Smila, Ukraine – May 3rd, 2006 – 22h50 – Nipro Hotel – in Cherkassy, Ukraine.
An emotional journey into the past – I visit Smila, Ukraine – Ancestral home of the Wener family
The year was 1996: I was traveling with my very good friend from Brazil, Flavio Bitelman, to visit the regions where our families had come from. Flavio’s father, Michel Bitelman, had come to Brazil as a young man, from Kishinev (Chisinau), Moldova (Bessarabia).
I had prepared for the trip using the internet and had arranged a guide and a driver from Montréal using a local Ukrainian tour operator. We had the services of a guide/translator and a car and driver for Wednesday and Thursday, May 3rd and 4th, 2006, with everyone sleeping over in Cherkassy, a city about 20 minutes from Smila.
After a very successful and emotional tour of Moldova, on Monday May 1st, Flavio and I took a 16-hour overnight train ride from Kishinev to Kiev. We arrived in Kiev on Tuesday and stayed overnight at the Dnipro Hotel in downtown Kiev.
On Wednesday morning, I was awake early – excited to see how the day would unfold. I had arranged to have our guide, Sergey, come a little early to our Hotel in Kiev so we could perhaps have breakfast together and maybe plan out the Smila trip a bit.
At 7:15 – we wandered into the lobby. To my delight, we met our translator there – Sergey, a wonderful warm and very bright young man – 51 years old. The three of us went off to breakfast. Yuri, our driver was waiting with his car.
Sergey, Flavio and I planned out the day together. Flavio and I liked Sergey right off the bat. His English was flawless. He was lively, full of energy and ideas. He had lived for several years in Peru as a military attaché with the Soviet Army, and then in Cuba for three years. He had a wife and 2 daughters. I told Sergey in detail about the Wener family history, the family tree project, about our giant Wener family reunion in Las Vegas and even about my daughter Ali meeting up with Jeffrey and Rhonda Wener in Chicago because of the family tree.
Sergey seemed quite enchanted with our adventure into the past and had some ideas about how we might proceed. We then checked out of the hotel and met our driver – Yuri – a bear of a man – who spoke no English but had a warm smile and a beautiful 4-door black Audi in impeccable condition. The weather was perfect. It was about 18 degrees Celsius (about 67 Fahrenheit) – sunny and bright.
It took us about 3 hours after leaving Kiev – to reach Smila. The road was quite good. A three-lane paved highway. We were able to travel at 120 km/hr. Yuri played a CD with a wonderful mix of classical music – with an emphasis on Russian music – Rachmaninoff, Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich, and Stravinsky. I was quite excited when we arrived at the outskirts of Smila.
There was a large sign and we took some pictures with the sign in the background. Even though we were in Ukraine, everyone spoke Russian and all signs were in the Cyrillic alphabet.
We entered Smila – a pleasant small city of about 30 000 inhabitants. Lots of industrial buildings and a shopping street. Yuri asked a passer-by about the location of the Jewish cemetery and we got there in about 5 minutes. It was a large field, about the size of a baseball field. One section had little fenced plots with tombstones in them and there were scattered and broken tombstones all over the place. (I later learned that the Nazis took many tombstones to use as the foundation of their army barracks when they occupied Smila during the War.)
Flavio, Sergey, Yuri and I wandered around the field looking for any trace of Cuni Lebe Vinokur – or any Vinokurs for that matter. I learned from Sergey that Vinokur meant winemaker. Flavio and I were able to recognize the Russian spelling of Vinokur – but after 45 minutes, we realized there was no hope. My grandfather Jack Wener died in 1972 – his father Frank died in 1946 – so I figured that Cuni Lebe Vinokur must have died between 1910 and 1930. I was hoping to find Cuni Lebe’s tombstone and his wife Debrah – with dates and maybe some photos to flesh out the Wener family tree and to connect with my past. No luck – there were no legible tombstones in the cemetery from that era.
After 45 minutes, we shifted to plan B. We thought we could look for the synagogue and get some help. We phoned someone whose name I had taken off the internet – but there was no answer, and no voicemail. Yuri suggested that we go to the market and ask people what to do. It was around 11h30 by now.
The market was full of people and small animals. Colourful stalls, live chickens and ducks. Flavio was busy taking pictures of the scene and Yuri went off to eat some piroshki – a local snack – pastry filled with cabbage or meat. Yuri came back to get us and brought us for some piroshki. The delightful lady who made them – had a broad smile and her eyes twinkled. Her name was Tatiana. {Everyone we met was named either Tatiana or Tania (a nickname) or Olga}.
Tatiana told us with a smile that she could help us. There was no synagogue in Smila any more, but that Tatiana lived at the edge of the market and told us to follow her. Next to her house was a small white building and it was the Jewish Community Center of Smila. We had found the mother lode.
Inside the Jewish Community Center we met Inna and Yossif – the two volunteers who ran the Jewish Community Center. Inna was the President. Yossif was the book-keeper. We later learned that Yossif had contracted a serious ailment – probably pancreatic cancer – and was given 1 chance out of three to survive. He decided that if he was lucky enough to live – he would live off his pension (around $100 USD/month) and work as a volunteer for the Center.
Yossif had beautiful deep blue eyes, slightly sad, with a ruddy complexion. Balding slightly and looking a bit older than his 59 years. He was warm but quiet. Inna was the chatty one – with her wagging finger at times – she seemed to be the quintessential Jewish Momma.
