Selected text
My father’s parents lived across from us on the other side of the street. They heated with wood, and since there wasn’t electricity, they lit with [mineral spirit] lamps. Grandpa Izsak Eilander was a tailor. We called Grandpa, ‘Zaidi’. I remember him sitting at a machine with a black kippah on his head. He wore a big beard. I remember a funny story connected with him. When I went to their house, he took me on his knee and said, ‘Gib mir ain kis’ [give me a kiss - Yiddish]. I didn’t want to give him a kiss, since he stunk of garlic. Grandpa laughed, but I always got a piece of candy for it.
Grandma Rachel, my father’s mother was a fat lady. She lived with Grandpa in a two-room house. They kept a cow. The stable was in the courtyard. Aunt Hindi, who was my father’s uncle’s wife – unfortunately, I don’t remember her name anymore – she and I went to feed the cow in the stable. She sent me up to the loft, and I threw down the hay from there. Aunt Hindi was fat, she didn’t fit up the ladder, that’s why she sent me.
Grandma wore a black skirt, blue apron, black headscarf and ‘pruszliks’ [Hungarian style bodices]. On her feet, she wore high-legged lace-up shoes of fine zsevro leather [Sevro leather – finely worked goatskin used for shoe uppers]. Grandma also wore a scarf over her wig. Grandpa went in trousers, a vest and shirtsleeves. He grew his payes, as did all the Jewish men of Dombo. My father had a beard, too, and payes. On his head, he wore a kippah. He didn’t wear a hat at home. The majority of Jewish men wore kaftans [It is likely that the community in Dombo were Hasidim], and they also wore streimels, but that was only what Father usually told us.
I don’t know anything about the siblings of my grandparents. Mother never spoke about them. My grandparents never talked about their childhood, either. I was seven years old when we moved away from Dombo. Yet, I never saw my grandparents again after that.
Grandma Rachel, my father’s mother was a fat lady. She lived with Grandpa in a two-room house. They kept a cow. The stable was in the courtyard. Aunt Hindi, who was my father’s uncle’s wife – unfortunately, I don’t remember her name anymore – she and I went to feed the cow in the stable. She sent me up to the loft, and I threw down the hay from there. Aunt Hindi was fat, she didn’t fit up the ladder, that’s why she sent me.
Grandma wore a black skirt, blue apron, black headscarf and ‘pruszliks’ [Hungarian style bodices]. On her feet, she wore high-legged lace-up shoes of fine zsevro leather [Sevro leather – finely worked goatskin used for shoe uppers]. Grandma also wore a scarf over her wig. Grandpa went in trousers, a vest and shirtsleeves. He grew his payes, as did all the Jewish men of Dombo. My father had a beard, too, and payes. On his head, he wore a kippah. He didn’t wear a hat at home. The majority of Jewish men wore kaftans [It is likely that the community in Dombo were Hasidim], and they also wore streimels, but that was only what Father usually told us.
I don’t know anything about the siblings of my grandparents. Mother never spoke about them. My grandparents never talked about their childhood, either. I was seven years old when we moved away from Dombo. Yet, I never saw my grandparents again after that.
Location
Slovakia
Interview
Ruzena Deutschova