It was just a few of us in the Sukkah at the end of Shabbos of Sukkot, when Raizy’s father shared with us memories of his family’s Sukkah in Tashkent, then Russia:
by Rabbi Shlomo Galperin
My father served in the Red Army in WWII from beginning to end, first as a soldier and then as a decorated officer, and miraculously survived. My mother and the rest of the family fled the Nazi onslaught, first to Bashkiria a wilderness by the Ural Mountains, and later to Tashkent in Uzbekistan, where many fellow Jews sought refuge.
After the war, my father was reunited with my mother and my older brother, and with his parents and began to rebuild their life in Tashkent, since all their previous homes and lives in Moscow and Leningrad were totally disrupted and destroyed.
After first living in temporary accommodations, and rented apartments, there came a time when my family began to look for a more permanent dwelling. My grandparents were living with us. In fact for a number of years (while my father Shimon was in Soviet prison and my mother worked double-shifts at the vinyl record factory) my grandparents, Zeide Shmuel and Bubbe Reiza raised me.
It was during this time that my grandfather took charge of the house search. My grandfather for some reason or another passed up many more beautiful dwellings for one that had private courtyards, both in front and behind it. This single-family home on Dzhar Kucha street is the home of my earliest childhood memories. This home also had a separate room where my grandparents lived. This is where we lived until the major earthquake of 1966 forced us to move once again to a newer apartment in a different part of the city.
This particular house came to us through Divine Providence. People knew we were looking for a place, and there was this German man who in his great love and admiration for communism settled in the Soviet Union and ended up in Tashkent. As things developed, he ended up with the KGB on his tail. He had to leave and sell his house quickly and cheaply. He had one condition, that the new owners keep and care for his giant German Shepherd dog named “Geraldo” (which my parents and grandparents did). My grandfather ran over to see it, and once he saw the inner courtyard, he said we’re taking it.
Sometime after we moved in to the house on Dzhar Kucha street, my father and grandfather, both who were quite handy, built a sturdy frame in the courtyard. Around Sukkos-time they added thin-paneled wood (not like the thick plywood used today) to the frame to make walls. And my grandfather took a scythe, and cut down all those tall reeds in the yard to use them as Schach cover. Finally we understood the reason for that planting. And for this choice of a house. Obviously, a Sukkah was far from legal in Russia, and any construction would require a permit, but we were lucky to have a private courtyard where this could be done.
My grandfather used a large area of the courtyard behind the house to plant a tall type of corn-looking plant that didn’t yield any food but was used in making brooms. Initially this bothered me as a child, why not plant something more useful? Our family didn’t make or sell brooms!? But it all made sense when it came time for Sukkos. My grandfather cut down all that vegetation and used it for Schach on our Sukkah!
It was designed to fit maybe ten people, but as many Jews didn’t have their own Sukkahs, there was often many more than ten in that Sukkah. Families brought their own bags of food, while some just stopped in to make a blessing. Ten people became 15, and sometimes as many as 20 or 30. We children hung around in and around the Sukkah, playing nearby or watching and listening to the animated Chassidic conversation.
I have a very distinct memory, a wonderful image of that Sukkah. I can still see it literally stretching, as the very thin wooden panels bent outwards to accommodate the occupants within. From the outside the Sukkah expanded and continuously stretching to look as a round as a barrel!
We had many Sukkah guests over the years. I remember an old man named Reb Avraham who introduced me to the idea of “Ushpizin” spiritual guests who visit the Sukkah each night. I never heard of it before he explained it to me.
One of our Sukkah guests was a chief engineer of a large factory which produced airplane engines. He was from a Polish Jewish background, they were very observant but afraid because of his high government position. They lived in an area of Tashkent known as the military city or complex, and a Sukkah there would be a hard sell. This engineer’s son went to college with my older brother. Being the holiday or Shabbos, they walked back from college, a long distance, about 2.5 hours. I remember one time when they came back to make Kiddush in the Sukkah. In those days we hardly had wine. We made our own wine for Pesach, but by the time Sukkot came around, there were usually only two options to make Kiddush on: either you used Challah or there was high proof vodka. The engineer’s son was making Kiddush, and when it came to the word “L’Zman” in the Shehechiyanu blessing he pronounced it Chabad-style with a “chirik” dot under the “Lamed” because he was using a Chabad Siddur to make Kiddush.
His father the engineer jumped up excitedly and insisted that it be pronounced “LA’Zman” with a “patach” vowel under the “Lamed” because that was their Nusach custom. There was an older Chassid Reb Mendel Azimov who stayed by us on Sukkot. His children were communists so it was very hard for him to celebrate at home. This Reb Mendel poignantly remarked something quite memorable to the engineer, approving of his son’s pronunciation of the “chirik” dot under “Lamed” : “Who knows? Maybe this “Pintele” (Yiddish for dot, and also for the spark within our souls) is what will keep your son connected and protect his Judaism during these challenging times!”
Reb Mendel Azimov’s penetrating Chassidic insight still rings in my ears, I live with it until this day, as beautiful lens with which to view life.