Mark Ryvkin

This is a photograph of Mark Ryvkin, my son. It was taken in 2002 in St. Petersburg in a photo studio. Our son entered the Leningrad College of Telecommunication, named after Bonch-Bruevich, and graduated in 1970. He was a very good student. In the process of assignment, the dean characterized my son as an excellent specialist and offered the commission members to send him to one of the defense industry enterprises. But a representative of that enterprise objected, 'No, we can't invite him. He lives too far from us.' And we lived only a stone throw away from that organization. Then that person started talking nonsense about their branch in Petrodvorets, but the college teachers insisted. When Mark called me and said that he got that job in 'Pentagon,' that was the way we called that organization, my whole world turned upside down. All the relatives of my husband had already left the country by that time. Samuil's brother-in-law was highly connected in Moscow, and he did something for my son, so that he could leave that enterprise. Several times Mark was asked in their staff department, who petitioned for him in Moscow. But my son told them nothing. At last he was informed that he was permitted to move on to another job, and do it immediately without taking an off. He found a place in another organization: 'RudGeoPhysics.' He got married in late 1988, at the age of 37. My daughter-in-law is Russian. Before his marriage, we talked a lot to our son regarding the problem of choosing a bride. But it happened. Now Mark is interested in Jewry more, than he was when he was younger. Earlier he never spoke Yiddish, and now he tries to.