Food

Rezmovit tells stories his mother told about Froim the merciful, a trickster figure. In one he eats at a Jewish inn and escapes without paying by tying the landlady's eyes. In another he steals from a Catholic priest by getting the dogs drunk. Kerler asks about the word for the rising agent used in baking. Rezmovit then recalls his mother's patience and wisdom, and how in the deportation wagon she and other Jewish women dealt with pork fat packed in a bundle.

Smajovics describes how cheder boys earned a little money before Passover by working at the communal matzo baking, as water, flour or wheel workers. He mentions matzo for poor large families and a communal collector. A word for secret deliveries of food is discussed, as is a term for a healer or miracle-worker.

Herbst describes the mountains and river near his childhood home, where children gathered wild blueberries, raspberries and strawberries. He tells how they picked on Tisha B'Av, when fasting, and made them into syrup and jam, and how a group made noise to scare off bears. He then says he went to work at the sawmill and that war began after his bar mitzvah.

Herbst answers a question on whether his family said challah or 'barkhes'. Kerler asks where in Hungary Jews spoke Yiddish; Herbst names small towns in the north of the country, among them Tokaj and Kalov, where there were many Yiddish-speaking Jews, and the talk turns to Slovakia. He says he would rather talk about the hard postwar years another time. Kerler thanks him and asks for a religious saying he remembers.

Gotlieb recalls prewar childhood: listening to cantors in the synagogue and preparing for Passover with separate dishes, the four questions asked by the youngest, and new clothes. She describes going from house to house in a mask at Purim to deliver food gifts. At Kerler's request she recites a Purim rhyme and a verse from a Purim shpil, repeating it slowly several times so he can write it down.

Answering Kerler's questions, Gotlieb lists Jewish trades in town, including baker, shoemaker and carpenter. She discusses the words for the Sabbath bread (barkhes, challah, kalach) and for potatoes. She says there was no regular theatre, only children's plays at school and at Purim.

Rezmovits recalls poverty in childhood: bread spread with lard and paprika as a snack. He describes his father's attitude toward self-important people in the community, and the nickname "karpn-kop" (carp head) his father used for them. He and Kerler compare the fish word in Hungarian and in other Yiddish dialects.

Rezmovits and Kerler discuss Yiddish words with Hungarian and Slavic elements, such as the word for a notebook, a word for brandy and 'flask', and their etymology. Rezmovits then mentions an earlier interview by a woman who came from Israel and sent him a video cassette, and Kerler suggests ways to view it. He ends with a story of a Romanian-Jewish woman who asked where his family came from (Sighet).

Kerler asks whether Herbst remembers how his mother salted meat, and Herbst describes a homemade wooden implement. Asked about anything she used to say while salting, he says he heard it but did not understand. Kerler then says he must change the cassette.

Herbst gives blessing and wish formulas he knew from childhood. Kerler then asks about the Hasidic rebbes he saw. Herbst explains that the old Rakhiv rebbe lived in Upper Vişeu, while the younger one headed a yeshiva. He attended his Friday night table and recalls his Hasidic fervour, and says he lived in nearby Bornobash. He describes how poor the area was, with only wild apples, cherries and plums. In answer to Kerler's questions he says potatoes, a potato soup and a potato kugel were eaten.

Kerler asks Herbst to repeat a song he has just given. Herbst sings a Yiddish song about a childless woman who goes to a rebbe, who gives a blessing. Kerler then discusses homemade schnapps and where it is made, including the Sighet area and a village near Cluj (Klausenburg), and the Hungarian saying that one does not drink alone. A picture on glass is mentioned at the end.

Pearl answers Kerler's questions about his childhood games, football and a game played with nuts. He also recalls Hanukkah games, with the dreidel and cards, and says the children cast their own lead dreidels. He answers a question about Hanukkah food unclearly and turns to a Passover dish.

Gotlieb recites and sings a Purim rhyme and says her grandmother taught it to her. She went from house to house at home, received money and baked goods, and recites another Purim rhyme about falling. She says she has no one to speak with now and so does not speak Yiddish well.

Gotlieb recalls childhood games in the courtyard, such as jumping over squares, while there were no animals as the courtyard held over forty children. She says she carried a chicken to the ritual slaughterer for the Sabbath, and meat was eaten only on Sabbath. Kerler then asks about the school she mentioned.

Blobshteyn recalls his mother's practices on the non-Jewish New Year to ward off bad luck, such as placing a nail on the lard and keeping poultry shut in. He mentions the family's home slaughter of geese and the food made from liver. Kerler asks about the term for the non-Jewish New Year and Easter, and Blobshteyn recalls that the winters were snowy and cold.

Briefly discusses wall decorations in the home, including Purim items, papercuts and children's pictures, and the terms for Sabbath bread (challah versus barkhes). Blobshteyn then describes his father's place at the table and the respect given to him, including that no one sat in his seat.

Blobshteyn recalls Hoshana Rabbah and Simchat Torah: going to morning prayers, the hakafot with dancing, and the sale of honors for money. He then explains games children played with nuts at Passover and Sukkot, and mentions stealing nuts and a game with a spinning top.

Kerler asks Blobshteyn terminology questions, such as the plural of rabbi and rebbetsin, and forms of address for a rabbi. They also discuss 'Litvak', and Blobshteyn tells a story about travelling to America, where he met a Hungarian-speaking Jew in a restaurant and discussed food. It ends with food and drink words.

Herbst answers Kerler's question about the best childhood memories: Sabbath afternoons with a simple meal, berries gathered in the forest, and his mother's not reading to the children. He names himself as the youngest of eight children and describes how his sisters learned to sew and what they were paid in. He also mentions his older brother, a carpenter who trained in Brno, and a second brother who trained as a tailor in Rakhiv.

Herbst answers Kerler's questions about Purim in Berlabashe: children went around from synagogue to synagogue performing a Purim shpiel and asking for money. He recites some lines and discusses how much a coin was worth and what a day's wages bought. He then talks about how the family could not afford meat.

