l​The morning after moving in, I woke up, washed my face and hands, dressed, and ate breakfast. I could not wait to go outside to discover the new neighborhood and to make new friends.  
            When I looked out my window, I saw a magical world. It snowed during the night, and everything looked virginal. I quickly put on my winter coat and valenki, the snow boots made of boiled wool. It was a popular footwear for many Soviet citizens. These boots were helpful during the winter when the snow was crisp and stayed on the ground for a long time. They provided comfort and warmth for the feet and were affordable despite being ugly. But at nine, I was not too concerned with fashion. All I wanted to do was to go outside and hopefully find someone to play with.
            Mama ensured I would not freeze to death by putting a large babushka/platok on my head and crossing its protruding, long ends behind the back of my coat. The platok was large enough to cover not only my head but the entire body of the little me. On my hands, I wore mittens. I felt like a little stuffed doll after Mama made sure I stayed warm. But none of it mattered. I was excited to discover the new neighborhood and make friends.
            Outside, I gingerly walked through the piles of freshly fallen snow, ensuring I did not lose my footwear. I pretended to be in a fairytale land. The sun rays gliding over the snow made it sparkle with myriads of colors. The tall old trees dressed in their finest stood sentinel in front of the ugly-looking Khrushchev Era apartment buildings. In my make-believe world, covered in snow, the tall buildings looked like mansions where princes and princesses lived.
            I pushed through the snow for a while, paying attention to my surroundings. It was too early in the morning for the volunteers to plow it. It happened to be the weekend, and most citizens slept in.
            Suddenly, I saw a group of small children not far away. Full of joy, I ran toward them. I wanted to make friends so badly, and this was my chance. As I ran, I noticed each child held a snowball in their hand. They were about to build a snowman. I could not miss this opportunity, so I sprinted away, forgetting I might lose my valenki.
            But as soon as I approached them, I heard a creak from an open window and an angry woman's voice yell, "Don't play with her. This girl is a Kike!"
            I froze in my tracks when I heard this word. At nine, I did not know its ugly meaning, but the woman's voice implied that it was something sinister. The scattering of children only reaffirmed my suspicion.
            Perplexed and upset, I stood in the middle of the playground, not understanding what happened. The rejection hurt, and I turned around and ran toward our house to ask Mama for an explanation. The tears ran down my cheeks as I moved as quickly as I could to reach my destination.
            Inside, Mama held me in her arms. She stroked my back to calm me down, and when I did, Mama told me that we were Jewish. She also mentioned another foreign word, "Judaism," to me. Mama said it represented the religion Jewish people practiced. Her explanations confused me even more because I knew that the Soviet Union did not practice religion. Religion was the anathema to the Communist Party and persecuted by law. How can I be Jewish if I do not practice Judaism? Nothing made sense.
            Years later, as I reflect on what transpired on this beautiful morning, I realize that the woman from the open window buried my innocence in a pile of virginal snow. Years later, I wish antisemitism had died that day as well, buried in the same pile of snow along with my innocence. The day I discovered I was Jewish, not because I was practicing the religion of my ancestors, but because the totalitarian government chose to use it as my nationality, I stared in the face of evil. From that day on, I began living in fear.
           

​New Neighborhood
 
In the Soviet Union, every citizen dreamed of a permanent place to live. My parents waited in line for over twenty years to qualify for a government-subsidized apartment.
The government owned everything in the country of my birth. The free enterprise that drives the economy was not allowed, and because of that, the proletariat had little motivation or incentive to produce. The lack of housing had much to do with rebuilding the country after WWII, but receiving an apartment had everything to do with quotas and bribes.
            The quotas applied to minorities, which the Soviet Jews were a part of. Having money to bribe helped to move one’s name from the bottom of the list to the top. My parents did not have money to bribe, so they had to wait their turn. It is no wonder it took them so long to get approved. Some bureaucrats had moved their names around to accommodate those who paid bribes. Finally, our family secured an apartment, but it did not happen without a fight.
            Before my father agreed to move to Kotovsk, Ukraine, from Kishinev, Moldova, to accept a director of an atelier position, he was promised a government apartment. Papa would not have come to this peripheral town without this promise. I was six when we relocated from one republic to another, and three years later, the promise came true. However, Papa was not with us when it happened. The communist party locked him up in prison. He was set up for a crime he did not commit. He was accused of misappropriation of funds, which he did not do. In short, the authorities accused him of stealing ten rubles, an equivalence of less than two dollars. And for that, he had to serve three years in prison. I mentioned he was set up and not guilty. Someone who was a director before Papa took over wanted his job back. That evil person bribed the police and helped to put my father in prison. Papa served half of his term, and when he returned, the authority expunged his records, proving his innocence.
            But while he was in prison, Mama fought the authorities to receive the apartment. In the end, she won, but not without the consequences. Instead of giving her the square footage for a family of five, consisting of three bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen, and a bathroom, the government allocated a one-bedroom apartment for us. Mama had no choice but to accept the offer because until then, we lived in one room in half a basement. We had no hot water, kitchen, or bathroom. We cooked our food on a portable kerosene stove in a tiny front room, which became our storage, entertainment, and kitchen room at once. On cold or rainy days, my siblings and I played in there. The front room always smelled of the previous dinner due to the lack of ventilation.
The main room was dark because the only light that came in was from a slit of window placed above the street level. My view of the outside world consisted of feet shuffling in opposite directions.  
Moving into the new neighborhood was a cause of celebration. It was quite an improvement to the dwelling we occupied at the time. I turned nine when we moved into a new neighborhood.
             

