The Party School CourseCHAPTER 6 We called our place of study the Soviet Communist Party School, but it was, in fact, a course for party activists from Soviet Latvia. Our lessons took place in a small hall of the A.Herzen-named Library in Kirov. Next to the hall there was a large reading room where one could read and study in peace and quiet till late in the evening and one could also borrow books to take home. It so happened that my living conditions at that time enabled me to enjoy these facilities to the full extent. I did not realize it at the time, but among our students recalled from all over the USSR to attend this course there were quite a few persons of special status: there was E. Ankup from Ventspils and Nyura Lomonosov , now deceased, from Ludza, Elza Kraulin', the wife of K.Kraulin'; Faivoush Fridman from the Party Central Committee, Shura Gudrinietze, a pretty young girl who worked as a secretary at the Central Committee and who later became the wife of the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Latvian Communist Party, Y.Kalnberzin'. There were numerous party and Komsomol officials and there was also Irina Sirmbarde, later Irina Strod, a ballet dancer and now the ballet master at the Riga's Opera and Ballet Theatre. She was a young ballerina then. Most of our teaching staff was made up of high-ranking party officials! A.Pelshe, who later became the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Latvian Communist Party and who is now a member of the Soviet Politbureau, was teaching us party history! Ya.Plesum, now deceased, who was a veteran underground member and later a party functionary for many years, was also one of the teachers. There were other important personalities too. I shall always remember the party history seminars conducted by A.Spalva, a veteran member of the Latvian Red Guards. I remember that one of his arms was missing. He is now very old and almost blind (I met him in a hospital). I could really appreciate his comments to the texts on party history only later, when I started studying party history sources. He also taught me how to make summaries of books I had read and later on several generations of students, including my daughter Tusya and Alik, her husband, had all used my little black notebook containing my notes on Lenin's writings. I very much enjoyed our lectures, studying for the seminars and I also read everything I could get hold of. It was in the reading room of the Herzen Library that I had finally found the whole of R.Rolland's "Jean Cristoffe" and read all of its volumes. In addition, I was elected secretary of our local Komsomol organization and gladly undertook my new duties there. The first half of 1942 was all taken up by my studies, the quiet atmosphere of our reading room and lots and lots of books. There was also something else. Finally, in February 1942, I was accepted as a candidate for party membership. Having disagreed with Nata Busse on the procedure, I started looking for new recommendations to the candidateship. I received one of them from Haya P., another one from B.Berkovish and Nata Busse provided me with the third one. However, the secretary of our party organization A.Pugo became ill. He was ill for a long time and the party meeting where my candidateship was to be discussed took place only at the end of February. My Everyday Life By the time I started attending my course Iren was getting better. Much of our life, however, was sad and difficult. One day I removed the little headscarf from her head (there were complications caused by the measles she had and she suffered from ear-aches) and I noticed that her hair was not growing well, that here and there she had bald patches on her head. A sudden fear engulfed me: what if new hair will never grow back on those patches?! I started crying. I embraced Iren and went on crying quietly, trying not to attract anyone's attention. My bitter tears kept falling on my little girl's head, while she kept saying: "Mum, don't cry! They will grow back!" Thus, one day one of my fellow students, Misha Wabel, a former Komsomol secretary from some place in Latvia, came over with a sled to help us "transport" our belongings to Vera's place. He put our suitcases and our sack on the sled, Iren all wrapped up in her winter clothes sat on those suitcases and I walked along, helping Misha. We moved to Vera and her little room was now housing three women and three children. Yet, I now had a real bed, where I slept together with Iren, and we even had two blankets. I received these blankets from two women, both of them called Rosa, who went to Ufa to study at a nursing course. (I still have one of those blankets, it is now 30 years' old.)