Re: [Cz-L] Are you Rumanian?

From: <fichblue_at_aol.com>
Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2010 13:35:15 -0500
To: naturesmom_at_aol.com, czernowitz-l_at_list.cornell.edu
Reply-to: fichblue_at_aol.com

My mother, Pearl Spiegel Fichman, wrote about the question of where she
was from. The excerpt below is from the Preface of her memoir, "Before
Memories Fade." For reference, she was born in 1920 and probably
drafted this text in 1985:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------
To tell that I was born in Romania is correct, historically, yet my
surroundings, my first language, my first registered impressions, the
first songs I sang, the first fairy tales told to me, the first jokes I
heard and understood - all those were German, based on the life of a
province, of a town, of a family that existed within the Austrian
culture. Up to the age of six, when I started first grade, I did not
understand a single word of Romanian. Growing up, the Romanian
education went on side by side with the accustomed life of before - no
cutting off of the former, just adding another facet to my life. I
became bilingual by necessity, by circumstance.

As history intruded onto the scene, when I was 20, the Soviet Union
took over the province where I lived and another layer was about to be
added to the former. The war and Nazi occupation brought a sharp
interruption of the Russian-Ukrainian scene and the Romanians came back
for three years. As the Soviets returned in 1944, I lived under them
another year and left Czernovitz for good, in 1945. After an interim of
two years in Bucharest, I came to the United States for slightly over
two years of studies and then settled for seven years in Israel. For
the last thirty years, my home is in the United States, my language
English. My native town has been Russian ever since 1944.

Now, considering layer upon layer of languages and cultures and
regimes, how can I easily answer a seemingly simple question? As a
rule, I say: "I was born in Romania." This often calls forth a remark
about liking gratar, mamaliga, red wine, ctuica and gypsy music and
dancing the hora. Well, I really do not stem from that background. We
liked different foods: we ate wiener schnitzel and drank spritz - a
mixture of wine and soda-, we listened to German classics, we enjoyed
German literature, we loved the poetry of Schiller, Goethe, Heine; we
sang songs by Schubert and Lehar, we danced to Strauss waltzes. "What
kind of a fake Romanian are you?" would be a natural reaction. We
followed the Austrian tradition because the area had been for
generations part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, those were the customs
familiar to us. Little by little the Romanian customs started to appeal
to the younger generation, yet old traditions are hard to erase, it
takes generations for the new ones to set in.

"So what is the area now?" It is part of the Soviet Union now. In fact,
Bukovina was located in the North-Eastern corner of Romania and is now
the Western part of the Ukraine. Hard to explain to any person who does
not exactly follow the vagaries of European history in the 20th
century. Instead of trying to clarify this complicated matter orally, I
rather take a detailed map of Europe and try, if possible, to clarify
and show where all this took place.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------

Eytan

Eytan Fichman, AIA
B.Arch., M.Arch., Ed.M.

-----Original Message-----
From: naturesmom_at_aol.com
To: czernowitz-l_at_list.cornell.edu
Sent: Wed, Mar 3, 2010 12:04 pm
Subject: Re: [Cz-L] Are you Rumanian?

My parents were born in Czernowitz in 1913 and 1914 and always
considered=
  themselves Austrian although they grew up in Rumania and lived there
unti=
l 1950. I was born in Arad and left for Israel when I was 2 years old,
li=
ved in Israel until 1957 and immigrated to US. When asked about my
nation=
ality, I respond that I have dual citizenship Israeli and USA. "But
you=
  were born in Rumania--aren't you Rumanian?" I answer--"If I was born
in=
 a barn would I be a cow?"
Melita Fuhrman Vickter
Calif USA
FUHRMAN, ZIMMER, SPITZER, HALM
Czernowitz
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This moderated discussion group is for information exchange on the subject of
 Czernowitz and Sadagora Jewish History and Genealogy. The opinions expressed
 in these posts are the opinions of the original poster only and not necessarily
 the opinions of the List Owner, the Webmaster or any other members
 or entities connected with this mailing list. The Czernowitz-L list has
 an associated web site at http://czernowitz.ehpes.com that includes a
 searchable archive of all messages posted to this list. Please post in "Plain
 Text" if possible (help available at:
<http://www.jewishgen.org/InfoFiles/PlainText.html>).

To remove your address from this e-list follow the directions at
http://www.cit.cornell.edu/computer/elist/lyris/leave.html

To receive assistance for this e-list send an e-mail message to:
owner-Czernowitz-L_at_list.cornell.edu
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Received on 2010-03-03 11:44:26

This archive was generated by hypermail 2.2.0 : 2010-07-03 14:34:39 PDT