Not online: the recording is held by the project and is not on Media Collections Online, YouTube or archive.org. Everything below is a paraphrase of a machine transcript, the weaker of this site's two transcript layers — see how it was made.
Interview with Rosa Sternberg, a woman from Khotin who has lived in Chernovits for about twenty years, recorded in her home on 31 May 2012. It opens with chat about a young woman from Budapest, matchmaking and Itsik Manger's birthday. Sternberg then recalls the wartime camp and the return to Khotin, her work as a laboratory assistant, her three marriages and her singing with the Jewish culture society. The rest of the part is largely songs and talk about them: a lullaby, a camp parody, Purim and Passover songs, and humorous matchmaking songs, with reminiscences of prewar Khotin weddings, school, theater, tarts and a recipe for flodn. Second half of an audio-recorded session in Chernovtsy (31 May 2012) with Rosa Sternberg, who sings Yiddish songs and tells jokes for Kerler and team members present. It opens with the end of a wedding or mother song, then moves through songs about a boy and a bird, Eretz Israel, Papirosn, Rayzele and Margaritkelekh, interspersed with talk about Chernovtsy (a restaurant, Hesed, a barber) and about sending photographs and a card. Anecdotes in Yiddish and Russian, some word questions (blumen, kade, vaydl) and the story of the binding of Isaac as the women told it fill the middle. The recording ends with Kerler arranging to bring a card the next day.
Informal talk before the interview proper. Kerler tells of a former fiancé of a woman named Sasha who studied with him in Moscow and now lives in Chicago, and of a visit there. They note that 31 May is Itsik Manger's birthday, and Sternberg says he died three years ago. The young woman from Budapest is teased about marriage. Kerler then announces the date and place of the recording and asks Sternberg to speak about Khotin.
Sternberg recalls Jewish life in Khotin under the Romanians, then the German-era deportation to a camp near a station she names as Vinitsa Kopay-gorod (?). The family walked there: she, her mother, her father, and a married sister with a small girl, Klarishke, whose mother was named Sheva (?). She describes sleeping rough, hunger, deaths on the road, her mother's illness and her father's death in 1943 (?). They gathered brushwood to sell, baked flour, sold goods, and were guarded by Germans, Romanians and gendarmes; Kerler asks who the guards were. The station was bombed, the Germans left, and partisans told the prisoners to go home. Mogilev is mentioned.
Sternberg describes the return to Khotin in 1944: the house was gone and only the cellar remained, so the family took lodging. She tells how a woman at the market helped her find work, and how she trained for three months in Chernovits and became a laboratory assistant. She worked there some forty years. She mentions her pension, her veteran status, and the present-day visits and gifts from the authorities, and says she later had a son.
Sternberg says she married in Khotin in 1948, after the war and the return of those evacuated. Her first husband worked in a clothing workshop and later died; she married a second and then a third time. She moved to Chernovits about twenty years ago. She tells how she began singing when a Jewish culture society was organized in the early 1950s (?), and mentions Eliezer Shteynberg and the later Hesed.
Kerler asks about the wedding canopies in prewar Khotin. Sternberg says they were put up outdoors and the bride was led to the canopy. Asked what was sung there, she starts to sing wedding songs.
Sternberg sings a song about a sick child and his mother, in which the child dreams that three angels call him to heaven, and then a lullaby about a mother. She also sings a long humorous song structured as questions and answers about where one was, what one ate and drank and where one slept. It apparently concerns life in the camp years. Kerler asks her to sing, and Russian remarks to the Budapest guest are inserted at 33:15.
Sternberg sings a nostalgic song about how Jewish life used to be, comparing the old times with today's. It covers prayer houses full of people, minyans morning and evening, the Sabbath cholent, and the old-time Jewish women and girls and their marrying age compared with today's girls.
Asked where she knows the songs from, Sternberg describes her home: four sisters and a brother, with the mother baking and serving tea. She recalls going to the theater and learning songs as a child. She remembers a Romanian school in Khotin with a Jewish director where Yiddish was also taught, and the teacher Yanever (Israel), who wrote songs for every holiday and had pupils copy them out.
