Tag #146823 - Interview #92368 (Lyudmila Kreslova)

After that teacher my mother hired a Jewish nanny for me and my sister. There were Jewish nannies in Vitebsk. Mother hired one, but she didn’t speak Russian. She was about 60 years old, an old woman. She lived in her Jewish environment: Jewish family, Jewish neighbors. At first I didn’t understand what she said. Mother and Father spoke Yiddish to each other, but they always spoke Russian to us. So the nanny started to persuade me, ‘You have to learn the Yiddish language.’ So I learnt it step by step. I can speak Yiddish now, though I forget some words. Nanny taught me to read books, she brought me Russian fairy-tales, ‘The Gray Wolf, Prince Ivan and Elena the Beautiful.’ [Tsarevitch Ivan, the Fire Bird and the Gray Wolf is a Russian fairy tale collected by Alexander Afanasyev in Narodnye russkie skazki] She gave me the books, because she didn’t understand Russian. I was not five years old yet, when I read fairy-tales myself. I read Russian fairy-tales. There were no Jewish fairy-tales, I don’t know why. But there was the Soviet Power, so there could be nothing of the kind. Nanny spent all days with us, working days and holidays, she also participated in the feasts. She was an old woman, and a lonely one, she had no relatives. She lived for two years with us and then left. After her we had a Russian nanny. The Russian nanny was also old, but she was very cheerful and she also brought me books. She didn’t spend the Jewish holidays with us, she wasn’t invited. I liked both nannies.