Kerler asks about the evil eye, and about the entertainer at weddings, and Reti is unsure of the term. Reti says his grandfather died before he was born and that his brother is named after him; the grandfather was a learned man. The talk turns to the women who helped at births and the small Sabbath loaves given to children visiting after a boy's birth (barkhes, which Kerler compares with challah), then to other expressions and a yahrzeit blessing.

Samadi sings a Yiddish potato song he knows from his father, with Sunday-to-Friday potatoes and a potato kugel for Sabbath. Kerler asks him to repeat it slowly to learn the words, and they discuss the Yiddish word for potatoes and a word in the song that Kerler explains. Samadi then tells and sings the song of two brothers, one rich and one poor, and the angel who comes for each of them. Kerler finally asks about a song on the Messiah, and Samadi says he sang that one in Hungarian.

Mostly informal conversation, much of it in Hungarian, about food and drink offered to the guests, fruit, her diet and illness, and her flat. Kerler and David touch on a Purim greeting and on which towns it is known from, and S2 remarks that men rather than women used to speak Yiddish. David talks of her health, an operation, her age, and a move to the present flat from the Kossuth street flat (?). Kerler says he recently came from America and describes his travels and his parents' ages at death. The passage ends with thanks and goodbyes to David.

Galambos talks about making kosher Kiddush in the synagogue and about keeping separate Passover dishes in the attic before the war. He describes Passover foods such as stuffed goose, matzo balls and potato kugel, and says that in Vaja the Orthodox did not eat soaked matzo (brak) except on the last day. Kerler then asks him to recite Purim plays again.

Altman finishes the story of her husband Mordkhe (Matye) meeting the rebbe of Stefanesti while on military duty. She then answers Kerler's questions about her father's synagogue, called the tailors' or Shmeshe synagogue, and a nearby synagogue with a nickname. Kerler asks about Havdalah and her mother's Friday-night candle-blessing prayer, which she says she does not remember. She describes what her mother prepared for Sabbath and mentions losing an eye and hearing in one ear during the war.

Dzigifker recalls Purim in prewar Mărculești, with a festively decorated turkey for a party buffet and children dancing. She tells how the rebbe Shmuel Zandl, from Rashkov(?), stayed in their home for six weeks with two attendants. People came to him for help, her mother's limp was healed by his blessing, and the mother refused payment. The father died after the family went back to the village, leaving three orphans. Practical talk about the recording and a Russian conversation about a scarf and photographs interrupt the passage.

Bukshpun answers questions on Sabbath preparation, saying his mother cooked on Friday and a Christian came to light the candles. Kerler asks about the term for a Shabbes goy, which Bukshpun does not know. He recalls Sabbath food, gefilte fish, the shoykhet in Kurzhevits (?), Jewish tailors, Passover matzo, Sukkot, Purim and fasting. His uncle's tailor shop and its sewing machines are mentioned. He notes the Yiddish was spoken at home and he now has little chance to speak it.

Furman says she finished two classes before the war, one year in Romanian and one in Russian, with no Yiddish, and ten classes after the war, then worked as a librarian. She recalls childhood games and sledding. She describes the Sabbath at home: her mother's candles, the oven-kept cholent and the baked bread. She recalls a spring outing with the melamed Berl, who danced with the children by the river. She explains that her brother studied in Berl's cheder, which cost more than Hershl's. She also describes Hanukkah dreidels, gifts, matzo brought from Capresti, and the turkey fattened in the attic from Purim until Passover.

Boltykh describes how his mother celebrated holidays: matzo and special food for the poor at Passover paid for by the rich, her separate Passover dishes and knife, gefilte fish, and Friday candle blessing. He mentions Purim visits with presents to neighbors, fasting, and a blessing from the rabbi of Bălți. He says his father could not pray while his mother was learned.

Tatyana recalls one Purim when children gathered and ran around a courtyard, with masquerade. Semyon describes nut games at Passover, such as setting up nuts to knock down, and mentions the dreidel at Hanukkah. They also recall Hanukkah money and sweets, but no recipe for latkes.

Kalussky sings a short Friday-night song and answers Lemster's questions about weddings: a shames announced the wedding, and guests received fruit compote and meat. Old men drank brandy and the young drank wine. He cannot recall wedding songs.

Faiershtein renders in Yiddish some of her poems about the war: the first calls for remembering the dead and the survivors, and the second concerns hunger in the camp and the taste of brown sugar in a small pot. She reads parts in Russian, saying Yiddish is hard for her. Lemster says it is a pity.

Goldberg describes prewar High Holiday observance, when a cantor was brought from Chişinău. For Simchat Torah she recalls processions with the Torah scrolls and a children's rhyme, and the interviewers press her to sing, but she declines. Questions on Hanukkah lights, Hoshana Rabba, Shavuot dairy food and the river for tashlikh follow. Near the end the interviewers discuss with her why remembering matters for historians.

Roif answers Kerler's questions about prewar weddings in Bessarabia. He stresses that Bessarabian Jews were strictly observant and ate only kosher food at weddings. He talks about wedding music, the master of ceremonies (a kind of guide), matchmakers and their fees, the engagement contract, and the difficulty poor girls had in marrying.

Farber sings a Russian-language song about a gefilte-fish recipe and a Jewish home, partly Yiddish and partly Russian. He then sings Hasidic-style melodies with Russian lyrics about Jewish wandering and the Sabbath, with others joining in the refrain syllables. The interviewers then discuss where the tune comes from.

Lipovetskiy explains how his mother salted meat to draw out the blood. He talks about his grandmother, daughter of a rabbi, who studied in Yiddish and died in the 1940s, and about visiting the graves of his relatives. He gives the names of his parents' siblings and grandparents; his parents and grandparents were born in Chișinău.

