Faina Moshkovich with her children

This is a picture of my wife, Faina Moshkovich, nee Shistman, holding our daughter Olga Berman, nee Moshkovich. On her left is our son Dmitri Moshkovich. The photo was taken in Uzhgorod in 1962. I only wanted to marry a Jewish girl, I couldn't imagine otherwise, but there were hardly any single girls in Uzhgorod. I was sent to work in the small town of Solotvin in Subcarpathia. There were some nice Jews that became my friends there. They said they knew a nice Jewish girl in Chernovtsy. I went to Chernovtsy and met my future wife. Faina was born in the village of Ozarintsy, Vinnitsa region, in 1937. My wife's father, Zamvel Shystman, was a shoemaker and her mother, Etia Shystman, was a dressmaker. They had five children. My wife was their third child. My wife's parents were religious and she was raised religiously, too. Faina was four when the war began. The fascists occupied Ozarintsy and sent all Jews to the ghetto in Shargorod, Vinnitsa region. In March 1944 the Soviet army liberated the inmates of the ghetto in Shargorod and my wife's family returned home. My wife's uncle, her father's brother, lived in Chernovtsy. He took Faina there. He thought that it would be easier for Faina to find a job in a bigger town as well as accommodate her personal life. After finishing school at 16 Faina went to work at the glove factory. We met in Chernovtsy and got married on 7th December 1958. We had a traditional Jewish wedding in Solotvin. The rabbi conducted the ceremony and there was a chuppah. My wife and I lived in Solotvin for two years and then returned to Uzhgorod. I received an apartment from the enterprise where I worked. We have two children: our son Dmitri, born in 1958, and our daughter Olga, born in 1962 who was named after my sister who perished in Auschwitz. Dmitri's Jewish name is Mayer after my elder brother. My son was circumcised as required by Jewish traditions. They are nice children. They helped my wife and me to do work about the house. They studied well at school. We tried to spend as much time as possible with the children. On Sunday, our only day off, we took them for a walk in the park, to the cinema or theater. In the evening we read books to them and had discussions. My wife and I enjoyed spending time with the children. They told us about their hobbies and they often had friends visiting them. My children didn't face any anti-Semitism at school. Everybody was friendly there. Whenever I had my vacation in summer I took my family to a village in Subcarpathia for two weeks. We swam in the river and walked in the woods. Our children spent their summer vacations in children's camps. They liked it there. After my wife fell ill we couldn't go on vacation any longer and I had less free time in the evening and at weekends.