This is Uncle Ruvim before the war, somewhere in the Caucasus.
Uncle Ruvim [brother of Abram, Valentina's father] came to visit grandmother Tamara in Vladikavkaz, he lived in Leningrad.
Uncle received a military education, was at the front, and when he arrived on leave in Leningrad he was killed at the railway station. It was in 1942. A bomb exploded there.
I think it was at the Moscow railway station, I can't say for sure. That's how he died. He was a military, wore those strips, there were no shoulder straps then. He was a senior lieutenant.
All relatives on the side of grandmother Faina, my Leningrad grandmother, the wife of grandfather Zorakh, died during the blockade and are buried in Piskarevsky 11 cemetery. I remember one of them, my small grandmother, named Feiga.
She was very tender and kind, of very small height, and that's why I called her "the small grandmother". We met when I came to Leningrad [1930s]. And then, later, we did not communicate any more.
I was about 7 years old then. They lived in 16 Zagorodny Avenue12, near the post-office. When Aunt Maryasya was alive, she knew their grave, and she had shown it tome.
This year I skipped going to Piskarevka, because of my leg, otherwise I go there [to Piskarevsky cemetery] every year.
