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Singer Herman egy Ungvár központjától nem túl messze lévő családi házban lakik a feleségével és Jelena lányával. A ház régi, de nagyon tiszta, rendezett, otthonos, mellette néhány gyümölcsfa áll. Tavasszal Jelena a ház köré virágokat ültet. Singer Herman alacsony, vékony és nagyon mozgékony ember. Fiatalabbnak látszik a koránál. Szeret sétálni, a közelmúltig rendszeresen járt horgászni az Ung folyóra. Az interjú felvételekor jelen volt felesége és lánya, és érdeklődéssel hallgatták végig, amit mesélt. Singer Herman beszédstílusa sajátos, gondolatait nagyon pontosan fogalmazza meg, találó szavakat használ. Az emlékek nagyon fölkavarták, de amikor fölajánlottam, hogy folytassuk az interjút máskor, nemet mondott, és befejezte a történetet. 1997-ben adott már  interjút a Spielberg Alapítványnak.  

Mindkét szülőm családja Kárpátaljáról származik, amely 1918-ig az Osztrák–Magyar Monarchia részét képezte. A hivatalos nyelv a magyar volt, Kárpátalján még ma is sokan beszélnek magyarul. 1918-ban az Osztrák–Magyar Monarchia a kárpátaljai területet húsz évre bérbe adta a cseheknek. Antiszemitizmus nem volt az osztrák–magyar közigazgatás alatt sem, de a csehek idejében a zsidókat még ki is emelték, támogatták. Az 1918-as évtől kezdve a zsidók vállalhattak állami tisztségeket, magánvállalkozásba foghattak [A zsidók az emancipációt követően természetesen az Osztrák–Magyar Monarchia fennállása alatt is viselhettek állami hivatalt. Idézzük Karády Viktort: „Paradox módon az állami alkalmazottak aránya különösen magas volt az ortodox vidékeken… Részletesebb vizsgálattal kimutatható, hogy az ortodox megyék állami alkalmazottai főként adminisztratív, hivatalnoki pozíciókat töltöttek be mint a falusi közigazgatás vezetői: Észak- és Kelet-Magyarországon elsősorban olyan falvakban, amelyek zsidó többséggel vagy erős zsidó kisebbséggel rendelkeztek.” Egyébként Karády becslései szerint 1910-ben az ortodox városok zsidó lakosságának 6,3%-a állt állami szolgálatban vagy dolgozott szabad/értelmiségi pályákon (ezen belül pedig 13%-uk állt állami szolgálatban, és 9,4%-a működött tanári és tanítói pályán). (A magyar zsidóság regionális és társadalmi rétegződéséről (1910), in Zsidóság, modernizáció, polgárosodás. Tanulmányok, Cserépfalvi, 1997). (Majd csak az 1939. évi IV. tc., az ún. második zsidótörvény idején tiltották ki a zsidókat a  köztisztviselői pályákról.) – A szerk.]. A csehek nagyon toleráns, kulturált emberek voltak, abban az időben az antiszemitizmus teljesen megszűnt. A falvakban a zsidók és az őslakók nemzedékeken át egymás mellett éltek, a barátságos, jószomszédi viszony egyik nemzedékről a másikra öröklődött.

Kárpátalja központja Ungvár volt. A második világháborúig ez egy kis kellemes európai városka volt mintegy negyvenezer fős lakossággal [1921-ben Ungvár lakóinak száma alig haladta meg a 20 000 főt, és az 1941. évi népszámlálás szerint is csak 35 200 ember élt a városban. – A szerk.]. Ungvár lakossága soknemzetiségű volt. Éltek ott magyarok, csehek, rutének, zsidók, kis számban oroszok, cigányok. A zsidók Ungvár lakosságának mintegy harmadát képezték. A különböző nemzetiségű emberek Ungváron barátságban éltek egymással, nem volt konfliktus a nemzetiségek között. Ungvár zsidó lakossága főleg, de nem kizárólag iparral és kereskedelemmel foglalkozott. Voltak zsidó orvosok, ügyvédek, tanárok is. Persze a zsidók között sokkal több volt a szegény, mint a jómódú ember. Ungváron volt egy nagyon szép zsinagóga, franciák építették. Ez egy nagy zsinagóga volt, nagyon szép belülről is, kívülről is. Miután 1945 után Kárpátalját a Szovjetunióhoz csatolták, a zsinagógát átépítették, elvitték belőle a zsidó jelképeket, és hangversenytermet rendeztek be benne. Annak idején volt még héder, zsidó iskola. A zsidók Ungvár központjában éltek. 1918-ig, amíg Kárpátalját át nem adták Csehországnak [Csehszlovákiának], Ungvár földszintes épületekkel volt beépítve. A csehek Ungvár központjában egy- és kétemeletes házak építésébe fogtak, kényelmes és tágas lakásokkal, a földszinten, az utcai felőli oldalra pedig üzletek kerültek. A csehek alatt élte Kárpátalja a fénykorát.

Édesapám szülei Kárpátalján születtek és éltek, Turjaremete faluban, a Perecsenyi járásban [Turjaremete – kisközség volt Ung vm. Bereznai járásában, 1891-ben 1500 rutén, szlovák és német lakossal, 1910-ben (ekkor már a Perecsenyi járáshoz tartozott) 2000 rutén és magyar lakossal. Trianon után Csehszlovákiához került. – A szerk.]. Nehéz bármit is mondanom Turjaremetéről, csak egyetlenegyszer voltam ott, még gyerekkoromban. Ott születtek a nagyszüleim édesapám ágán az 1860-as években. Én őket sohasem láttam, jóval a születésem előtt meghaltak. A nagypapát Jákobnak hívták, a nagymama nevét nem tudom. Édesapám, Singer Kálmán 1886-ban született. Édesapám rokonai közül csak a húgát ismertem. Ő 1900-ban született. Az utónevére nem emlékszem, a vezetékneve, miután férjhez ment, Klein lett. A lánya ma Izraelben él. Édesapámnak még volt két bátyja, de róluk semmit sem tudok azon kívül, hogy a huszadik század elején mindketten elmentek az Egyesült Államokba. Gyerekkoromban egy ideig édesapám még levelezett velük, aztán megszakadt a levelezés, de nem tudom, miért. Édesapám mesélt nekem egy kicsit a családjáról. Igen szegényen éltek, szűkösen tengődtek. A család vallásos volt, másképpen abban az időben ez nem is lehetett. A gyerekek vallásos nevelésben részesültek. Édesapám és a bátyjai héderben tanultak. Apám szüleinek a házában megtartották a zsidó hagyományokat. A nagyapám a fiaival zsinagógába járt, otthon is imádkozott. Édesapám szüleinek családjában tartották a sábeszt és minden zsidó ünnepet, kóser háztartást vezettek. Minden szigorúan a zsidó hagyományok szerint zajlott. Amikor a gyerekek felnőttek, mesteremberekhez adták őket, hogy kitanuljanak valamilyen mesterséget. Apámat tizenhárom éves korában egy kőfaragóhoz adták, aki sírköveket készített. A taníttatásért nem fizettek, de az első két évben a tanuló ingyen dolgozott. Aztán amikor már mester lett belőle is, ha a mesterénél maradt dolgozni, már kapott pénzt a munkájáért.

Édesanyám családja Nagybereznán élt. Nagyberezna egy nagy falu, negyven kilométerre északra Ungvártól [Nagyberezna – közigazgatási státusa szerint kisközség volt Ung vm.-ben  (szolgabírói székhely, járásbíróság). 1891-ben 1600 rutén, német, magyar és szlovák (29%-uk az izraelita felekezethez tartozott), 1910-ben 2800, 1919-ben 2600 fő lakossal. Trianont követően Csehszlovákiához került. – A szerk.]. Ma már város, a körzet központja. Nagy vásárokat rendeztek ott, még Ungvárról is mentek az emberek Nagybereznára, a vásárba. Magyarok, ukránok [rutének] és zsidók éltek ott. Nagyon sok zsidó volt a faluban, mint ahogy a többi kárpátaljai faluban is. A zsidók a faluban jiddisül, magyarul és ukránul [ruténül] beszéltek, és nem elkülönülve telepedtek le Nagybereznán, a házaik el voltak szórva a más nemzetiségű falubeliek házai között. Sok házban még padló sem volt, csak döngölt agyagpadló. Háziszőttes szőnyegeket terítettek le a földre. Az emberek barátságban éltek, segítettek egymásnak. A nemzetiségnek nem volt jelentősége, az volt a fontos, hogy milyen az ember. A központban volt egy zsinagóga, volt két héder – egy a fiúknak és egy a lányoknak. A zsidók többsége iparral és kereskedelemmel foglalkozott. A falubeli kis boltok a zsidóké voltak. Voltak olyan zsidók is, akik csak földműveléssel foglalkoztak, ezeknek nagy földjük volt. Minden zsidó hívő volt, olyan, amilyennek egy zsidónak lennie kell, ahogy azt a zsidó törvények előírják. Minden zsidó család kóser háztartást vezetett [lásd: étkezési törvények]. A kásrut törvényeit szigorúan betartották. Például amikor levágnak egy tehenet, egy zsidónak az állat hátsó részét nem szabad elfogyasztania, csak az elülsőt [A négylábú állatok hátsó részében fut végig az ún. „gid hánáse” (ülőideg vagy szökőin), amelyet Jákovnak az angyallal vívott harca nyomán nem szabad elfogyasztani. Ha ezt az inat szakszerűen eltávolítják az állat hátsó feléből, akkor a maradékot meg lehet enni, de az áskenáz országokban nagyon kevesen tudják, hogyan kell az inat eltávolítani. Emiatt pl. Magyarországon is inkább az volt a szokás, hogy az egész hátsó részt eladták a nem zsidóknak. Mindazonáltal ha valaki ért a szakszerű eltávolításhoz, akkor a hátsó rész maradéka kóser. (Ráadásul a négylábú állatok hátsó része a drágább hús, az eleje csontosabb, ezért olcsóbb.) – A szerk.]. A tehén hátsó részét eladták a falubelieknek. Minden családban külön edény volt a húsos és a tejes dolgoknak. Pészahra is kötelező volt külön étkészletet tartani.

Édesanyám apját Halegerter Jákobnak, anyját lány korában König Zálinak hívták. Nagybereznán születtek az 1860-as években. Nagyapám iparos volt, nagyanyám háztartásbeli. Az édesanyám szüleit se láttam sohasem. A nagymama 1907-ben halt meg, nagypapa pedig 1914-ben, a születésem után néhány hónappal. Mindketten Nagyberezna zsidó temetőjében lettek eltemetve, zsidó szokás szerint [lásd: temetés; temető]. Édesanyám mesélt róla, hogy a családban volt még néhány lánygyerek, de én csak egy nővérét ismertem édesanyámnak, viszont nem emlékszem a nevére. Édesanyámat Hannának hívták, 1886-ban született. Családja, mint minden zsidó család akkoriban, vallásos család volt, minden zsidó hagyományt követett.

A szüleim sádhen segítségével ismerkedtek össze. Ez volt akkoriban a házastárskeresés általánosan elfogadott módja. 1910-ben házasodtak össze. Hagyományos zsidó esküvőjük volt rabbival, hüpével. Az esküvőt Nagybereznán tartották. A szüleik közül akkor már csak anyám apja élt. Rögtön az esküvő után anyám szüleinek a házába költöztek, édesanyám nővére is ott lakott már a férjével. Anyám nővérének a férje cipész volt. A ház nagy volt, elég volt a hely két családnak is. 1912-ben született a nővérem, Helén. A zsidó neve Haja. Én 1914-ben születtem. Nekem a Henrik nevet adták, a zsidó nevem pedig Cháim. Az öcsém neve Leopold volt, ő 1918-ban született. A zsidó neve Lejb volt.

Később édesapám vett házhelyet édesanyám szüleinek házának közelében, és épített oda egy külön házat a mi családunknak. Ebben a házban laktunk 1944-ig. A házunk nem volt nagy, vályogból épült. A vályogtégla fölaprított szalma és agyag keverékéből készül, amit négyszögletes formákba tesznek, aztán a napon szárítják meg. Kárpátalján nagyon sok a vályogtéglából készült ház. A házunk átlagos ház volt, olyan, mint a falu legtöbb háza: egy szoba és egy nagy konyha volt benne. A tető szalmából [nádból?] készült. A konyhában volt egy nagy kemence, a hátsó fala átnyúlt a szobába. Ezen a kemencén főzött az anyám, télen pedig ez szolgált fűtésre. Fával fűtöttünk. Kárpátalján sok az erdő, a farönkök olcsók voltak, a rőzsét, a levágott gallyat pedig ingyen adták hozzá. A ház körül gyümölcsfák voltak. A ház mögött volt egy nagy udvar, és azon túl kezdődött a kert. Az udvar jobb oldalán volt a baromfiól és a fészer. Jószágunk nem volt, de csirkéket anyám mindig tartott. Az udvaron balra volt édesapám műhelye. Édesapám kőfaragó volt, sírköveket készített, föliratokat vésett rájuk. A sírköveket az udvaron tárolta. Ez a munka csak tavasztól őszig tartott, aztán mikor már jöttek az esőzések, apám üvegezőként dolgozott, és képkereteket meg fényképkereteket csinált. A családban csak az apám dolgozott. Édesanyám háztartásbeli volt, ez volt a szokás a zsidó családoknál akkoriban. A férjes asszonyok nem dolgoztak. A gyerekeket nevelték, vezették a háztartást.

A szüleim vallásos emberek voltak. Otthon szigorúan kóser háztartást vezettek. Ez nem valami egyszerű dolog, sok mindent kell hozzá tudni. Minden házban volt egy tálcaszerűség – ez egy vesszőből font tálca szegéllyel. Ha a sajhet [sakter] levágta az állatot, és kifolyt a vére, az onnantól még nem számított kóser húsnak. Meg kellett tisztítani a bőrtől és a zsírtól, ráhelyezni a kóserre – ezt a tálcát így is neveztük, és jól megsózni. A kósert ferdén kellett fölállítani, és a sós vér az alája helyezett tányérba folyt. Aztán a húst jól le kellett mosni, és csak ezután lett kóser [Mások szerint a jól leöblített húst fél órára langyos vízbe áztatták, hogy a só majd jól kiszívja belőle a vért. Utána az ismét leöblített, inaktól megszabadított, bevagdalt húst közepesen durva sóval alaposan besózták, és így helyezték a ferde felületre, hogy a vér kifolyjon belőle. Legkevesebb egy órán át kellett ilyen állapotban tartani a húst, majd ismét le kellett öblíteni, háromszor egymás után. – A szerk.]. A zsidóság az egy bonyolult dolog. Ezeket a szokásokat nemzedékről nemzedékre adták át egymásnak az asszonyok.

Édesanyám nem hordott parókát. A mi falunkban ez nem volt szokás. De a fejét mindig és mindenhol kendővel fedte be. Még otthon sem láttuk soha fedetlen fővel. Egyszerűen öltözködött, ahogy a többi asszony a faluban. Hosszú ujjú blúzt viselt és hosszú fekete szoknyát. Amikor a zsinagógába ment, sötét selyemruhát vett föl, ez volt az egyetlen ünnepi ruhája. Apám is mindig befedte a fejét. Otthon kipát hordott, az utcán pedig széles karimájú fekete kalapot. Hétköznap egyszerű munkaruhát viselt. A zsinagógába járáshoz másik ruhája volt, egy fekete posztóöltöny. Ezt a ruhát csak a zsinagógába vette föl.

Péntek este összegyűlt az egész család. Mindannyian imádkoztunk, aztán édesanyám meggyújtotta a szombati gyertyákat. A gyertyák fölött imádkozott, közben eltakarta a szemét a kezével. Aztán imát [lásd: imádkozás, imádság] mondtunk a kenyérre, a borra, utána kezdődött a közös étkezés. Anyám igyekezett valami finomat főzni. Péntek reggel általában a sajhethez küldött a csirkével. Hétköznap mi csirkét nem ettünk. Nem éltünk gazdagon, csak a legszükségesebbre futotta a pénzből. Péntek estétől szombat estéig a zsidók közül senki sem dolgozott. Nemhogy csinálni valamit, de még gyufát gyújtani, a kályhát befűteni is tilos volt [lásd: szombati munkavégzés tilalma]. Péntek reggel anyám elkészítette az ételt sábeszra. Télen sábeszkor a szomszéd ukrán [rutén] ember jött át begyújtani a kemencét [lásd: sábesz goj], hogy ne fagyoskodjunk. Lámpát is gyújtott. Akkoriban nem volt áram, petróleumlámpát használtunk. Szombat reggel apám a zsinagógába ment. A nők csak ünnepnapokon mentek a zsinagógába. Amikor az öcsémmel már nagyobbak voltunk, édesapám magával vitt minket is. Miután visszajöttünk a zsinagógából, apám fölolvasott egy hetiszakaszt [lásd: szidrá] a Tórából. Édesapám arról álmodozott, hogy valamikor saját helye lesz a zsinagógában, mert nem engedhette meg magának, hogy vegyen egyet. Én pedig arra gondoltam, hogyha majd fölnövök, és sok pénzt fogok keresni, ajándékozok majd édesapámnak egy helyet a zsinagógában, hogy Nagyberezna összes zsidója tudja, hogy azt én vettem az apámnak. De sajnos ez az álom nem valósult meg, az élet másként rendelkezett.

Otthon jiddisül beszéltünk. Mindannyian jól tudtunk magyarul. 1918 után, amikor a cseh nyelv lett a hivatalos, a szüleim nemigen tudtak megtanulni csehül, a szomszédokkal továbbra is magyarul beszéltek. De mi, gyerekek hamar elsajátítottuk a cseh nyelvet is. Tudtunk még mindannyian ruszinul is, ez az ukrán nyelv kárpátaljai dialektusa.

Otthon minden zsidó ünnepet megtartottunk. Pészah előtt a szomszédok a mi házunkban gyűltek össze, néhány család számára nálunk készült a macesz. A nők a nagy asztalnál dolgoztak a konyhában, átszitálták a lisztet, összekeverték a tésztát és kinyújtották. Édesapám a kemence mellett ült, ott sütötte ki a maceszt. Én nagyon szerettem mellette ülni. Sok maceszt sütöttünk, mert a családok nagyok voltak, kenyeret enni meg tilos volt a Pészah nyolc napja alatt.

