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We were accommodated in a school building in Mariupol. We slept on the floor on our luggage. We were there several days. Aunt Rosa went to Tokmak. My mother, Zachariy and I went to Saratov by a freight train. I don’t remember how we managed to get food on the way, but we somehow survived. It was a long trip and we arrived in Saratov in winter. It was December, minus 36 degrees. We joined my father in Saratov. We lived in a room and our landlady lived in another in her apartment. One railcar with the plant equipment got lost and some officers [from NKVD] came for my father. I don’t know by what miracle they didn’t shoot him at once, but he was taken to court. We didn’t have anything to eat. My mother went to the evacuation agency at the railway station where she could get some bread. My mother fell ill with typhus. My father was in jail and my mother was ill. I don’t know how we managed. Besides, we became enemies of the people in our surrounding since my father was in jail. Fortunately, everything turned out well. This ill-fated railcar arrived and my father was released. Life was hard in Saratov and we went to my mother’s sisters Rosa and Tsylia in Tokmak [3. 625 km from Odessa in Kirghizia]. My father stayed to work at his plant in Saratov. They manufactured mines.
Period
Interview
Bertha Isayeva