Samuel Eirus and his family

This photo was taken in 2006 in our apartment. We gathered to celebrate my wife’s birthday.

Here you can see my son, his wife Lena and my grandson. It was my wife who took the photo.

My son Igor was born in 1964. He finished 7 classes, then technical school. He was sent to work at a car pool. But later he changed it for a bread-baking plant. He worked there as a driver till Perestroika.

At present he repairs automobiles at a privately owned car repair service: it means that his salary is high. He is married for the 2nd time. And I have two grandsons; Alexey and Mikhail (Alexey is by my son's previous marriage). His wife's name is Elena.

And my brother and his family live in Israel. They are very pleased to have left. At present we are often informed about firing in Israel. I suggest my brother's family to come back if they are frightened. They answer 'No, we'll never return!'

They left about 10 years ago, when Israel already became independent. Sorry, I am not sure about the Israeli historical events: I do not keep my eye on it...

My brother's daughter Julia was the 1st to leave for Israel. She graduated from the Architectural College. [The Architectural College was founded in 1832.] She started working at the beginning of Perestroika and soon realized that she had no future there as an engineer. She also had nobody in sight regarding marriage: all men around her were married.

When my brother left for Israel (it happened approximately in 1996), he called me to follow him, but I refused. The point is that I am an engineer and I like to work.

In the beginning of 1990s (when Perestroika came) they simply knocked me out from the institute and said that I could take comfort in my pension (at least), while many other people had got nothing. But I considered myself to be still able to work; I considered my head to be still worth something.

You see, in fact Israel is a large village! They have no industry: mainly rural economy. They certainly try to regulate, but it is very difficult for them. Even now when my brother comes to visit me (he usually does it every 2 years), he says that it is very difficult to find job in Israel.

Germany is absolutely different. Everybody knows that it is a hi-tech industrial country with advanced exact science. I wanted to go to Germany. It also happened many years ago: approximately when my brother left for Israel. Germany offered to cover traveling expenses and free-of-charge accommodation.

At present it is better not to go there: it is useless. Recently a friend of mine had to come back from Germany: welfare payment was the only income she could get there. But those people, who managed to leave for Germany earlier, live there much better.

I remember a lot of people standing in line to get into the German embassy! At that time I wanted to leave for Germany together with my son. But later everything changed: my son found good work and decided that it would be silly to give up his new work.