There are about 500 Jews left in Smila. The little building had an office, a classroom and a kitchen. There were desks and an Israeli flag. They gave Hebrew lessons, prepared children for their Bar-Mitzvahs, prepared people who were planning to emigrate to Israel, had discussion groups, Seders, and Jewish cooking classes. They were able to conduct religious services for the high holidays when a rabbi could officiate. A former resident of Smila, upon leaving for Israel donated his house to the community about 15 years earlier.
Inna was a blond, 55 year-old slightly zaftig (I should talk!) middle-aged woman. Pleasant and cheery. She was delighted to meet Flavio and myself. Sergey translated at about 1000 words per minute – faster than a speeding bullet. Inna asked Flavio about Brazil, his family, his work, our trip to Kishinev. She was curious about how observant we were vis-à-vis Judaism. Flavio went to shul once a year- (on a good year) for Yom Kippur and I went not at all. I got Inna’s wagging finger and practically had to promise that I would go to a synagogue and do it for her.
I told Inna and Yossif that I was very proud of my Jewish heritage but made no special room for religion in my life other than one Passover Seder per year. To convince Inna that I was indeed Jewish, I broke into a chant of Manishta Na Ha Leila Hazeh – Inna and Yossif smiled, and that’s all we needed – Flavio and I went into a rousing medley of the Jewish songs we knew – Adon Alom, Eyn Chelohenu, Hava Nagila, and Flavio really impressed them with his rendition of Russian songs that he had learnt from his father – Ochi Chornya and Tum Balalaika. Both Inna and Yossif were touched by our common links – and were quite enchanted with Flavio’s impressive command of Russian – (at least in song) and his good singing voice.
They wanted to give us presents. We insisted that they shouldn’t, but they both left and said they would return in 15 minutes. We waited. They soon came back with boxes of chocolates and a collection of small Ukrainian liquors. We gave them some bottles of cognac and a bottle of Ukrainian Champagne. We opened the cognac and made multiple toasts in multiple languages.
When they told me of all their activities, I gave Inna $300 USD to help with their work. She was very grateful. She asked if there could be some help from Jews in the West and I said that I would try to help.
Inna asked about my family. I showed her pictures and even played a sound clip from my Palm Pilot (remember them?) with Rosie singing <It’s A Wonderful World> accompanied by yours truly on the piano. Inna was charmed.
We talked about Cuni Lebe Vinokur and Frank Wener – Vinokur. They said there were many Vinokurs in Smila but no one was left. Either they had died during the war or emigrated. They said that the name meant winemaker. They called the oldest Jewish man in the community – he had known some Vinokurs before the war, but there were none left. There were no written records in the town or archives that made it through the war.
We decided to invite Inna and Yossif for lunch. Inna arranged this at the Hotel – and Yossif, Flavio, myself and Sergey, along with our driver Yuri went on a tour.
Yossif took us into the forest about 5 km out of town. The woods were beautiful, green and quiet with apple trees in blossom. Mostly hardwoods but some spruce and pine were seen. We could hear nightingales and cuckoos singing. We followed a little dirt road with grass growing between the tracks.
Yossif told us that in 1943, the Nazis rounded up all the Jews that were in Smila at the time – 3,500 individuals and marched them into the woods. Yossif showed us the spot – a little glen where they machine gunned everyone to death. To save on bullets, they beat the children to death with clubs and then buried them all – some still alive. At this point, I was very emotional and my eyes filled with tears. At the time of the massacre, a local village resident was hiding in the woods and witnessed it all. A memorial stone marks the spot and a large garden is planted every summer with annuals. We were getting eaten up by giant Red Army mosquitoes and we all left our blood at the massacre site.
The Nazis also killed Communists and Gypsies and separate memorials are there for these groups as well. Our hosts, Yossif and Inna were alive because they were born after 1945. Their parents had been further East with the Russian Army.
It was a very emotional moment for me. If my great grandparents Frank and Ida hadn’t had the courage to emigrate 100 years ago with their 7 children, the little glen in the woods would have been the fate of the Weners of North America.
After the trip to the woods, we went to the new Jewish cemetery. This was a well-kept cemetery just adjacent to the Orthodox one. At the entrance, we saw two graves – a couple with the surname Vinokurov – no doubt relatives of mine. Avram Vinokurov was quite probably a great nephew of Frank Wener – the grandson of a brother who didn’t leave for Canada. He was born in 1911, just a few years before my mother Rosie was born.
We noticed almost a total lack of Jewish symbols in the cemetery – no menorahs or Stars of David. We saw only two in the entire section. Yossif explained that this was to cut down on the vandalism.
We then drove to the small Hotel where we all had lunch. Our lunch consisted of of borsht and sour cream, and delicious breaded veal. We also ate bread with garlic – (actually garlic with bread) called pampushki – quite delicious. There was potato purée, Russian salad and Ukrainian beer. For dessert, we had blintzes/ blinis with cheese.
Yossif seemed tired and we drove him home. We said our emotional good-byes to Inna at the Hotel. We hugged and kissed and said good-bye.
I took a small scoop of earth in a ziplock bag from both the old and the new Jewish Cemetery.
All in all, the day far exceeded my expectations. I knew I had little chance of actually finding the tombstone of Cuni Lebe Vinokur and his wife Debrah. Instead Flavio and I connected in a very meaningful way with Inna and Yossif – the keepers of the flame of the Jewish Community of Smila. I will remember this day and my link to the past for many years to come.
My Address: Michael Mindel, 4970 Glencairn Avenue, Montreal QC, Canada, H3W 2B2 – or by email : michael@mindel.ca
KRUCHENITSKA INNA SEMENIVNA
JEWISH CULTURE SOCIETY
FRUKTOVA, 3, STR.
SMILA, CHERKASSY REGION,
20700 UKRAINE
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