tales from the village

it seems odd that life should have returned to such a normal state as of yesterday here in ukraine, but seemingly, it has (at least in the west- im in lviv now). the tv programming seemed to have returned to the regular, buses running noramlly, people working, students back at school business as usual. but hopefully, it hasnt. and what happened last week will be the beginning of a radical change for ukraine for the better. anyway- tales from pidhaitsi. on sunday evening, i was invited over to frieds of th family i was staying with. to my great surpriae, the grandmother there, perhaps 80 or more, spoke wonderfully in english. she had been the english teacher at the secondary school in pidhaitsi for many years. although she has never left ukraine, she talked with ease in english. she told me a bit of the history of pidhaitsi. she told me tht before the war, there were ukrainians, poles, and jews living in town. i had visited the jewish cemitary in this town a few days beefore. Jthere were over 3000 jeiwsh people living in pidhaitsi in the 1930se town or more (the town's population today is 3000). today, there are no jewish people in pidhaitsi. completely absent. and this lady said that these people lived together in peace before. then the nazi occupation came. her father hid 2 jewish families in the basement of their house. when the father was out of the house, the ss came and searched the house. they found the mother an daughter. the grandmother told me she remembers so clearly the ss taking the mother with her baby child in her arms; taking them to the fieeldd behind her hoouse, and shooting them. she says that memory is so engraved in her mind. can you imagine? to be in a town with such history, but then life proceeds normally. the ruins of the empty synagogue lay near the centre of town, along with the cemitary with hundreds of jewish people. but no one today is left to be buried there.