Az ünnepi asztalra kerülő halat magunk fogtuk. Nagybereznán volt egy kis folyó. Régebben nem úgy fogták a halat, mint most. A boltban lehetett kapni valami port, amit a vízbe szórtak, és a hal olyan lett tőle, mint aki részeg, hassal fölfelé fordult. Csak össze kellett szedni. Ez legális volt, a port a boltban lehetett kapni. Emberekre ártalmatlan volt.

Pészah előtt édesanyám nagytakarítást csapott. Az összes bútort elhúztuk a helyéről, minden le lett mosva, le lett tisztítva. Összeszedtük a kenyérdarabokat, még a kenyérmorzsákat is. Libatollal egy papírra söprögettük, és gondosan beletekertük. Aztán a papírt a hámeccal együtt elégettük a kemencében [lásd: homecolás]. A húsvéti étkészletet az egyik Pészahtól a másikig a padláson tartottuk. Egy évben csak egyszer hoztuk le, Pészah előtt. Édesanyám jó előre elkezdett főzni. Pészah előtt a sajhetnél hosszú sorok álltak, minden háziasszony elküldte a gyerekét a sajhethez csirkékkel, libákkal. Aztán a baromfiról lenyúzták a bőrt a bőr alatti zsírral együtt, fölvágták, és a zsírt nagy öntöttvas lábasban olvasztották ki. Ilyenkor csak ezzel a zsírral főztek. A gyerekekre bízták, hogy a maceszt egy nagy mozsárban lisztté zúzzák össze. Aztán ezt a lisztet átszitálták, és Pészahra mindent ebből sütöttek. Édesanyám a csirkelevesbe nem a sábeszkor szokásos metéltet főzte bele, hanem maceszdarabokat. Sábeszkor is és az ünnepekkor is mindig volt gefilte fis [töltött hal – lásd: halételek]. Anyám fölfújtat készített, úgy, hogy az összetört maceszt tojással keverte össze. Csirkenyakat főzött, pirított liszttel és hagymával töltött csirkenyakat készített. A maceszlisztből puszedlit, lekváros, mazsolás rétest csinált. Pészah első napján reggel elmentünk a zsinagógába, este pedig apám húsvéti szédert vezetett. Az asztalon, a szokásos ünnepi ételeken kívül volt egy tál, amire csípős zöldfűszer, tormagyökér és főtt tojás volt kirakva. Egy tálkában pedig sós víz volt. A zöldfűszert bele kellett mártani a sós vízbe, és úgy megenni [A zöldfűszer  keserűfű – torma vagy saláta – volt (lásd: máror), amelyet nem a sós vízbe, hanem az édes hárószetbe mártogatnak. A sós vízbe a tojást mártogatják. Lásd: széder. – A szerk.]. Mi már tudtuk, hogy ilyenkor az őseinkre emlékezünk, akik kivonultak az egyiptomi fogságból. Pészahkor speciális húsvéti bort ittunk, vörös volt és nagyon édes. Az asztalra kis ezüst poharak kerültek minden családtag számára és ezenfölül még egy, Illés prófétának. A széder alatt mindenkinek ki kellett innia négy pohár bort. A gyerekek nem kaptak bort, csak egy egészen kis bort öntöttek a poharukba, és vízzel öntötték föl. Föltettem az apámnak héberül a négy tradicionális kérdést [Általában a legkisebb gyerek teszi fel a négy kérdést, de ez nem háláhá (törvény), hanem minhág (szokás). Pedagógiai jelentősége van, mint ahogy az egész széder célja a gyerekek tanitása, a kivonulás törénet elmesélése, továbbadása generációról generációra. Ha egy családban a legkisebb gyerek nem tud még beszélni, vagy nem fogja még fel amit mond, esetleg a családfő héberül vezeti a szédert, és a legkisebb gyerek még nem tud héberül, kérdezhet a nagyobb is. – A szerk.].

Szukot ünnepén a kertben szukát építettünk, kukoricaszárral fedtük be, és szalagokkal, virágokkal díszítettük föl. Beraktunk a szukába egy asztalt, és a Szukot minden napján kizárólag ebben a szukában étkeztünk, és itt is imádkoztunk.

Ros Hásáná előtt a zsinagógában egy egész hónapon át, egész elul havában, sófárt fújtak a reggeli ima után. Az ünnep előestéjén bocsánatot kellett kérni azoktól, akiket megbántottál, még akkor is, ha akaratod ellenére bántottad meg őket. Ros Hásáná ünnepén édesapám fehér ingbe öltözött [kitli], és elment édesanyámmal a zsinagógába. Mindenképpen fehérbe kellett öltözni. Amikor már nagyobbak lettünk, mi is velük mentünk. Édesapámnak volt egy külön imakönyve, ami csak Ros Hásánára és Jom Kipurra szólt. Anyám ünnepi ételt készített, az összes ünnepi zsidó specialitással: csirke, húsleves, gefilte fis. De a hagyományos ünnepi ételeken kívül Ros Hásánákor még szeletekre vágott almát is ettünk, mézbe mártogatva. Édesanyám azt mondta, ezt azért tesszük, hogy a következő év édes legyen [A méz a bibliai idők óta az élet édességét és jóságát jelképezi. A manna is – mely a pusztai vándorlás alatt az égből hullott – édes volt, mint a méz. Eredetileg datolyából készítették, de a posztbiblikus időkben már a méhek által készített mézet tekintik méznek. Bár a méh nem kóser állat, mégis engedélyezik a törvények a méz fogyasztását, mert a méz nem tekinthető a méh testrészének. – A szerk.].

Jom Kipurkor az egész család böjtölt. Még a kisgyerekek is tartották a böjtöt, körülbelül öt éves koruktól [A gyerekeknek a bár micvójuk / bát micvájuk után kell a felnőttekhez hasonlóan egész nap böjtölniük, addig fél napot böjtölnek. – A szerk.]. Jom Kipur előtt otthon kápóreszt csináltunk. Édesanyám és a nővérem fehér csirkét vett a jobb kezébe, az apám és mi, az öcsémmel pedig fehér kakast. El kellett mondani egy imát, aztán pedig lassan forgatni az állatot a fejünk fölött, és közben azt mondani héberül: „Légy te az én vezeklésem!”. Az egész család elment a zsinagógába. Jom Kipurkor az imák nagyon hosszúak voltak. Miután hazatértünk a zsinagógából, mindannyian asztalhoz ültünk. A huszonnégy órás böjt [A Jom Kipur-i böjt 25 órás. – A szerk.] után minden különösen finomnak tűnt.

Vidám ünnep volt a Hanuka és a Purim. Hanukakor a gyerekeknek pénzt – hanuka geltet – és fából készített, színesre festett pörgettyűt [denderli] adtak. Purimra édesanyám háromszögletű mákos és diós süteményt készített – hámántáskát [A hámántáska vagy humentás kelt tésztából készült sült tészta. Négyszögletesre vágott, majd félbe hajtott táskácskák, szilvalekvárral vagy cukros mákkal töltve. – A szerk.]. Purimkor szokás volt finomságokat vinni a családtagoknak, ismerősöknek. Ez volt a sláchmónesz. Egy szalvétával letakart tálcára raktak mindenféle finomságot, a gyerekek meg körbevitték a sláchmóneszt a házakba. Purim első reggelén édesapám Eszter könyvéből olvasott föl [lásd: Purim; Megilá].

Nagybereznán két héder volt: egy a fiúknak és egy a lányoknak. A lányok kevesebb tantárgyat tanultak, de azért mindent megtanítottak nekik, amit tudnia kell egy zsidó nőnek, tanultak imádkozni, héberül olvasni. A lányok öt- vagy hatéves korukban kezdtek tanulni a héderben, nem emlékszem pontosan, és egy évig tanultak ott. Mi pedig, fiúk, hároméves korunkban kezdtünk a héderbe járni. A melamednek volt egy segítője, aki az ilyen kisgyerekekkel foglalkozott. A melamed tanított minket, a segítője pedig a gyakorlati dolgokkal törődött: megetette a gyerekeket, kivitte őket a mosdóba és hasonlók. Négyéves korunkban már elkezdtük tanulni a héber ábécét, addig meg hallás után tanultuk a héber szavakat. A héderben jiddissel is foglalkoztunk, megtanultunk írni és olvasni, tanultunk a zsidó történelemről, hagyományokról és vallásról. A héderbe hétéves korunkig jártunk, és akkor kezdődött az oktatás az általános iskolában.

Nagybereznán nem volt zsidó iskola. Mindannyian, a nővérem is és Leopold öcsém is a nyolcosztályos ukrán iskolába jártunk. Koedukált iskola volt, a fiúk és a lányok együtt tanultak. Az osztályban sok zsidó gyerek volt, és voltak ukránok [rutének] is és magyarok is. A többség már az iskola előtt is ismerte egymást. Semmiféle antiszemita megnyilvánulás nem volt. Megesett, hogy verekedtünk, veszekedtünk, de ennek nem volt nemzetiségi színezete. A barátaim között voltak zsidók is, nem zsidók is. Az iskolában nem tanultam rosszul, és bár nem voltam kitűnő, azért minden tantárgyból elég jól teljesítettem. Amikor betöltöttem a tizenhármat, a szüleim bár micvót csináltak nekem. Ezután már felnőttnek számítottam.

Tizennégy éves koromban befejeztem az iskolát. A szüleimnek azt javasolták, hogy küldjenek Csehszlovákiába, egy ruhagyárba, hogy ott tanuljak két évig. Működött akkor Kárpátalján egy cionista szervezet, amely azzal foglalkozott, hogy tizenéveseket különböző foglalkozásra tanított be, aztán Palesztinába küldte őket [Föltehetően a Betárról van szó. Betar (Brit Trumpeldor, vagyis „Trumpeldor Szövetség”): a cionizmus jobboldali irányzatát képviselő ifjúsági szervezet, amely Vlagyimir Zsabotinszkij kezdeményezésére alakult 1923-ban. Tömegbázisát a lengyel zsidóság alsó középosztálya alkotta. Három alapelv szerint működött: monizmus (a célok sorában a zsidó állameszme rendelkezik prioritással), a légionizmus (a felfegyverzett önvédelem elve) és a chaluciut (vagyis az ideális „pionir” elve). (Maga a rövidítés egyébként utal Betár városára, ahol Bar Kochba életét vesztette.) – A szerk.]. A ruhagyár ehhez a szervezethez tartozott. A gyár neve Zborovic volt. Nem emlékszem, hogy mi volt a neve a városnak, ahol a gyár volt [Csehszlovákiában (a mai Csehországban) volt egy Zborovice nevű helység – valószínűleg itt volt a gyár. – A szerk.]. Ott velem együtt sok zsidó gyerek volt Nagybereznáról, és voltak gyerekek Kárpátalja más helységeiből is. Voltak lányok is, fiúk is. Egy nagy házban laktunk, egy szobában tíz ember volt. Lent volt az étkezde. Kóser ételeket készítettek nekünk, sábeszre és az ünnepekre ünnepi lakomát rendeztek. Pénteken megtartottuk a sábeszt, szombaton pedig nem dolgoztunk. Az ünnepeket is megrendezték nekünk, minden úgy zajlott, ahogy a zsidó tradíciók szerint kell. Megtanultunk különböző gépeken és a futószalag mellett dolgozni. Ezenkívül még héberül [ivrit] és jiddisül is tanultunk. Két évet töltöttem itt, boldog évek voltak, nagyon tetszett a munka is és az életforma is. Csehszlovákiából 1930-ban jöttem vissza, akkor apám beadott tanulni egy szabóhoz. Három évig tanultam. Persze gyorsabban is ki lehetett tanulni a mesterséget, de akkoriban az volt a szokás, hogy a tanoncok nemcsak tanultak, hanem segítettek is a tulajdonos feleségének a házimunkában. Vizet is kellett hordani, a gyerekekre is kellett vigyázni, amit mondtak, azt megcsinálta az ember.

Amikor befejeződött a taníttatásom a mesternél, dolgozni kezdtem nála szabóként, pontosabban szabászként. A szüleimnél laktam az öcsémmel együtt. A legjobb barátom egy falubeli fodrász volt, aki ugyanabban az évben született, mint én, és nem volt zsidó. Nagyon jó ember volt. Akkoriban számunkra nem volt jelentősége annak, hogy milyen nemzetiségű valaki, persze ha tisztességes és rendes volt.

1934-ben Helén nővérem férjhez ment. A szüleim igazi zsidó esküvőt rendeztek neki. Volt hüpe, az esküvői ceremóniát a rabbi vezette [lásd: házasság, esküvői szertartás]. Az esküvő Nagybereznán volt, utána pedig apám vett nekik egy házat Ungváron. A nővéremék Ungvárra költöztek. Felnőtt az öcsém, befejezte az iskolát, és én elkezdtem a szabómesterségre tanítani.

1936-ban sorköteles szolgálatra hívtak be a csehszlovák hadseregbe. A gyalogsághoz lettem beosztva. Hadiszolgálatra képeztek minket ki – folyamatos edzéseket, sportfoglalkozásokat tartottak nekünk, és volt elméleti oktatás. Kaszárnyában laktunk, ahol külön szobák voltak, mindegyikben nyolc-tíz ember lakott. Minden szobában voltak ágyak, asztalok, székek, a falon könyvespolcok. Ruhásszekrények is voltak, mindenkinek jutott egy saját polc a személyes holmija számára. A kaszárnya mellett működött egy könyvtár, és a szabadidőben lehetett olvasni. A hadseregben minden felekezetű katona számára -- legyen az izraelita, katolikus vagy pravoszláv -- megtartották a vallási ünnepeket. A zsidóknak Pészahra maceszt hoztak a zsinagógából, a pravoszlávoknak húsvétra kalácsot sütöttek. A katonák fölkereshették a zsinagógát, a templomot. A kásrutot persze nem tartottuk, kénytelenek voltunk mindent megenni, amit adtak, de a többi dologban sikerült a zsidó szabályokat betartanom. A vallásosságot még támogatták is. Különböző nemzetiségű katonák laktak egy szobában velem. Rajtam kívül volt még egy zsidó a mi szobánkban, voltak csehek, voltak magyarok. De soha nem volt semmiféle konfliktus nemzetiségi alapon. A tisztek nagyon jóindulatúan viszonyultak a fiatal katonákhoz. A hadseregben nem fordult elő, hogy a felettesek visszaéltek volna a hatalmukkal a fiatal katonákkal szemben, kigúnyolták volna őket, mint ahogy azt a mai ukrán hadseregről hallani. Mi mindannyian teljes egésznek éreztük magunkat.

A katonaság után, 1939-ben hazamentem, de akkorra ez már Magyarország volt. 1938-ban Kárpátalja ismét Magyarország fennhatósága alá került [Ekkor még nem került egész Kárpátalja magyar fennhatóság alá, csak Ungvár és Munkács környéke, amelyek az első bécsi döntéssel kerültek vissza átmenetileg Csehszlovákiától. Kárpátalját 1939 márciusában szállták meg a magyar csapatok. – A szerk.]. De ez már nem az a Magyarország volt, ahol a szüleim fiatalsága telt el, ez a fasiszta Magyarország volt. Akkor már háború dúlt Lengyelországban, Hitler csapatai elkezdték megsemmisíteni a lengyel zsidókat. Sok menekült érkezett Lengyelországból. Magyarország a hitleri Németország szövetségesének hirdette ki magát. Megkezdődött a Magyarországon élő zsidók üldözése. Zsidóellenes törvények sorát fogadták el [lásd: zsidótörvények Magyarországon]. A zsidóknak megtiltották, hogy vállalkozásokat, üzleteket birtokoljanak, mindent önként át kellett adniuk nem zsidóknak, máskülönben az állam kobozta el a tulajdonukat. Aztán bevezették a magyar útleveleket. Minden zsidónak be kellett bizonyítania, hogy Magyarország területén született, különben tudom is én, hova telepítették ki [lásd: KEOKH; Kamenyec-Podolszkij-i vérengzés]. Össze kellett gyűjteni az iratokat, igazolásokat [Az 1939. évi IV. tc. (a második zsidótörvény) rendelkezéseinek értelmében tömegeknek kellett beszerezniük származási irataikat, anyakönyvi kivonataikat, egyéb okiratokat, egyrészt a mentességek igazolása (1–2. §.), másrészt a szavazati jog biztosítása (4. §.) miatt. Ez nem csak a zsidókra vonatkozott, hiszen a zsidó köztisztviselők, állami alkalmazottak elbocsátása (5. §.) miatt mindenkinek igazolnia kellett származását. Ugyanez volt érvényes többek között a szabadfoglalkozásokban dolgozókra, az iparigazolványt kérelmezőkre is. – A szerk.]. Az útleveleket Budapesten, Magyarország fővárosában adták ki. Oda kellett érte utazni, ez drága volt. A zsidóknak nem volt joguk állami tisztségeket betölteniük. Sokkal nehezebb lett az élet.