Kishlyansky recalls Briceni as a Jewish town, his observant mother who kept meat and milk separate, and the several ritual slaughterers and a rabbi. He recalls the circumcision custom of reading the Shema, and a few prayer words. He describes Friday and Sabbath at home, with challah, a blessing by his father, and cholent kept in the oven.

Gordin recalls holiday customs: Passover preparations and the removal of bread, and delivering Purim gifts for which he received money. He describes the postwar Purim after his father's death, making Simchat Torah lanterns from pumpkins, and a Purim rhyme children recited. He also mentions Rosh Hashanah and Hanukkah money. He closes by noting that the war began when he was five.

Kerler and Lemster put questionnaire items to Diner. They ask about a rare word of Polish Yiddish origin, Lithuanian Jews and the word for a Lithuanian Jew, and the meanings of 'dybbuk' and of a simpleton or fool. They also ask about the term 'a good Jew', Hanukkah food such as latkes and doughnuts, and the golem. She often does not know the word or answers in Russian.

Goldman recalls helping her frail mother at home as a child and describes how her mother koshered meat by salting. She mentions her grandparents' portraits in the museum and the uncle who moved his factory and later settled in Israel, saving his two daughters.

After a short exchange about a photograph, Goldman tries to recall the name and location of a big kosher butcher shop and sausage store in prewar Chișinău, on a street she names as Aleksandrovskaya (formerly Lenin Street), which operated until about 1940. She and Kerler discuss the quantities bought, the shoykhet and home kosher slaughter. Kerler asks whether there were Lithuanian Jews, and Goldman says many Polish Jews came, and describes how the Yiddish of Polish Jews and of Caucasus Jews, who have no Yiddish, differs from the local speech. They also compare local usage with Galician, Polish and Lithuanian Jews and touch on the word for Passover, before Kerler begins asking about the place of the cantor in the synagogue.

Dajch recalls the preparation for Yom Kippur, in particular the custom of swinging a chicken (kapores) which her mother performed with poor means. She describes children helping wash and dry walnuts for sale to visiting Americans. She then talks about working in an office and a fixed-price task connected with a textile firm and checks.

Dajch says she cannot recite songs in Russian, since Romanian was spoken before the war and Russian came only afterwards; she says she left in 2000. She describes folk signs her mother used, such as a spinning object used to tell whether a young man would return. She also describes a home remedy of dough smeared with honey for a boil, and answers Lemster's questions about how the dough was made.

Rotner recalls childhood games with walnuts that her father bought and sold, and the cellar and storeroom in the yard. She says her father made and sold wine from the vineyard, but not to customers visiting the house. She answers questions about songs connected with wine and about interest in the village's earlier inhabitants.

Yaruskaya describes Passover preparations in her family's home. Matzah was hidden in the attic, Passover dishes were koshered, and the children went to fetch Passover wine. She tells the seder plate, including horseradish, and recalls what her mother told about the origin of matzah. She does not remember the four questions.

Gordin begins his interview. He says his mother died in 1947 and that two of his brothers went to Eretz Yisrael. A cousin and an aunt helped him, and he explains how relatives from Bălți (?) and Florești sent Purim gifts. He recalls carrying Purim gifts as a small child with his father and being given money, then Passover customs: kosher dishes, matzo latkes, potato dishes and poppy-seed latkes. Kerler asks about the name of Purim.

Kleyman discusses traditional Jewish weddings, which she says were the finest, including a wedding she attended as a girl in Briceni. She describes the wedding pastries and the flodn, and explains a flodn ingredient. She recalls what her mother-in-law said about Jewish merchants in Lipcani before the war. Katz asks about writers, theatre and the film or cinema in Lipcani, and Kleyman says she was a child then. Kerler ends by asking about folk remedies against the evil eye.

Kleyman says she remembers no songs, discusses how much money is needed to live decently today and compares it with her pension. Asked by Lemster about prayer in the camp, she recounts how her very ill mother was taken to Briceni, how the family waited three days in the Kasarulitser woods, and how only those able to walk could cross the bridge to Ukraine while the weak were shot. She tells of her grandmother Feyge's dream, which advised her mother on what to eat to survive, and of the cheap food they made.

Raisa says she met Iosif after both returned to Lipcani, and Iosif says he worked about forty years making Soviet-style sausage. Kerler tells them where the team members come from. Iosif describes how Jewish life continued after the war: a prayer house with a cantor, kosher meat, old people praying, and their traditional wedding with a chuppah and musicians.

Akkerman talks about her sons' studies and work and about her husband, a conscientious bookkeeper. Lemster asks about childhood games and Jewish weddings in Edineț; she says her own wedding was with a chuppah, as were her sons'. She answers briefly about wedding customs, musicians and the grandparents she never knew, and Kerler asks when she married. Lemster then asks about food in a Jewish home, including Sabbath baking.

Kigel recalls her father's religious faith and the singing of Sabbath songs by her parents. She names several synagogues in Orhei. She describes Purim baking and Passover matzo buying, and recalls a Purim greeting and a Purim song that she repeats slowly for Kerler to write down.

Boiarskaia describes the ghetto, where it was forbidden to leave and there was no water, and where Jews slipped out to fetch water and bread. She tells of the rebbe who prayed alone by day and night, helped by others, and who was helped to reach the Dniester. They fasted and were brought food secretly by acquaintances; for Passover two brothers had matzo baked for him. She says she was there with her three children.

Answering Katz's questions, Magetman describes her mother blessing the Sabbath candles on Friday and on holidays, and her mother's charity. She recalls Sabbath cakes and challah in a Jewish home, and her grandfather, a man with a white beard who lived in a small house in the courtyard and ate with her mother.

Plotnik describes the High Holidays before the war. Her mother prayed in the women's section as a prayer-leader, and the family had a field with nut trees. She fasted from age seven and describes the meal before Yom Kippur and the tea afterwards, and the words for these. She says that in the Bershad ghetto she wanted to fast and to eat, and mentions begging.

