Before taking the train, I wandered down Clara Zetkin Street.
Not a sound from No. 23.
I circled the house from the back, climbing over the fence.
The chicken shed was deathly silent. The door was wide-open. Not a feather or a seed to be seen.
Oster was a well-known shtetl. Jews were roughly in the majority. The rest were Ukrainians. Hardly any Russians.
In places, amid the devastation, buildings were going up. Not much to look at but made of good, solid wood. Not regular houses exactly but not jerry-built shacks either. People were building for themselves. Planks were slotted together with care, then slats placed over them. Liveable enough.
Oster greeted me with a wedding. A Jewish man taking a Jewish bride. And, let’s be honest, the guests were all Jews as well. For the most part,
