This is me and my friend Izya Reutman playing chess in his apartment. Kishinev, 1948.
After we returned to Kishinev in 1946, I studied at a secondary school. I was overage and it was hard for me to study. I took an initiative and soon became one of the best students. There were a lot of Jewish students in our class, as well as in the whole school. We got along very well in spite of the exacerbated all-state anti-Semitism. I became a Komsomol member. I took an active part in the wall paper. I was rather 'righteous,' I didn't drink or smoke, so the guys didn't take me to be good company. Being a teenager I was interested in chess and music. I joined a chess circle and choir. Music appealed to me, especially accordion. I was eager to learn how to play the accordion, but my mother couldn't afford it. At times I asked my friend for an accordion, but he only let me hold it and not play.
When in 1950 I finished school, my mother insisted that I should enter the most unpopular college where there was no competition. It was very hard for Jews to enter institutions of higher education without bribe or connections as it was the time of the struggle against rootless cosmopolites. I wanted to become an engineer and work with metal, but I agreed with my mother that I should acquire some profession and start working. I entered a statistics college.
