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I chose Zagoryanovka village near Kherson hoping to be able to often go to Kherson. When I came to the regional department of education its chairman looked at me (and I was a thin short girl) and said: ‘I don’t think it’s worth for you, girl, to go to Zagoryanovka. It’s not the place a young girl would like to be at. I will send you to Tehinka. There is big construction there. They need teachers with diplomas and this place is better than Zagoryanovka’. So I went to Tehinka. They welcomed me warmly and showed me the school. I rented a room from nice Ukrainian people: Marusia and Kolia who liked me, too. The department of education paid my rental fees and gave me money for wood and kerosene. So I was a desirable tenant. Three weeks later my mother joined me. She lived with me ever since.
There was a kolkhoz 22 named after Kalinin 23 in Tehinka. It was a poor kolkhoz. Its members were paid with food coupons for work. Since I had a regular salary I also became a desirable fiancée. Young people proposed marriage to me, but my mother and I declined them joking about it. Teaching was easy for me. I taught in the 5th, 7th and 8th grades. The 8th grade was the first year of higher secondary school. They were the children who wanted to have a complete secondary education. They listened to me with attention and I was eager to inspire love to the Russian literature in them. As for the 5th grade those children didn’t bother to listen to me. Why did they need Russian? They were noisy and caused problems. Once I lost my temper and pushed one of those hooligans. I forced him out of his desk and pushed him out of the classroom. They began to respect me then: ‘Hey, she can fight!’ and were quiet at my lessons. After working for a year I got a transfer to Daryevka, a neighboring village, since a new doctor came to Tehinka and his wife who was a teacher, needed this vacancy. I didn’t mind since Daryevka was even bigger than Tehinka and there were more comforts there.
There was a kolkhoz 22 named after Kalinin 23 in Tehinka. It was a poor kolkhoz. Its members were paid with food coupons for work. Since I had a regular salary I also became a desirable fiancée. Young people proposed marriage to me, but my mother and I declined them joking about it. Teaching was easy for me. I taught in the 5th, 7th and 8th grades. The 8th grade was the first year of higher secondary school. They were the children who wanted to have a complete secondary education. They listened to me with attention and I was eager to inspire love to the Russian literature in them. As for the 5th grade those children didn’t bother to listen to me. Why did they need Russian? They were noisy and caused problems. Once I lost my temper and pushed one of those hooligans. I forced him out of his desk and pushed him out of the classroom. They began to respect me then: ‘Hey, she can fight!’ and were quiet at my lessons. After working for a year I got a transfer to Daryevka, a neighboring village, since a new doctor came to Tehinka and his wife who was a teacher, needed this vacancy. I didn’t mind since Daryevka was even bigger than Tehinka and there were more comforts there.
Period
Year
1951
Location
Ukraine
Interview
Tsyliya Spivak