Osip Hotinskiy

This photo was taken in Germany where my mother's younger sister Revekka [Schukina] took me with her.

The picture was taken in Berlin in 1933.

My mother's younger sister Revekka spent a lot of time with me. She was an 'Old Bolshevik' like my mother. It's not that she was old, but this was a common name for those who had joined the Communist Party before the Revolution of 1917.

Revekka finished the College of Foreign Trade. She worked at the Trade Representative Office.

In 1929 she was sent to work at the Trade Representative Office in Germany.

In 1933 Revekka came to Moscow on business and convinced my mother to let me go with her. We spent a couple of months in Copenhagen, Denmark, and then went to Berlin.

I went to the Russian school for the children of employees of the Trade Representative Office.

Hitler came to power in Germany, when we arrived there. I remember how surprised I was to see flags with swastikas on each house in Berlin. At home people put flags only on holidays.

Later I got to know that people were ordered to have flags on their houses. I remember fighters wearing brown uniforms marching in the streets. All passers-by were to greet them with their arms stretched when they were marching.

My school friend was the daughter of an employee of the Trade Representative Office. I don't remember her first name, but her surname was Grishina.

Her father didn't greet the marchers once and two of them started beating him. He screamed that he was a foreigner, but it didn't help.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent its protest to the German government, but they didn't reply. Then employees of the Trade Representative Office started going back home.

In 1934 my aunt and I returned to Moscow.