Tag #146462 - Interview #103743 (Clara Shalenko)

Many graduates of our school went to the front. I got a job assignment to a hospital in a small town of Khorog in the mountains near the border with Afghanistan. I worked there with my schoolmate Luba Dymshytz and her sister Rosa. They evacuated from Gomel. Rosa learned the Tadzhyk language and worked as an accountant for chairman of the collective farm. She was a smart and intelligent girl. She could also ride a horse. Luba and I went around the neighboring villages riding a donkey to inoculate children from smallpox. The local Tadzhyk people treated us well. They gave us food since we were always hungry. I remember baked pumpkin that we got from them. We lived in jurta [portable Tadjik dwelling from felt round in perimeter, with a cupola-shaped roof]. Tadzyk people took their children to get treatment. We made inoculations and gave them medications, mainly quinine since many of them had malaria. I also had malaria. I worked in Khorog for about a year. In summer 1945 I returned to my parents in Stalinabad.