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 It's
strange and even funny to say now, but till senior school I didn't know that
I was a Jew. I mean, I knew - it was written in my documents, but I could
not understand the difference between me and other girls. When Hesed and JCC
came into my life everything changed. With a secret pride I saw myself bringing
the Jewish tradition back to our home and connecting my family to the Jewish
background.
 The
Republican Jewish Library in Almaty has recently announced that everybody having
old family photos can bring them to "Davar" newspaper. And here is
my mother selecting and singing yellowy pictures at my instance. Her face is
shining with a light I have never seen before, and suddenly she says -
"no, the Jewish community never forsakes its members!" I am a bit
shocked with her words - my mother has never mentioned that we are Jewish,
and she learnt about the Jewish community only from me. And then she told me
a story of my great-grandmother and her family.
 The
civil war scattered my great-grandparents round Ukraine. But my great-grandfather
Evsey found an opportunity to gather his family. My great-grandmother (her name
was Mariya, the same as mine) with her three children went to his town by train.
But it happened so that during the trip she fell ill with typhus. She and her
children were made get off from the train in some small town. Mariya was taken
to the hospital, but what happened to the children? A local synagogue sheltered
them. By the time Evsey arrived in the town, Mariya had already passed away,
and the children were put into different families. My great-grandfather turned
to the synagogue that had detailed records, and soon managed to gather his family.
It seemed that the old photographs opened some invisible source,
and mother began telling the stories I have never heard before. About my grandmother,
her brothers, their life during the war and many other things. But her first
story remained in my mind.
The Jewish community never forsakes its members.
Mariya Maistrovskaya
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