to the chapters : 1 2 3 4
Chapter 2
As Marija remembers, Jews and non Jews were living peacefully together.
Mutual children played together, very often in the neighbourhood of the red brick stone synagogue. Marija had one Jewish girlfriend whose name was Gitele. They lived opposite each other at the main street and when they had to go to bed, they very often waited for one another, looking out of the window of their bed room and when they spotted one another they waved to one another and then they went to sleep
house 3Here you see the house, I mentioned before, and the bedroom window , just modernised. Marija is standing in front of her parents’ house
house
4This is the house which belonged to Gitele's parents. One of these windows was Gitele's bedroom window.( the third form the right). Her father kept a shop and Marija remembers on Saturday she saw the father of Gitele wearing teffilins and praying. She wasn’t allowed to speak then and she felt a great awe for Gitele’s father.
Marija doesn’t remember Gitele's family name. She was devastated for days when hearing the terrible news what had happened to the Jews of Seduva and in this special case to her friend Gitele. Before the Germans drove the Jews out of their houses, Marija had asked her parents to take Gitele in their house and to hide her there, but her parents thought it was too dangerous. " My parents were afraid to be shot and they feared for her life , also", Marija said . The shoemaker of Seduva Kirpitsjnikas and one Jewish woman hid for the Germans. They both had converted to Catholicism. The woman’s name was Sulamita Noliene. About her I know she survived. Sulamita’s story I will relate later.
Marija also remembers, that when a non Jew couldn’t pay for the items he had ordered in a shop belonging to Jews, then the Jewish shop keeper still gave him the items and the buyer could pay later . This attitude impressed the people in Seduva a lot.
When it was Pesach, the Jewish Holiday commemorating the Jewish exodus from Egypt, the Jews presented their non Jewish neighbours matzos and this was appreciated, also.
The milk was delivered by non-Jews and all the citizens of Seduva bought this milk.
The person in Seduva who killed the chickens for non Jews and Jews was a Jewish man, name unknown, even his house is not to be found anymore. The only thing which remembers of his presence in Seduva is the spot to be seen on the next photo. The spot is at the Veriskiu gatve, at the boundary of Seduva.
spotThis was the property of the sjochet.
His neighbour was a Lithuanian woman who helped him preparing chickens, after they were killed, and she helped him selling chickens.
Copyright
© 2005 Dora Boom