1941-ben Németország megtámadta a Szovjetuniót. Magyarország Németország szövetségese volt a háborúban, és megkezdődött a magyar hadsereg mozgósítása. 1941-ben elvittek a hadseregbe munkaszolgálatosnak. A munkaszázadot először németek irányították, aztán csak a magyarok maradtak. A frontra küldtek minket, a Szovjetunió területére. Árkokat ástunk a Donnál.  A doni frontot magyar tisztek irányították.  A magyarok néha rosszabbul viselkedtek, mint a németek. Néhány magyar tiszt rosszabb volt a vadállatnál. Velünk, a munkaszolgálatos katonákkal bármit megtehettek, amit csak akartak, bármilyen munkát adhattak. Nem lehetett nemet mondani, ha megtagadtad a munkát, akkor helyben lelőttek. Az első munka árokásás volt. Körös-körül mindent beborított a hó. Az utakat meg kellett tisztítani a hótól, hogy a német hadsereg végig tudjon menni rajta. Emlékszem, hogy 1942 január-februárjában olyan szörnyű tél volt, hogy az emberek a földre estek, és percek alatt megfagytak. Mindegyikünknek adtak egy ásót. Aki eldobta az ásóját, az meghalt, mert miután kiszálltunk a vagonokból, gyalog kellett menni. Olyan fagyos tél volt, és olyan orkánerejű szél fújt, hogy csak az ásókkal lehetett a szél ellen védekezni. Volt egy gyapjúból készült maszkom, amit a nővérem kötött nekem, csak a szemet és az orrot hagyta nyitva rajta, a többi részén mindenhol zárt volt. Munkaszolgálatra csak zsidókat vittek [Bár a munkaszolgálatosok túlnyomó része zsidó származású volt, a fegyverviselésre alkalmatlanok között voltak nem zsidó származásúak is (jobbára baloldali elemek, a fegyveres szolgálatot vallási okokból megtagadók stb.), de 1940 decemberében a zsidókat szinte kizárólag zsidókból álló munkásszázadokba rakták, és elkülönítették őket a nem zsidó munkaszolgálatosoktól. (Azokat a zsidókat és nem zsidókat pedig, akiket nemzetbiztonsági szempontból veszedelmesnek ítéltek, büntető muszra soroztak be.) 1942 tavaszán, amikor már nyilvánvaló volt, hogy a Szovjetunió elleni háború elhúzódik, és várható volt a 2. magyar hadsereg bevetése is, a honvédelmi miniszter utasításba adta, hogy mozgósítás esetén a behívandók 10%-a zsidó legyen, és hogy a zsidó munkásszázadokat a hadműveleti zónába kell vezényelni. Amikor 1942. április 11-én a 2. magyar hadsereget a frontra küldték, meredeken felszökött a fronton szolgáló muszosok száma. Tízezrével hívtak be zsidókat, elsősorban SAS behívóval, nem pedig korosztályok szerint. – A szerk.]. Nem tudom, hányan maradtunk életben, de biztos, hogy nagyon kevesen. Azt hiszem, körülbelül egy százalék. Ezekben a századokban az emberek nagyon gyorsan meghaltak. Nem csak a munkakörülmények voltak embertelenül nehezek, de amikor árkokat ástunk, az oroszok is egyfolytában lőttek ránk. Fegyverünk nem volt, az ásóval meg nem sokra mész a golyók ellen.

1942 februárjában szovjet csapatok támadták meg a századunkat. A magyarok szerteszét szaladtak. Nem tudtuk, hol vannak a mi századunkból való katonák és a tisztek. Mi, munkaszolgálatosok kilencen voltunk. Járkáltunk, nem tudtuk, hogy hol vagyunk, és hova kell mennünk. Egy házhoz értünk az erdő szélén, amiben egy konyha volt. Ebben a konyhában főztek ételt a magyar katonáknak. Volt ott néhány ember, és mi fölajánlottuk nekik, hogy a konyhán ételért cserébe dolgozunk. Odavettek minket magukhoz, megbíztak, hogy vágjunk fát, hámozzunk krumplit. A katonáknak a csaták előtt feketekávét, konyakot vagy rumot adtak, hogy fölélénkítsék őket. Nekünk is megengedték néha, hogy kávét vagy rumot igyunk. Sajnos, a munkánknak a konyhán hamar vége szakadt. Egyszer éjszaka a szobába, ahol aludtunk, részeg német tisztek rontottak be. Ezt kiáltották: „Ébresztő, kommunisták!” Valamiért ők azt hitték, hogy minden zsidó kommunista. Mi nem értettük, miről van szó. Megparancsolták, hogy gyorsan öltözzünk föl, vegyük a hátizsákunkat a holminkkal, és menjünk a konyhába. Amikor odamentünk, az élelmezési szakasz vezetője ránk kiabált: „Koszos zsidók, kommunisták, kiittátok a konyakot és a rumot, ami kell a katonáinknak!” Azt bizony a tisztek itták meg, de minket hibáztattak. A tisztek elkezdtek verni minket. Féltem, hogy be ne törjék a fejemet, összehúztam magam, így az ütéseket főleg a hátizsák fogta föl. Nekik semmibe sem került volna mindannyiunkat megölni, felelniük ilyesmiért nem kellett. De miután belefáradtak a verésbe, mindannyiunkat kikergettek az udvarra.

Futni nem lehetett, körben nagyon magas hó volt. Sebesülten feküdtünk a havon. Amikor egy kicsit megnyugodtunk, próbáltunk továbbmenni. Kerestük a mieinket, mert nem volt hova mennünk. Oroszul nem tudtunk. Én tudtam ruszinul, ez nem tisztán ukrán nyelv, hanem egy kárpátaljai tájszólás. Így beszéltek a mi falunkban. Végül sikerült megtalálni a magyar hadosztályt, és megint befogtak minket munkára. A legnehezebb munkákat adták nekünk, de választásunk nem volt. Ha menekülni próbáltál volna, rögtön megölnek, de menekülni úgysem volt hova. Úgyis lelőttek volna, a különbség csak annyiból állt, hogy ki lő le: a magyarok, a németek vagy az oroszok. Arrafelé vonult el az orosz front, harcok folytak.

Egyszer az orosz csapatok támadást indítottak, és éjszaka visszavonulásra kaptunk parancsot. Mi, az a kilenc ember, együtt maradtunk. Úgy döntöttünk, hogy a faluban rejtőzünk el. A falut Osurkinak hívták, legalábbis ezt mondta az a nő, aki elrejtett minket [Ilyen településnév nem található Ukrajnában. – A szerk.]. Köröskörül bombáztak. Mindannyian bementek hozzá a házba, én pedig, az udvaron maradtam. Megláttam egy hosszú fonott kosarat, amely a ház ajtaja mellett állt. Belebújtam ebbe a kosárba. Egy idő múlva a ház mellett föltűnt három német katona, akik aknavetőt állítottak föl, és lőni kezdtek. Az oroszokat tartóztatták föl, hogy a többiek el tudjanak menekülni. Ez néhány percig tartott. Én közvetlenül mellettük feküdtem. Ők engem persze nem láttak, de én láttam őket a kosár résein keresztül. Aztán elfutottak, az oroszok támadása nagyon határozott volt. Egy kis idő múlva csend lett. A harc továbbvonult, abbamaradt a bombázás és lövöldözés. Én persze nagyon átfagytam, mert a szabadban feküdtem abban a kosárban. Egy kis idővel az után, hogy elmentek a németek, csend lett, és ekkor valami zajt hallottam. Egy síléc surranása volt. Egy fehér álcázó köpenybe öltözött orosz tiszt síléccel ereszkedett le a hegyről, kézi golyószóró volt nála. Földerítő volt. Meglátta a fényt a szobában, és bement. Én még mindig a kosárban feküdtem. Ők már tudtak rólunk, tudták, hogy a magyaroknak vannak zsidó munkaszolgálatosaik. Az orosz tiszt bement a házba, és megkérdezte: „Hányan vannak itt?” Megszámolta, kiküldött minket az utcára, azt mondta, hogy gyorsan menjünk a hátországba, mert a hadszíntér visszatérhet ide, és útba igazított minket, ekkor már én is előbújtam a kosárból. Oroszul beszélt, nem értettünk mindent, de megmutatta nekünk, merre menjünk. Éjjel két óra volt. Elindultunk, de hogy merre menjünk, azt nem tudtuk. A falvakat jártuk egészen reggelig. A front nem tért vissza. De már nagyon szerettünk volna vizet inni, enni valamit. Majdnem minden házat szétlőttek, az épségben maradtakba bementünk, megmelegedtünk, néha adtak nekünk enni. Mentünk, mint a nincstelenek, házról házra, tovább és tovább. Nappal az úton halott embereket találtunk a mi századunkból. Repülőgépről lőtték le őket. Ahogy mentünk, fölöttünk is repülőgépek szálltak. Mivel én nemrég még a csehszlovák hadsereg katonája voltam, tudtam, hogy amikor közeledik a repülőgép, le kell feküdni a földre, és halottnak tettetni magadat. Amikor elrepült, tovább lehetett menni. Azokat, akik ezt nem tudták, rögtön megölték. Hogy német vagy magyar repülőgépek voltak-e, azt nem tudom, de valamelyik a kettő közül, mert más nem lehetett. Nem emlékszem, hány napig mentünk, de nem nagyon sokáig, mert gyalog nem jutsz messzire, pláne nem éhesen. Mindenhol ennivaló után kutattunk. Egyszer tököket találtunk, amit egy pincéből dobtak ki. Tüzet gyújtottunk, megsütöttük, és megettük a tököket. Már majdnem elrohadtak, de mi mégis megettük. Egyszer találtunk egy megfagyott lovat, mindenki darabokat vágott ki magának belőle, és azt ette megsütve. Éjszakára a szétlőtt házakban rejtőzködtünk el.

Egyszer oroszok raboltak ki minket. Civil emberek voltak, jöttek éjszaka pisztollyal, megnézték, kinek milyen cipője van, kinek van jó ruhája, kényszerítették, hogy vegye le, és cserébe régi dolgokat adtak. Elvették a jó kis kecskebőr mellényemet, amit otthonról hoztam magammal. Még jó, hogy adtak cserébe legalább egy régit.

Végül orosz katonákat találtunk. Beszéltem velük, szerencsére néhányan közülük értettek ukránul, megkérdeztem, nem tudunk-e csinálni valamit nekik, nincs-e szükségük szabóra. Hoztak nekünk javítanivaló ruhát, fehérneműt. Enni adtak, és amikor eljöttünk tőlük, adtak egy hátizsáknyi kétszersültet. Aztán megint csak mentünk, fogalmunk sem volt, hogy hova megyünk. Számunkra ez egy idegen ország volt. Útközben tífuszosak lettünk, az egyik faluban az emberek megmutatták nekünk a kórházat. A kórház, amelyben a tífuszos betegek feküdtek, az iskolaépületben volt elhelyezve. Onnan minden nap úgy vitték ki a halott embereket, mint a farönköket. A betegek a koszban feküdtek a szalmán. Nagyon sok tetű volt. Az embereket reggelre halálra ették a tetvek. Én nem tudom, honnan volt erőm hozzá, de éjszakánként nem aludtam, hanem a ruhámat tisztogattam a tetvektől. Nem volt más megoldás. Ez mentett meg. Nem volt ott étel, nem volt víz, havat olvasztottak, és azt ittuk. Az emberek – én is – annyira legyöngültek, hogy nem tudtak járni, négykézláb is csak nagy erőfeszítéssel sikerült. Még a falakba sem tudtak kapaszkodni. Nekem és két ezredtársamnak valahogy sikerült túlélnünk. Aztán orosz tisztek és civilek jöttek. Voltak köztük orvosok is. Az egyik orvos megkérdezte tőlem, hogy hová valósi vagyok. Megmondtam neki, hogy Ungvárról jöttem. Kiderült, hogy ő is Ungvárról származik, az 1920-as években ment ki a Szovjetunióba. Kérdezgetni kezdett, én feleltem. Megnézte, hogy kit lehet még megmenteni. Azokat az embereket, akiknek még volt némi esélyük a túlélésre, kivitték onnan, és külön helyezték el. A többiek helyben meghaltak.

Miután meggyógyultunk, továbbmentünk. Megfürödhettünk a fürdőben, valamennyire letisztálkodhattunk. Aztán Uszmanyba vittek minket [Moszkvától kb. 400 km, délkeletre. – A szerk.]. Ott egy hadifogolytábor volt. Voltak ott németek, olaszok, románok, törökök, mindenféle katona volt ott. Azt, aki megadta magát, odavitték a frontról. Sok olyan német katona volt ott, aki megadta magát. Odavitték őket, levetkőztették meztelenre, úgy, ahogy egyébként engem is, átkutatták, aztán megengedték, hogy fölöltözzenek. Ez egy elosztó tábor volt, ahol átkutatták, szortírozták, ellátták és továbbküldték a foglyokat. Én mindig azt kerestem, hogy mivel tudnám elfoglalni magam. Sok rongyos ember volt ott. Mondtam, hogy tudok ruhát javítani. Volt mivel varrnom, mert tűt hoztam magammal. Voltak egyéb apróságaim is. Az ollómat elvették a motozáskor, bár az olló számomra nem fegyver volt, hanem munkaeszköz. Ollót aztán szereztem. Először a foglyokat szolgáltam ki. A munkámért cserébe ételt adtak nekem. Aztán nyitottam egy műhelyt ebben a lágerben. Az orosz hadsereg alá tartozott egy, a front ellátását biztosító raktár, ott volt a műhelynél. Az olaszok oda jártak ételt lopni, ők különösen éhesek voltak. Azokat, akiket elkaptak, helyben lelőtték, ezt én nem egyszer láttam. Aztán a műhelyem mellett nyitottak még egy műhelyt, egy cipészműhelyt. Kerestek a foglyok között mestereket. Én elég régen voltam már ebben a lágerben, és egész otthonosan mozogtam. Mindig újabb és újabb emberek érkeztek. Egyszer egy vagon SS-est hoztak. Köztük volt a barátom, Schwarz, a mi munkaszolgálatos századunkból [A Centropa Nyikolaj Svarccal is készített interjút. – A szerk.]. A németekkel együtt rejtőzött el egy házban egy nőnél, amíg meg nem találták. Odavettem magamhoz a műhelybe. Elég sokat voltunk ebben a lágerben, aztán Uszmanyból Voronyezsbe küldtek minket. Voronyezsben először is a fürdőbe vittek minket. Már sokkal jobban éreztük magunkat, mint előtte. A ruhánkat fertőtlenítették, és visszaadták. Az is egy nagyon nagy láger volt. Ott is voltak németek is, olaszok is, románok is, magyarok is. Óriási fabarakkokban laktunk. A barakkban a fal mellett végig fapriccsek húzódtak két sorban. Elég jól etettek minket. A lágerbe folyamatosan érkeztek amerikai küldemények, lencsét küldtek csirkehússal. Amerika egy nemzetközi megállapodás értelmében élelmiszer-szállítmányt küldött a foglyoknak. A voronyezsi fogságban már nagyon jó volt ahhoz képest, hogy mi volt előtte. Ott már elég jó ételt adtak, volt mosakodási lehetőség. A lágerben voltak zsidók, de a zsidó hagyományokat nem követték. Természetesen disznóhúst nem ettünk, de ez volt az egyetlen dolog, amit tehettünk. Ez egy másik világ volt, és mi el voltunk szakítva a megszokott valóságtól. Én ott is nyitottam egy varróműhelyt, de ez már egy igazi, jó műhely volt. A voronyezsi műhelyben új dolgokat is varrtunk: egyenruhát az orosz tiszteknek, női ruhát, emellett ruhák javításával is foglalkoztunk. A varróműhelyben nagyon jó német szakemberek dolgoztak. Az igazat megvallva, tanultam tőlük egy s mást. Azóta is őrzöm a följegyzéseimet, amiket ott készítettem, egy ábrákkal teli albumot, mindenféle szabásmintát. A műhelyem közvetlenül a parancsnokság mellett volt, a láger területén kívül. A parancsnok, egy ezredes fent lakott, és lent volt a cipész- és a varróműhely. Ott laktunk mi ketten, Schwarzcal a mi munkaszázadunkból. Én varrtam, ő cipészkedett. A lágerben nem sokáig laktam, hamarosan fölszabadítottak az őrkíséret alól. Adtak egy fényképes igazolványt, és azzal szabadon mozoghattam a láger területén és környékén. Én és Schwarz a parancsnokság épületében laktunk, a munkánkért ételt kaptunk cserébe. Nagyon sok volt ott a poloska, nem hagytak minket aludni. Az ágy lábát nedves rongyokkal tekertük körbe, hogy a poloskák ne tudjanak fölmászni lentről. De azok olyan gonoszak, hogy fölmásztak a plafonra, és onnan vetették ránk magukat. Azért valahogyan túléltük. Én minden reggel elmentem a lágerbe, összeszedtem az embereket, akik a varrodában dolgoztak, huszonöt-harminc embert. Szökni nem készültek, nem lett volna hova menniük. A helyi lakosság fasisztának tartotta őket, és aligha segített volna nekik. Minden nap a műhelyben dolgoztak, este pedig visszakísértem őket a lágerbe.

A lágerben tartózkodásom alatt ismerkedtem meg a jövendőbeli feleségemmel, 1945-ben. Ez már akkor volt, amikor fölszabadítottak az őrkíséret alól. A parancsnoksággal szemben, ahol laktunk, az utca túloldalán állt egy ház. Az ablakban gyakran láttam egy lányt. Egy nagy család élt ott. Schwarzcal gyakran néztük őket az ablakon keresztül. Számunkra ez a látvány a békebeli élet egy kis darabját jelentette, otthoni emlékeket idézett föl. Lent egy kis patak folyt, volt ott egy kút, oda jártak az emberek vízért. Mi fürödni jártunk a patakhoz, és gyakran láttuk ezt a lányt, vödrökkel jött a kúthoz. Valahogy összeszedtem a bátorságomat, hogy megszólítsam. Német egyenruhában voltam, a németek adták cserébe azért, hogy varrtam nekik. Ezek a németek nem is tudták rólam, hogy zsidó vagyok, mert jól beszéltem németül, és akkor már oroszul is kiválóan tudtam. Beszéltem a lánnyal, és megkértem, hogy találkozzon velem este. Nagyon hiányzott nekem az emberi közeledés. Féltem, hogy nemet mond, hiszen nem tudta, hogy ki vagyok. De beleegyezett. Este találkoztunk. Kiválasztottam egy helyet, ahol senki sem láthatott, mert a foglyoknak tilos volt este az utcára menniük. Egy kicsit sétáltunk, beszélgettünk. Ez ünnep volt számomra. Ezután minden nap találkoztunk. Hoztam neki az ételből, amit a lágerben adtak. A lányt Szofija Belinszkajának hívták. Nem tudtam, miféle, azt gondoltam, hogy cigány. Külsőleg egy cigány lányra hasonlított. Egyszer megemlítette, hogy az anyja próbálja lebeszélni arról, hogy találkozzon velem, azt mondja, hogy én német vagyok, és megölöm őt. Elmondta, hogy zsidó. Én meg mondtam neki, hogy én is zsidó vagyok. Az anyja nem hitte el, azt mondta, hogy a hadifogolytáborban csak németek vannak. Elkezdtem följárni hozzájuk. Csak esténként lehetett, amikor senki sem látta. Szofija családja nagy volt, a hét gyerek közül Szofija volt a legidősebb. 1924-ben született. Az anyja háztartásbeli volt, az apjuk nem lakott velük, más családja volt. Próbáltam segíteni a családnak. A műhelyben fehér anyagból köpenyeket varrtunk, az anyagot tekercsekben kaptuk. Minden este betekertem magam ezzel az anyaggal, és így mentem hozzájuk. Szofija anyja a piacon eladta az anyagot, és ennivalót vett belőle a családnak. Egyszer meghívott ebédre. Aztán rájöttem, hogy beszélni akart velem, megtudni, hogy beszélem-e a zsidó nyelvet. Beszélgettünk, és a beszélgetés végére meggyőződött arról, hogy én jobban beszélek jiddisül, mint ő. Ezután már nem tartott tőlem, én meg minden este elmentem hozzájuk vendégségbe. Schwarz barátom is találkozgatott egy helyi, voronyezsi lánnyal.

