Stepan Neuman with his brother Frank Newman

This is me (sitting), with my brother Frantisek Neuman. My wife photographed us when my brother came to visit us in Uzhgorod. My brother and I were going to ski in the mountains. This photo was taken in our apartment in Uzhgorod in 1992.

My brother was married twice. His first wife was a Jewish girl whose parents moved from Germany in the early 1930s, when Hitler came to power there. They moved to Australia. In this marriage Frank had a daughter named Carole. His wife died shortly after childbirth. Some time later he married a woman who had moved to Australia from South America. They have three children in this marriage: Peter, Nelly and Frank.

During perestroika I finally got an opportunity to meet with my brother. In 1989 my wife and I went to see him. Of course, I would not have been able to afford this trip. Now, after 58 years of work records my pension is 210 hrivna [about $ 40], and 40 hrivna of it [about $ 8] I get for 16 years of my deputy work. My brother paid for this trip.

We stayed there a few months and it was like a fairy tale. I met his wife and children and we became friends. We traveled across the country and we talked a lot. We had lived a long life apart from one another. We recalled our life before the war, our parents and talked about life after the war. We were sorry, when it was time for us to leave.

My brother kept telling me that I should move to Australia, but we were not quite comfortable with the climate in Australia. Besides, I’ve lived my life in Ukraine and there are my children and grandchildren, my friends and my memories – everything connecting me with my parents – here. However, we’ve been in touch with my brother. He’s visited here twice: once he came with his older daughter Carole. I hope he will visit us again. I would like to travel to Israel to see my grandson and the country, but I don’t think I will ever be able to afford it.