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Recording Content:
Continuation of formal interview with Tsilia Borisovna Khaiut. (Part 2 of 3. See MDV 582 and Accession # 09-010.52-F MDV 694)
Cities and towns mentioned on this tape: Mohyliv-Podil’s’kyy, Chernivtsi.
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00:00:00
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Continuation of formal interview with Tsilia Borisovna Khaiut. She details other foods that her family would eat on shabes (Sabbath). |
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00:02:37
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Khaiut shows off a gorokhvinike, or pea-filled pastry and her chopping knife for fish. |
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00:04:20
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She then demonstrates how to make gefilte fish, using a knife and newspaper. Khaiut also explains some aspects of pre-war Jewish life in the town, including how each profession had its own synagogue and brought in guest cantors from time to time. Khaiut remembers Sidi Tal’ and various Yiddish theater troupes that came to Mohyliv-Podil’s’kyy before the war, putting on plays such as Sholem Aleichem’s 200,000. After the war, Jewish artists, such as Iosif Kobzon, also visited the town. Professor Kerler asks the interviewee about how she dealt with the potential contradiction of attending a Soviet Yiddish school, while maintaining a religious practice at home. She states that it's a lie that they made fun of religion and/or religious people in the schools. Nevertheless, in the 1930s, Khaiut reports, many of the synagogues in Mohyliv-Podil’s’kyy were closed down. Khaiut then recalls several food and gaming customs associated with holidays, such as Shavuot, Chanukah, Purim, Passover, Sukkot and Yom Kippur. Khaiut can still read in Yiddish, and even reads Professor Kerler’s interview notes out loud. Her son Sema understands and speaks some Yiddish. Khaiut then shares some Yiddish idioms and sayings. Both of her sons are circumcised. When her second son was born in 1946, she got a moyl (mohel) from Chernivtsi to come and circumcise him. The interviewee also answers a series of questions related to linguistics and dialectology. Khaiut also talks in detail about her own pre-war Jewish wedding, which featured Jewish klezmorim led by “Moyshele der Puker mit der Muzike” (Moshe the drummer with the music). At her wedding, as at others, there was a chuppah, and the bride circled the groom accompanied by her parents. Berl Sanver presided over the occasion as a kind of master of ceremonies/badkhn, and spoke with rhymes and songs. Khaiut also shares more of her linguistic knowledge as well as recipes for tsimes (stew) and fludn (dessert). |
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00:43:18
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Khaiut gives the team samples of her homemade rose jam, all the while sharing more of her profound knowledge of culinary customs and recipes. The interviewee also remembers folk remedies from babkes (folk healers). Khaiut then shares her romantic history with her husband, who was in fact her second suitor. Her husband Khayem had received a Moscow residency permit, but after three years writing letters back and forth with Khaiut, he returned to Mohyliv-Podil’s’kyy to marry her in 1937. Khaiut then shows old photos of her and her husband. Cities and towns mentioned on this tape: Mohyliv-Podil’s’kyy, Chernivtsi |
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