1945 májusában megtudtuk, hogy vége a háborúnak. Nagy öröm volt ez nekünk. Az utcán ismeretlen emberek ölelkeztek, csókolgatták egymást, gratuláltak egymásnak. Reméltem, hogy nemsokára haza tudok menni. A családom sorsáról semmit sem tudtam. Szofijával elhatároztuk, hogy összeházasodunk, de úgy döntöttünk, hogy akkorra halasztjuk az esküvőt, amikor megérkezünk az én házamba, mert az én családommal szerettünk volna ünnepelni. Megkértem a lágerparancsnokot, Ptasinszkijt, aki szintén zsidó volt, tudja meg, mi zajlik itt, Kárpátalján, van-e még valaki ott a zsidók közül. Ptasinszkij hivatalos úton megkérdezte, és azt a választ kapta, hogy a családomból senki sem él. Minden zsidót elvittek a németek Auschwitzba, mindet megölték [Nem a németek „vitték el” a zsidókat Auschwitzba. A deportálást a magyar hatóságok hajtották végre. Lásd: Ungvár. – A szerk.].

Amikor fölszabadítottak minket a lágerből, mindenkit megkérdeztek, hol akar élni. Bármely országot megnevezhettem, oda vittek volna. De én haza akartam jönni Kárpátaljára, bár már tudtam, hogy senki sem vár. 1942 elejétől 1946 szeptemberéig voltam fogságban. Szeptemberben megszereztem a megfelelő utazási okmányokat, és hazautaztam. 1945-ben, miután befejeződött a második világháború, Kárpátalja szovjet lett, de ez engem nem riasztott el. Emlékeztem rá, hogy a szovjet hadsereg szabadított föl minket a fasisztáktól. Reméltem, hogy hazajövök, és találok valakit a családomból. Először egyedül jöttem. Elő akartam készíteni mindent, mire a jövendőbelim megérkezik. Nagybereznára utaztam, és a szomszédok megerősítették, hogy a németek az egész családomat elvitték 1944-ben az auschwitzi koncentrációs táborba, és senki sem tért vissza közülük. Elmentem Ungvárra. Iratokat kellett szereznem, de nem sikerült. A nővérem házában idegenek laktak. A nővérem is és a családja is meghalt a koncentrációs táborban. Én egy távoli rokonomhoz költöztem, és elkezdtem intézkedni, hogy visszaadják a nővérem házát. Ungváron lakott az unokatestvérem ismerőse, egy ügyvéd, aki a bíróságon vitte az ügyemet. Nagybereznán végre kaptam egy papírt, ami igazolta a személyemet, és ezzel kaphattam igazolványt. A bíróságon sikeresen végződött a perem, visszaadták a házat. Akkor elutaztam Voronyezsbe Szofijáért, és együtt tértünk vissza Ungvárra. Rögtön összeházasodtunk, ahogy megérkeztünk Ungvárra. Zsidó esküvőnk nem volt [lásd: házasság, esküvői szertartás]. Egyszerűen bejegyeztettük a házasságot a kerületi anyakönyvi hivatalban. Máig ebben a házban lakunk. Amikor az 1950-es évek elején elkezdtük fölújítani a házat, és lecseréltük a rothadó deszkapadlót, egy ajándék várt rám a nővéremtől. Amikor az egész családdal együtt elvitték őt a koncentrációs táborba, nyilván nem akarta elöl hagyni a fényképeket, és elrejtett egy fényképekkel teli borítékot a padló alá. Ott találtunk rá a fölújítás alatt. Számomra ez nagy öröm volt, hiszen egyetlen fényképem sem maradt a családomról.

Egy varrodában helyezkedtem el, a város központjában. A háború után az emberek kevés új dolgot varrattak, főleg a régi ruhát javíttatták. Csak én dolgoztam, a feleségem otthon volt. 1947-ben született az első gyerekünk, egy fiú, akit az apám tiszteletére Kálmánnak neveztünk el. 1949-ben született a lányom, akit Jelenának neveztünk el a nővérem, Helén tiszteletére. A lányom zsidó neve Haja. Nagyon sokat kellett dolgoznom, hogy eltartsam a családot. Azok nagyon nehéz idők voltak, éhínség volt.

Egy idő után a varrodánkból nagy műhely lett. Ott dolgoztam szabászként huszonöt éven keresztül. Először brigádvezető voltam. A munka menete a következő volt: én kiszabtam az anyagot, odaadtam egy varrónőnek, aki megcsinálta a kabátot, az öltönyt az elejétől a végéig. Én csak ellenőriztem a munkáját, és kész. De amikor az egyedi varrásról áttértünk a műveletmegosztásos módszerre, elmentem onnan. Szerintem az nem munka, hogy az egyik csinálja az egyik műveletet, a másik a másikat, és így nyolc ember dolgozik egy dolgon. Ez a minőség rovására megy. Próbáltak rábeszélni, hogy maradjak, de én nem akartam ebben a rendszerben dolgozni. Átmentem egy másik műhelybe, ahol egy ismerősöm dolgozott. Ott csodálatos munka folyt, a ruhadarabokat az elejétől a végéig az ember maga varrta, mindössze egyetlenegy próbával. Ha nagyon pontosan készíti el az ember a szabásmintát, akkor megesik, hogy még próba sem kell. Nagyon sok kuncsaft volt. Olyan jól dolgoztunk, hogy a kuncsaftok mindig igyekeztek valahogyan megköszönni, többet fizetni, mint amennyi járt. Mindenki elégedett volt az új ruhájával, és újra eljött hozzánk. Nyugdíjba csak hetvenéves korom után mentem. Mikor végleg otthagytam a munkát a szalonban, tovább dolgoztam otthon. Nagyon sok kuncsaftom volt. A boltokban nem lehetett jó ruhát kapni, minden hiánycikk volt, ezért az emberek nagyon sokat varrattak. Akkoriban nagyon jól kerestem, semmiben sem szenvedtünk hiányt. Szabadidőm majdhogynem nem is maradt. De azért igyekeztem teremteni valamennyi időt, hogy a családommal töltsem, hogy sétáljunk, moziba menjünk.

Amikor visszajöttem Kárpátaljára, már voltak antiszemita megnyilvánulások. A háború alatt az embereket a közös balsors kötötte össze. A fronton az embereknek más mércéjük volt. A háború utáni első időkben meg olyan nehéz volt az élet, hogy mindenki el volt foglalva a saját problémáival, és nem nagyon törődött a másik ember nemzetiségével. De aztán az antiszemitizmus teljes erővel megjelent. Azt hiszem, ebben közrejátszott az, hogy a háború után Kárpátaljára sok ember jött ide a Szovjetunióból [Azaz: a Szovjetunió egyéb részeiből. – A szerk.]. Sokan közülük antiszemiták voltak. Antiszemitizmus mindig volt, és azóta is van, a közlekedési eszközökön lehet hallani effélét, hogy „Zsidók, takarodjatok Izraelbe”. Nem lehet azt mondani, hogy az állam most üldözné a zsidókat. Most már ilyen nincs, de korábban volt. Viszont a mindennapok szintjén néha előjön ilyesmi. Mi már hozzászoktunk az antiszemitizmushoz, bár személyesen én és a családom magunkon ezt sohasem tapasztaltuk, velem mindig rendesen viselkedtek, a megrendelőim a legkülönfélébb nemzetiségűek közül kerültek ki, és a hálálkodó szavaikon kívül sosem hallottam tőlük semmi mást.

Az 1953 elején zajló orvosper engem nem érintett. De meglepett, hogy sokan őszintén elhitték ezt a nyilvánvaló hazugságot. Egyébként a politika engem sohasem érdekelt. Ezek a politikáról szóló beszélgetések azoknak valók, akiknek nincs más dolguk. 1953 márciusában meghalt Sztálin. Itt, Ungváron kevesen siratták meg, szinte csak a Szovjetunióból áttelepülők. Nekem az ő halála nem okozott nagy bánatot, de az igazat megvallva, én is, mint valószínűleg mindenki, elgondolkoztam akkor azon, hogy mi lesz ezután. Emlékszem, ahogyan a huszadik pártkongresszuson Hruscsov Sztálin bűntetteiről beszélt [lásd: az SZKP XX. kongresszusa; Hruscsov beszéde a XX. pártkongresszuson]. Engem sohasem érdekelt a politika, de sok ismerősöm akkoriban nagyot csalódott, hogy Sztálin nem is volt a népek atyja, ahogy a propaganda nevezte, inkább a népek elnyomója. Sokan ezt nem is hitték el. Arra számítottunk, hogy a huszadik kongresszus után valami jobbra fordul, de a változások nem voltak túl jelentősek. Mi Kárpátalján több különböző uralom alatt éltünk. A dolgozó embert, aki a saját keze munkájából él, nem nagyon érdekli, milyen hatalom van az országában. Csak annyit kíván, hogy ez a hatalom ne zavarja az életét, hogy legyen munkája, amiből el tudja tartani a családját.

1948-ban megalakult Izrael. Természetesen örültem, hogy saját államunk van. De hát Palesztina már régóta létezett mint zsidó állam. Már a születésem előtt is vándoroltak oda zsidók, hogy a munkájukkal erősítsék és építsék Palesztinát. Így ezt én inkább úgy fogtam föl, mint névváltozást.

A feleségemmel igyekeztünk, amennyire ez lehetséges volt, betartani a zsidó hagyományokat, megünnepelni a zsidó ünnepeket. Követtük a kásrutot [lásd: étkezési törvények; kóser háztartás], főleg az első időkben, amikor még szabadon lehetett élelmiszert kapni. Nem messze tőlünk lakott egy zsidó asszony a családjával, és péntekenként a feleségem vele együtt készítette el az ételt sábeszre, mert sábeszkor semmit sem lehetett főzni, még a tüzet sem volt szabad begyújtani [lásd: szombati munkavégzés tilalma]. Péntek este a családdal együtt ünnepeltük a sábeszt, minden a hagyomány szerint zajlott. Mindannyian imádkoztunk, a feleségem gyertyát gyújtott. De arra, hogy szombaton ne dolgozzak, nem volt lehetőségem. A szovjethatalom alatt a szombat munkanap volt. Ha el tudtam menni szombaton a munkahelyemről, akkor elmentem. De én brigádvezető voltam, nem hagyhattam ott csapot-papot.

Otthon a feleségemmel oroszul beszéltünk, mert ő rosszul beszélte a zsidó nyelvet. Nekem nem volt annyira fontos, hogy megtanulja a zsidó nyelvet, inkább az volt a fontos, hogy megértsük egymást. Otthon minden zsidó ünnepet megünnepeltünk. Az 1950-es évek elejéig Ungváron működött egy zsinagóga. Oda jártunk a feleségemmel. Volt fent egy erkély kifejezetten nők számára [Az ortodox zsinagógában a nők nem vegyülhetnek a férfiak közé, különválasztott hely  (sokszor ráccsal vagy függönnyel is ellátott karzat) van számukra fenntartva. – A szerk.]. De kicsi gyerekeink voltak, és a feleségemnek nehéz volt elszakadnia otthonról, hogy szombatonként eljöjjön velem a zsinagógába. Aztán amikor a zsinagógát bezárták, és hangversenyteremmé alakították át, Ungváron nyitottak egy imaházat. Oda már csak a férfiak jártak. Jom Kipur alatt a feleségemmel mindig böjtöltünk. Most is, a korunk ellenére, tartjuk a böjtöt. A Pészahot is a hagyomány szerint ünnepeltük meg. Most is megvan a húsvéti étkészlet, a poharaktól az asztali terítéken át a lábasokig, edényekig. Pészahkor a szédert én vezettem. Amikor a fiam már egy kicsit nagyobb lett, megtanítottam neki a hagyományos húsvéti kérdések héber szövegét, melyeket a fiú tesz föl apjának a széder alatt [lásd: má nistáná]. Otthon minden ünnepet megtartottunk, és én elmeséltem a gyerekeknek, hogy melyik ünnepnek mi a jelentősége, és hogyan kell megtartani őket. Én és a feleségem zsidónak neveltük a gyerekeket. Tudták, hogy ők zsidók, és ezt nem titkolták, pedig sokan voltak, akik eltitkolták a zsidóságukat azokban a nehéz időkben. A szovjet ünnepeket otthon nem ünnepeltük meg, számomra ezek a Győzelem Napja, május kilencedike kivételével mind szokatlan és jelentés nélküli ünnepek voltak [1945. május 9-én 0 óra 50 perckor Berlin keleti negyedében, Karlshorstban véget ért az az ülés, ahol a győztes hatalmak elfogadták a német fegyveres erők feltétel nélküli megadását, és aláírták az erről szóló okmányt. Ezzel Európában véget ért a második világháború. A Szovjetunióban ez a nap lett a Győzelem Napja, amit évente a moszkvai Vörös téren, a legfőbb párt- és állami vezetők előtt vezényelt díszszemlével ünnepeltek meg. – A szerk.]. Amikor a gyerekek megnőttek, és már iskolába jártak, a feleségemmel elmentünk az iskolába az ünnepélyekre, melyeket a szovjet ünnepnapokon rendeztek, és ahol a gyerekek fölléptek a szülők előtt, de számunkra ezek nem voltak ünnepek, csak szabadnapok, amikor együtt lehetett a család. Otthon minden családtag születésnapját megünnepeltük. Barátok, rokonok jöttek hozzánk.

Majdnem minden barátunk zsidó volt. Én nem a nemzetisége alapján ítélek meg egy embert, de valahogy így alakult. Én nagyon szeretem a hosszú sétákat, szeretek sokat gyalogolni, és a feleségemmel és a gyerekeimmel gyakran mentünk sétálni. Szabadidőmben a kedvenc foglalatosságom a horgászás volt. Csak az utóbbi néhány évben nem járok már a barátaimmal horgászni, korábban hétvégén egy egész napot el tudtam tölteni a folyónál.

Amikor a gyerekek nagyobbak lettek, a feleségem elhelyezkedett az ungvári alkatrészgyárban, az Uzsgorodpriborban. Harminc évet ledolgozott ott, bejárva a tanulótól a brigádvezetőig vezető utat. A feleségem nem azért dolgozott, mert szűkölködtünk volna, eleget kerestem én. Egyszerűen emberek között szeretett volna lenni, és a nyugdíjra is jó előre gondolt.

A gyerekek iskolába jártak. A fiam gyerekkorában nagyon szerette a zenét, és hegedülni tanult. Aztán abbahagyta a zenélést. A lányomat is taníttattuk zongorázni, de az sem sikerült. Az iskola elvégzése után a fiam fényképészetet tanult, aztán fényképészként dolgozott. Egy jóravaló ungvári zsidó lányt vett el feleségül, a fiuk, Dimitrij 1982-ben született. 1996-ban a fiam a családjával együtt kivándorolt Izraelbe. Először a fia utazott ki, amikor gyerekeket toboroztak, hogy izraeli iskolákban tanuljanak. Aztán a fiam és a menyem kimentek, hogy megnézzék, hogy van Dimitrij, és ott ragadtak. A fiam sofőr. Az unokám befejezte az iskolát, jelenleg katona. Miután leszolgált, jelentkezni fog egyetemre.

Jelena lányom az iskola befejezése után az Uzsgorodpribor alkatrészgyárban helyezkedett el, ugyanott, ahol a feleségem is dolgozott. Egy ungvári zsidóhoz ment feleségül, Goldman lett a vezetékneve. 1976-ban született a fiuk, Edvárd. Az unokám befejezte az iskolát, és elutazott Izraelbe egy fiatalok számára létrehozott programmal. Azóta Izraelben él, dolgozik. Ott házasodott meg, van egy nyolcesztendős unokám, Danielnek hívják. Jelena ledolgozott huszonkét évet a gyárban, mindaddig ott volt, amíg a gyár a peresztrojka idején meg nem szűnt. Azóta a Heszedünkben dolgozik. Először időseknek hordta ki az ebédet, most beteglátogató nővér.

Amikor az 1970-es években elkezdődött a zsidók tömeges kivándorlása Izraelbe, sok barátunk és rokonunk odaköltözött [Néhány ezer, többnyire magyarul beszélő szovjet zsidó – főleg beregszászi, huszti, munkácsi, ungvári és nagyszőllősi lakosok – az 1970-es évek végén engedélyt kapott az Ukrán SZSZK Kárpátontúli területének elhagyására. – A szerk.]. Mi a feleségemmel mellettük álltunk, segítettünk nekik, amiben csak tudtunk. De mi magunk nem készültünk elmenni. Izraeli viszonyok között én már túl öregnek számítottam ahhoz, hogy dolgozzak, de otthon ülni és nyugdíjból élni nekem még nem akaródzott. Dolgozni akartam, a munka örömet szerzett nekem.

A peresztrojkát, amit Gorbacsov kezdett el az 1980-as években, úgy fogadtam, mint egy szükséges, jó dolgot [lásd: gorbacsovi politika]. Végre azok az emberek, akik akartak és tudtak dolgozni, lehetőséget kaptak arra, hogy a munkájukkal foglalkozzanak, anélkül, hogy félnének valakitől. A Szovjetunió történetében először, legális lett a magánvállalkozás. Persze azelőtt is létezett a dolog, de ha az emberre rábizonyították, hogy magának dolgozik, és nem az állam hasznára, akkor ez általában bírósággal, börtönnel végződött [A saját zsebre dolgozást hívták magyarul „fusizásnak”. Lényegében ugyanaz zajlott a szocialista országokban mindenhol. Lásd: fusizás. – A szerk.]. A peresztrojka után ezt nyíltan meg lehetett tenni. Ezenkívül csökkent az antiszemitizmus is. Az állam részéről is csökkent az antiszemitizmus, és a hétköznapi életben is kevesebb lett. Abban az időben rendeződött a viszony Izraellel. És egyáltalán, akkor kaptak a szovjet emberek lehetőséget először arra, hogy más országokba utazzanak, meglátogassák a családtagjaikat és a barátaikat, meghívják őket magukhoz. És még valami: abban az időben kezdtek megjelenni a hivatalos zsidó szervezetek, emlékezni kezdtek a zsidó írókra, zenészekre. Korábban hivatalos szövegben egyáltalán nem használták a „zsidó” szót. Ha a második világháború alatt elhunyt szovjet állampolgárokról beszéltek, a zsidókat „szovjet embereknek” nevezték, amikor a harcolókat sorolták, azt mondták: „oroszok, ukránok, beloruszok és a Szovjetunió más nemzetiségű állampolgárai.” Itt meg elkezdtek beszélni a Szovjetunió hőseiként számon tartott zsidókról, a zsidó tudósokról, elkezdték kimondani a zsidó szót is a többi nemzetiség között.