Plotnik describes how Shavuot was prepared for, with decorations, and the dairy foods her mother made, such as rice with milk and varenikes. She then says non-Jews in Dumbraveni, shepherds among them, spoke Yiddish, even better than she did, just like the Jews.

Rolshut recalls prewar holidays at home with her parents: her father lighting Hanukkah candles, Purim, Yom Kippur at the synagogue and Friday-night Sabbath candles. She mentions Purim baking, potato dumplings and dreidel at Hanukkah, and sending baked gifts. She can describe only the content of the Purim play, about Haman and Esther, and does not remember it being performed in Soroca.

Plotnik describes how a neighbor heated the oven for the family on Sabbath, and the Jewish-style chopped fish her mother made. She recalls her sister asking the four questions at the Passover seder, going to fetch matzo, and Purim customs such as masked visitors and singing. She also mentions her mother's charity after her father's death.

Talks about her parents' house and her grandmother, who baked home bread and Sabbath challah and kept a small shop. She mentions Passover baking, her father as a good provider, and that the family sold their house. The transcript does not clearly show a move to Soroca before the war.

Answers Kerler's questions about the difference between a rabbi (rov) and a rebbe or 'good Jew', and about the expression for being buried in a good place. She recalls Khayim Kishkar (?), the local maker of kosher sausage, and gives the Russian term for jellied meat. She then describes customs around a boy's birth: amulets hung up, reading the Shema, the brit on the eighth day, and the lack of a ceremony for girls beyond naming her.

Dunaevskij answers questions about Sukkot, saying the family built a booth, ate there and sometimes slept there, and about the cheder teacher, whose name he forgot. On Hanukkah he recalls Hanukkah money, fruit and sweets, doughnuts (pontshkes) and potato latkes. Kerler asks about the custom of throwing things at Tishah be-Av, which he only vaguely remembers. Kerler then asks about non-Jews who spoke Yiddish in Ştefăneşti.

Dunaevskij says that a Yiddish theater came from Iași and that films were shown. He answers questions about cultural terminology: the Ştefăneşti rebbe's followers, a Litvak (a Jew from Latvia), and a tsadik. Kerler then asks the Yiddish word for tomatoes and for peppers, and Dunaevskij gives terms for red and blue vegetables.

Dunaevskij describes Jewish weddings in Ştefăneşti: the chuppah, dancing, and Jewish klezmer musicians, and a badkhn named Motl who entertained the guests. He says people drank wine rather than spirits, and his father made cherry wine. He says too much time has passed to remember details.

Luminskaia says her grandfather's sons in America sent him kosher wine and other items. He kept separate kosher dishes in the attic and ate from them when he visited, while her mother kept the household kosher for the visits. She also says the family ate matzo at Passover.

Goldshteyn recalls his neighbor, a priest whose son studied with him at the Romanian school. The priest knew Hebrew well, and the families exchanged holiday food, with Jews sending matzo and gefilte fish. A short exchange follows about speaking Yiddish and Russian with a neighbor.

Goldshteyn and Luminskaia answer Lemster's questions on Jewish weddings. They recall the chuppah and its escorts, the food (strudel, lekach), the music and the weeping of the parents. Luminskaia then sings a wedding song in which a mother-in-law is asked to look after the bride. They discuss the groom buying out the bride and whether this was a Jewish or a Moldovan custom.

Luminskaia recalls a chuppah held secretly at home in Soviet times, with the groom and bride brought separately and glasses broken. Lemster presses on the difference between Jewish and Moldovan weddings. Goldshteyn recalls musicians, including Gypsies, who played Yiddish music at weddings. Luminskaia describes a wedding, mentioning the klezmer instruments and the seating. Goldshteyn speaks of wine rather than brandy in Moldova.

Asked about the holidays in Talmaz, Grinberg says her parents observed Passover and Jewish custom, keeping separate dishes. She mentions that the family had a cow. Prompted on Sabbath, she names the blessing of the candles and speaks of Hanukkah. Her account is halting and mixed with Russian.

Asked about childhood in Chişinău, Moisei recalls a courtyard with three synagogues, the street name Shmiter(?), and his father going to synagogue while he did not. He describes Passover under the Romanians, when a Jewish charity gave out matzo, potatoes, eggs and wine, and how dishes were koshered. He answers Kerler's question about Purim, mentioning baked goods and mishloyekh-manes.

Elizaveta recalls holidays in poverty, including Passover, burning the chametz and Purim baking, and says there were no Purim players in the town. She says her mother did not make gefilte fish; she learned it herself. She describes buying on credit from a wealthy employer, the Sabbath hen and cholent, and how the family kept house after her mother's death.

Meir talks about holiday food and customs: Shavuot dairy dishes, Purim baking, and the poor who went from house to house in costume with musicians. For Hanukkah he recalls gelt, the dreidel and potato dishes. For Sukkot he says they went to his grandfather's sukkah.

Kerler asks David about his childhood before and during the war. He recalls first and second grade, his father's forced labor digging trenches, the closing of schools, and the deportation train from Iași, and tells of hunger and shortages, shopping for food in a market square near the family's home, and non-Jewish neighbors. He also describes heating with wood and the restrictions of the Ceaușescu years.

David answers Kerler's questions about Jewish weddings after the war, klezmer musicians who knew Jewish pieces, and the intellectual level of the Jewish musicians. Lemster asks for Yiddish words for colours and for vodka. David says Jews drank a little wine or brandy with fish, that vodka came from Russians, and that he himself does not drink or smoke.

Finkel answers questions about Purim in Sulita. People prepared Purim treats and people came from Botoșani, and there were masks, music from Gypsies or fiddlers, and dancing all night. She cannot recall any songs. Kerler asks about Zionist songs sung on outings, and she mentions the Hatikvah; the interviewers steer back to Sulita.

Finkel says Sulita had one Jewish school and she learned from the prayer book, and later from a tutor who came to her house. Lemster asks how Passover was kept. She says she did not know where matzo was baked in Botoșani and that the matzo was brought from there, and she does not recall the food. The passage ends with Kerler asking the name of her best friend.

