Iyah Dziekovskaya’s mother Nadezhda Dziekovskaya with her daughter Inna Dziekovskaya

This is my mother Nadezhda Dziekovskaya with my sister Inna Dziekovskaya in Odessa Opera Theater. This photo was taken in Odessa in 1959. This photograph was taken during my mother's visit from Izmail. My mother loved opera, and my sister tried to take her to the theater on such occasions.

My sister Inna entered the History faculty of Odessa University, but soon she married Vladimir Sorokin, Russian, captain of a long voyage boat , and quit the university.  However, my parents insisted that she got at least some education and she finished the school of cultural education in Odessa and then the Librarian College in Leningrad. In 1953 Inna gave birth to her son Alexandr. Inna was a bright and generous person. She looked like father: tall and fair haired. Inna worked at the conservatory library.  At the age of 30 she fell ill with severe diabetes and quit work, though she led a very active life.  She often went on tours abroad and in our country. I went with her to Bulgaria and the Caucasus. Inna liked giving me expensive gifts. Inna was very active. When they bought a dacha and were reconstructing it, she made drawings herself. She supervised their workers, though she had never dealt in construction.  She also arranged repairs in their apartment when her husband was sailing.  

After father’s death in 1960 my mother often came to visit us from Izmail. In 1963  my mother helped me to buy a cooperative three-bedroom apartment in Odessa and  then she in with me. My mother insisted that we moved my father's ashes to Odessa.  We were one of the first in our house to buy a TV. We watched all programs, even our state leaders' speeches, I believe, at first.  My mother and I were sitting side by side on the sofa.  Our neighbors visited us to watch TV, of course. My mother died in 1975.  We buried her near my father in the international cemetery.