A peresztrojkának köszönhetően én is ellátogattam Izraelbe, 1997-ben, hogy meglátogassam a fiamat és a családját, az unokámat, megnézzem a dédunokámat. A korom ellenére sokfelé jártam, sokat láttam. Csodálatos ország, mi mást is mondhatnék! Nagy kár, hogy nincs ott béke. Nekem nagyon jó volt látni, hogy az izraeliek mennyire szeretik az országukat, milyen patriotizmus jellemzi a fiatalokat. A lányom is járt Izraelben, meglátogatta a családját. Valószínűleg jobb lenne neki Izraelben élni, a fia és az unokája közelében. De ő jó és szerető lányunk, és megérti, hogy a feleségem és én nemigen tudnánk meglenni nélküle.

1993-ban szétesett a Szovjetunió, és Ukrajna független lett [Mindez 1991-ben történt. – A szerk.]. Azóta megkezdődött a zsidóság újjászületése Ukrajnában. Korábban sok zsidó teljesen eltávolodott a zsidóságtól. Gyakran megesett, hogy az imaházban tíz embernél kevesebb gyűlt össze a minjánhoz, és szét kellett széledni anélkül, hogy az imát megtartottuk volna. Most sokan azok közül, akik korábban nem ismerték el magukat zsidónak, járnak a zsinagógába a gyerekeikkel együtt, szóval visszatértek a zsidósághoz. Minden szombaton elmegyek a zsinagógába. Különösen örvendetes, hogy nő a zsidó fiatalság száma, ezek a fiatalok valóban zsidónak érzik magukat. A zsinagógába mindig nagyon sok fiatal jön el. Ungváron működik egy zsidó iskola is. 1999-ben létrehozták Ungváron a Heszedet. Ez nagy dolog mindannyiunk számára – a gyerekeknek is, az öregeknek is. A Heszedben sokféle klub és szakkör működik a fiataloknak, ahol azon túl, hogy a zsidó tradíciók, szokások felé fordulhatnak, jiddisül és a héberül tanulnak, külföldi nyelvleckéket is vesznek, és a számítógép használatával is megismerkednek. Felnőttek és gyerekek számára egyaránt van kórus és tánctanfolyam. A Heszedben megünnepeljük a sábeszt és a zsidó ünnepeket. Azon túl, hogy a Heszed lelki támasz és találkozóhely, sok öregembernek lehetőséget ad a fizikai túlélésre. Az embereknek élelmiszerrel, gyógyszerekkel segítenek, az időseknek házhoz viszik az ebédet. Ez nagyon nagy segítség az embereknek a mi nehéz időnkben.             

Vladislav Rothbart
Novi Sad
Serbia
Interviewer: Sonja Radulovic
Time of the interview: March 2003

This interview was told by Smilja Rothbart, the wife of Vladislav Rothbart. She remembers very well the stories that her husband told her immediately before his death about his life and his and his last three years in Israel.  She lives today in their very nicely furnished apartment in Liman 4, in Novi Sad. We are preparing the interview in the living room; she is showing me her husband’s photos and a beautiful sculpture of a mother with a child in her arms that is the only remaining object of her husband’ family from before World War II.

My family background
Growing up
During the war
After the war
Glossary

My family background

Vlada’s [Vladislav’s] grandmother from his mother’s side, Fanni Rothbart, was married to Leopold Wollner. Her father was Jakob Rothbart and mother Tribele Hauser -who died at the age of 103, but I don’t know exactly which year that was. Fanni was born in Budapest, I do not know what year. She was a checkroom attendant in the Budapest Opera House and was very proud of it. When she would complete her job, that is put the coats off of all the visitors, she would get into the hall and listen to all the operas that were in the repertoire. She considered that she was, for that reason, more educated and cultured than other women at that time.

There is another interesting anecdote in connection with Grandma Fanni Wollner. Namely, when Vlada’s father Maxim Rothbart would be out of house, busy with his obligations at work, Vlada’s mother Irena and Grandma Fanni would stay in the house with the children. (Grandma was in charge of the children.) When father would forbid something, would not allow something or give, she would always have in her kitchen apron a pocket, some money of hers, and she would give that to the children.

Grandma and Grandpa Wollner spoke Hungarian. In regards to Leopold Wollner I only know that he was an electrician at a power station. Grandma Fanni was killed in Auschwitz in 1944.

Vlada's grandpa and grandma from his father's side, Joseph Rothbart and Fanni Rothbar [It is possible that the two grandmothers were relatives -that is why Rothbar is the maiden name of one and the married name of the other- although this is not verifiable.] were born in Slovakia.[Editor’s note: Slovakia came to existence in 1993. In the 19th Century the later to be Slovak lands were parts of the Kingdom of Hungary within the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.] Grandpa was a butcher and had his own butchery. Grandma was a housewife and was very religious, shaved head with and wore a wig. They both strictly observed all the rules and customs, had a Jewish way of life and are kosher food in the house. In Slovakia they lived a very modest life. They spoke mainly German and Yiddish. They had 6 children, 5 sons: Maxim, Artur, Sandor, Juld, Emil and a daughter Kamila.

Grandma Fanni Rothbart had a constant habit, whether needed or not, when grandchildren would come to her, she would, spread some jam on a piece of bread and prepare cocoa. There was no chance that grandchildren would go home without eating and drinking. She insisted on that always. Rarely she prepared anything different.

Vlada's grandmas and grandpas were not members of any political or other organizations, they were only loyal to the Jewish Community. They were regularly present at all holidays and services in the synagogue. Of course in synagogues they had their own honorary places. They would give very big donations for the Jewish Community. It was, in some way, a matter of prestige. It was normal for them. Grandma Fanni Rothbart and grandpa Joseph Rothbart were killed in Auschwitz.

Growing up

Vlada Rothbart was born in 1925 in Subotica in a quite strange time and in a strange family. I say strange time because it was 7 years after World War I ended. That area was an area where Hungarian was spoken. At the end of World War I Backa [Voivodina] 1 and some other areas became part of Yugoslavia.

Vlada, in the first days of his life, felt double isolation, first because he was Jewish and second because he was Hungarian speaker. He was not only isolated as a Jew but he was not desirable as a person whose mother tongue is Hungarian.

Vlada's family consisted of father Maxim Rothbart [born in 1886] and mother Irena Rothbart [nee Wollner, born in 1919] brother Paja and sister Vera. Allegedly great grandpa came from an Orthodox family.

Vlada's mother [Irene Wollner] was born in Pest [Budapest]. Both, his father and mother, as Vlada remembered, had completed commercial college. They spoke German, Hungarian, Serbian and Yiddish. They dressed conventionally. They married in synagogue. Back then Jews married that way. They didn't want to have a civil marriage. [Editor’s note: Ever since 1895 in Hungary civil marriage has been obligatory and the religious one optional.]

Father Maxim Rothbart was very religious. He would go to the synagogue whenever he could. Mother Irena Rothbart was from Pest, more exactly from Ujpest 2 Father would not even touch anything that was not kosher, but he would bring home ham. ‘Let his wife and kids still eat something nice’. Mother would go to the synagogue, but she was not an orthodox Jew. To the kids she gave food that was not kosher and she has eaten that type of food herself.

Vlada’s mother was much younger then her husband. She was also a real beauty. She didn’t work, but devoted herself to her family and particularly to the kids. Vlada was specially attached to her, among others also because he spent much of the time in his youth with her. With his mother he would go for afternoon walks, mother would take him to the seaside and other picnics and father would always work and didn’t have that much time for the kids and the family.

Mother always dressed nicely, she always had nice silk dresses with decorations and had always nice stylish hairstyle. She always supported the children and kept their side. Vlada’s father in the beginning didn’t like that his son was learning to play the violin, so Vlada hid this from his father, but mother knew all the time he was playing and was hiding it from her husband. Father was, beside other things, very rational, and was hard on spending money. When it was necessary to buy coats for the children, he would always suggest buying for elderly son Paja a new coat and that for the younger son Vlada we should turn the old father’s coat and sew from it. Mother never allowed that and managed to persuade the husband to buy for Vlada as well as for Paja identical new coats.

Vlada’s family belonged to a Neolog 3 community. His father was a member of the executive board of the Jewish Community. It means that he was in charge for religious issues. Vlada’s family had a friend from the Orthodox community, but their friend didn’t wear the traditional Orthodox dresses. Vlada’s family lived at a place where they couldn’t build a sukkah, so at Sukkot he would always go to them to sit for a while in their sukkah.

In front of the children the parent never talked about about anti-Semitism. It was known to exist though. So to say, every month a man would come to sell a photo of King Aleksandar 4, and every time would Vlada's father open the door and buy a photo, Vlada would ask him, 'Why are you father buying a photo when we already have 5-6'. Then his father for the first time told him, 'My son, it is a must because we are Jews and we have to'. When King Aleksandar was killed, it was quite unclear and unpleasant for Vlada, and especially for Vlada's father since such a killing was being suspected.

At that time in Subotica ruled a far right organization ORJUNA, [the Organization of Yugoslav nationalists] 5. Since the official explanation was that Hungarians killed the king, ORJUNA went its rage by circling the city on bicycles. [Editor’s note: The Hungarians in interwar Yugoslavia –contrary to the Macedonian IMRO and the Croatian Ustasa- did not maintain separatist and terrorist organizations. These accusations, even if existed, were false and without any bases. The king himself was assassinated by the Croatian Ustasa, and that was not a secret for the contemporaries.] On gridiron would sit someone with a sling and smash store windows of Jewish and Hungarian stores and the windows of Jewish apartments. That was the time when in Vlada's apartment window-blinds would close.

Vlada remembered that his father, who was an Austro-Hungarian reserve officer and who spent some 3-4 years in Siberia in captivity, had his revolver, official, that he, of course, kept against the law. He remembers that in those ORJUNA times, after the killing of the king, his father went to a meeting of the Jewish Community one evening, but he turned back from the stairs and put the revolver into the pocket. Mother was sitting the whole time up until father returned from the meeting. That is what the atmosphere was in the country in which officially anti-Semitism didn't exist.

In Subotica father forbade Vlada and his brother Paja to go to the Zionist organizations, regardless of their father being religious and an active member of the Zionist organization.

After Vlada's 11th birthday, in 1936 they moved to Novi Sad. Vlada started school and his father told him he should learn everything twice better than the other kids, 'because we are Jews, we have to know more and better, because you kids will be most likely graded more strictly by the teachers because it appears as we are not very likeable to them'.

In Novi Sad they lived in the very center of the town. Vlada's father founded his private company that was engaged in international freight forwarding. His father was a customs freight forwarder and in his company he had 3 employees: Joca Banjanin, a Serb, Matija Simerling a Jew and a German, a 'Volksdeutcher’ 6. They 3 worked well together. Vlada's father, Maxim was very reserved, a cold employer, and also reserved with the family and with the children. He was overloaded with his office duties and mainly he spent the whole day on the job, and in the afternoon he stayed in hotel Putnik. There some official businesses would be concluded. In contrast to father Maxim, mother Irena would stay home, devoted to kids.

Vlada’s family could have been considered an upper middle class one. They were well-off, they had a big 5 room apartment, a housemaid, their own tailor, driver, laundress and everything of their own. They had enough money to travel every year on a holiday, afford to send their kids to different summer vacations, to send them to Bled [an alpine holiday resort, today in Slovenia]. Every year mother Irena took the kids to Opatija and Crikvenica for a vacation. [northern Adriatic coast-towns, today in Croatia] They were, we could say, well-off. It was never talked in the house about any financial crisis.

The apartment was a 5 room apartment and there was a small room for the housemaid, who lived there, very nice furniture, especially the living room that had a wonderful black dresser with engraving and mirrors beautiful armchairs, rugs and curtains. Of course the other rooms were nicely furnished. It could not be said that there was a big library in the house. There were mainly father's official books about international freight forwarding there were some religious books, of course the Bible, different prayer books, since one could not go to the synagogue without prayer books. All the books were locked and the kids had to ask father for the permission to get books for reading also the children books were in a closed case. Only the encyclopedias were unlocked because father told them that they could use them whenever they want. The kids were normally told that they had to study and read a lot, so Vlada and Paja were well-read.

At that time it was a custom that the children doing their bar mitzvah sang only the beginning of the bracha, or a part of it or, mostly, the end of the bracha, and the Torah portion was read by a competent religious official. Vlada remembered that his father had forced his brother in 1936, while still in Subotica, to learn the entire bracha by heart, so he was the first and the only one among the kids who sang it completely. When it was Vlada's turn, 2 years later in Novi Sad, he also had to do it, and it was a big pleasure for him since he had a talent for music, especially for singing.

Vlada remembered that after bar mitzvah, where he had sung the whole bracha, cantor of that time had come to his father and suggested to teach him free of cost to become a cantor and opera singer. But cantor of that time said that if he ever employs Vlada as a cantor or singer 5 percent of his salary would be his. Vlada’s father Maxim Rothbart replied to him, ‘if I want to teach my son singing, I will pay for it, but I won’t get into this kind of arrangement’. It was in 1937 and if Vlada had gone for it, he may have never studied at law school.

Paja, before the war, attended secondary school, he was very intelligent and capable, he was considered to be an excellent student and a good Jew. He was religious exceptionally observed all Jewish holidays and customs. He spent a lot of his time in the synagogue, it was partially his profession. Every morning before the school he would lay tefillin and pray to God.

In regards to Vlada, he was religious but was not too much overburdened with it. He practically replaced the music for religion. It was his preoccupation, and he mostly dedicated his time to it. Paja's and Vlada's sister Verica was at that time still a child. She was born in 1934 and she came as to say, as God's gift in the house (little sweet sister and loved). She was little and with her the brothers played a lot and had fun. They would take her for a walk, talked with her... She was an object of love and fun in the house.

Paja had been until the war attending secondary school in Novi Sad. Vlada attended the School of Queen Maria. Officially it wasn’t a Jewish school but more than half of the kids were Jewish here, so it was almost like a Jewish school.

Vlada was some kind of a big musical hope of Novi Sad. He played the violin. He started playing at age 13. At age 14 he played with Novi Sad philharmonic orchestra. He was 15 when in secret, secretly from his teacher learned Beethoven’s Violin concert and played it for his birthday. Vlada told me that the teacher had first started crying and then scolded him.

Vlada attended the first high school for boys in Novi Sad, which was called Gymnasium of the Blessed King Aleksandar I. It was a custom that in January, on the day of Saint Sava 7 be held ‘svetosavska beseda’ [Saint Sava’s speech]. It, with speeches, didn’t have any connection, here there were chorales, recitations and different attractions, among others, every year one and that the best violinist and pianist took part in that program. Then he was told that because he was young he could only play the following year and that it would be for sure since there was nobody better than him. It was agreed to play Beethoven’s F major romance. It was known who would be following him; it was also known who would be turning the pages of the sheet music for the pianist.

At the beginning of the winter holiday Vlada received the program for the Saint Sava’s speech. At his big surprise he was not on the program, and that the same romance was to be performed by some Branko Jeremic, who attended the 5th grade. Vlada told me that he was not bad, but that Vlada was far better than him. Then Vlada asked his music teacher, some Mita Pernic, who he was very close with, ‘what is this’? He remained silent for some time, and then he said, ‘You know what, I will tell you, but don’t tell anyone that you heard it from me. On teacher’s council, there are two teachers’, he also said which ones, ‘they stood up and asked if it is necessary that some kind of plays for them at the Saint Sava’s concert. And it ended as that’. It was already in 1940. People were afraid and why would they support some Vladislav Rothbart? For Vlada it was not a musical blow, but a national one. Vlada considered it a clear anti-Semite provocation, because the Yugoslav government had been more and more approaching Hitler.

It was the atmosphere of Novi Sad, the atmosphere of a cultural center that was not burdened with something that is today called ‘gorstacki element’ [mountaineer element, barbarian element]. The majority of Serbs, intellectuals, spoke there Hungarian, German and French. The majority of Serbian intellectuals were educated either in Vienna, Paris or Pest. It was an irrational thing to be chauvinist, when you are everywhere, at everyplace surrounded with people of different nations.

He became a member of the SKOJ 8 in September 1940, at the age of 15, though he has never got engaged in politics. About Marxism, about proletariat he knew nothing. He only knew that in the SKOJ organization he was not a Jew but a comrade. And it seemed to him that this motive prevailed at many others.

During the war

On 13th April 1941, when Hungarians entered Novi Sad [Hungarian Occupation of Yugoslavia] 9, a Jew was killed, some Lacika Cerni, a very wealthy man and a drawing-room communist. He was killed because Hungarians claimed that he had been a Chetnik 10 activist.

During the massacre [Novi Sad massacre] 11 they were very lucky since the military police didn’t come to them, only a police patrol came the third day. They were not that notorious as the military police. Brother Paja told him that their mother had kept, since the first day of the massacre, a huge pot with hot water on the fire. When the police entered the house, she immediately asked them, ‘Would you gentlemen, drink a hot tea’? The temperature outside was minus 32 degrees centigrade. The policemen happily accepted it, drank themselves fill with tea, stood up and left.

However the police was not bloodthirsty. The most bloodthirsty was the military police, then the soldiers who were drunk, but the police was mainly fair. It was a professional force. Maybe they were even traffic policemen.

In the Novi Sad massacre nobody, from Vlada's relatives, was killed even though he had only few relatives. After the massacre Vlada's family fled to Pest, more exactly to Ujpest where they rented an apartment. Paja there didn't continue the school but stayed at a locksmith where he studied locksmith trade.

