The tape is a formal interview with Evgeniia Abramovna Kozak, nee Shafir, born in Bershad in 1926. (Part 1 of 3. See MDV 368 and MDV 369) After briefly providing personal background information, she talks about her family and childhood in Bershad. Her father, Avrom Hershkovich Kozak, was a furrier. Her mother, Blume Shlomovna Shafir, was a homemaker and worked as a baker after the war. She grew up with her brother Shloyme (b. 1928) and her sister Lyuba (b. 1931). Kozak studied at a Ukrainian school for eight years.

The conversation moves to her life during World War II in evacuation. When Bershad was bombed in 1941, her family was evacuated to the Caucasus; and lived in Bezopasnoye for one year. They then evacuated further to the Andijon region in today’s Uzbekistan. She then shows the team a document bearing Red Cross insignia. The conversation returns to Kozak’s early childhood memories and life in prewar Jewish Bershad. Among different topics, she discusses family recipes, food customs, the celebration of holidays, and weddings before and after the war, as well as recalls religious customs in the synagogue.

Before Kozak returns to talking about prewar Jewish life in Bershad, she remembers her return to Bershad in 1944. Her home was already inhabited by strangers, so her family had to move in with her aunt. In order to make a living, her father worked in the surrounding villages and her mother baked bread at night in order to sell them at the market. Kozak was married in 1958. Kozak’s mother told her family anecdotes about her grandfather who rescued his grandchild in the snow and passed away as the result of the winter conditions. The tape concludes with a couple of songs from her childhood. The first song is about fiery love and the latter includes a story about a poor boy in love.