Raisa Kirilovna Teplitskaia

Arrival at Teplitskaia's apartment and the start of the interview. Kerler asks about doing it in Yiddish, and she is asked her name and birthplace. She was born in Ternovka, a small town not far from Uman', lived there until the war, and has lived in Uman' since 1952. She was ten when the Germans came.

Gives her birthplace Ternovka, her residence in Uman' since 1952 and her age at the German arrival.

Teplitskaia names her family: her parents are buried in the Jewish cemetery, and her sisters and brother live abroad, in Dimona (?). She speaks of her children, one son in Germany, and of raising them alone after her husband left. She describes four years under the Germans, hiding in cellars and attics, hungry, naked and lice-ridden, and two pogroms she lived through.

Adds her siblings' names, her children in Germany, and her account of hiding in cellars for four years.

Asked about liberation, Teplitskaia says the family returned to Ternovka and got a small house there. Her parents later died and are buried in the Jewish cemetery. She mentions her children's ages when her husband abandoned her with them.

Covers the return to Ternovka after liberation and the death of her parents.

Kerler asks about her work; the answer is garbled, and she speaks of her struggle raising the children alone so that they would not become drunkards or thieves. She says a son died, that one child in Germany helps her, and that she lives on a pension. Kerler asks about a Russian-influenced expression she uses.

Adds her pension, her son in Germany and a question about her phrasing.

Teplitskaia recalls her prewar childhood in Ternovka. Her father was a worker (the exact term is unclear) and her mother kept house; the family of seven had pigs and a cow and, she says, was not hungry before the war. Kerler asks why they kept pigs.

Adds her father's work, the household livestock and the family's prewar circumstances.

She tells how, when the Germans came and a pogrom broke out, her father's friend took the family to another village, where non-Jews hid them. She later returned to Ternovka and then, in 1952, moved to Uman' with her parents. She says her sisters are in Israel, in Haifa and Dimona, and mentions phone calls with them.

Adds the escape to another village, hiding by non-Jews and her sisters in Israel.

Kerler asks about Ternovka: it was a small town before the war, with Jewish neighbors and enough Jewish children. Now only one Jewish relative remains there among non-Jews. She says almost no true Jewish souls are left and the population is mixed, with Jews, Russians, Gypsies and others.

Adds the size and Jewish neighbors of prewar Ternovka and its mixed population today.

Teplitskaia says her children have non-Jewish spouses, including the daughter-in-law of her son in Germany. She says the son has a tallit and tefillin and attended synagogue in Germany. Kerler asks whether the children know Yiddish and ends by beginning a question about a synagogue in the town.

Teplitskaia recalls her parents' daily prayer with tallis and tefillin, and says her father kept faith in God during the German occupation. She says she wanted to leave Ukraine with her children, but could not leave her three children behind when her sisters offered to take her. She says her children treat her well.

Besides Jewish life in Ternovka, it shows her wish to emigrate and her reasons for staying.

Answers Kerler's questions about Passover before the war: baking matzah together with neighbours, and her mother's matzah dishes, latkes and kokelekh (?). She describes how her mother prepared fish with onions, and Kerler then asks about Hanukkah foods. She breaks off to ask the team not to be hurried or revealed, because she is wary of being denounced for her talk.

Kerler records the date and place of the interview, then asks Teplitskaia about her Yiddish name. She gives two names, Braine/Brane (?) and a home name, and says she attended a non-Jewish school. The names of her father and mother are discussed, including her mother's second, non-Jewish name. She then asks the interviewers where they come from and begins to ask a favour on behalf of a poor, blind Jewish woman.

The catalogue says 'Personal information and family'; the transcript also shows Kerler stating the date and place of the interview and the plea for a poor woman.

Teplitskaia recommends a poor Yiddish-speaking woman in Uman' as a possible interviewee. Her name is given as Manya, but the family name and address are unclear. Kerler and others ask about her family, saying they will go to her the next day. She also reflects on honouring parents and old people.

The transcript also shows her views on respect for parents, which the label does not mention.

Answers Kerler's questions about Hanukkah food in her mother's house: latkes, grated potatoes, and baked goods. Kerler describes a pastry from a woman in Bershad', and Teplitskaia recalls a teacher from Ternovka who lives there. She asks the team to be discreet about a pension matter and about aid from abroad. She then begins to speak of the pit in Ternovka where Jews were killed, a visit to it, and her relatives buried there.

Besides holiday customs, it covers the Bershad' woman, discretion about aid and pensions, and the beginning of the Ternovka mass grave account.

Teplitskaia describes the mass grave in the forest near Ternovka, where her father's relatives lie. She says the site is neglected and that this year she brought flowers. She says she bought a burial plot beside her mother in the Jewish cemetery and stresses honouring the dead. She says she visits the grave of Nahman of Bratslav and pleads for her children's health there, and that she went in the 1950s and 1960s, bringing her son.

Besides memorialization and prayer, it shows her burial arrangements for herself and visits to the grave in the 1950s and 60s.

Teplitskaia talks about the character of people and about Jews who came to Uman' from abroad, including from Israel. She criticizes some of them and talks of freedom and of speaking the truth. She also speaks of Jews who fled during the war. The talk drifts to the present.

The transcript is hard to follow, but shows opinions on foreign visitors and on speaking freely, and includes a Russian-language aside.

Answers questions from Kerler and another person about whether Ternovka's Jews knew of Nahman's grave before the war, and she says they did not. Her father did not know of it or go there, and he worked all day. She says there were few Jews in Ternovka and that her father died after 1977 (?). She says people began going after the war.

Besides religious customs and family, it covers the small number of Jews in Ternovka and whether the Bratslav grave was known before the war.

