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December 14
My dearest and only beloved,
You absolutely can’t imagine what a letter from you means to me. With your letter you give me the strength to be able to breath again for a while. The letter is read by me so often and wetted by my tears, until I get another one from you. And your letters keep me alive. Unfortunately I’ve already lost my strength and courage but the energy that I want and have to see you again, my dearest, help me bear this misery. What should I tell you my most beloved ones; your good deeds spared you from this misery in which hundreds of people perish every day. May God Almighty keep you safe, that is my one wish. You deserve it; you are precious souls
and did very good things for our dear parents and for us. May God repay you. I am so happy that you stayed at home. I thanked God, screaming and crying aloud, for sparing you from seeing and experiencing this misery and filth. Enough of that, I won’t write anything about that anymore. I pray to God that we will have the strength to persevere so we can meet again in joy. Maybe the day of our salvation will come. I know my wretched heart knows that you, my darlings, want to see us again and are doing everything you can. May God help us. I don’t have any other wish than to see you and
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all my darlings again, then I will be ready. I can say one thing to you, my dearest: treat yourselves to everything, eat well, just hold your nerve and keep your strength up, keeping these, as well as the commandments, is of vital necessity. Juni always told me to eat and drink and enjoy life – I never understood, and now, unfortunately, it’s too late. Now this is what I want you to do. Eat and drink the most delicious and best stuff you have. You had such a good opportunity, why didn’t you write more about yourselves? How are you, how are you living, what have you been through? I don’t want your letters to be full of your worries about us, my dearest, tell me more about you, good things, that’s what I’m so eager
to hear about. Don’t worry so much about us, maybe God will help and we will make it through, and then we will all be happy exchanging our stories. Today is the first day of Hanukkah, maybe a miracle will happen as it did many years ago. Promise me, my darlings that you won’t worry about us, that will help me so much. So be sensible, dearest sister. I want to eat bread baked by your own hands again, so be strong. I received the 50 cans along with the butter. I will see tomorrow what else I have received when I go to Dr. Twers. I met him in the street and he didn’t have time to talk to me. I will go there again tomorrow morning to receive personal greetings. Thank you so much for your devotion. Hopefully I will be able to give the cans back to you personally. I don’t need them at the moment. However, as I said, we
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don’t know what tomorrow will bring. I gave 5 cans to Schendel. I will also give the 10 cans to Mrs. Weisselberg and a letter to the housewife, etc. because we don’t have an opportunity every day. I’ll take care of it. As for Lezu Diserl, I think, dear Adrenul, that Mr. Kern will deal with things. I will try to find out about her situation tomorrow and act accordingly. Then I will let you know. Bertha’s and Arie’s situation is as follows: as far as I know, Arie earns some money from time to time but he thinks it wouldn’t hurt to have another source of income. So he came to me today and asked me if I knew if someone had come from Radauti, and I said yes. Then he wanted to know if I had received anything. I asked him why he was asking
and he told me: “I sent a letter to [XXX] in Radauti to ask for money.” Then I said to him: “But I know that you earn money.”, whereupon he told me that he didn’t earn as much as they needed. So I told him that I would give him 2,000 lei. In the afternoon he came back to me and demanded 5,000 lei from me, claiming that the uncle wrote to Singer (Postelnik’s son-in-law) to tell him that he could take as much as he needed from me. Of course we will only give him 2 cans. Could you find out about that? He said he would write to Piniu who is to send it to Avrenul. My darlings, nowadays you shouldn’t get too involved with other people because time has stopped people being ashamed and made them think others have to help them. Arie says he has to go home, as does Schendel.
IV This means there’s a way to go to Chernivtsi, fare-dodging, but it’s very expensive. Schendel wants to write to Peretz about this to get her to help. She wants to thank him for the 10 cans and hopes to get a month’s salary from him when she is in Chernivtsi. She also claims to have cans at your place. Dearest Avrenul, don’t worry about your sister Fanie Terner. They are in a village 40 km from here and Schendel told me they are fine. I will try to put you in touch with them. Don’t worry about it. Waldi cried bitterly when I read about your mistaking someone for him on the railway track, dear Avrenul. If I had known what
was awaiting us here, I definitely wouldn’t have been such an egoist and would have left Waldi with you, if possible. The tea hall is also actually working and if you could sell anything, you could earn some money, but unfortunately there’s nothing on the market. I fear starvation. We haven’t seen a single piece of bread in days and if you do find some, it costs 500 lei. I’m incapable of describing the price inflation and misery. May God help by sending aid quickly. Fortunately we haven’t yet starved. We are getting by as well as we can. Unfortunately we didn’t receive much of your big package because you mentioned a box in your letter which we don’t seem to have received. It is here in Ataki and can’t be brought over. If you don’t find anyone willing to deliver packages personally, it’s not worth
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sending them. I’m sure you passed my last letter on to dear Oscar to keep him updated. I received the shoes, my dearest, they are fabric shoes, aren’t they? I wanted to give the same to my mother so she wanted to take them. It’s not easy with sensitive people but what can you do. God shall help me bring them back home safe and sound. You told me, my dearest, that dear Sonin was working for us. In what way? To get us out of here? What did you give Mr. Gen to take with him? Documents that will help us in a way? Did he promise you anything? We’ve only received 1 telegram from the children in Bucharest and nothing else since then. I don’t know if they care at all because they don’t write. My dearest, you shouldn’t send any telegrams.
It’s a waste of money for nothing. Be reassured. I will always send you postcards but I don’t know if they get through. Your cards take 8 days to arrive. There were no cards to come by, now I’ve got hold of 10 so I’ll be able to write. Please write regularly too, because this is my only source of pleasure. My dearest children, do you think God considers me worthy of seeing you again? You have been so good to me and I love you so much but I want to see you again. Dearest Avrenul, I miss you here. I would definitely worry less; we’ve often talked about this. But I thank God that you
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are not here and God shall spare you from this. Write often and tell me at least that we will be able to come home soon. That’s like a shot for me. What about my former house? Is anyone living there? Write again soon. Send my love to all of you, my dearest. Stay healthy and let us hope for a happy reunion,
Gusta