Brief says his parents spoke Yiddish at home and describes the Yiddish books in the house. His father read a Romanian newspaper all day. Brief discusses rabbis and rebbes and the difference between a rav and a rebbe, mentions a visiting rebbe, and describes a dish made of white flour and potatoes.

Cohn says the teacher Balter taught Jewish holidays and customs at the Jewish school. He describes Sabbath at home: his mother baked challah and made the Sabbath, and he explains what the Sabbath means.

Cohn describes Tisha b'Av and the children's games, and recalls prayers learned from his mother. He mentions the Havdalah and Hanukkah customs and foods such as latkes, and Shavuot dairy food, and describes Hoshana Rabbah in the synagogue.

The man shows a Hebrew family-tree or yikhes letter, naming Menakhem Yehuda as himself and his parents David and Miriam Guta (?). The talk drifts to the interview and recording, with Romanian and Russian asides and a mention of the languages he uses. He mentions a village about thirty kilometres from where he grew up with a stream, and Friday-night fish at home.

Freundlich describes her observant childhood home and her mother's blessing over the candles. She recalls the kosher butchers, the shochet and the rabbi in Satu Mare, and describes how meat was salted and soaked. She talks about taking challah and recites the Saturday-night prayer to the God of Abraham, in Yiddish, at Kerler's request.

Hershkovich talks about his time in the yeshiva in Dej: the tractates he studied, his attendance at the rabbi's lectures, and how he ate at the yeshiva's refectory and at other people's homes because his father could not pay. Kerler asks to see the photograph of the rabbi.

Kerler asks Kraus to recall a song; fragments of a dialogue song about marriage follow. They discuss Purim before the war: sending shalekhmones between families, a competition over baking, and the Purim play. Grunfeld says he dressed as a Romanian peasant and visited the school director, and they discuss Yiddish among the village Jews.

Miller describes Friday night at home before the war, with a white tablecloth, candles and two large challahs, and his father singing and chanting the Sabbath hymns and prayers. He chants and sings long stretches, the transcript of which is too garbled to read, and tells a story about Joseph who honors the Sabbath and finds a jewel in a fish. He closes with remarks on Jewish tradition and the Holocaust.

Lipovici discusses the Ceaușescu period and the shooting of Jews during the war. Lemster and Kerler ask about his life with sheep in the field. They also ask whether kosher certification was needed for cheese and milk, and how cheese is made from lamb's rennet.

Lipovici explains how cheese and brinza are made from milk and rennet from lambs, and how Passover milk and cheese were obtained under supervision. Lemster and Kerler ask about foods allowed on Passover (potatoes, cornmeal). They ask whether he ate lamb, and whether Jewish robbers also existed in the area.

Hirsch reflects on the future of Jewish life in Romania, in Yiddish with Hungarian asides, then describes Luduș before the war. He lists Jewish shoemakers, tailors and bakers, says there was much poverty and many children, and names a wealthy wine dealer, Heller Moshe, along with Aron Moritz. He speaks of Jewish pubs and drinking at the seder, and of poor Jews in the villages. He also mentions bochers from villages being fed in Jewish homes on assigned days, poor people eating maize porridge, and pellagra.

Chajim gives his birth in Podu Iloaiei, about October 1906 and his age as nearly 100, and says he remembers everything. His father was Chaim, and he himself is Chaim Itsik. He recalls Sabbath kugel his mother made and a customs-related remark on Purim.

Answering Kerler's questions, Finkelshteyn describes what Jews drank before the war: wine on Friday night and for kiddush, little brandy, and mostly tea. He tells of a Jewish tavern keeper and how he sold his drink.

Karuel recalls Yiddish films shown after the war and singers who performed at weddings and bar mitzvahs. He describes his own wedding, with a huppah, food and klezmer, and a dance in which grandparents danced a mitzvah dance. He is then asked about Hasidim and rebbes.

Karuel answers questions on drinking customs and on terms such as dybbuk and golem. He speaks about cemetery customs, including kaddish and prayers for health and livelihood. He describes the folk remedy of pouring molten lead or coals into water against fright and the evil eye.

Asked about Purim after the war, the speakers recall hard times and hunger in 1945–46, with Purim treats made at home but no old-style Jewish life. At Kerler's request Iakob tells a story about his parents in Iași. They were given a flat in a block where all the doors looked alike, and his mother once tried the wrong door and met a neighbor. A passage on the word for a stove tile or similar (kakvele) also occurs. The story then turns to his mother's sister in Palestine.

Resh recalls a Yiddish saying, and a woman says she has one daughter. Lemster then puts the AHEYM questionnaire in Yiddish: greetings, request and thanks formulas, 'mazl tov', words for house, room, apartment, colors and adjectives, pickled cucumbers, body words, short sentences with tenses, comparatives, pronouns and 'barely'. Resh answers with his own forms, often not knowing the form.

Shtaigman and S2 describe postwar Purim in Rădăuți: children dressed in masks and went from house to house, with Jewish families living close together. Kerler asks what they said and about costumes such as a chimney sweep, with a figure with a big nose, but they do not remember the greeting. They mention hamantashn that his wife is expert at making.

Kaizerman describes preparations for Passover: cleaning and koshering the house, burning the chametz and eating matzo. His father led the seder and he asked the four questions. He recalls his mother salting meat to make it kosher. He then describes Purim, with sweets and preserves, and masked players going from house to house with the Esther story, together with Gypsy musicians and klezmorim.

Kaizerman briefly recalls Hanukkah in the house, with candle lighting and potato latkes. He then answers questions about local rabbis, the Yiddish words for a cemetery and the Hasidic groups in the city, including Chabad. He is also asked about matchmakers, written engagement contracts and the wedding jester.