Sternberg sings and explains a Purim song and describes Purim customs in Khotin: sending shlakhmones, giving alms, and children going masked from house to house wishing the householder well in song. She also recalls the mother's custom of sending shlakhmones to relatives. Kerler asks her to repeat the song and asks who taught her the Purim play; she says the teacher Yanever did, at school.
Talk of photographs and a gift from Israel with a Star of David. Kerler asks what the bread called kamish broyt is, and Sternberg describes it: a dry, sliced, nut-containing bread. There is chat about Kerler bringing young students, among them Hungarians from Budapest who are interested in Yiddish.
Kerler asks about a song for Passover and Sternberg sings one about the 14th of Nisan. She then answers questions about clubs in Khotin and visiting Yiddish theaters and singers before the war. She says she sang small songs herself, and her mother took her to the theater. She names the Yiddish artist Pushman, who sang in the schools.
Sternberg recalls the singer Pushman being hosted by householders who sent tarts, and how she carried them and sang. Kerler asks what such tarts were called and about the custom of giving tarts at weddings. She explains the sharing of tarts at her sister's and son's weddings, including a shortage and a story about the in-laws.
Kerler asks what "roizn" means and how to say flowers in Yiddish, and Sternberg answers. Kerler comments that this is the far end of Bessarabian Yiddish. Asked how flodn are made, she describes the recipe (nuts, preserves, flour, dried pieces) and says it is baked at a Jewish wedding.
Sternberg jokes about finding a bridegroom for the young woman from Budapest, and says she will make flodn when Masha comes in August. She sings a humorous matchmaking song and talks about getting a haircut or wig-maker. She tells a story of a man who learned a melody and sang at the door as he came home, and sings the song about Sore-Beyle (?), opening the door. Kerler asks to hear more. She also sings a short song telling a mother not to cry.
Rosa sings the end of a song about a girl who is a musician and about a weeping mother. Kerler asks her to repeat it. Rosa then asks whether the songs are Kerler's own, and he says they are Moshe Lemster's.
Rosa asks to be sent a card or photograph. Kerler asks which street the barber is on, and she says her husband used to be shaved at home. They discuss where one can eat Jewish food in Chernovtsy: a restaurant with vareniki and fish called Chernovchanka (?) on Kobylianska street, a place she says is open on Pesach.
Rosa mentions the rabbi Kaufman and two French visitors, and talks about Barsuk (?) at the Hesed. Kerler says he spoke with him only briefly because of the time limit. She sang songs about a mother for Barsuk, who praised them.
Rosa sings a song about a boy who catches a little bird or swallow. The boy lets it go when he remembers his sick old mother, and the song ends with the saying that a mother is the only one. Kerler asks what the word for the flowers in the song means, and she gives the word and what it means.
Kerler asks where in Kobylianska street the restaurant is, and Rosa describes it: a large place with no upper floor where kasha dishes are cooked. She then sings a comic song about marrying for a dowry or dollars. Kerler asks when it was sung, and she says not on Purim.
Kerler asks about two songs, one about a girl who ran off and was baptized (?) and one calling Jews to come home. Rosa does not remember them. The others talk over each other.
S2 and Rosa recite and sing the text of the cigarette-seller's song Papirosn, about an orphan boy whose father lost his hands in the war. Kerler asks whether this is what she sang for Sasha and Masha, and she confirms it.
S2 speaks Russian about Gordonia demonstrations and singing. Rosa says she tells things in Russian and then sings in Yiddish. S2 asks in Russian who is interviewing her, and Rosa explains that a specialist writes everything down and that a man called Nikolai works in the museum.
Rosa sings a song about Eretz Israel as the best land, where it will be good, like a bird in its nest. S4 and Kerler say the young woman understands Yiddish better than Russian. Asked where she knows it from, Rosa names a man called Yanover as the source. He sang and read out songs to the family.
