A Day in the Country

In the Russian countryside, you can visit old churches... ...and then make shish kebabs for dinner.

My dad and his mother, sometime in the early 1970s.

Mother's Day

My mom and I back in 1983.

Family Outing

My dad, 4 or 5, sulks about spending quality time with adults (his parents, middle, and family friends).

Ski Trip

My dad and a pal of his on a ski trip: Cooking over an open fire:

Young Love

Aw, young love. My father and his very first girlfriend. Leningrad.

Dolphin Show

My mom and I at a dolphin show in Anapa, a resort town on the Black Sea.

En Famille

My dad, age 10 or 11, with his parents.

St. Petersburg

One day circa spring 1986 or '87, my parents and some friends of theirs took me sightseeing around St. Petersburg. We posed on bridges:
I met a camel statue:
We went to the Hermitage.

Military-Industrial Complex

My dad, in 1973, at an abandoned (?) military base not from from Arkhangelsk. The caption on the back of the photo reads, "Me with a grenade and a cannon."

Boyhood

My dad, ages 5, 8 and 20. With a plush-toy bear:
Getting ready for school:
Hiking in the Carpathians:

Mushroom Eaters

My mom (9 months pregnant with me), my paternal grandfather (middle), and his brother pretend to eat just-picked mushrooms while vacationing in the country. Mushroom-picking is big in Russia.

Bike Trip

My mom, on a bike trip in Zelenogorsk (a suburb of St. Petersburg, not the Siberian city).

Siblings

My mom (on the stool), with her older sisters and brother. Ural Mountain region, early 1960s.

Bundled Up

My dad, age 5(?), all bundled up.

Mother and Child

My mom and I (age 4?), vacationing on Lake Voldai.

Family Portrait

My mother as an infant, with her parents. Ural Mountains region.

Kama River

My mom (left) and some girlfriends, on a bridge overlooking the Kama river.

Chess

My father, age 11 (?), puzzing over chess. He wanted to join the boys' firefighting club--they got to tour the local fire station and climb on the fire trucks. He was rejected, though, because of his nationality--Jew. So he joined the chess club instead.

Summer camp

My dad and my grandmother (top row, middle), late 1950s or early 1960s. Taken at a summer camp on parents' day.

Dad, early 1960s

My father, in Leningrad, in the early 60s.