Chirilau gives her mother's name as Lena and says she had one sister. She talks about the neighbouring family's children, one of whom died and another who lives in Israel and visits her yearly, and Kerler offers to find his phone number. Asked about weddings, she describes Jewish weddings with a buffet, dancing and the kolomeyke dance, in contrast to Christian ones.

Chirilau answers questions about Jewish books and says the library belonged to the Yiddish school. She knows nothing of Zionists before the war but remembers two boys leaving as pioneers. She talks about Passover matzo and potato dishes, a tutor who came to teach the boys, and the shofar blown at the High Holy Days. A stretch about language and the phone is garbled.

Leichtner answers questions about cultural terminology: converts, mad people, a well, and the muddy water given to geese. Romanian equivalents and the non-kosher status of sausage come up, and he does not know a word for fortune-tellers. He says there was no Jewish market in the area, only the Thursday market in Sighet.

Leichtner describes how his mother koshered meat by soaking and salting it, and how she baked challah and bread at home for the week. He answers questions about grandmothers, Friday-night candle blessing and fasting on the Ninth of Av, when children threw burrs from the garden. He is also asked for Yiddish sayings and some Yiddish greeting phrases.

Shwartz speaks about his work at the matzo bakery before Passover, at seventeen or eighteen, when a great many matzos were made for the large community. Before that, until sixteen, he carried the dough, and afterwards he learned another trade (unclear in the transcript). At the end he begins a story about work near a priest.

Freund says he cannot recall Purim play pieces. He talks about his father singing Sabbath songs (zemirot) while sewing at home. He says his mother baked challah for Friday night and that Sabbath was observed strictly. He did not attend Jewish weddings before his deportation, and there are no weddings or circumcisions among Jews there now.

Macarie describes working in a laboratory with medicinal plants after the war. She recalls her childhood up to eighteen in a large, happy family where Yiddish was spoken at home and Romanian learned at school. Asked whether the Yiddish of Maramureș differs from that of Moldova, she says no. She recalls holiday preparations and what her mother taught her in the kitchen: cooking, kneading bread, Sabbath cholent and kugel.

Macarie describes her mother's baking of challah and bread, using a peel and different shapes, and her salting and washing of meat as required by kosher rules. She recalls her mother making gefilte fish and, after Lemster's questions, begins to give the recipe: carp cleaned, skinned and boned, the flesh chopped.

Macarie completes the gefilte fish recipe and talks about bread. She describes the family house: three rooms (boys, girls, parents), a separate kitchen and a porch with steps and a threshold. Kerler elicits the porch word. She says on holidays they cooked, baked, ate and went to the temple.

Lemster and Kerler ask word and custom questions: she does not know dybbuk but explains golem as a slightly mad person. Then come questions on gefilte fish: whether sugar or pepper was added (a little sugar), and vinegar meat. Lemster asks what she cooks today.

Macarie says she cooks Romanian, Hungarian and Jewish food today, buying kosher meat. After the camp she returned home and married; her second husband has died. Her son is a school director with a good wife, and a daughter married a Jew from Johannesburg (?). She had no children with the second husband. Lemster asks about her first Jewish wedding.

Shwartz describes his work today as mashgiach in the Oradea community: a shochet comes and the meat is brought from Bucharest for koshering. He explains the process of koshering meat: soaking, salting, rinsing, leaving for about an hour, and rinsing again. He adds that he came to Oradea in 1966.

After footage of the synagogue, Grinberg speaks about her recent activities: the city days at Gura Humorului where minorities bring food, and her baking of sugar cookies, then the Jewish periodical and the Romanian readers who buy books from the community. She mentions conferences in Constanța and Suceava, and complains about visiting foreign groups who presented themselves as rabbis.

Grinberg says she lived on good terms with Christian neighbors and keeps kosher. Kerler asks about words for sausage and money, including a Russian word, a German word and Yiddish words for money. S2 and Grinberg discuss S2's Romanian-accented Yiddish and the languages S2 speaks well.

Marcus recalls that matzo was baked before the rebbe's death, and that the rebbe's remains were taken to Israel. He says he visited the grave at about the age of ten, when many people travelled from the region. He discusses his mother, who blessed the candles every Friday and baked challah at home. He mentions that kosher meat was bought and describes the town's shochet after the war. He had one brother, who is no longer alive and was two years younger.

Salamon speaks about an uncle who was a wedding jester and how it supplemented his income, and about women's work and dowries before the war. Asked about Purim, she describes the big Purim feast, baking, and sending of shalakhmones, and says there were performances she was too young to see.

Kurtsberg describes the deportation to Bershad: the night in the rain in the woods at Mărculești, the Dniester crossing where the sick were shot, and the winter in unheated houses. He tells of lice and typhus, of children collecting frozen vegetable peelings from Ukrainian yards, and of the yellow star. He describes street-by-street roundups, executions at an airfield and the mass graves, and children's games. He also describes theater performances, prayer in small groups, and two Romanian soldiers from the front who came to the house. Lemster also asks about songs.

Bercovici is asked what was done against the evil eye and says she does not believe in it and calls it superstition. She says she has gone to the synagogue for the memorial prayers (yizkor, in the transcript as 'Ischer') since her father died in Transnistria in 1944, and on the holidays. She describes herself as a good Jew but not religious and says she cooks ordinary food. She then recounts her schooling: lyceum in Chernivtsi, a university in Iași, and work as a teacher (dates unclear) and later at the national bank. The conversation ends with her saying that she has been interviewed before.

Milchenko says the synagogue was taken away after the war, while a shoykhet continued to work in Balta. The second woman adds that he slaughtered chickens and that boys were circumcised after the war. Milchenko cannot recall his name, and Lemster asks about Jewish teachers and doctors and about eating veal. She has grandchildren, and one grandchild lives in Beer Sheva in Israel. She says she was afraid to have her son circumcised, though others did so under the Soviets, and Kerler asks about relatives in Israel.

