Anna Fukson about my mother-in-law Faina Hordas

My mother-in-law Faina Hordas was a very short, round-faced and curly woman. She was very witty and full of humor. She could find a positive side almost in everything. Her life wasn't easy. When I saw her for the first time in 1965 the family lived in a shabby wooden building in the suburbs of Leningrad (now St.-Petersburg). They were moving from the first floor to the second and the last floor of this building. It was called an improvement of the living conditions. But even with all "improvements", it was very cold inside, and they had to buy firewood and stoke the most primitive stoke-maker. They didn't have running water, therefore my future husband had to bring water from the well. But even in these severe conditions she managed to be full of joy and humor.

She was a very good mother to my husband and his sister. When they were very little kids, she took care of them and didn't work. But when they grew up, she went to work and worked almost to the end of her life. She was a typical Jewish mother.