And at last we came there! I don't even know how to describe everything I saw and heard during that unforgettable trip.

   Our Akmola region is stretched on 146 square kilometers. And on that territory, 300 km far from Kokshetau and Hesed "Nathan", there is a village Golden Niva.

   Since middle of autumn Kokshetau Hesed has been going to send there its representatives. But everybody had a lot of things to do. And at last we - I mean Elena Sherbinskaya, "Etgar" program coordinator, a driver Andrey Krivih and me, Anatoliy Itkin, Hesed "Natan" director - went to Golden Niva.

   Merrily smiling we passed Shuchinsk city, which has long ago became so dear to us. There "Hesed on Wheels" program is several timer per month and Suchinsk community is not a rare guest in Kokshetau. 80 km away and we reached Stepnyak city. And then …

   Steppe, steppe, steppe. No people, no cars, bad road. Even no birds and animals. Suddenly the driver saw cows, trying to find something to eat under the snow. But herdsman appeared only 3 kilometers far from them. That was the first man we met during our 5-hour trip! Namely he showed us the way.

   In 40 minutes we reached our aim. And there appeared an interesting situation.

   Filling in children's program forms we were talking to people. We found out that there are several Jewish families in that village, that Hesed didn't know about. We asked our new friend Ludmila Kobilkina, Jewish community member about the way those people appeared there. And again war! Evacuation from Ukraine to Kazakhstan across the whole Soviet Union. They stayed there.

   So, grew up the children and grandchildren of first Jewish families of the village Golden Niva.

  The children from that village, turned out not to go to the kindergarten, because there was no kindergarten. There is also a problem with school - some times ago Russian school was closed and now the teaching is only in Kazakh.

   Children and adults were very glad to see Hesed representatives. And Chanukah sets that "Mitsva" Association and JDC gave to every family made eyes of old people, middle aged people and children shine with hope.

  Nobody wanted us to go away. They asked us to stay at least for one more day, but we had to go back.

  Almost whole our way back we were talking that our nation is so small and it leaves all over the world. And we thought about one more thing, that we often repeat: "To find every Jew, to reach every Jew" … In our case we had to be able to reach Jews form the village Golden Niva.

Anatoliy Itkin