Lolita Milyavskaya: "Anti-Semitism in Russia and Ukraine - it's Two Big Differences"

“I think that the toughening of repressions (may cause the departure from Russia, - editor's note). Then the instinct of self-preservation will say that it will have to be done.

I do not think that there is a protective film (of fame), no one canceled the demonstrative flogging.

I will honestly say that due to the fact that I have great responsibility for my mother and daughter, I am very filtering the bazaar.

And this is the instinct of self-preservation.

I remember how my dad ended. The reason why dad received the status of a political emigrant seems ridiculous today, on the one hand, but on the other hand, time goes back so much that you can get it again for this.

There was a joke ... He was an entertainer. And we, the whole family, were registered in Yalta, a cooperative was being built there, parents worked in the Yalta Philharmonic, both dad and mom.

Yalta was home, so when I am asked whose Crimea, I say: mine. Because my pot was there. He stood there since childhood.

And the parents stood there in line for a three-room "cooperative".

And so the first secretary of the regional party committee came to a concert at the Green Theater. Dad was reading a monologue about a dirty Yalta beach.

I was backstage and I remember it very well. I grew up behind the scenes.

In the morning - dad and mom, and in the evening Toropunka and Shtepsel. Then everything changes, and there are many, many artists. Obodzinsky, Korolyov... This is all my childhood. And an endless pot that moved around.

And there was a fragment that I remembered for the rest of my life. A backdrop was drawn, which fell, and on it, it means, bottles, dirt, in the distance the Yalta coast. And I remember that, in the guise of a drunken man, he uttered the phrase "from this pillar to this one". I remember only this from this monologue.

That is, it was a drunk walking on the beach.

The first secretary of the regional committee said that everything is fine, the program is good, only this monologue should be removed, about dirty beaches.

And dad had such a nature that "I won't take anything away". I read it twice, three times, and on the fourth it flew in - they were deprived of the cooperative; Mom was then, in my opinion, presented to the title of honored, dad was already deserved, for them at that time it was very important, but they were deprived of it. This was followed by a personal letter from Furtseva about the prohibition of work.

That is, it is - for nothing. And they involuntarily fashioned a political emigrant, although there were no circles, no literature.

Parents began to visit the synagogue in Kiev. There was some kind of dissidence, because a lot of people tried to leave through the Red Cross.

Well, there was talk about dad - Voice of America, Radio Liberty.

The author of this monologue also left, he also emigrated, I don't remember his name, he had a pseudonym. And that's it, dad had no chance.

Two years passed and with the help of these very radio stations he was given status, and he left.

And unlike many of our emigrants who went to Rome, where there was a stop - almost no one reached Israel, people left for Canada, the United States, someone stayed in Italy - dad, as part of this small group, made it to Israel.

In this sense, Golda Meir helped him a lot. By the way, I learned that my dad talked with Golda Meir from our scout, Shabtai Kalmanovich, the deceased.

He once told me, do you want me to tell you everything about your dad? He served at that moment.

Golda Meir gave her dad the opportunity to be on television, he had his own show.

I had no idea how I could go there. I told my dad, at the age of six, that I would come to this Israel of yours in the first Soviet tank.

By the way, in Russia I have never encountered anti-Semitism, but in Ukraine it was the norm.

Jew, Jewess, it was all. I already talked about this, I can repeat myself. In the school magazine there was always such a page on the back, where the information about the parents was indicated. There, Ivanov Ivan Ivanovich, parents are such and such, an engineer and a housewife.

And my surname was Gorelik, and it was written: parents - artists; Russian. After all, I’m Russian for my mother. And it was crossed out and written: Jewess.

Since we periodically looked through what was in the magazine, I saw it with my own eyes.

Well, in general, I was ordered to enter the institute in Ukraine. Our local district deputy to my mother - and then they knew district deputies by sight, as district police officers, and they knew everything about you too - she said: your girl is finishing school soon, I advise you - to Russia, she will not go anywhere here; and change her last name".

You can watch the full interview with Lolita here.

* “Women above” is a program produced by the Dozhd TV channel, which was entered by the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation into the register of “foreign agents” media outlets.