Item UF1994.023.c240 - Interview with anonymous

• Sound recording

2 audio files, mp3, duration: 0:31:25 min. and 0:31:22min.

This item contains an interview in German with an interviewee who wishes to remain anonymous.
Her father came from a rich family. In Russia rich people were prosecuted and displaced to the East Siberia to starve at the time of Bolshevism. The interviewee and her family moved to the next bigger city so her father was not displaced but he was unemployed for a long time. Interviewee went to a German school and was always afraid that her father might get arrested, because many people got arrested in this time. Thus they decided to move to Omsk / Siberia, where it was very cold. Her father could not find a job so they moved to Slavgorod a place where many Germans lived. She and her siblings were able to go to the German school again.
The family had a hard living and her father still was unemployed, then he got ill and died in the spring. After that her mother sold all personal belongings from her father (tools, violin) and the family got back to Ukraine. Her mother had to work and the interviewee lived with her aunt. When Hitler took power in Germany, Germans abroad were prosecuted and displaced again. One night her uncle got arrested and they never heard from him again. She lived in fear that her mother might get arrested too. After the WW2 they were living in West Germany until her uncle helped them to move to Canada. She is talking about deportations during the war. Her brother came to a concentration camp in Russia after the war and was arrested there for 10 years. When Stalin died he was set free. In the next ten years her brother has been taken for interrogation over and over again. He was living in a constant fear that he might get imprisoned again. The interviewee is saying that the church had no power in Communism. Later in Canada the interviewee was able to go to the Catholic church again.

She talks about arriving to Canada. Says that Canadians let her feel that Germany was the country who started the WW2. Talks about her husband (Canadian) who was injured in the war. She says her children are the real Canadians, she loves Canada as well and does not want to return.