About the Novi Sad massacre Vlada didn’t have anything else to tell me since then he was in the Csillag prison 12 in Szeged at that time. He could only tell me that on that day when the massacre had ended, or a few days later, a jail teacher visited them. The teacher told the guard that they had been lucky for not being there because they would have been all killed.

Vlada got to the jail because in 1941 he had been a member of some regional SKOJ leadership. The secretary of the leadership was Franjo Kardos, a Jew. Another member of the leadership was Ilza Zeilinger, a Jew. The third member was some Lacika Kuzmanovic, also a Jew, then it was Vlada and there was some Nada Kuzmanovic.

In Novi Sad there was a planned action for smashing Pifat’s store window. It also went down in history. Pifat was a Croat from Petrovaradin [a town in Srem, across the Danube, with considerable Croatian population]. In Novi Sad he had a tavern, that was full of anti-Soviet and mostly anti-Semite elements. The SKOJ organization decided to break it. Vlada was also anticipated for that team however he got sick and could not be present. In that action among others took part: Pavle Katic, a Jew, Nikola Timar, a Jew, Ivan Haker, a Jew, in addition two more people who were not Jewish. Kardos, as a regional chief, circled the place in order to see what was happening and according to him this company got afraid. They, in fact, delayed the action, because they had realized that an officer was coming, Kardos didn’t see that, he grabbed from the ground a half brick, hit the window. That officer ran after him. Kardos started to run and ran into a café bar. The officer follows him in, approaches a waiter and asks him who entered the last. The waiter points and Kardos together with a friend get arrested.

Kardos later on tried to commit suicide at the investigation by throwing a brick in the air and then stood under it. But the brick didn’t fall on his head but on his beard. From him they asked nothing else but to reveal the codes of his contacts. He had revealed the codes and then started the big arrests in Novi Sad and here also Vlada was arrested, 29th September 1941.

For two month he was on investigation in the department of Hungarian counterintelligence. That they beat him, they did.  He lived through. After 2 months, together with a group, they transferred him to the prison in Szeged. There, in the month of June, they sentenced him to 6 years of imprisonment.

Vlada worked on 2 books from that period, one was: Ne zaboravi druga svog [‘Don’t forget the comrade of yours’] and is concerned solely with the Szeged prison. The second book: Jugosloveni u madjarskim zatvorima i logorima [‘The Yugoslavs in Hungarian prisons and camps’]. This one you find also in Yad Vashem. In 1941 in the month of June, when they also sentenced Vlada in Szeged, there were 12 trials. It was about groups of 20 to 60 people. From all of those verdicts he found only 3-4.

I would start with this that Vlada weighed 85 kilograms when he had arrived to the prison, and that he left it weighing 55 kilograms. He told me that the taste of the food was so awful that there they had a rule that if somebody faints goes for several days to the prison hospital. There they would revive him somewhat.

When he arrived to the prison, in the cell that was anticipated for one person, that is solitary confinement, they threw in 3 straw mattresses and five of them. The biggest shock they experienced was when they noticed that in the corner were 3 straw mattresses covered with 5 blankets, and in one corner there was something that looked like a big pot covered with a black lid. The pot size was about 20 liters. The guard told them that it was kibble. They didn’t know what kibble was, but he explained it to them. Nobody among them had ever before relieved themselves in front of others. They agreed that while one of them was on kibble the others should turn their back. Later on they discovered the system for sitting on the kibble. They found a broom and placed it horizontally and this way they could quite well use it as a toilet board.

While Vlada was, with others, on investigation they were under special order of Hungarian counterintelligence. This order included the following: in one big room, one meter away from the wall, there were some jammed straw. Prisoners were sitting on that straw and looked towards the wall. And did like that the whole day. In the evening at 10 o’clock, when it was time to go to bed, that straw was stretched a bit and they went to sleep. They were woken up at 5 o’clock in the morning and it was only to mistreat people that way too. They had to walk one after the other, with their hands on their backs. The walk would take about an hour. It had reached the culmination when they transferred them, the Jews, into the Aszod prison. [small town near Budapest] Then their section chief, sergeant Joska Birkas brought for everybody a box of 100 cigarettes and told them, ‘Kids, where they are taking you I can’t tell, but it will be better for you than here’. That Birkas was often asking Vlada to help him around some office work.

Entered once some Kolompar, a guard, into a cell and one of the convicts asked him directly if he wants to take out letters past the censorship. For all of them the letters were very important because in them they explained to their families how and what should be smuggled. Kolompar then, in front of some 30 people, took off his hat, took the letters, put them in the hat, and put the hat back on his head. He was sure that nobody among these 30 inhabitants of Voivodina 13 would betray him. Of course later on he liked it more and more so he started smuggling food too on the bases of fifty-fifty. The system was the following: Who wants to send to his relative in the prison food, must send to his daughter’s address Vera Kolompar the package. If, in the package, is 5 kg of goods, the prisoner will get 2,5 kg. It was functioning exceptionally, only he forgot too that in every post office there is counterintelligence.

Later on Kolompar was arrested. There was  the original letter, whether from the Ministry of Justice or from the Public Prosecutor’s Office, I don’t know anymore. There is written that it is true that Kolompar was taking in food, but not for the reason of humanity but for the reason of greediness. Vlada, in his book, ended the chapter about this event this way, ‘If only there were more of the greedy ones’. For them he was suitable because there were far more guards who would report them immediately, and would not help them.

Later on they left that small cell, they got beds, but the food was worse and worse. Every week they got clean laundry. Then they were changing the laundry biweekly and then later on they left that small cell, they got beds, but the food was worse and worse. And they had the opportunity to wash themselves. And then somebody remembered, and they accepted, so they started cheating themselves by wearing shirts at the right side of the fabric for a week and for a week at the reverse side, and they had the impression that it was more clean this way.

I would like to say another thing about the packages with food. To Vlada and his Jewish friends it was not a big problem, because they shared in the prison everything with everybody. At the beginning they had problems with two Jews, who refused to join the group, because it could provoke anti-Semitism and then 3 or 4 Serbs declared that they would not take a crumb, until these two don't join the group.

The question of being informed in the prison is very important. For example, they in February 1942, before getting accustomed to the prison, had got some news about some big Russian offensive and that the Russians arrived to the place Ostrava. [Editors’s note: Obvious misinformation. Ostrava is in the Eastern Part of today’s Czech Republic. The Soviets were nowhere close to that in 1942] Why exactly to that place, Vlada didn't know, but a big enthusiasm overtook them. And wherever somebody would slammed the gate, they thought that the cannons were roaring.

They had regular visits. Those who were sentenced to imprisonment had visits every 2 weeks, those who were sentenced to hard labor, every 3 weeks. Once Vlada was punished with a ban for visits for some time because he organized a strike. Namely, they worked on, in a backyard, knitting reed mace. They knitted them into braids resembling girl's pigtails. Their norm was 50 meters a day for one person, and for that they would get a cigarette. For every additional 25 meters they would get another two cigarettes. The job itself, as Vlada told me, was not a problem, but the prison administration made a mistake and set up a low norm of production, and they hung on it for dear life (unyielding). The administration wanted to raise the norm, as all that was produced was for some private owner, so the prison manager would put that money in his pocket. He permanently pressured them to do more. Well now, in the morning they had an hour for walk, from the walk they would go to reed-mace, in the evening from the reed-mace they would go again for the walk. In order to carry out a pressure on them, they canceled the walks to raise the norm.

On the first day when in the prison the sound of the bell announced the time for walks for the whole of the prison and when they started walking, a guard started to shout that there is no walk for them. He warned them to go back, but nobody went back. And he continued shouting at them and asking them who wants to go for an interrogation to the guard commander. No one volunteered and he grabbed somebody and took him away.  After some moments the guard came back and asked: who else wants to go for interrogation’? Vlada said ‘I do.’. So at the end 7 of them were in a cell for solitary confinement for 3 days.

In the Szeged prison they had only one nice person; it was Doctor Jeno Frenkel 14, the rabbi of Szeged. Vlada told at one time that the rabbi had been an exceptional humanist, exceptionally brave man. The first time they had to receive packages, they all received them except Vlada. The last day for receiving the packages the guard called Vlada. Took him into the room in which a gentleman was sitting. After his beard and cap and his suit he concluded that he was a Jew but not an orthodox one. The guard turned to the rabbi in Hungarian ‘Mr. Rabbi, submissively reporting, this is that’. And the rabbi says ‘listen son, your father phoned me and told me that his package got returned to Novi Sad. He asked me to bring the package for you. Tell me what you want me to bring’. Vlada, since he realized it was a good man, asks him ‘Mr. Rabbi, excuse me but I don’t know what you can get’. Then he offered to bring sausages, salamis, cheese… then he said ‘but listen I could get bacon too. I know what the situation is here’.

Once the rabbi told him that a group of Jews, communists, came from Pest and they wanted to meet with them and if it was not a problem for them they should come to the synagogue. The synagogue was a room with bars on the ground floor. He didn’t remember if they had had Torah or not. Here all the Jews from the prison would gather on Friday nights. Rabbi Frenkel survived the war and died in Israel.

When Germans arrived in Hungary [19th March 1944] everywhere except in the prisons, the wearing of the yellow star became obligatory. In the prison they didn’t wear them, because the prison was not considered as being a street. That day, when the star had to be worn for the first time, Doctor rabbi Frenkel in redingote, top hat, with the star on his coat, came to the prison, put his hands on his back and for hours walked in the prison’s backyard. With this the rabbi wanted to show to them that it was not a problem. After 5 or 6 days a new regulation came out according to which even those in the prisons were obliged to wear the yellow star.

Vlada arrived to a plan to cease wearing the yellow star. Every week they would get clean bed linen, so they would take the stars of from dirty things and sew them on clean ones. Vlada has suggested not to sew them immediately but only after a day or two, and if anyone asks them they should say that they didn’t succeed in sewing them. One day Vlada said that it is not necessary anymore at all to sew them, but to wear them in the pockets. No one noticed anything, or didn’t want to notice, that they were not wearing the stars. The manager held a speech for them in the sense that Horthy has asked for a truce, that they hope that the war is over, that they have to be patient and not to run away. [Horthy declaration.] 15

On 4th April they tightened the regulation that Jewish prisoners must wear the yellow star. On 11th April the Ministry of Justice introduces a regulation that Jews, prisoners can’t receive from home any kind of packages. On 8th May 1944 the Ministry introduces an order that in the future the prisoners, Jews can get only 30 grams of sugar and 30 grams of cooking oil monthly, and weekly 100 grams of horse sausages. On 19th June of the same year a new regulation is introduced that said all the Jews had to be gathered in certain prisons and that minor Jews into prisons for minors in Aszod.

Vlada arrived in Aszod with another 8 friends. There were 6 of them from Szeged and 3 from Cegled [small town in central Hungary]. Here there were: Gavra Altman, Nikola Timar, Ivan Haker, Sima Epstajn, Egon Stark and Vlada from Szeged too. From Cegled came Pavle Sefer, Dordje Hajzler and Ivan Blum.

From Szeged to Aszod they traveled by train. 6 of them in a passenger train, all 6 of them tied on a chain. They could barely climb on the train. It was very difficult every time when somebody had to go to the toilet.

While they had a small break at a station, tied with chains and with the yellow star on them, near-by appeared a Nazi policeman, an SS. ‘Does anyone speak German here’? he shouted. Vlada then said ‘I speak’. He wanted Vlada to ask somebody something. Vlada stood up and the SS only then saw the yellow star on Vlada. ‘Mit einem Sau Juden will ich nicht sprechen’. (I will not talk with a Jewish pig). And Vlada said ‘you called me, I didn’t call you’, and Vlada’s five friends grabbed him and pulled down. Their 3 guards were more afraid then him.

When they arrived to Aszod they were very hungry and had been told that they would get food when they arrive to the family. It was not clear for them what family means while they didn’t see that there existed blocks in the prison and that 2 on each floor. A Block consisted of a room that was a dinning room and a living room then there was a bigger bedroom and a small supervisor’s room. The supervisor was always present. These blocks they called ‘family’. In the prison in Aszod, another unusual event happened. At the beginning of October 1944 the Russians were some 20 km away from Aszod. Later on Vlada read that the Russians had advanced very slowly because it had been the fall with the most rains. He told me that when the Russians approached them to about 4-5 km, they would watch them for weeks, and they could not get to them. And then at the beginning of October, a guard came for Vlada and told him that Toth, the assistant to the prison manager, was looking for him.

When Vlada went to him and he told him ‘Listen, you received from your brother from Pest a telegram’. In the letter it was written ‘I obtained for you a Swiss passport. Do you want me to send it to you or not’? Since the assistant to the manager has behaved nicely to him, Vlada asked him ‘Gentleman, tell me, if this could be of use to me’? And he replied ‘It is a smart thing, you only ask him for it. Nevertheless I can not let you out from the prison. He only didn’t tell him to run away, because as Vlada told me, from there you could escape, but they didn’t have where to.

Those were already troubled times and times of expectations. Unfortunately already the following day they heard new things. The Germans had requested from the manager that the whole prison and the Jews and others be evacuated and handed over to Germans to take them to Auschwitz. And they also threatened him that if they act contrary to the order they would blow up the prison. The manager wanted to hand it over to the Russians.

Then 9 of them agreed that everyone should provide for himself a place in case of escape, but they must not tell each other who would go where. Gavra Altman and Vlada, since they already had had contacts with the workers of the machine gun workshop, they went to their bunker. They had had quite of fun there for several days but a love affair revealed them, a love affair of an engineer's wife and a German lieutenant. Then they were all taken to Vac. It is a town on the left bank of the Danube, some 30 km from Budapest. They were not convicts anymore but suspicious citizens. From there Vlada and Gavra have gone to Gyor in a factory where the director of that workshop told them that the engineer's wife blurted out in front of her German lover that they were Jews.

They began to move towards the town called Papa, it was about 50 km away. On their way a German military car stopped beside them. The driver asked Vlada if he could wrap his cigarette, because he had been frozen. Vlada then took from his pocket a box of cigarette and gave it to him, but in return he wanted him to take them to Papa. Later on they went to the German airport and worked in some kind of beer cellar where they had to fill in bottles. After that they went again to Papa and then to a Hungarian village at the junction of Czechoslovak, Austrian and Hungarian borders. They have gone to Poland, South Germany, Munich, Nuremberg…

On their way they associated with different people from whom no one talked about their past. Vlada once told Gavra that if he ever writes about that, he would name the book ‘The division of people without past’. Even before their departure from Munich, Gavra Altman was added on to the company that was supposed go to Czechoslovakia in order to reserve an accommodation. Since Vlada was leaving for Nuremberg with his company here those two separated. On the way from Munich to Nuremberg Vlada taught the group in the railroad car the song ‘It’s a long way to Tiperary’ and different other songs. 

Before Nuremberg they threw them out of the train. They were lining up to go to the town, when at once a huge explosion occurred. They were informed that an arsenal, with shotguns blew up into the air; the ones they had to get. Then they had to go back by walk from Nuremberg to Triol. The first sergeant and Vlada then tried to escape three times. Two times it was unsuccessful but finally at the third time they managed to escape and in a special way they arrived to Regensburg. They were hitchhiking. Vlada has changed very many American camps and at the end arrived to Marseilles, in the camp for repatriated Yugoslavs.

There he was arrested by American counterintelligence service under the charges that he was a Russian spy. Saved him a Subotica’s doctor A. Ivica, who told a story how he knew Vlada’s father as a good preference player.

On 18th August 1945 Vlada crossed the Yugoslav border and came to Zagreb. In Zagreb they were questioned by OZN [department for the people’s protection]. ‘What is your name?’ ‘Vladislav Rothbart.’ ‘Are you German?’ ‘No I am not.’ ‘Then what are you?’ ‘A Jew.’ ‘How come you are alive?’ He told them his story. In Zagreb he had stayed for two days in the prison, till, from Novi Sad, didn't arrive a confirmation that Vladislav Rothbart existed. In Zagreb, some time before he had to be released, a journalist appeared. He was looking for inhabitants of Voivodina. Two of them reported, and after Vlada had told him his name he introduced himself and told him that his name was Zelmanovic. Vlada's and his parents were on good terms. He had taken him to his place and showed him the list of those Jews who were coming back to Novi Sad. Since it was the month of August, those who were not on the list, mainly never returned.

After the war

On the list was Vlada's uncle Emil with his wife and daughter. Aca Kekic, Vlada’s friend was in Auschwitz and he told Vlada that when the group from Budapest had arrived, he recognized his mother. He told him that they wanted to take from her the child, Vlada's 10 year old sister, but that mother didn't let them, and that later on they didn't insist. Vlada's mother was then 44 years old.

Vlada’s father Maxim, mother Irena, sister Verica, grandmother Fani Rothbart, grandmother Fani Wollner were killed in Auschwitz. From other relatives Uncle Artur Rothbart was killed there. When Vlada was telling me about all that he also told me, ‘But, we were not anyway a big family’.

Vlada immediately after the war got engaged into journalism. After that, since he was very capable, he worked with Slobodna Vojvodina [Free Voivodina] and Dnevnik, he was the editor of a column, so it was very promising for him. He, then in 1950 got transferred to Subotica, at that time he had already been a reporter for Tanjug [Yugoslav News Agency]. He was a member of the Communist Party, clearly from idealistic reasons. Before the war he had been a member of SKOJ and in the prison he joined the Party. He didn't need the Party because of his career or any other interests, but solely because of his political convictions.

From the end of the war till the early 1950s many things had happened. Vlada immediately upon his return became a journalist for a Hungarian youth newspaper that was called 'IFJUSAG SZAVA' [The word of youth].

In 1947 Vlada, together with me in the same class, completed the 4th grade of secondary school so here he had met with me. We got married in Novi Sad. I was not of Jewish origin, but later, on the occasion of our trip to Israel I became a ger, I converted to Judaism. I wanted that, and it was necessary and desirable. When we met in 1947, to him it was absolutely not important whether I was a Jew or not, at that time it was not given much importance to that. Unfortunately, he didn't have parents who may have reacted differently to that. There was no one else but uncle Emil who too made absolutely no issue of it.

I was born in Cantavir, my mother tongue is Serbian, the degree of education, completed secondary school. I worked as a social worker till retirement. My parents were so to say peasants, mother would sit at home doing the housework, father worked at railroads. We have two children who were at school in Subotica till 1960 and later on in Novi Sad. It was normally important to get an education and become financially independent.