Teplitskaia says she began to go to Nahman's grave after returning from the Germans, when people began talking about him, and the neighbours showed her the hiding place of the tsadik. She says non-Jews called him a saint. She describes Bratslav Hasidim and pilgrims from America, England and France coming on holidays. She mentions that they are robbed, and that red items are given out recently, as Kerler asks what that means.

The transcript also shows Bratslav pilgrims, the robbing of visitors and what the non-Jewish neighbours said of the tsadik.

Teplitskaia and Kerler talk about television and freedom of speech, and about an interviewing crew member whom Kerler describes as trustworthy. Kerler asks what non-Jews say about the tsadik, and she answers that people no longer say anything about it. She also mentions her children and their marriages. The passage ends with Kerler's question about Yiddish-speaking non-Jews in the town. This does not read as a discussion of religious life today.

The transcript shows talk about television and speech freedom and about the crew, rather than religious life.

Teplitskaia answers Kerler's questions about non-Jews who speak Yiddish. Some learned it by working with Jews for years, and some speak it better or worse than others. She also compares Yiddish with German, having spent four years under the Germans, and says the two are close.

Asked about songs, Teplitskaia recalls Ternivka during the war, when Hungarians, Romanians, Poles and Germans passed through. As a child she had to go to peasants and fetch milk and eggs for the soldiers. A German soldier took pity on her and gave her tinned food. She recalls his remark that every people has its own customs, and that she suffered for four years.

The passage is about the German occupation and the soldier's pity, with the town name Ternivka (the transcript's spelling is approximate), rather than childhood memories.

Teplitskaia says she was ten years old during the war. Asked by Kerler and Katz about prewar songs and people, she says that as children they worked at home after school, feeding pigs and cows, and that her father was a poor worker. There was no time for singing, and she says she began to sing Yiddish songs only after the Germans. A cousin who had been in Romania sang songs from there.

The transcript shows daily work after school and poverty rather than songs, and mentions a cousin who had been in Romania.

Asked by Katz and Kerler about prayer, Teplitskaia recalls only that her father prayed. Her mother taught her the modeh ani (?) prayer. She says she remembers little because the children were always working.

Asked about Yiddish theater in Uman' after the war, Teplitskaia says she arrived in the 1940s and does not know what had happened there before. She goes on to speak of holiday customs and Jewish observance, and mentions an anecdote about a woman losing her pension. The passage is fragmentary and the topic is unclear in places.

The transcript shows an answer about Yiddish theater and a shift into holiday customs and other remarks.

Teplitskaia discusses Yiddish jokes and sayings: Jews used to say witty things and people laughed, and such things still exist. She says that when she sits alone at home she begins to remember. She tells of a neighbor of her mother who used to sing, and mentions Israel, where kibbutzim keep pigs and chickens, as a comparison.

Teplitskaia talks about relatives in Israel, including a late relative's grandson, and about Jewish-Ukrainian relations. She describes a visit to a rabbi in Kyiv and services there, and fears that Jews might be attacked. She mentions Putin and a Moscow incident, and says she watches many television programs and cannot sleep. Her neighbors urge her to leave. Kerler asks how a Ukrainian phrase would be said in Yiddish.

The transcript adds relatives in Israel and fear of antisemitic attacks, with Kerler's request for a Yiddish rendering of a Ukrainian phrase.

Teplitskaia says she has lost hope in the present, and prays to God for peace and for the good of her children and grandchildren. She describes loneliness alone at home, her depression and tears. Her daughter and son visit and bring medicines and food. Kerler urges her to be optimistic. At the end he asks whether she has a message for the Jews in America.

The transcript shows no proverb exchange here but loneliness, family visits and prayer.

Teplitskaia sends greetings and good wishes to the Jews of America. She talks about emigration, including a woman who could not take her son out, and Ternivka natives who live in America, and wishes that her own children could settle abroad. She discusses the difficulties of getting out, visas and money, and compares leaving from Israel with leaving from Ukraine. She mentions her sisters, who live in Germany, and her hopes of burial beside her parents. The passage ends with Kerler's thanks.

The transcript adds her sisters in Germany, visa difficulties and the wish to be buried beside her parents.

Teplitskaia blesses the interviewers with health and the help of God for them and their families. She invites them to visit her, and Kerler responds. This closes the interview.

Katz and Kerler talk at the grave of Nahman of Bratslav with Rabbi Kirshnboym (who gives his name as Abraham Moyshe) and other Breslov Hasidim. They discuss the word Breslover, Breslov teachings on joy and not despairing, singing and dancing, the Yiddish prayers and songs of Breslov, and Yiddish as a language of the rebbe's teaching. The kibbutz word, a singer from Kibbutz Nahal (?), the cantor Levi Yitzhak Bender in Uman' and Israeli election jokes come up. The group also tells a story of a letter to Rebbe Nahman and talks about Breslov books and scholarship, with Kerler photographing the site. The recording contains much recogniser looping.

The transcript shows a multi-voice conversation with Breslov teachings, Yiddish, jokes and songs, not only the grave.

A gathering at the grave of Nahman of Bratslav. The community members discuss Rebbe Nahman and his disciple Rabbi Nosn, the Bratslav teachings, the ten psalms and the idea that every Jew has some good point, and they sing Bratslav melodies together, including one about a joyful year. They talk about Sabbath songs and the differences between Bratslav and other Hasidic groups. The talk turns to Yiddish and Hebrew vocabulary, with some word discussion and a few parables. Katz and Kerler are asked about themselves (Katz born in New York and now living in Vilnius, a professor of Yiddish language, literature and history), and the group talks about yeshivas and rabbis of Lithuania, Poland and Brooklyn, and about praying together.

The passage includes much singing and talk about Yiddish and the interviewers' own biographies, not only a gathering with the rabbi.