Today started with a trip to Babiy Yar, followed by a visit to the Babiy Yar Museum — temporarily housed in an office.. for the last 20+ years. The head of the museum gave a fascinating interview on Jewish life in Soviet and present-day Ukraine. Then he showed us the book of compiled names of Jewish victims of Babiy Yar. There were over 20 Kievskys; at least two of which were 99% my great aunt and uncle. One of the names even had an address, but that building is no longer there.
The rest of the day was less successful, but promising. We were pleasantly surprised at how open and accessible the SBU archives were — they’re even going digital now… if only they had the files on my grandfather we were looking for. They were kind enough to find out were his file was, at an archive 20 minutes away that was closing by the time we got there. We have an early start tomorrow.