Kerler asks for Yanover's full name, and Rosa gives it as Yisroel Yanover (?). She tells an anecdote about a half-Jew whom the synagogue wanted circumcised. It ends with his letter to a friend in Israel asking how much must be cut off and what he will be left with.
Kerler asks for Russian anecdotes told in Yiddish, and Rosa tells several. They include a man at a spa with a wig, a telegram announcing a wife's death, a boy writing letters to his father about his mother, and a woman at a sanatorium who loses her allowance. Kerler and others repeat or explain Russian terms.
Kerler asks for more about Yanover's songs and for holiday songs. Rosa names Purim and Pesach, but says there were no songs for Shavuot. She tells the binding of Isaac in a mocking version in which three women gossip about where Abraham took the boy.
Rosa sings a song about a tree by the road and a Jew travelling to Eretz Israel in torn trousers. Kerler says he knew a different version and recalls Papirene kinder. They joke about the evil eye and about Jacob.
Rosa asks Kerler who he is, and he says a professor. He explains the project, and she says she learned Romanian at school. She tells a story about Ferdinand arriving by horse in a place she calls Katin (?) and a hat-removing joke. She then recites a Romanian verse about night falling and birds going to sleep, and explains it in Yiddish at Kerler's request.
They arrange sending a photograph or card by post. Kerler says he will bring a copy tomorrow and is wary of touching the camera. S4 asks Rosa's name, and she gives it as Sternberg Rosa with her Chernovtsy address; the street names are unclear in the transcript.
Kerler and Rosa talk about a young couple, Sasha and Masha (?), whose match was arranged, and about one of them who went to America. Kerler arranges to return the next morning, which is a Friday, and asks her to say that she sang for him.
Rosa tells a joke about a neighbour searching for a cow with a black tail. Kerler asks what the word for tail means, and they compare the words for a cow's, a dog's and a person's tail and for onion greens. She ends with a joke about why a Jew has a long nose.
Rosa sings a song about the cheder, in which a boy learns Torah and is glad to be a Jew.
Rosa and Kerler talk about how a couple found each other and whether a match turned out well, with Kerler explaining that both were content to remain apart. Kerler then asks about a song concerning travelling to a place whose name is unclear.
Rosa sings a song about how to get the papers after a husband's death, and Kerler says he will send the words and have them shown on a computer. He jokes about being Ded Moroz, and she asks about his children. He answers that he has a son and no grandchildren yet.
S4 says it is her first time in Ukraine and that she has been in Mukachevo and Munkatsh. Rosa says old people there may still know songs, while Kerler says the young people no longer do. Some English phrases are audible.
Rosa asks when they will come again, and she wants the pictures brought in the morning. Kerler and Rosa chat about French politics (Sarkozy). Rosa mentions a director making a film about mothers, and Kerler says he hopes for another song.
Rosa sings the song Rayzele, about a boy whistling for his beloved who comes down from the attic. Kerler changes the battery and asks her to go on, and she sings further verses.
Rosa sings a long song about a dream of Rayzele, with a pious mother and a pouch with a Magen David. Kerler says it was printed and is by a Yiddish poet whom he names as Mordkhe Gebirtig from Lodz.
Kerler asks about the song Margaritkelekh, and Rosa sings and tells it: a girl in the forest at night meets a dark young man who calls her the loveliest daisy. Her mother's warning is unheeded. Kerler comments on its meaning.
Rosa sings Papirene kinder, a sad song about children who have emigrated and only send cards. S4 and Kerler call it a sad song.
Kerler asks where her son lives, and she says in New York. She sings Kinder yorn, about her birthplace village, the little house she was raised in that still stands there, and childhood that has gone like a dream.
Kerler asks how to say in Yiddish a word that is unclear in the transcript, and Rosa gives a word that means roughly reason or sense. She sings a song on the same word (the child's reason and hunger) and repeats the first verse for Kerler. Kerler then says they will bring a card or two tomorrow in exchange for more songs.