Tag #135880 - Interview #78511 (Vasile Grunea)

In my father’s family it must have been my grandfather who led the seder night; in our family it was my father. It is always the youngest member of the family who asks the so-called four questions [the ma nishtanah], which go like this, ‘Why is this night different from all other nights?’. As I was the youngest, it was always my job to ask the four questions. I learnt the ma nishtanah from my father. I think that he read them out to me several times and I memorized them. I had three tasks to perform: first, I had to participate; second, I had to ask the four questions; and third, I had to steal the afikoman and then give it back. Of course, the afikoman was placed on the table for me to hide. [Editor’s note: It is usually the adults, who hide the afikoman, but in Laszlo’s family it was the opposite, because the child had to hide it.] Because the seder ritual couldn’t be concluded without the afikoman, the person who hid it came and there was some kind of a bidding, I said that I would give back the afikoman if they gave this or that in return. I usually hid the afikoman behind the back of the chair or went out of the room and hid it among the books. I usually asked for some toy – a toy car – or a book for it, and when I was older, I asked for a watch or something like that. Seder was very intimate, as the entire family got together at these times. My father put on his kitel, in which he got married. Another Pesach custom was that the seder leader sat in an armchair or on a bigger and more comfortable chair, and a cushion was put on the chair, which symbolized that he was the master, and he was free to do whatever he wanted – this was a symbol of comfort and freedom. On seder night a basin was brought so that he wouldn’t have to get up and go out every time he had to perform the ritual of hand washing; the basin was placed on a chair together with a pitcher, from which he could pour water to wash his hands. Everything was done according to the rules.