We cared little about the death of Stalin in 1953. We didn’t feel any grief or happiness. I don’t understand why it was sort of a personal tragedy for many people. We realized that the situation in this country would never change in favor of its people, that nothing would change our life. Of course it was much later, in the 1980s, that we got to know the truth about him.
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Displaying 49261 - 49290 of 50504 results
Elena Orlikova
In Saratov Borya rented a small room from a Jewish woman from Byelorussia. She was a different woman with the views and morals that she had when she lived in a distant Bielorussian village. She didn’t treat her tenants well and she was scandalous but they had to tolerate her character. Boris didn’t earn much. He had to pay the rent and sent us some money. Besides, he always helped his mother.
There were not many Jews in Saratov. They were mainly those that stayed in Saratov after evacuation.
There were very few Jews at the Institute where my husband worked and there was no evident anti-Semitism there.
In Saratov we received one room and then another room at a hostel. This hostel was arranged on the ground floor of a garment factory. Students and lecturers of the Institute lived on this one and the same floor. There was a long hallway and a big kitchen with several gas stoves. We were in good terms with students and teachers. The hostel was located in the center of the town, not far from the Institute.
Later I also went to work at the Institute. It was not easy to find a job. At first I replaced the employees that were on maternity leave, or on vacation. I was a lab assistant, and later was promoted to senior lab assistant. I had to prepare all necessary literature, materials and meeting of the Department I was working for at the moment. Some time later I received a full-time position.
The conditions in this hostel were uncomfortable. There was one common toilet and no bathroom or shower rooms. On weekends we went to a nearby hotel, where we had to stay in line for hours and hours to get washed. As for the children, they were washed in the room. We heated some water and washed them in a washbasin.
My husband was very ill. He died in February 1991. We didn’t have close friends in Saratov and I moved to the United States to join my son there.
My son has been in Israel several times. He has quite a few friends there. But he has an interesting job in the United States. And, of course, he will go on living in the country where his job is. He is very interested in Israel. He likes to travel there. He says he will take me there one day. I would like to go there, if everything goes all right.
My son and grandson have always been interested in their Jewish identity as well as history of the Jewish people. My son had books related to this subject as soon as they became available. It was when he was a student in Saratov. Now he reads more and more about it as he travels to Israel. I’ve never told my children anything about Jewish history or traditions. I know very little about them myself. I just explained to them that there are Russian, Ukrainian, Hungarian, Jewish people, etc. We are Jewish, and Jewish people historically live in various countries. So they happened to go back to their roots at their own initiative.
Unfortunately I do not observe any Jewish traditions or rules. I don’t remember and I don’t know any and it is perhaps too late to start anything in this respect. We were brought up as atheists and this cannot be changed. I think this is what many Soviet people of our generation are like. Only on family gatherings in the memory of my parents I make stuffed fish and sweet and sour stew according to my Mamma’s recipe.
,
After WW2
See text in interview
My grandfather and grandmother got married in 1894 when my grandmother reached 18.
They lived with the Faivish family at first, but later my grandfather received an apartment from the grammar school where he was working. It must have been a two-room apartment as far as I can guess.
They boy was circumcised. They followed all traditions as was customary in the Jewish families at that time: they went to the synagogue and prayed regularly, lit candles on Sabbath and did no work on this day, they fasted on Yom Kippur, celebrated Purim, Pesach, Hanukkah and the other holidays.
Their family was rather well off and they were trying to educate their children. Zinoviy studied at the commerce school and Solomon went to grammar school.
But in 1917 Lev, Leib Orlikov, my grandfather, died of a heart attack, and my father became the head of the family at 21.
I don’t know any details. All I know is that since then he was involved in some sort of commerce. It was probably more convenient for him to live in Ekaterinoslav - Dnepropetrovsk at present - and he moved his family, his mother and two brothers, to Dnepropetrovsk. They lived in Bazarnaya Street in the center of the city. My father rented a comfortable apartment for them.
I don’t know any details. All I know is that since then he was involved in some sort of commerce. It was probably more convenient for him to live in Ekaterinoslav - Dnepropetrovsk at present - and he moved his family, his mother and two brothers, to Dnepropetrovsk. They lived in Bazarnaya Street in the center of the city. My father rented a comfortable apartment for them.
Although this was a difficult time: the period of revolution and civil war. There were all kinds of gangs all around the country1, many enterprises were closed due to the war and there was not enough food produced.
I don’t know how Solomon, my father’s brother happened to be in Mariupol, but he was shot there by some white guard bandits.
She came from a rich merchant’s family. Her father Zelman Kats was a merchant of guild II2. At that time Jewish people were not allowed to live in Kiev, especially, in its central part, in the neighborhood of Kreschatik3. Only merchants of guilds I and II, doctors and midwives had this right. He lived near Kreschatik, in Mikhailovskaya Street. He owned a butcher’s shop. A shochet was cutting the meat there and it was considered kosher meat.
I only know that he came to Kiev and married Rachil Markovna Kulinskaya, the daughter of a rich merchant in Kiev. My grandmother was about 15 years younger than my grandfather.
She got education at home, she didn’t go to school, she had private teachers at home to teach her to read and write, as well as the rules of conduct in the society, good manners and foreign languages. Of course, she spoke fluent Russian and was an educated and intelligent lady.
My grandparents’ family wasn’t very religious. They only celebrated the main holidays and very rarely went to the synagogue.
After the revolution the newly founded Soviet state expropriated all richer people’s possessions leaving their families in poverty. All people were equal in their poverty. I don’t know exactly how this all went with my grandparents.
She talked (or argued, I’d say) with my grandfather in Yiddish.
They lived in a small room in the wing of the house that they previously owned. Any observation of traditions, rules or just order in the house was out of the question. They became a poor and degraded family. My grandfather worked as a night watch in an office in Kreschatik.
He wore a tyubeteika [a small traditional Tajik cap] cap.
After he came back from work he went to bed and in the evening he went to work and took his violin. He used to play violin at work. Nobody bothered him there.
I don’t know whether he was religious. He never prayed in my presence, but I know that he observed Sabbath and celebrated holidays. On holidays all their relatives were supposed to visit and greet them. There were no festive dinners, because my grandmother was ill and couldn’t cook for a whole family gathering. But it was a must to visit them on all Jewish holidays.
Maria Illinichna Kats, my grandfather’s sister, lived with them. She was born some time in 1870s and she was single. She was a dentist and was a very kind and nice person.
People said that she belonged to such people that could only love once in a lifetime. She loved a man once, but he married somebody else. She did not forgive him and never married herself.