… The new arrangement enabled me to keep Iren at home as Eida stayed at home looking after all the children. Even though Iren did not need much looking after, the fact that she was being taken care of was, of course, an enormous favor. True, Iren did not always feel very well there but I was still very grateful to Vera and Eida as I was able to leave in the morning to attend my studies, came back home and then leave again to go to the library. I gave them my bread rations and some of the food we received at the cafeteria. I brought home everything I could possibly spare. When I think of the good people I have met during my life I also remember Faivoush Fridman (who later worked for many years at the Central Committee of the Latvian Communist Party and who wrote a book about the Communist underground in Latgaleh, a part of Latvia). It so happened that one day we sat at the same table in our cafeteria. We were given a small cube of butter each with our tea (which was the third course). I put mine away into a little box I had always carried with me. Faivoush asked me: "Why are you putting it away in that box?" "I will give it to my daughter" – I said. "How old is your daughter?" – he asked. "She is four." Faivoush did not say anything and silently put his little piece of butter into my box. He did this on several other occasions when we happened to be eating at the same table. (Some twenty years later I met Faivoush Fridman and reminded him about this, but he did not remember anything. He did not even understand what his act had meant to me – not so much because of the little piece of butter but because of his humaneness.) My diary notes of that period contain a few lines that were added later, when I had already been sent to work at the Shava orphanage. They are very bitter since I had obviously gone through some difficult times, but had only written very little about what happened. In one of the notes the phrase "at Fanya's" was crossed out, but I do not remember when and why this was done. I assume that I did not want to remember all the unpleasantness and frustration that I had gone through but I did not want to feel ungrateful. Here is what I had written: "10 June 1942. The hard times (at Fanya's) in Kirov had passed. There were many difficulties at Vera's place too. It is true, my girl got much better there, but there were enough difficulties too, both morally and otherwise. Whole days she was with insensitive strangers who often kept saying to her "you are lying", "tell your mother what you had done today", etc. They were cold and unfriendly, as if she had been their enemy. She must have felt one: she became grim, looked around with distrust and instead of telling what had happened she kept saying : "I forgot". How could I scold her too after all that? I could only speak to her when we were alone. What could I say if after she did not give a toy to another child she was called "greedy" and was told that "Jahn will not give you anything now!" At the end of our course we had to sit for exams. I got very good marks and received a certificate stating that I had completed a 4-months' course for Communist Party activists organized in Kirov by the Central Committee of the Latvian Communist Party and the Latvian Government Mission stationed in Kirov. Then we had our "graduation ball". All the female students received two length of cotton each for making new dresses and everyone was in a "travelling" mood. About that time Tamara Vitinya, the ballet dancer, arrived in Kirov from one of the distant republics in Soviet Asia. …Our government found her and asked her to come to Kirov. We were all very fond of Tamara, tried to get her some clothes. She was later sent, together with her friend and colleague from the Opera, Ira Sirmbarde, to the town of Ivanovo, where they joined the Latvian Song and Dance Ensemble. (Our Papa, L. Futlik, was also part of that ensemble when he lived in Ivanovo. He had met Tamara there and later, when we all met again in Riga, it was interesting to hear them talking about their experience.) By the end of the course I already knew from Nata Busse's letters where I shall be sent to work. She wrote me that she had wanted to send me as a cultural worker to the "Udelnoye" guest-house near Moscow, where wounded soldiers from the Latvian Division were sent to recuperate, but had decided against it as she thought that I would have a problem living there with Iren. She therefore decided to send me to work in an orphanage because I would have better living arrangements there for Iren and it would be easier for me to proved food for her there. I often thought of these letters and I always felt thankful to Nata for having tried to make my life easier instead of making it more complicated. I never regretted having worked at the Shava orphanage. I worked there until our return to Latvia.
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Since 1945 Tamara became a regular guest in our house. She used to come once a month or once every two months and she also gave us a few pictures where she was photographed wearing her stage costumes. She wrote on the back of one of the pictures: "To Lyova, as a memento from Tamara. I shall always remember all the good things you have done for me. Riga, 2nd July 1955." This must have been a reference to that period in Ivanovo, when she was very ill and suffered greatly from hunger and our Papa tried to take care of her and to get her some food. Tamara is now an Honored Artist of the Latvian SSR.