The New Neighborhood

​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.