In regards to his non Jewish neighbors, then there was an euphoria, that the war was over, that we were all there and that it was not important anymore who was Jewish and who was of another religion etc. So there were no problems, all of them who remained in Novi Sad, were happy that someone survived. In regards to the apartment we had lived in, in Novi Sad, was not the property of our parents, so some completely different people lived there. Vlada, in 1947 along with his job as a journalist, completed gymnasium in Novi Sad, the 8th grade, today this is the 4th grade of gymnasium, and that he had been all the time employed as a journalist and then he got married and got 2 children, Verica, born in 1948 and Nada, born in 1956.

In 1948 during the big aliyah to Israel, Vlada was married to me, and I was not a Jew, however I was willing to emigrate to Israel regardless of the parents who were here. Vlada communicated that he fought for this country and that this was his native country, here he was born, wished to live here. After all that he was deeply disappointed, that he had received nothing for his patriotism.

Vlada's political convictions were positive in relation to the regime and the politics that existed then and there were big expectations. There was an opinion that we were looking towards big outlook. However, a large number of people emigrated to Israel, some even to the West, so it meant a big damage to the Jewish community in Novi Sad. It remained ruined. It was terrible that among those people were many of Vlada's friends who were very dear to him but the hardest thing was that the Jews who were emigrating to Israel had to renounce their Yugoslav citizenship and their property.

About the regime after the war he had a very positive opinion, but as the time went by, the regime and that kind of relations suited him less and less. In regards to social activities like socialist holidays in schools, at work, he normally took part but he was not particularly involved.

After Stalin's death, and not directly connected to Stalin, it was already clear that things were not as ideal as it had been at the occasion of entering the Party in 1948 when the Informburo Resolution 16 had been introduced; Vlada came out against the resolution. He considered that normal.

We strived, in any case, to teach the kids about their Jewish origin. The children went to the Jewish Community, they associated there. However, during that time in the Jewish Community there were no lectures that would urge the children to their Jewish identity. It was mainly to socialize one with the other, though the children knew that it was their Jewish Community.

In regards to every day life, it was all boiled down to our duties, since Vlada worked a lot as a journalist, very often on a business trip and away from the house. We had a three room apartment, it can be said modestly furnished, there were also books we bought after the war.  Mainly we would go to the theater, not as often to the movies and exhibitions. However, in regards to theaters, we had permanent passes to operas and dramas. In spare-time we mainly went to picnics to Fruska Gora, and for summer vacations together with our children we went to Italy all the way to Rome or to Vienna, Budapest, Prague and of course to the Adriatic sea.

Vlada in Yugoslavia had no relatives, the only contacts were with my mother, brothers and sister. The meetings had become less frequent, because the children were small and the duties bigger. The children were raised not too much in a religious tradition, though it had been insisted on that, but the situation in the society was not such that it would be very important. We told them that father was Jewish and that mother was not. We told them what happened with Vlada's family in Auschwitz and with my father and brother who were killed by Chetniks in Serbia. The Christmas and the Easter were not celebrated. In the house it was known when Chanukkah, Yom Kippur were, etc. But without big pomp and celebrations.

The children had no chance to meet grandfather and grandmother who were religious. Vera lives in Novi Sad, she is a graduate lawyer, works in the insurance business and has two children. They are not a typical Jewish family because Vera's husband is not a Jew. The children go to the Jewish Community, they were several times in Israel, daughter Sonja speaks Hebrew and gladly travels to Israel whenever there is a chance.

The life in the family in fact, in the marriage in the family and generally the financial situation, since he had started his life without any inheritance, started to stabilize in 1950 when it was possible to purchase things taking loans and buy more things. Somewhere around 1965 Vlada found some power to travel to his brother in Israel, who emigrated in 1948 and applied to the Ministry of Internal Affairs to get a passport, but had been asked first to spy for Yugoslavia. However, he told them frankly that it was his second country, and that he was absolutely not going to spy in Israel for anyone even if could never travel there so he didn't get the passport nor the possibility to travel.

At the job, it could not be said that there were any difficulties because of the Jewish origin. It had all lasted until somewhere in 1970 when he got employed with the Executive council of Voivodina and at one point he was dismissed without any explanation. That way, for almost a year he would run from committee to committee, from office to office to Executive council to hear what he had done to be dismissed. And after a long time I managed to find out talking to the president of the Executive Council of Voivodina, who had been a school mate of my brother, and he confided to me that Vlada had been dismissed because he had a brother in Israel. Of course when everything had been cleared up, he was brought back to the job, but of course, not at his old job, that had already been occupied, but to the Provincial Parlament of Voivodina. He worked here for another few years and then retired, disappointed and in his job, and in the Party and in everything. Because of a big nervousness and stress that he had experienced in 1975 he survived a heart attack that he suffered from till the end of his life. He died 8th January 1997. In fact because of that heart disease he died.

He was burried on Jewish semetery by Rabbi Ichak Asiel.

In regards to the children, it could not be said there were problems neither on the job nor for the admission to the university because of their Jewish origin. At that time it was not that emphasized. Then there was still some kind of brotherhood and unity. Two daughters were excellent students so there were no problems at all.

Never Vlada hid his origin because of his position at the job, nor he denied his tradition. Even more, during his job with the Executive Council of Voivodina, he was in a mandate also the president of the Jewish Community in Novi Sad. With the arrival to the power of Slobodan Milosevic 17 and his party, the situation for Jewish families, and in general for Jews, considerably worsened. It was not desirable at all to say that you were a Jew, Hungarian nor the second or the third. A danger lured that any neighbor could break into your apartment etc. It happend but not to them. A shortage of medicaments had appeared so Vlada together with me emigrated in 1993 to Israel.

In regards to the life in Israel, there all that was in the best order. We were regularly receiving assistance from the state of Israel. We had good quality health care protection. We have lived in a decent rental apartment in Ashkelon.

We came back from Israel 30.12.1996 because of Vlada’s illnes and because he wanted to be beried in Novi  Sad.

We thought a lot about aliyah to Israel and normally followed the development of the state of Israel. Vlada and I were enthusiastic that the situation has been settling there. At the end the wars broke out in Israel, so the break up of diplomatic ties with Israel effected Vlada's and mine moods. We considered that it would very negatively influence the Jews. Normally, there are a lot of people, anti-Semites, who connected that also with the Jews in the state of Yugoslavia. We could not stay much in contact with our family in Israel. It was not desirable to write letters. At one moment Vlada's brother Paja came with his family to Novi Sad.

After the arrival of Slobodan Milosevic to the power, rises the anti-Semitism in Yugoslavia as the result of that time official politics. At that time more and more members of the Jewish Community became active again within the Jewish association. Premises of the Jewish Community became cramped for all Jews from Novi Sad who wanted an active involvement in the Jewish life. Several families have activated themselves in the Jewish Community, so there has been done quite a lot on that. Periodically, even today, we receive assistance from the Jewish Community particularly in medicaments and clothing. This increased activity of the members of the Jewish Community was particularly a revolt to the arrival of Milosevic to the power and the intensified anti-Semitism in Yugoslavia during his reign.

Glossary

Stefan Minc 
Warsaw 
Poland 
Interviewer Marta Cobel-Tokarska 
Date of interview: January-February 2005 

Mr. Stefan Minc is a short, elegant man with a small mustache.

He is always dressed with care – in a suit and a hat. He is invariably quick and energetic, despite his advanced age.

I met with him several times in the offices of Warsaw’s Jewish organizations on Twarda Street.

After each of our meetings Mr. Minc would run on to take care of some urgent business, and  never seemed to be tired.

Due to his excellent memory, the narrative is filled with detailed information, dates and names.

At times it reminds one of a detailed life report.

• My Family Background
• Growing up
• During the War
• After the War
• Recent Years
• Glossary

• My Family Background

I will first tell you about the family of my father – Izydor Jozef Minc. My father’s family comes from Warsaw. My grandfather was Adolf Mintz, spelled with a ‘tz.’ We spelled our name the same way, with a ‘tz,’ until the 1930s.  [The original German spelling of the family name was Polonized in the interwar period, after Poland regained independence.] Grandfather Adolf came from Lomza. He died in 1925.

My grandmother and his wife, Roza – her maiden name was Imergluck – came from Cracow. In Cracow there was an entire huge clan of Imerglucks. The sister of grandma Roza, whose married name was Haber, lived in Cracow at 10 Grodzka Street, and was a well known doctor.

They owned their house there. Her husband was a dentist. Grandma Roza’s brother was named Wilhelm Imergluck and was a representative of Lloyd, an English shipbuilding quality assurance company. At first he worked in Hamburg, but when Hitler came to power [1933], the headquarters were moved to Paris.

There was also quite a numerous family of  Imerglucks in Podgorze [district of Cracow]. Among others, there was an old grandpa there, I forget his name, who lived to be 93. He fought in the January Uprising. [National uprising in 1863-64 against Russian rule.] I don’t know how he ended up in Kongresowka [see The Kingdom of Poland] 1, but I do know that he was a veteran of 1863. I even visited him as a child... he was a hunter and their home was filled with stuffed animal trophies.

My grandparents lived in Warsaw. Their home was in a very elegant place, on Smolna Street, opposite what is now the drugstore at the corner of Smolna and Nowy Swiat, on the third floor [the house was destroyed in WWII].

That’s where the two eldest sons of my grandparents were born: Bernard Mintz, who later became a doctor, and my father – Izydor Jozef. My father was born in 1877, on 22nd March, and his brother was born some two or three years earlier. Later my grandparents moved, and the youngest son, Zygmunt was born at their new place, at number 40 Marszalkowska Street, right at Zbawiciela square. In 1913 my grandparents moved to Cracow and lived at number 2 Czarneckiego Street.

Then there were also two daughters: Anna, who was older than my father, and Natalia, who was younger – both were, of course, called Mintz. And later they both married their uncles, the brothers of my grandmother Imergluck, so their names were then Imergluck. It was quite a complicated situation, and really amusing, because they were simultaneously each other’s aunts and sisters in law of their own mother.

My father’s eldest sister, Anna Imergluck, née Mintz, had four children, but she died young, when she was in her thirties. For her husband, Izydor, this was terribly painful. And half a year afterwards he died as well. So the four children were left behind.

These children were raised in the home of my grandmother Roza’s sister, Jetka [Jettit] Imergluck in Cracow at 33 Jozefinska Street. The costs of their upbringing were covered by the younger brother of grandmother Roza, Wilhelm. He had bought a house in Paris [for rent] and the income from this huge house was used to cover the costs of living of those children.

My father’s older brother, Bernard, completed his studies in Vienna around 1908-9. There he married and her name was Maria (people called her Mitzi). She was a native of Vienna, and although there are many Catholics in Vienna, she was a protestant.

Until 1926 they lived in Lodz, at 6 Plac Wolnosci [Freedom Square]. They were childless, but since they loved children, they always had Christmas parties at their house and all the children of my mother’s sisters would come visit them. Bernard and Mitzi could afford this, they were quite wealthy.

Bernard was the head of a ward in a hospital, and he also worked in a doctors’ co-operative called Sanitas. Since we were also doing quite well, the gifts he gave us were rather modest. But my mother’s sisters were not so well off, so for them he would prepare more meaningful presents. It was all very nicely arranged. Bernard had never been baptized but his wife was a protestant.

My father’s younger brother, Zygmunt, graduated in law some time in the early 20s, and he became a judge in Bochnia near Cracow. Up until the war he was a judge in a town court. There was some pressure, but he never got baptized. Zygmunt had a wife named Erna.

In 1927 or  1928 their son Adam was born. Before the war Zygmunt would sometimes visit us in Lodz – he came rarely, but he did come – and then we would sometimes travel to Cracow, for family gatherings of sorts.

My father’s whole family was quite polonized, assimilated, several generations back they had spoken only Polish, the children were sent to Polish schools... In any case, a nice bit of evidence of the extent of their assimilation is that my father had given us Polish names.

Moreover, he insisted that other children born in my mother’s family should be given Polish names, too. The point was for the kids to have an easier time later in their lives. So that my older brother, he was my senior by some 6 years, was named Wladyslaw, then I was named Stefan, and the youngest one was called Ludwik. Wladek, Stefek and Lulek [Polish diminutives for the three brothers].

My mother’s maiden name was Fajner, she was named Anna, but everyone called her Andzia, Anele. My mom’s documents said she was Chana vel Anna. She was born in Olkusz in 1891. Her parents’ names were Maurycy and Roza Fajner, but I don’t know the maiden name of my grandmother.

Later her family moved to Lodz. There were very many of them. In my father’s family there were three brothers and two sisters, but here there were as many as eight children. Her sisters: Bella and Helena; and her brothers: Samuel, Jakub, Maksymilian, Adolf and Jozef. Eight altogether.

The eldest was Samuel Fajner, who served in the tsarist army and was involved in the social-democratic movement. As you know, this was an illegal party in Russia [SDKPiL] 2 and right before the revolution of 1905 [Russian Revolution] 3  he was warned by some officers who were his friends, that his name was on the proscription list – as one of the people to be shot. 

He ran away from the army with his friend Roghovy, a native Russian. They stopped at home for just about half an hour, they were so scared of the tsar’s security forces following them. They emigrated to the USA, through Germany. And from about 1906 onwards he lived in the United States.

Up to about 1922 Adolf worked for my father. My father had an electro-technical establishment. Adolf learned the profession while working for him, but then things got difficult in Poland, so he emigrated to Germany, to Dortmund in the Rhine region. He lived there until more or less 1938, working, among other things, as a taxi driver.

Then he moved to Manchester in England. He was struggling financially and he believed things would work out better for him in America. And just before the war he was planning to join his brother Samuel in Cleveland, he even sent all his belongings out there. Then the war broke out and he stayed in England, in Manchester. He survived the war, just as Samuel’s family in Cleveland did.

My mother’s younger brothers, Maksymilian and Jozef, both took part in the 1905 revolution – they were on the barricades as young boys. My uncle Jakub Fajner was quite an active member of Poalei Zion 4. The brothers of the husband of Helena, my mother’s younger sister, that is Wolf and Jakub Eichner, were activists in Bund 5. My relatives were so numerous, that when I arrived in Cracow after completing my high school finals in 1939, I had a difficult time stopping by and visiting each of them, to collect my presents... It was a family of about one hundred people, maybe more than that.

My father was an engineer, specializing in electric technology. He graduated from Russkoye Realnoye Uchilishche [Russian Highschool with emphasis on the Sciences in its curriculum] on Nowy Zjazd street in Warsaw. After that he studied in Germany. He completed one faculty in Sachsen Anhalt, and then another, that is mechanics, he did in Charlottenburg, Berlin.

He spoke German very well, and he spoke French, and then later he taught himself English as well, in his mature years. Why did he choose to study abroad? German technical universities had an excellent reputation. And my father wanted to have the diploma of a polytechnic that really meant something in the world.

Anyway, in those times a degree in engineering was not what it is today, the position of an engineer was incomparably higher. My father did his apprenticeship in the ‘Lazarz’ coal mine near Sosnowiec, and then another in the paper-works of prince Druckolubecki in the Smolensk province. 

How did my parents meet? That is a long story. After my mother’s oldest brother ran off to the United States, it was the grandfather, Maurycy Fajner, who supported the family. He did trade in Lodz, but what he traded in I don’t know exactly. So here was the situation: seven children, and two parents, and suddenly there is no income.

That was when my mother, who was 17 at the time [it was 1908], decided to set up a sewing workshop for women. She got her sisters involved in this project, they had three sewing machines, and they supported the entire family. My mother, being so brave and so smart, enjoyed great respect in the family.

She was the unwritten head of the household. She even managed to put aside a dowry for herself, of 700 rubles [the equivalent of 15 average salaries of an office worker]. This was a huge sum of money! She kept it in a postal savings account. They thought after the war [WWI] that there would be something left of it... but of course they never saw any of it. And she also prepared her whole trousseau.

Because she was working so hard, she would take her vacations in Ojcowo [near Cracow]. But then one year she went to Kazimierz on the Vistula [small very old town about 50 km west of Lublin], and this is where she met my father.

So this is where they met. And my father decided to move to Lodz for my mother’s sake. He opened his electro-technical office there. They got married on 18th March 1914. My older brother, Wladek, Wladyslaw, was born on 26th January 1915.

Soon after that the Russians left Lodz [on 5th December the Russian army began its evacuation. On 6th December 1914 the Germans took over Lodz]. My younger brother Ludwik, known as Lulek, was born on 27th March 1922. 

• Growing up

And I was born in August 1920 in Lodz. In fact I was born on the 14th August, but in my papers they put the 15th, and since I was already the second son, my father was not so particular about what it said in the papers. I was born in the apartment building at 44 Kilinskiego Street, but at that time it was still called Widzewska.

My parents also owned a villa in Wisniowa Gora [about 15 km east of Lodz]. I spent my childhood with my parents. We often traveled, because I was quite a sickly child, so my mother would take me to health resorts more often that the other boys. To Ciechocinek for instance. My brothers were stronger than I was. But later I grew to be strong as well. Thanks to sports I got to be no worse than the others.

We kept on living at Kilinskiego 44 until 1936. Afterwards, for a brief while,  my father rented an apartment at number 1 Glowna Street, but we basically moved into our villa in Wisniowa Gora. On Kilinskiego Street we paid very high rent: 133 zloty per month. That was quite a lot. As long as my father earned a full income, this high rent was not such a big problem. But then it became a real burden for him. And since he didn’t like to get behind on the rent, we had to get rid of this apartment.

Kilinskiego 44 was a huge apartment building, constructed a short time before the first war [WWI]. It was owned by Wislicki – a Lodz capitalist of Jewish descent, who owned a number of houses. Our apartment was on the second floor in the side annex, it was number 44, so my father would often joke ‘And his name was 44’ – like in Mickiewicz [allusion to famous quote from ‘Dziady’ by Adam Mickiewicz] 6.

Our apartment consisted of three rooms and a kitchen. It was quite spacious and well furnished.

There was a hallway, a corridor,  and then opposite you faced my parents’ bedroom. On the left there was the largest room: dining- and living-room in one. And from this dining-living room, if you turned right, you walked into my father’s study. You could also enter this study directly from the staircase.

So there were two entries into the apartment: the main one was on the right, as you walked up the stairs, and the other one you faced straight from the stairs, and it led directly into the study. Later, when things got rough, my parents rented out the study.

