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by Yehude Tsemiel, Canada
Translated by Tina Lunson
Golde Lakh
Golde Lakh was the Seratske Rebi's daughter. She operated a dry-goods store and earned a living through great effort. Yet she found time and energy to help people in need. She created her own kind of lodging for the poor and helped poor sick people. When the doctor went to a poor patient, she would go with him and also buy the medicines for the patient until the person was able to pay. She also carried medical equipment, in case the doctor went to a patient and did not bring along an instrument and it could heaven forbid result in a misfortune.
Her activity and her personality were famous in the whole area and even as far as Warsaw. It happened more than once that when a patient had to travel to
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a Warsaw hospital, the patient was taken because of her recommendation. Non-Jews in the area spoke of her as of a mystical person. And not for nothing. She also did favors for the goyim.
Golde was an institution in herself. Her whole life she was dedicated to helping people in need and took from it the highest spiritual pleasure and personal satisfaction. She did this in no one's name. Everything stemmed from her inner self. One of the greatest and rarest women, whom Jews called a saint.
Khaye-Etel offered another aid service: She cooked the necessary food for the needy sick whom she and the patient, and even the doctor, believed the life of the patient hinged on. Khaye-Etel knew each patient and knew what kind of cooking he must have in order to get well, or to believe that such would make him healthy. She had various pots in which she cooked each individual his food according to the directive from the doctor.
Thus she went on for years with her service and was an address for all the needy. The doctors knew that they had to give Khaye-Etel a report after their visit to a poor patient, and she would know what to cook up for them.
The last year before the Nazi decimation, a society was formed in Rozhan, involving a large number of people and that
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was dedicated to helping the poor sick. To that end they created a “sick fund”. The youth took a large part in collecting money for it. We also had an agreement with Dr. Reynier that for each visit to a sick person he would be compensated by our fund for two zlotych. Then we would often remember Khaye-Etel and ask ourselves, how did one woman do so much.
A huge soul, it turns out, was Khaye-Etel.
Ite was proprietor of a general store in Rozhan. She made a very good living but always looked out for those whose luck had not played out. She created a small-loan fund with her own money and would help small, needy merchants with loans.
She gave the loans for a week or two weeks, and people obeyed the terms and paid back the money to the fund on time. The help from her loans was so important and so convenient that no one wanted to disrupt the credit that Ite gave.
Ite also protected the honor of her “clients” so they would not heaven forbid feel humiliation and not need to beg her. So her name was treasured by everyone who came to her.
No few people had their livelihoods sustained thanks to Ite's aid institution, and many mentioned her name as that of a concealed saint.
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