Haya Lea Kats and her family in Rovno, 1938

In this picture we are seeing off our relatives to Israel in 1937.

On the right is my brother Aron, and on the left is Daddy, Mum and my sister Bella.

In the middle are all those relatives who left for Israel. I am not in this photo, because I had been in a kibbutz back then - in the town of Slonim in Baranovichi district.

My elder sister Hava left for Israel after graduation from grammar school in 1932 to study medicine. First she joined the kibbutz in Poland and lived there a full year. She had a groom there - a Yakov Blikh, he wanted to take her away, but she was lingering.

He helped her emigrate from Poland to Israel. He sent her the certificates for departure. Our parents let her go as a bride, gave her all the best: a plush blanket, a coat, she was very beautiful.

She was really beautiful, the best in the city. Everyone was in love with her, including that teacher Khvoinik, who persecuted me.

Eventually, my sister married that Yakov Blikh. They had 2 sons. I had been to the grave of my sister when I was in Israel. She died at the age of 44 in 1960. But I do not know the reason. It seems she had a high blood pressure. She worked as a nurse. She was very respected, even loved in the hospital. And she died right there, at work.

She had two kids. One of her sons died too, and I don't know why. Her other son, Avraam Blikh, lives in Israel. When Natan, the elder son of my brother Aron, came here to visit from Germany in 1988 (he now lives in Israel), he, too, concealed from me, that Hava had for a long time been dead.