Family
Categories: Residence and weekdays, Ira Motolyga
When «Azot» was being built, my husband built «Azot» and we were directed here.
And you arrived at Grodno for the first time. What were your first impressions?
Small street, very good impressions. I liked to be here, we lived very well, he earned quite a lot, and we lived not bad. But we lived in a hostel in Lidskaya street, there were housemasters there, we had a small room. Well, we had very interesting New Year’s parties, good parties. We have been since we lived together. Well, in Grodno we often went to restaurants, gathered together. We travelled a lot. We were given health resort vouchers. We went on cruise Moscow-Astrakhan with my husband, out and return by Volga, we visited all cities; we were given health resort vouchers.
Do the people in Borisov differ from those in Grodno? Do they differ?
Yes, they do. We lived there poorer, we lived poorer. His mother lived in the village too. My husband had six brothers and one sister. We lived poorer there. I was living somehow, well. I am, for example, a Jewess, they are Belarusians, we lived friendly, and his mother loved me very much. I used to go to the village to bring them some bread, the children were small, I was the eldest among them, and I brought buns and bread, herrings, and the neighbours asked to bring something. I brought them cups, everything I could do, I always helped them. And I used to go to comb flax. I helped them in everything they needed.
They lived at the collective farm Они тогда at that time. They didn’t have salary, did they?
No, they didn’t have any salary. My husband even finished 10 years of school, he performed well at school. But he had no possibility to enter the institute in Minsk, he wanted to enter the Polytechnic Institute, he studied well. And he worked here well too. In general, he had gifted hands. But he couldn’t enter the institute. He wrote so nice. His handwriting was so perfect that he helped all to prepare the works that are done at the institute. He was asked and he prepared, he prepared these works, made different letters for his schoolmates, he made such stamps, and then stamped these letters to all the schoolmates and they all went to pass to the institute with this letters. And so they studied on the basis of this letters and then they entered the institute. Later they received passports because they even didn’t have passports. And he was travelling from Borisov to Minsk on the roof as he didn’t have money to buy a ticket. He told that he had been selling milk but nothing earned at all. In one word, his family was big, they were getting on badly. Very badly. And you know I cannot understand why they lived joyfully. And why now we have money and it’s boring. Maybe it is decline of life or what is it… I always pay attention, I see, I have remembered the plant for many years. I was working at the radio devices plant when it broke down in the year of 92, my husband fell down at the plant and hit his head against the wall and died. He fractured his scull. He was tall. It was, perhaps, still Brezhnev’s time; I still worked at the plant. We liked books very much. There were such people called «book lovers». Well, they noted, then paid the money. People were fighting for books when they were distributed. In one word, someone was given, someone wasn’t. Also jackets were distributed; I still have some of them. Coats were distributed, towels were given out at those times. It was Gorbachev’s time. It was Gorbachev. Later we were told that we would be given pillowcases and door curtains. My mother was sitting and waiting, and we had a flat in Borisov, and besides, we were offered to build a small flat in block of flats number 51. I couldn’t live without mother. We told her, «We have to move in together». And we moved in together. We got this flat after we had moved in together. We left two flats and got this one. Mother was already here and we said, «Mom, tomorrow we will bring new pillowcases and curtains». In order to do this one had to go to the plant and rank. So we, all the plant workers, ranked at the gate, but not at the gatekeeper’s office, but at a special gate. So we were standing at this gate. And then the gate was opened. And such a man who worked at the stamping press, he was very-very tall, so he stood in front of us and said, «Taking winter clothes!» And all the people flocked! Everybody ran into this gate. I have always remembered that. Then I came and told mother about that. I came with my husband because if you came together – husband and wife, they gave both of us. And we brought these curtains. Such curtains made of bamboo sticks and these … well … pillowcases. We hung these curtains and my mother was sitting and then she said, «You needn’t to go and take them!» She had lived in the past. And these were such curtains that you couldn’t pass it through because they made noise. (Laughing). And Sergey said, «Look! Isn’t it nice in the flat?!» We throw them away, of course. So, I remember these years, these were just war years.
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Researcher: Наталья Иващенко, кандидат исторических наук, ГрГУ им. Я. Купалы, Светлана Силова, кандидат исторических наук, доцент, ГрГУ им. Я. Купалы