THE LITTLE HANUKKAH MIRACLE

I went to a friends' house for a Hanukkah dinner in Long Beach. The place was packed, great food, children running around (including my daughter), nice conversations... Until I met a woman, named Dina, who said she was from Russia. I asked where and the answer was "from the South" - with a face like "you would never know where it is so I won't say the name of the location". Insistently I asked again where. The answer was Moldova.

Just the name "Moldova" opens up room for a lot of conversation. But ours was fast. When I mentioned my grandmother was from Orhei, Dina called her husband right away and put me in contact with him.

To make the story short, we found out I am related to Emil, Dina's husband, through a common relative: Fima Tolpolar. Dina invited me to her house the next day. 

Dina and Emil

Dina and Emil are a very nice couple. Dina is a pianist and Emil was a journalist in the extinct Soviet Republic - and turned out to be a computer programmer in the States. Amongst homemade latkes and mamaliga, we exchanged stories and information, and talked to relatives in Miami who knew more about our connections - and even sent us some rare pictures I had never seen before.

It so happens that Emil's grandmother was the sister of Fima's mother! Her last name was Davidovich - and I also found out that there was a Davidovich in Brazil who was married to my dad's uncle - and was also Fima's cousin.

One of the pictures sent to us from Miami opened up multiple interpretations of what could have happened in 1930 between Tolpolar and Davidovich cousins. A mystery that, if solved, can help us picture the past.

More in the next post.

REVISITING FIMA

It was just now in December 2011 that I read only for the second time some of the translation of the letters my father's first cousin from Moldova, Fima, sent to him in Brazil in 1991. The first time I read them I didn't have any notion of family ancestry as I was about 15 years-old. Fima was still alive with much information about the Tolpolars. Some he shared with us, some I believed were buried with him.

Fima was the last direct family member to leave the Soviet Republic of Moldova and move to Israel. Because of that, much of the recent information we find about our ancestors are related to him and his impressive life story. He fought in World War II in the Soviet army, got hurt and was taken to a Moscow hospital, that's how he survived the war. He returned to Moldova to find all of his family killed, and it is said he was set to find some of the killers. We don't know for sure what happened on his journey, but that in the 90's he was exchanging letters with my father. He would write in Hebrew/Yiddish and my dad in English. I'm sure some was lost in the translation on both sides.

What caught my attention was that Fima wrote the 8 Tolpolar brothers and sisters loved and cared about each other. That my grandfather taught him Yiddish, that he had raised a fortune working for 45 years as a high ranking lawyer but had to leave everything to the Russians when he moved to Israel. The letters reveal a sad and nostalgic Fima, but incredibly excited to connect with my father. In his words, he and my dad were the last of the Bessarabian (male) Tolpolars.


These two men finally met in 1994 for a few hours only, in Israel. I dare to say this meeting was historic, a meeting between cousins who never met but were always so close. Unfortunately I was not there. Fima passed in 2000. At that point, Israel, Bessarabia, immigration, and my own ancestry were things I could not completely comprehend. It was beyond my reach.

I never met Fima, but I still have my father's memories and Fima's direct family in Israel. I'm sure that, in different levels, Fima lives in all of us.

THE KARSHENBOYMS

A few weeks ago I got a message on this same blog from Gene Karshenboym. He said “Hi! My father was born in Yedentzi and I spent my childhood summers there… I have many pictures and would love to chat with you about your experience. I reached out to my dad right now over the phone to see if he knows any of the people you are looking for.”

We exchanged a few e-mails, Gene sent me some pics from his latest trip to Edinitz, and then we finally talked over the phone.

His dad Ruvin was the one who knew more about Edinitz. Now living in Atlanta, US, he told me many things, including well known "celebrities" from Beltsy and Edinitz (where he said people were known for being well educated) and wine making in Moldova. He said most Jews who left Edinitz went to New York, Toronto, Germany or Israel. Ruvin said his father was also in South America, in Argentina (he was a "gaucho", he joked). Actually his father, (still alive, in Israel) when questioned if he had heard about any Tolpolar, said “of course, Fima Tolpolar!” Fima, my dad’s first cousin, was a teacher for Ruvin’s mom, and was like part of the family. Ruvin and Gene also know many of the people we met in our 2008 trip, including Semion Furman and Ana Filipona (in the photo below).

We chatted for a while. At last, Ruvin said the old generation, his parents, never talked about their past. For some reason, they didn't want to or feel like it, he wasn't sure if they didn't want to remember the atrocities committed to Jews or just didn't think it was important. Ruvin regretted that, because now he doesn't know as much as he wanted about the past. I thought about my grandparents, who also never said much to my dad.

My in-laws happen to live close to Atlanta, so when I go there, in December, we will meet in person with the Karshenboyms. We'll eat mamaliga and drink wine. As Gene put it in a later e-mail, “Isn't it pretty crazy to think that after everything my dad told us about your family, that we found each other and that a Karshenboym and a Tolpolar are e-mailing each other? Crazy world.”

Crazy world indeed.