The end of the Pivnik interview. An informant mentions a man taken to the front, then answers questions about Jewish and non-Jewish ovens and baking, and about Yiddish ways of saying 'thank you' and 'sick'. Kerler and Lemster discuss dialect differences and the project; the segment ends as the team turns to Khotenko.

Khotenko describes the famine in which her sister died and the years of hunger, then says she heard Anna Guzik in postwar concerts. She recites part of a song about a girl with geese in the woods and discusses prewar Jewish weddings, with a canopy and big halls, and the custom of carrying a 'makeh' cake. She also answers questions on Sukkot and Purim before the war.

Borukaeva answers questions about the family and prewar religious life: her grandmother died in the ghetto, and she attended a Russian school, not a Yiddish one. She recalls her mother's cooking for Passover, the Purim pastry, her mother's Sabbath prayer and her father's synagogue attendance. She explains that her father and the father of Mulerman were brothers, and that his family lived in Kharkiv. She also mentions the one remaining Jewish woman in Pyshchanka and says she used to sing.

Miaskovskaia remembers her grandfather praying and her grandmother, and sings a Yiddish song about an old couple at a sick child's bed. She talks about her children and grandchildren in Rybnitsa and Germany, their languages and her visits to Germany. She gives the names of her grandparents and her father's work as a forwarding agent at a warehouse. Her family kept pigs, a cow and ducks before the war and for selling.

Asked about life in Khmelnyk before the war, Zhovtis recalls it as good and speaks of low prices. He recalls antisemitic insults, the fear he felt under the Germans and keeping quiet about being Jewish. In reply to Kerler he describes the synagogue, Sabbath and weekday prayer among older men, and not having seen a rebbe. Kerler then asks about Passover, and he describes koshering utensils with a stone and hot water, and pancakes or dumplings made of matzo meal.

Zhovtis answers questions about Passover food and the seder: potato and matzo-meal pancakes. His father did not lead the seder, and the household gathered at a relative's, but he does not recall the four questions. He says his father did not teach him the morning prayer, and tefillin are mentioned.

Zhovtis discusses non-Jews who spoke Yiddish, including Romanian soldiers, and their attitude to Jews. He recounts being beaten and the arbitrary violence under the occupation, and being made to wear a cross-like sign (?). There is talk of a mayor, of Purim fare and of Passover utensils, and of not eating pork.

Marmalevskaia recalls the famine of 1932–33: the family ate potato peelings mixed with oats, and two of her mother's sisters with their children died. Kerler then asks about her childhood, her family's one room with kitchen, her siblings' and parents' birth years, and her mother's work. She describes her mother weaving while swollen from hunger, and how her father sold his suit in Moscow and sent bread, which saved the family.

Kerler asks the meaning of the word 'papshoi' (maize/corn), and Shor explains that it is maize, from which mamaliga is made. They discuss mamaliga and the lack of maize flour where they are now.

Shor says that only one non-Jew lived near them in Orhei and he spoke Yiddish fairly well. Asked about Hanukkah, he remembers Hanukkah money and playing dreidel. He describes Sabbath at home: his mother baked challah, made a meat soup with noodles, and bought fish and stuffed it.

Kerler puts a long series of dialect questionnaire items, including attic, sun, son, tooth, book, deaf, bluish, 'a lot of Jews' and Purim pastries. Shor answers some and says he has forgotten others. In the middle Shor says that after the war he went to Orhei when his mother's sister died aged 85, and describes the Jewish cemetery, where the dead are laid on boards, not in a coffin. He also gives the meaning of 'golem' and answers questions on Purim food.

The Vaismans answer questionnaire items from Kerler. These include a Russian word for 'forbidden' or 'gloomy', words for ear, attic and the Passover afikoman, and a Hanukkah song. Toward the end Kerler asks what latkes were made from; buckwheat is suggested and not confirmed.

Skobilitskii speaks of the present-day yeshiva in Berdychiv, where Yiddish songs are sung, the Torah is read and Jews are invited for cholent on Sabbath. He mentions American support of five dollars a month and Kerler asks whether it is Chabad; he says it is Skvira. He then returns to the Yiddish school, where subjects such as physics, geometry and botany were taught in Yiddish. The books were destroyed by the Germans, and he still has some prewar Yiddish books.

Skobilitskii describes preparing for Sabbath at his parents' home. His mother lit the candles and put the cholent in the oven, sealing it with clay. She baked large round loaves herself, and there was white Sabbath bread (challah) alongside the dark weekday bread. He mentions that bread was also sold in shops.

Chukh gives the date and place of the interview and says the Berdychiv tsadik's grave is a pilgrimage site for visitors. She says she was born in Berdychiv, as were her parents, and was evacuated to the Caucasus during the war. Trained as a nurse, she wanted to go to the front but was kept at hospital work because she had a small child. She worked as an operating-room nurse and was later recognised as a war participant. She names her parents (father Yosl/Iosif, a sieve-maker from a place in Poland whose name is unclear; mother Tsirl, a quilt-maker) and her brothers, one in Germany. She describes her Jewish school (school no. 13, seven grades), her later nursing school and her long postwar nursing career in a Berdychiv hospital. She recalls childhood games, dolls she makes today from broken ones, and home life with Yiddish-speaking parents. She tells of the hungry early 1930s, when her mother sewed quilts to feed the children and the school later fed them. She remembers Soviet-era closing of synagogues, the synagogues of Berdychiv, the Hasidic rebbe's prayer house and holiday observance at home but not in school. Chukh also recalls Yiddish literature and press, a large library, visiting Yiddish theaters, the seltzer seller Itsik, and about 60,000 Jews in the town. She describes weddings with music and a rhymester, and Sabbath and holiday foods. She then answers Kerler's dialectological questionnaire: translating Russian words and sentences into Yiddish (greetings, household words, animals, colours, adverbs, body and illness terms), plus words like dybbuk and golem.

