Here you can see me with my wife Dora Slobodianskaya, my mother Pesia Slobodianskaya and my sister Sheiva Slobodianskaya in the courtyard of our building in Chernovtsy. The photo was taken in 1953.
My younger sister Sheiva lives in Chernovtsy. After the war she finished Business College and worked as an accountant at a plant. She married a Jewish man, a former inmate of a ghetto. Her husband was foreman at a textile factory.
They had twins: a boy and a girl. They are 45 now. Their son moved to America over ten years ago and their daughter lives with her parents. She is single. She lost her job recently due to major reduction of staff. My sister Sheiva had an infarction. She is 72 and her husband is the same age.
In 1952 I met my wife-to-be Dora Melman. She was born in the Romanian town of Faleshty in 1930. Her father, Wolf Melman, was a leather specialist and her mother, Golda Melman, nee Shnaiderman, was a housewife. My wife’s parents were religious people. They observed all Jewish traditions.
After World War II they moved to Chernovtsy. Dora graduated from the Faculty of Biology of the University and worked as a teacher of Biology at a school in Chernovsty. Her distant relative was my colleague and he introduced me to her.
We got married in 1952. We didn’t have a wedding party. We had a civil ceremony and our parents organized a small dinner to celebrate. We invited our closest relatives to the dinner party.
