Efim Pisarenko’s older sister Broha Shapiro and her school friends

This is a picture of my older sister Broha Shapiro [nee Pisarenko] and her school friends. She is the one on the left. The photo was taken in Gomel in 1935. My older sister was born on 31st December 1921. She got her name after our grandmother. In 1933 Hitler came to power in Germany. My father saw Germans during World War I and thought they were civilized people. My mother was afraid of Germans nonetheless. She was sure that if there was a war they would castrate Jewish boys. My father laughed at her. Nobody considered the possibility of a war with Germany, even after Germans occupied Poland. Nobody had any premonition of the war. Life was beginning to improve. In 1941 my older brother Misha and Broha finished the 10th grade at a Jewish school and were thinking of continuing their studies. My father had only studied at cheder and was very happy that his children would get a higher education. Everybody had great expectations of the future. I was a very vivid boy and interfered with Misha and Broha when they prepared for their exams. After the war Broha finished the Oil College in Bashkiria. She couldn’t find an adequate job with her profession in Chernovtsy and had to work as a shop assistant to support her family. In 1947 she married Isaak Shapiro, who was a widower after his wife Haya died. Broha lives with her children in Rostov now.