Shternberg provides personal information and discusses childhood memories. She then talks about food customs and life today, before talking about her education. A Yiddish teacher came to her Romanian school twice a week and taught them reading, writing, and singing. Shternberg sings a number of Yiddish songs she learned from her teacher. They include themes about mothers and their children and grandparents.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg is asked about her Yiddish name and tells a story about being called Reyzele at work. She recalls a visiting Yiddish teacher at her Romanian school, who came twice a week and taught reading, writing and singing, and she mentions letter-writing and cooking today. She sings songs she learned from him: a sick child and his mother, a boy and a captured little bird, and a short grandparents song. She also talks about concerts she took part in.
The transcript shows letter-writing and cooking today, and the grandparents song; the teacher's name is unclear.
Shternberg talks about her education at the Romanian school, in particular her Yiddish teacher. He hosted the students at home and taught Yiddish songs, in addition to the regular lessons twice a week. She then talks about her family and recalls singing at home. Shternberg sings a song in lashon kodesh, she remembers from her father. She recalls a number of holiday songs in Yiddish, in particular Purim shpiels. Another song deals with an unemployed religious teacher (melamed) who tried his luck in America and fell in love.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg describes the Romanian school, where the Yiddish teacher took pupils to his home for extra lessons. She recalls her grandmother, family singing at Simchat Torah and her father's Rosh Chodesh and Sabbath songs. She also talks about recording cassettes with a composer at the Hesed. She sings Passover songs, a Purim play song and a melamed-in-America song.
The transcript adds the Rosh Chodesh blessing and the recording of cassettes at the Hesed.
Shternberg talks about food customs and prewar cultural life. She mentions the Moldavian cantor Fushman and his singing about “Papirendike kinder” (children made of paper), as well as wedding and love.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg describes preparing the kitchen and baking for Passover, and is asked about Passover songs. She recalls the visiting cantor and singer Fushman and the songs he sang, including one about paper children and a comic song about marriage. She also sings a wedding-related song and answers Lemster's question about the phrase 'Moshe, kum arayn'. Kerler explains the archive's purpose.
The transcript adds Passover preparations, other songs Fushman sang, and the explanation of the phrase 'Moshe, kum arayn'.
Shternberg talks about life day and sings a song about childhood years.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg talks about a video interview made for a Ukrainian project, in which she sang two camp songs, and mentions Spielberg. She and Kerler look at a newspaper clipping about her late husband, a cantor at the synagogue, and about the Hesed. She then sings a song about childhood years and the house where she was born, and Lemster asks about the camp songs again.
The transcript shows a video interview, a newspaper clipping about her husband, and a song about childhood years.
Shternberg talks about her life in the Kopayhorod ghetto during the war. She then sings the well-known melody from Tumbalalaika with a text Shternberg remembers from her childhood.
From the machine transcript
Lemster asks where she was during the war, and Shternberg says Kopaihorod, where people were housed in a ruined building. She recalls singing songs there and sings a Tumbalalaika-type song with a text she knew from childhood. She then talks about Sabbath dances.
The transcript adds Sabbath dances at the end.
Shternberg talks about her family and her hometown Khotyn, including a non-Jewish tailor who spoke Yiddish. Shternberg then sings a number of Yiddish songs about drinking in the tavern, living a Jewish life, and life in the Kopayhorod ghetto Shternberg wrote herself. The ghetto song deals with a girl who sits next to her dying mother.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg answers questions about her grandparents and relatives. She says she lived in Khotyn before the war and remembers it as a large Jewish town. She recalls a non-Jewish cobbler who spoke Yiddish. She then sings several songs, among them a drinking song and a song about a Jew in the house of study. She finishes with a song she says she wrote herself about a girl beside her dying mother in the ghetto.
Also covers her grandmothers, relatives and the tavern songs she sings.
Shternberg talks about her life in the Kopayhorod ghetto. She was forced into military barracks next to the railway station. Shternberg then sings another song in Russian she wrote during her imprisonment in the ghetto, before she again sings a different version of Tumbalalaika.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg recalls the Kopaihorod ghetto. She says the prisoners were driven into former military barracks by the station, where Romanians were present. She describes hunger there and her mother's trading for food. She then sings a Russian song about Jews being despised and thrown alive into pits, and a Yiddish version. She also sings a ghetto song about sitting beside her mother in rags, and a version of Tumbalalaika with riddles.
The passage includes the Russian text and the Tumbalalaika riddle verses.
Shternberg sings a different version of the well-known Yiddish song “Vu bistu geven” (where were you), dealing with the kibbutz. She discusses Yiddish cultural life before the war and recalls how her brother and sister used the local library.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg sings a parody of "Vu bistu geven" about a kibbutz hakhshara. In it a mother questions her daughter about food and sleeping arrangements. The interviewers explain who they are. She says she read little because of school and preferred dancing and singing. She is asked about a poet named Shternberg, about visiting troupes in Khotyn, about Purim plays, and about the Jewish library, which her mother and siblings used. She also speaks of an old man in Chernivtsi who was shown on television.
Also covers reading habits, visiting theater troupes and Purim plays, and a man seen on television.
Shternberg talks about her family and discusses her father’s work as a merchant. She then talks about the Rabbi of Stefanesti and how her mother went to see him, as well as Sabbath celebrations at home. Shternberg then sings a Sabbath song she remembers from her childhood, as well as reciting sayings and poems. She also discusses folk remedies.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg says her father was a merchant who took partners and traded goods. She recalls her mother visiting a rabbi to ask for blessings and describes the Sabbath at home: blessing the candles, two loaves, charity money, a non-Jewish woman who heated the stove and the cholent kept warm. She sings a Friday-night song. The talk turns to taking a piece of dough, the God of Abraham prayer, Yiddish writers, Purim players going from house to house, water carriers, and folk remedies against the evil eye.
Also covers Purim players, water carriers, the village well, Yiddish writers and the evil-eye cure.
Shternberg sings a Yiddish song about marriage, before she shows photographs. The camera then records Shternberg singing from a tape about Jewish life of the past and distant lands.
From the machine transcript
Shternberg sings a comic song about a bride and groom and a dowry, and Kerler identifies it as coming from a Purim play. The interviewers then try to copy her cassette and discuss it, partly in Russian. She is shown photographs and asked to tell more. Talk about visitors from the Czech Republic and a rabbi is followed by a long stretch of garbled speech. A second voice then sings or recites songs about Jewish life of the past, covering the synagogue, Sabbath, girls and a cottage with smoke, as well as songs about a bird and a boy.
Most of the passage is a dispute over copying the cassette, plus a second voice singing.