Skobilitskii describes prewar drinking customs, including Berdychiv's seltzer water, and remembers a Purim theatre and visiting artists from Kyiv and Moscow. He recalls a cantor from the Kyiv opera hired for Yom Kippur and a singer in postwar Berdychiv, whose name he cannot remember. He talks about learned Polish Jews who had settled in the town, including his father, who came from Poland. The talk ends with how their Yiddish differed.

A speaker recalls a Jewish wedding in a Hungarian town, Pápa, in 1948. The speaker's mother had been there, and Hungarian and Hebrew were spoken. The passage mentions a stay in Austria in Tiefenbach (?), where Jews who spoke Yiddish lived. It ends with Jewish dishes such as gefilte fish from carp. It is unclear whether the speaker is Skobilitskii or an interviewer.

Berzon speaks about antisemitism and mixed marriages, citing a newspaper figure on the share of mixed marriages in Israel. She says there were good non-Jews who rescued Jews in the war. She remembers childhood relations with a Ukrainian neighbour who fed her borscht and gave her radish on bread, while her own home was kosher.

Asked about Hanukkah, Soyfer speaks of holiday observance after the war, and says his father the shoykhet brought frozen kosher meat. Kerler asks about latkes, which were made of grated potatoes, and the others chat about the Yiddish way of eating.

Talk about bread and milk continues, with Sara on the phone. Visitors from America, who are recording people's stories, are mentioned. Mikhail mentions buying milk from a cow that is milked in front of him, to ensure it is kosher, and also varenyky and pelmeni.

Talk about the custom of washing hands before eating and the blessing. Burmenko says she knows everything in Yiddish. She speaks of her husband's and her own Jewish customs, partly in Russian.

Snook says there was no Yiddish theater in the village and going to town cost money. Jews who farmed had fields, hay, a cow and sheep and made cheese. She explains how cheese was made kosher with rennet from a slaughtered calf. She says there were few Jewish shepherds.

Snook says she went to the village synagogue with her parents, and that her father prayed at length. Her parents kept a cow and horses and worked the land. She describes cheese made kosher with rennet and meat salted at home, with a shoykhet. Kerler then works with her to reconstruct a childhood song about a girl who marries and eats up the household.

Kerler opens with the date and Kozak's address, then she gives personal details: her Yiddish name Sheyndl (Zhenya in her passport), her birth in Bershad and her maiden and married names. She names her parents, Avrom Hershkovich and Blume Shlomovna, and their birth years; her father was a furrier who worked in the villages, and her mother was a homemaker and, after the war, a baker selling bread at the market. She recalls her siblings, a Ukrainian eight-year school, evacuation to the Caucasus and Central Asia, and her return in 1944 to find strangers in their home. She then describes prewar Bershad as a Jewish town, her grandmother the midwife and her grandfather's death after a rescue in the snow, and the town's water-carrier, shoykhet and mohel. Kerler asks about weddings and klezmer musicians, a relative's wedding in Khust (?), Sabbath cholent and challah, fish dishes, latkes, Passover and Sukkot, and the old synagogue. She ends by singing two Yiddish songs, one of passionate love and elopement and one about a poor orphan boy.

Answering Kerler's questions about prewar holiday customs at home, Kozak recalls Hanukkah (candles, grandmother's gelt, no memory of the dreydl), Shavuot (cheese-filled pastries) and Purim (hamentashn). Near the end she offers to show photographs.

Kerler works through the dialectological questionnaire with Kozak: Russian prompts to render in Yiddish (illness, bed, crying, 'good day', 'thank you', cold, gentile, peasant, vineyard), words for non-Jews, and Lithuanian Jews. She also talks about Passover dishes (kezelekh, fish with horseradish) and about separating dishes for Passover. The recording captures many uncertain items.

Kerler continues the questionnaire with Kozak: verbs for plastering or decorating a house, a grand house (moyer or tsimer), words for a rich man (gvir), breathing, 'came from another town', 'book', mouse/mice, groats, dove and bouillon with kneydlekh.

Leiderman cannot recall her father's travels. She says Passover was kept at home, with matzo, kugel and pancakes, but she does not remember the Haggadah, the four questions or the stories. Kerler then announces a set of Russian words for her to translate into Yiddish.

Leiderman says she was evacuated to the Urals, to a place whose name is unclear (Izhevsk?), and returned to Bershad' after the war. She was about seventeen when the war began. She then answers many more questionnaire items: words for non-Jews, a gravestone, Hanukkah latkes and the dreidel, Purim pastry, Sabbath bread, 'rabbi' and plurals, tefillin, and other words and phrases. She says her parents were from Bershad'. She recalls her father laying tefillin only vaguely.

Bershadskaya answers questions on Sabbath practice, such as sealing the oven for the cholent, and on Passover in Chernyotka and Bershad': matzo baking, pancakes made from matzo, and a small seder with guests. She remembers little of the seder songs, and recalls going to the Bershad' synagogue with her parents. A second voice asks about Hanukkah at the end.

Bershadskaya talks about Hanukkah in Chernyotka, held in a rented house, including the dreidel and latkes made of potatoes. She says her father taught the children what they needed in Yiddish, and mentions that her mother died before the war. Kerler then leads into the war years.

After a brief exchange about photographs, Gvinter describes life after the war. The family lived in the synagogue building; her sister was killed and her mother was young. She began working before she was fourteen and worked in an artel. Her mother baked for weddings, as her grandmother and great-grandmother had, and she herself can bake too.

Feldman recalls the hunger of her childhood after the war. She describes how she and her mother cooked and ate flour, potato and berry dishes, black bread and cornmeal. She and Lemster discuss the Yiddish word for maize and the Yiddish, Ukrainian and Russian words for it. She then describes a semolina porridge and mamaliga with milk.

Sklyarskiy describes months of hiding in a pit or catacomb with his family near Ivanky, in Lypovets district, until they were betrayed by local people. He explains what they ate while in hiding. He tells of their flight, of a night spent near a river, and of another family's hidden bunker in the forest.