I Have a Story to Tell You

David Shaya Kirman

David Shaya Kirman  I interviewed David Shaya Kirman (he was Shaya to all who knew him) at his home in Vancouver in 1974. Shaya Kirman came from Wlodova, Poland, which is by the River Bug, near Lublin, Chelm, Zamosc, and Goray, and not far from Warsaw . He was never short of stories to tell. Even though Yiddish was his mother tongue, he could still spin a good tale in English. During my visit, Shaya showed me the Yitzkor book from the Wlodova and Sobibor gas chambers, which had been recently published (Yitzkor books are books of remembrance created by Holocaust survivors to memorialize the places they’ve lived in). We looked at photos of his father, who was a painter; of Shaya in a play called Shulamith; and pictures of others, some still alive. I sadly recall visiting Shaya Kirman in hospital a few days before he died in 1982. MY FATHER WAS A HANDWORKER. A handworker is not a worker which works by somebody.He is self-employed and somebody could work for him, and he belongs to the handworkers union. You see, if a boy wants to apprentice, after he finishes his apprenticeship, he goes to this board—the zect—and they examine him to see if he could be a self-employed handworker. And there you will find different kinds of professions. [He points to a photo.] This is not a shoemaker,but he makes the top part of the shoe.He’s a kamashenmakher . And here’s a tailor; and there’s another tailor. My father was a sign painter; and here’s a capmaker.[He points to another photo.] Most of them were tailors. Some was for men—men’s tailor, and somebody was for womans, ladies—a damske. A damske couldn’t make a costume for men. 39 40 i have a story to tell you My first memories was going to the kheder, that they took me to the kheder. The belfer—you know what a belfer means? A helper to the melamed, the teacher. A little boy, a helper—that’s a behilfer. He used to go to bring the kids home and took them to the kheder, you see, like you used to do to our kids. [I used to pick up Shaya Kirman’s kids after school, along with my own, and drive them to Jewish school.] There was no car, you had to take them when they were small; you had to carry them. Every child went separate . And the first time they took me with a tallis. So I was about three years old. Not like today. Three years they took me the first time to kheder. And then I learned a few years. They made an agreement with the father from the child: I’ll give you my child for zman. Zman is six months from Pesach to Succoth, and then from Succoth to Pesach is another zman. The melamed, the teacher, used to come after zman and the father paid him for the zman. And then, if my father liked the melamed, then he gives me to the same melamed for another zman. If not, he went to another melamed. But the melamed used to come every month, every two months to the home to examine the child. And the father used to sit this side; if the father didn’t like the melamed, he doesn’t teach him good, so he went to another melamed. So I was with the first melamed maybe three zmans and this was called dardeke melamed, the first grade or primary. Then the primary melamed hasn’t got more to give me so we went to another level melamed and start to learn khumesh.20 You see [in] the dardeke you learn the alphabet: aleph, bet, gimel, and to put together words.And then in the higher melamed we used to learn to davn, to pray already. You see, for myself, after khumesh and Rashi,21 I was learning another few months with this melamed. So this melamed hasn’t got more to give me. By now I’ve had two melameds already. Now I go to a third melamed and I start to learn Gemorrah—this is Talmud . So my father doesn’t like this melamed. So I learn there a zman and my father says to the melamed, Moishe, I see I don’t like the way you are teaching my Shaya. He is able to know better...