​In my mind, the first day of school stands for something sinister. Years later, I still feel the pain of rejection. When I returned home, I told Mama I did not want to go to school anymore. I described to her what happened, and she responded. “Now that you know you are different, you must do your best to become number one in your class.”
“But why?” I objected.
“Because you are Jewish, and for that reason, you will have to fight for your right to belong.”
“I don’t want to fight. I do not know how Mama.”
“In time, you will figure it out.”
Mama was right. Time takes care of things.
The following morning, when I came to class, I immediately noticed which kids were on my side and which were not.
Hate and bullying became a constant issue throughout ten years of my formal education.
In the Soviet Union, we went to school six days a week for ten years to receive a High School Diploma.
Some students who did not want to graduate from High School chose to stop their education after the eighth grade. They did it out of necessity or inability to learn. Most families struggled to survive under the oppressive totalitarian regime. The students who stopped their education out of necessity became apprentices and learned a trade to help their families financially. Those challenged academically did the same thing because no one in the Soviet Union could stay home and play hooky.
For me, getting high grades was easy. Breaking the social barriers to fit in was hard.

​Today, I want to write about how I discovered I was different in a country of not enough. It happened on September 1, 1961. I was seven and ready to start my formal education. This skinny little kid could not wait for the first day of school to come fast enough. With anticipation and full of excitement, I packed my school supplies into a school bag the night before. I chatted all the way through as I showed each item to my parents before putting them inside a designated spot. I had a box for pencils, erasers, and counting sticks, which my brother helped me to pick up at a bookstore. I neatly organized the schoolbooks and notebooks by sliding them between the dividers. 

As soon as I woke up, I put on my school uniform and a white apron. In the Soviet Union, the students wore white aprons for special occasions only. And what could be more memorable than the first day of school? Mama was the one who had sewn my garment. She trimmed the apron with lace around the edges of its straps that crossed in the back. My brown dress had pleats, long sleeves, and a white color, just like the protocol required.  

The night before, Mama and I had our serious talk. "Why don't you help your brother and sister with house chores?" Mama said.
My siblings ratted me out. I did not blame them. Cleaning was the most minor favorite thing on my mind.
"Mama, do you want me to be the best student in class?"
"Of course. I do not expect anything else from you."
"Then don't bother me with chores. I promise I will be the number one pupil in my class."

On September 1, 1961, holding on to Mama's hand, I entered the schoolyard in Kotovsk, Ukraine. One of the teachers approached us and asked Mama for information about the class I belonged to. Without a smile or saying one word, she took my hand and led me to a group of children my age. She then pointed to me where to stand and left. 

Befuddled and uncomfortable, I stood amongst the sea of students and wondered how quiet each seven-year-old was. Until then, the children I met were playful and rambunctious. On the first day of school, I realized I would have to become one of the obedient little bots. 

The Welcoming ceremony lasted a long time. It was full of pomp and circumstance. The Soviets were good at doing it. A slew of Communist Party members gave speeches, including the director and dean of the school. The ten graders also talked about the excellent education and encouraged us to study hard to be the best. The National Anthem of the Soviet Union played as the soon-to-be graduates carried the flags in and out. As a naive child, I loved the performances and thought they were great. 

But everything changed when most of the children dispersed inside the building. Inside the cemented yard without a spring of green, only two groups remained—ten and first graders. Each ten-grader approached a first grader to exchange a gift for a bouquet they held in their hands. I did not have a bouquet. No one told Mama I needed one. That day, I was the only child who stood in the middle of a schoolyard without a gift. I felt distraught, and to make things worse, Mama ran toward the soon-to-be graduates, begging them to give me a gift. In my memory, the first day of school was the most humiliating day of my life. But it did not end there. 

Inside the classroom, my teacher made fun of my name. She embarrassed me by singling me out. That day, I realized I was different. It was because my first and last names were Jewish. That day, I knew I had to fight an uphill battle. 

​Welcome all, and thank you for selecting this blog post. Today is monumental. March 26, 2024, is the official launch date for www.etyawrites.com. A big shout-out goes to my talented son, Jeff Krichmar, who designed this site. Check out his work at www.krichmar.com.
I have much to learn about managing my site because I am from a generation that did not grow up around computers. I am of a generation who played make-believe games in a country where the scarcity of toys was ever-present.  

On summer breaks from the end of June until September 1, we entertained ourselves by playing Kazakhs and Robbers, climbing trees, going into the woods to seek adventures, reading, and playing sales games. To create the supply of goods, we collected pebbles, twigs, and wild berries, using tree leaves as currency.
As kids, we loved to play this game a lot because everything was available for sale in our pretend world, unlike the real world of socialism we lived in. In our make-believe world, there were no queues, and the salespeople were polite and accommodating behind our made-up counters.
Growing up in the former Soviet Union, a country of not enough, even silly pretend games took on a serious theme. Life was harsh under the auspices of the ever-watching Communist Party. The entire nation suffered from the shortage of everything. The country lived in fear of being betrayed by a friend or a neighbor. 
Thus begins the prelude to my journey. I lived a childhood rife with injustice, disparity, and poverty. Mockery and hate speech became the soundtrack of my youth. The deep scars of discrimination, exacerbated by the birth of my daughter, propelled me and my husband to seek refuge in the United States in 1977. Fueled by a heavy heart and ignited by a glimmer of hope, we embarked on the daunting journey to freedom.


Please follow me to learn what life in the USSR was about for a tiny minority of the Jews, who had experienced antisemitism not because they were Jewish by practicing Judaism but because the totalitarian regime stole the religious identity of their forefathers and turned it into their nationality.
The word "Jewish" handwritten on the birth certificate of every Jew born after the Great October Revolution marked them as a target for religious persecution in a country where the religion was outlawed
So, welcome to my blog, where my readers' opinions are valued. It is a non-judging zone. It is a place where discussion is appreciated.