. I've sent over 400 forms there. It's my duty to do everything to contribute to the memory of the innocent people that perished, so that we may never forget this horrific tragedy of our people, the tragedy that took 6 million lives or a lot more, I guess. This must not happen again, and if we don't want it to happen again, we need to know and remember.