MDV 283 · Roza Ovsheevna Shternberg; Maria Chirilau

Closing thanks and farewells at the end of the Chernivtsi interview. The interviewers thank the woman and compliment her, and a question about how to proceed closes the passage.

A woman, apparently Shternberg, sings the Yiddish song about where to find a livelihood, and then asks what to sing next. The interviewers thank her and prepare to take a photograph.

A second song is proposed and the interviewers thank her before a photograph.

Camera footage of the team's drive, with a few intelligible remarks in Yiddish and Russian. The speech is garbled and its subject is unclear.

The team arrives at Chirilau's house and is welcomed in. Kerler gives her vitamins and Chirilau says she cannot speak good Yiddish. She talks about her illness, high blood pressure, a nosebleed and a hospital stay in Rădăuți (?), and about what she should eat. A son-in-law or relative is also mentioned.

Concerns Chirilau's illness and medical advice, and a hospital stay.

Chirilau answers questions about a relative's family today: someone has no car and no children, and a woman called Nechama (?) understands Yiddish. Kerler tells of a phone call with an elderly man in Haifa about his memoir of the town, which Chirilau has read, and which mentions a Purim play.

Chirilau explains that she spoke Yiddish and German at home as a child and Romanian at school, and that Romanians also spoke some Yiddish. She describes Mihăileni as a fine town and discusses the Jewish cemetery, now locked, and a family who tended it. She tells of Moshe Itsik Bernshteyn (?), who was in Transnistria with his children, and whose son Natan lives in Israel. Natan had a gravestone made for the grave of his father.

Adds the languages spoken at home and at school and the cemetery and gravestone.

Chirilau tells how the family of Moshe Itsik returned from Transnistria after the war, hungry, lice-ridden and with nothing; his wife had died there. Her mother washed and fed the children, and the house they found was in use by others and they reclaimed it. Kerler suggests going to the cemetery.

The house was reclaimed on return.

Chirilau recalls her childhood schooling in the Romanian school, where Jewish children also had a couple of hours of Jewish instruction a day. She mentions the rabbi and the shoykhet, and describes how chickens were made kosher with salt on a board. She recalls that Jews, Germans and Romanians lived together peacefully, and she describes weddings and Sabbath treats for children.

Includes the kosher-meat description, nine synagogues (?), and the memorial-day food customs.

Chirilau answers questions about foods that Jews cooked: fresh fish for memorial days, and Romanian dishes cooked by Jews, such as polenta and stuffed cabbage in several variants. She discusses terms for the stuffed cabbage in Romanian and Yiddish. She also mentions kosher meat, the slaughterhouse and that Romanians raised pigs but earlier Jews did not eat pork.

Chirilau tells anecdotes about a poor, drunken neighbouring couple, Dudl Heler and Malka, who borrowed everything from her mother. She describes the trio of brothers who were Purim players and how one was matched with a tall bride. She then tells how rich Jews traded in flour and building materials and how life was natural and healthy before.

Chirilau says her parents were both born in Mihăileni. She recounts her father's friendship with Moshe Itsik, and a funny story about two friends who agreed to circumcise each other's children. She then answers Lemster's questions about Jews who leased out fields and vineyards, with Romanian peasants working the land.

Includes an anecdote about the two friends and the leasing of land.

Chirilau answers questions about the town's cinema and visiting Yiddish theater troupes, which performed in a large school hall. She says she understood Yiddish plays and recalls singers. She does not remember a Zionist organization by name, but describes a hekhalutz group that met for dancing, talk and aliyah. She also names local musicians.

Adds the theater troupes, the hekhalutz group and the musicians.

Chirilau describes the prewar Jewish wedding with the huppah and the rabbi, and says that Jewish musicians played at Romanian weddings and sang Romanian songs. She tries to recall Romanian songs with Lemster and Kerler and names some.

Chirilau describes folk healing for fright and the evil eye: pouring hot coals into water, and other remedies. She says Romanian women also came to Jewish healers and vice versa, with no distinction. She recites a Romanian incantation and the group discusses other remedies, such as burning dog hair, used by old Jewish women. Kerler then asks about a local righteous man.

Concerns Romanian women and Jewish healers.

Chirilau answers questions on whether a rebbe lived in town, saying the nearby Târgu Frumos rebbe was visited by Jews and Romanians alike. She tells how her father travelled to Chernivtsi with a cart, and a quarrel over stolen leather which the rebbe settled by pointing out how the rich man should not strip the poor. She recalls her parents as good people.

Includes the full story of a quarrel that her father took to the rebbe.

Chirilau describes today's Mihăileni: few Jewish families remain, most people came from villages, and the town was once fine. Kerler shows her the photographs and addresses that he sent. They talk about a man from Chicago who wrote about her, about a very old émigré, and about her pension in old and new lei. Kerler then asks about Purim plays in the Carpathians.

Covers photographs, a letter, her pension and a Chicago visitor.

Women present recite a Purim-play fragment, with lines about a man with a long beard and a sick wife, and discuss it with Kerler. Chirilau says she cannot remember other songs, and recalls that there were different rhymers at Jewish weddings. A final question asks what she wants remembered about Mihăileni.

The Purim text is recited by other women rather than shown on video.

Asked what should be remembered, Chirilau recalls playing with other children and the Jews coming back from Transnistria, ragged and barefoot, which she remembers vividly. She says the Romanians helped with whatever they had. She says the Jews left for Israel before and after the war, and Lemster ends the interview.

Also covers the emigration of Jews and a closing question about when they left.

Chirilau speaks about gefilte fish with a Sabbath fire-lighter and memorial-day treats, saying it was sweet, made with sugar, onion and pepper. She says Romanians now make it too and that she cooks fish patties herself. Kerler asks about plums and then says farewell, and she invites them back.

Includes a farewell at the end.