This photo of my wife Alina Litvak was taken in Kishinev in the early 1950s.
Upon demobilization from the army I returned to my parents in Kishinev. Uncle Musia helped me to get a job at the meat grinder repair shop. Once I visited a tobacco factory, when I was chief of technical supervision. I met Alina Litvak, a Jewish girl, who worked at this factory. I liked her and we began to see each other. Then we fell in love with each other and I proposed to her. We had a small wedding party with my parents, relatives and a few friends. Of course, it was a common wedding with no chuppah. After the war we didn’t observe Jewish traditions, though we celebrated holidays, particularly Pesach, and my father always brought matzah from the synagogue.
We lived a good life. I earned well and was promoted to site superintendent in 1955. My wife joined the Communist Party. After about ten years of work she became chief of her laboratory, a forewoman and then shop superintendent. We didn’t have a car or a dacha, but we always spent vacations at the seashore or in a recreation center. We bought good food and clothes, often went to theaters and concerts. We celebrated birthdays and always invited friends and relatives. We also got together with friends on Soviet holidays to go to the river bank or to a forest and have a picnic and barbecue. We didn’t celebrate Jewish holidays, but we visited our parents’ place, where my mother treated us to all kinds of delicacies: she was an excellent cook. In 1954 our son Ilia was born. My wife Alina, a holy person, a kind soul, with whom I lived a beautiful life together, died in 2003.
