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Manya Auster Feldman - August 11, 1998

You had gone back to Dombrovitsa?

I went back to Dombrovitsa, yes. And I found—that's whereI found my cousin. I found some other Jewish people that survived in Russia.And I, and I vowed that my foot will never step in there anymore. I neverwent back. That was the last, the last time I was there. Now, I have—Ikeep having a desire to go to the grave of where my mother is buried. Butit's, it's, it's hard.

Where is she buried?

She's buried in Sarny, where 15,000 Jews are buried.

She's in a mass grave?

Yeah.

Yeah. . .

In a mass grave, with my two sisters.

This means that the last time you saw your father and yoursister, you were ill?

Right.

Is that the last time?

That's it.

Through a, through a haze?

No, it—it's like a silhouette I see. I don't have a pictureof my father. I look at my uncle, what I show them and he reminds me of myfather. But I don't remember his face vividly. I don't remember. I remembermy sister. But don't—you know, I'm—I'm 75 years old. My sister wastwenty-one. I was eighteen. I remember them as, as young people. My fatherwas young. My father was forty-two.

Of course, you didn't know it was farewell at that point?

No.

No. . .

We didn't know what's going to happen tomorrow. My father sortof like had a fatalistic outlook. He, he always was saying that, I'm not goingto live through it. And if you lived with—I didn't, I didn't—shouldI say that I lived with hope? No. I didn't live with hope. I, I, I just livedand I pushed through every day. What's going to happen tomorrow, I don't know.What's going to happen the next hour, I don't know.

What brought you to leave Dombrovitsa? I mean, how—whatsteps did you take leave there?

Well, what steps did I take? I lived in Pinsk actually. I cameto Dombrovitsa to visit.

Okay.

And when I saw—and there were some—some gentiles theysaid, "How come you survived?" That were the questions. How can I live amongthem? "All the Jews were killed and you survived? How did that happen?"

What did you say?

What do you say? You sit there—I stay there—what, shouldI start arguing with them? There was nothing to say. I said, "You are thesame murderers as the Germans." And they knew it. They knew it.