At the beginning, in the first three years of my life, because I was a bit sickly, I used to sleep between my parents. My brothers slept in what later became the study. When Wladek graduated and left, Ludwik and I slept in the dining room, but this did not last very long, because later we moved out of the apartment.

Our apartment on Kilinskiego Street had a bathroom, with running water. In this period Junkers gas stoves were just only being introduced [Junkers – the make but also popular name of water-heaters; the company has existed since the beginning of the 20th century]. We had a coal stove.

At least once a week the children were bathed, but in the summer it was more often. The kitchen stove was also a coal one, but there was a gas stove as well. We had electricity. My father was, in general, a great enthusiast of all technical novelties, such as the radio for instance.

In 1925 the first radio transmitting station was activated in Warsaw [Editor’s note: the first radio station was activated in Warsaw in 1918; subsequent ones started working in 1924, 1926 and 1931], so we had ‘detectors’ – a kind of crystal operated receivers.

Later on a friend of my father’s, Ignacy Strasfogel, brought us a lamp-based receiver, with a speaker. This must have been in 1926. Half the neighborhood would come over to listen to that radio. It was such a novelty. And later, for instance – there was the vacuum cleaner.

Two companies made them in this period: Elektrolux and Protos, both of them Swedish. My father bought a Protos, and I think it was the only vacuum in our building. I remember also that my father bought a car one time – an roofless Ford, a sports-car – and this car gave him two great moments of joy.

The first joy was when he bought it, and the second one, even greater than the first, was when he sold it. Because this ford would work a bit, but more often it broke down. It would be parked downstairs, in the courtyard, and the kids would go there, and break it. So when my father got rid of it, he was enormously happy.

Later there were these machines, a sort of half-washing machine, these were not yet automatic machines. In the years 1936-37 there was a wave of Polish Jews coming in from Germany to settle in Poland again, because in Germany they were being persecuted. So one of these returning Jews offered my father such an addition to our boiler – a washing machine.

In this apartment building on Kilinskiego Street there must have been at least seventy apartments, with two courtyards. One was bigger, one was smaller, and then there was a number of annexes. The people who lived there were mostly Jews, more or less assimilated. Directly under us lived the Rozenbergs.

I was good friends with a boy my age, Samuel Rozenberg, who – if still alive – is settled in Australia, a doctor, the owner of a polyclinic in Sydney. His uncle lived right next to us, but to enter his apartment you had to go through the other courtyard.  Then there was the Zylberszac family – they owned a factory that made, among other things, poplin for shirts.

So they formed a joint company: Zylberszac and Rozenberg. The oldest Zylberszac brother studied in Belgium and was a member of the communist party. Anka Zylberszac, the older sister, was in Vienna. Later she and her husband emigrated to the Soviet Union. The youngest sister, Ruth Zylberszac, who was more or less my age, got me involved in the communist youth cells. Samek [Samuel] Rozenberg, on the other hand, did not hold any leftist views.

Downstairs in our building there also lived the Kons. After the war Leon Kon became the district governor of Walbrzych, but by that time he called himself Leon Kan. In the front annex there was a department store, the owner’s name was  Leon Rubaszkin. He was a Jew from Moscow.

In Russia they had these settlement border rules for Jews, showing where Jews were allowed to live and where they were not. In Moscow, generally Jews were not allowed to live, but the intelligentsia – doctors, dentists, tradesmen on the first guild, in other words the very rich – they could live there. [see Jewish Pale of Settlement] 7.

My father had his electro-technical office on the ground floor, and further inside we had the house of prayer, which you entered from the other courtyard. My grandfather, Maurycy Fajner, was one of the people who went there regularly. But there were very few such religious Jews living in our building, only a few families...

The others were all assimilated, maybe they did believe in God but they did not practice on a daily basis. It was rather people from the outside that came to the house of prayer, because in our part of town [center of Lodz] there lived plenty of Jews.

Lodz had the second largest Jewish community in Poland, and possibly in Europe as well – Warsaw had the largest one. In Warsaw there were over 400,000 Jews, and in Lodz there were almost as many [Editor’s note: In 1939 there were 200,000 Jews in Lodz –  30% of the city’s population.

Pre-WWII Warsaw had over 300,000 Jews, also about 30% of the entire population]. There are good reasons that even today Lodz is referred to as ‘a city of four cultures’: Polish, Jewish, German and Russian. Even among our acquaintances in Lodz there were many Russians, who had stayed after the evacuation of Russian authorities and the Russian army.

One of my classmates, for instance, was Wlodek Nikonorow, a good friend of mine. We also had the Gombergs, immigrants from Russia. They lived at number 49 on Kilinskiego Street. This was another of those assimilated Jewish families. Lodz had quite a mixture of nations in those times, but I must say they all lived on friendly terms with one another.

My father was very assimilated, but despite this he did belong to the Jewish community, and he paid his dues on time. Moreover, since he had so many Jewish clients, it was considered in good taste for him to have a collection box for financial gifts to Keren Kayemet Leisrael 8. It was a sort of initiative for supporting and for the buying of land from Arab hands into the hand of Jewish settlers in Palestine.

My father was a non-believer, and my mother – though she had very leftist views, basically communist ones – was quite a believer. Of course, she did not practice – only at New Year’s [Rosh Hashanah] and on Yom Kippur she would go and pray for all of  us. Sometimes I would go there to the synagogue with my mother and she did take care to have me confirmed [i.e. that I had my bar mitzvah], and I had to learn alef beys and so on.

My grandfather, Maurycy Fajner, was still alive then, I think he died in 1936. He was the patron of my bar mitzvah. The ceremony took place in the house of prayer in our building on Kilinskiego Street. But my mother did not interfere in our views – as you choose it, so it will be, she’d say. And we, in general, had these extreme left wing views, so we were non-believers, but we respected my mother’s views, and so we didn’t bother her, and neither did my father – and that is the way it was in our family.

Grandpa Maurycy was a religious man, but progressive, too. Certainly, he did celebrate seders, we went over to his place for them a lot. And then later, when grandpa got older and weaker, it was aunt Bela’s husband, Leon Herszman, who did the seders, it was to their place that we all went. But this was all the contact with religion, with tradition, that I had. I never recited the Haggadah, it was always only Jurek Herszman [the son of Bela and Leon] who did that, because he knew it better than I did, so he would ask these questions.

My Father had a lot of clients who preferred to speak Yiddish. If a man came over who was more comfortable with Yiddish, my father was able to understand him, because he was fluent in German. And so, since my father was so used to Yiddish, the conversation would go on, with the other man speaking Yiddish, and my father speaking German.

But there were few such customers, because most people, after all, did speak Polish, even if they were Orthodox Jews. My mother, however, did know Yiddish from childhood, even though they spoke Polish in the household of grandfather Maurycy. But from time to time, when they had some intimate matter to discuss, and didn’t want us children to understand them, then they would speak Yiddish with each other.

And in our household for such situation it was German they would use. But why did my parents know German so well? Because my father had done his studies in Germany and my mother had a lot of her business in Gdansk see Free City of Danzig] 9, and then in general, German was widely known in Lodz.

We had a housekeeper –  in those days you would say we had ‘a girl’ – who  came to us when she was 17, and her name was Jozia Nowak. She was from Belchatow. She stayed with us at least 20 years. We had this little room off from the kitchen, and this is where Jozia slept.

Jozia was treated like a family member, and the children had to obey her. Jozia learned from my mother how to run the kitchen, and how to bake excellent cakes. At our house a home-made cake was baked every Friday – for Saturday and Sunday. And there had to be two types of cake: one was a yeast-based cake and the other was some kind of cheese-cake or an apple pie.

The cake would just sit there in the living-room cupboard, and nobody had to ask if they could have some, each child could just take as much as they wanted. And sometimes, when they expected guests, they would have cakes sent off to the baker’s, to be baked. What we liked most about the cake was the crumble topping, and we would pick at it when it was still hot.

Then my mother would tell Jozia: ‘You’d better  make the crumble for them separately, so they don’t ruin my cake.’ And then I remember in the kitchen cupboard there were almonds for baking, and my mother noticed that I stole  some occasionally when I thought nobody was looking. So she said to me: ‘You know what, we will put the almonds for baking over there, and these here, they will be for you.’

Our household was managed very well, and the kids were always being spoilt, there was great variety of foods at breakfast, and lunch and dinner. I was a bit more picky where food was concerned, but my younger brother, Ludwik, he was well known for his appetite.

When he got hot milk with pasta, he would say: ‘More pasta, more, more.’ Later, when we moved off to Wisniowa Gora [to the family villa in a small town near Lodz], Jozia became the chief cook. By then my mother did not have to take care of kitchen matters personally, she would just give directions, and sometimes a recipe – if it was some new dish. The food was wonderful, always. My mother was enormously hospitable, and she entertained lots of guests, especially on Saturdays.

On Kilinskiego Street there were these small shops. I remember especially this one really wonderful dairy shop, which belonged to the Segals. Like Chagall 10 – it was the same name, really, except that he had come from Vitebsk, and our shop-owner was a Segal from Lodz.

So from him we got our milk,  cheese, butter, eggs, everything was from his shop. In those days it was the custom not to pay right away, but instead there was this little book [credit book], and then each month you would pay what was due. This was how things worked.

I remember one more thing: it was considered enormously important at our house to have fresh bread. It came in round 2-kilogram loaves. And we especially liked the bread heels. I used to go buy this bread  near to my aunt’s place, at 29 Narutowicza Street, that’s where the bakery was.

On my way home I would often rip off a piece, it was so good I couldn’t help myself. On Piotrkowska Street there was this lady called Mrs. Bluska, who ran a bakery that sold these teeny-weeny little buns, really crunchy. They were 2 groszy apiece, while a normal bun cost 5 groszy.

Then there was this shop on Ceglana Street, near Piotrkowska, it was called ‘Dorotea.’ My mother was always buying sweets there. Candy, small chocolates, chocolate in bars. When I was a bit bigger, I would help mama out at home, and she would send me to this ‘Dorotea,’ with a list in my hand, so I would buy exactly what she wanted.

And another shop was a delicatessen, owned by Mrs. Jaworska, a Polish woman, on Narutowicza Street. My mother used to buy tapioca and some other specialty foods there, and from time to time she’d buy cranberries. That is where you’d buy wine, except for wine for Passover dinner, because that had to be kosher, so we’d get it in a special store.

When we went over to my grandfather’s for a seder, we always took two or three bottles of this kosher wine with us. So as to be accommodating, and to make a contribution to the meal.

My mother would buy meat from a Jewish butcher, at 50 Kilinskiego Street. Jewish meat had one big advantage, that is why my mother bought it. You see, it was koshered. What does this mean? It means that all the veins were taken out. So it didn’t require work at home. At our house meat was mostly marinated. First it was marinated, rubbed with garlic, and then only a few days later it was cooked.

The same for the cold-cuts, and it’s interesting that we did that, in a way, because we did not keep kosher. It was only at Passover that my mother koshered the food. But she genuinely liked kosher meats, especially this special goose sausage.

Later, when I became a bit more independent, my younger brother, Ludwik and myself rented a room in same the building where Helena, our aunt, lived, at 31 Narutowicza Street. My parents were living at Wisniowa Gora by then, and this arrangement was made so that we wouldn’t have to walk to the station every morning in the winter, so it would be a bit easier for us.

I was the one who ran our household, but it was arranged that I had lunch every day at a this restaurant,  at Handelsman’s, at 21 Narutowicza Street. The owners had a daughter, Bella, Izabela Handelsman, who was later my fiancee. Breakfast and supper we would make for ourselves, at home. And there was this Jewish dairy-grocery shop, where we would always do our shopping on credit.

I would take care of the bills later, I as a marvelous housekeeper, if you know what I mean. Our favorite dish was raspberry jam. We would buy bread, butter and jam in this shop, everything we bought in this shop. It was a corner house: number 57 on Kilinskiego Street, and 31 on Narutowicza. But the owner’s name – that I don’t remember.

It was only rarely that we would go to the market in Lodz. My mother had her own deliverymen from villages, and so this cream for instance, so thick that the spoon would stand in it, this cream was brought directly to our home. It was the same later on, and at Wisniowa Gora. She wouldn’t even have to check if the cream was clean or not.

Because some of them would add flour to the cream. Then there was this door-to-door salesman who always brought Wysocki’s tea. Wysocki, it was a Moscow company, which brought tea from China, and India.  [The company still exists, it is now called  Wissotzky Tea Company, and has its base in Tel Aviv].

We didn’t drink much coffee, and more often it was ersatz coffee, not the real thing, because it was for kids. The basic drink in our house was tea, my father was a great tea-lover. He learned to drink it in Russia, when he was working in the Smolensk province, with prince Druckolubecki.

He was a young engineer, just beginning his professional life, and in those days it was real prestige, quite a social position, not like an engineer today. He often told us how the prince invited him to join him at the table, and everything was served Lithuanian style.

Among other things, they served bear meat with honey, and he had to eat that. He could hardly swallow the stuff, but he ate it anyway. Anyway, this is where he learned to drink tea. And at our house evening tea was quite a ritual. Everyone else used normal powder sugar, but for my father it had to be sugar cubes, because he liked to drink his tea Russian style, ‘na prikusku’ [biting on a chunk of sugar while he drank his tea].

My father rarely smoked cigarettes – just for the sake of style. I did not smoke either, but Ludwik got into it when he reached the age of about 16. And he would smoke secretly. He had to hide the habit for health reasons, because everyone said that smoking was bad for you.

Our uncle Minc from Cracow also used to smoke, but later he gave up. Obviously, when the guests came, there would be an ashtray ready. Cigarette brands? Ergo, Egipskie. Egipskie were very expensive, and if I bought cigarettes at all it was Egipskie. They would just sit around waiting, so I could have one once in a few months. I could smoke with my parents around, even as a boy, because they were not worried I would get hooked on it.

What did we read? What newspapers did we have at home? My father was basically a liberal, but in the late 1930s he got closer to socialist views. When he had some qualms or hesitations we would watch him closely [making sure he voted for the socialists].

We didn’t have to watch mother, but father we did, so he would always vote for the socialists, for ‘number two’ [the election list number 2] in Lodz. So at home we would have two Lodz newspapers. One was more liberal – ‘Republika.’ For a long time we used to subscribe to ‘Republika.’

And the other paper, which was more of the left wing shade, was ‘Glos Poranny,’ and later my father began to subscribe that paper. But there was a period of time when he bought both papers. There was an open kiosk, right in front of our building. My father would also buy weeklies. There was a lot of reading going on in my family. My father hated to miss any news. And mother also read a lot. This is why they spoke Polish so beautifully.

We were all enrolled in Polish schools. At first I attended the primary school number 122 at 27 Narutowicza Street. Later, I went on to the Wisniewski gymnasium. Wisniewski was the owner of this school, which was named after Boleslaw Prus. My older brother also attended this school.

At first he had gone to the public school named after Nicolaus Copernicus, on Ceglana Street. And my younger brother, Ludwik, when he completed elementary school, he went to a technical gymnasium. I was only at Wisniewski’s school until 1935, because after that things got a little difficult for our family and there were problems with paying the tuition, which was quite high.

My cousin Teofila, that is Tecia Herszman, prepared me for the competitive exam. I passed this exam and I went on to a city school, the Jozef Pilsudski Boys’ Gymnasium at 48 Sienkiewicza Street. The city school was different from the other one in that the tuition was much lower to begin with, and then it was basically determined by the parents’ committee on the basis of the financial situation of a given family.

We paid an average tuition, which, in any case, was much much lower than tuition in the private school. And it was from this school that I graduated. I was good at studying. I was one of the students who excelled, especially in the sciences. In 1939 I took my finals. If you got 5 [the highest grade] in the written exam, then you were excused from taking the oral.

So I was excused both from the Polish language and literature oral, and from the one in math. But I did have to take physics and chemistry because this was what my class specialized in, we were being prepared to enter the polytechnic. I passed all the exams with excellent results.

What later helped me a lot in mastering other languages was Latin. I had such luck that only two boys out of the entire class were taking French, Wlodek Merle and myself. So I mastered French rather well for school expectations... but then the expectations in our school were rather high, we had 2 hours of French 3 times a week. And since there were only two of us, we always had to be prepared.

The teacher had time for us, so we worked our way through French literature and history and the geography of France and Paris. When I later got to France, and found myself in Paris, I knew it all. We had to study languages. The situation at Polish universities was very tense, very difficult, there was ‘numerus clausus’ [see Anti-Jewish Legislation in Poland] 11 and Jews were being persecuted, so we were seriously considering the possibility of my going to France or to England to study.

Let me now tell you a bit about my interest in sports. Some time in the 1930s they opened a swimming pool in Wisniowa Gora, and this was where I learned to swim. At first I just jumped into the water and I nearly drowned... Then I learned to swim so well, that I even became an instructor. I made an extra bit of money for myself at the pool. In 1935 I joined the Maccabi club 12, they were based at 21 Kosciuszki Street in Lodz, in a side annex on the ground floor.

Hanna Torunska lived on the first floor, she was a sort of family friend whom we called ‘aunt.’ In this club the most important thing was swimming. We used to go to Zgierz, where they had a swimming pool, not so big but quite good. We would take an electric train to get there, about 10 or 12 km. Later, at school, we went to the YMCA, it’s American: Young Men’s Christian Association.

Well, this was Christian, and the climate there was not so good for Jews. As a student of my school I could go there, but members of the Maccabi club were banned at the YMCA, it was out of the question for them to take part. In any case, at least twice a week I would go swimming.

I got first class qualifications, took part in competitions and did rather well. I later got a swimming badge of the Polish Swimmers’ Association, and then the badge of a lifeguard and instructor.

As far as leisure time is concerned, I must say that we really enjoyed music. My father was a great music lover, and my mother, too, had a really good ear. But there was no permanent Jewish theater in Lodz. [From 1912 onwards Jewish actors gave performances in the building at 18 Ceglana Street (today 15 Wieckowskiego Street) in the Scala theater. The Lodz troupe, named Folks un Jugnt Teater, gave many performances in Lodz in the 1930s. The building of Scala was burnt down, reconstructed in 1950 and used by Jewish actors until 1956.]

But there were many visiting performances, among them the famous theater of Habima 13, who later settled and performed in Palestine. They gave their performances in Yiddish, and later they also played in Hebrew. He came to Lodz with various plays. I remember, for example, the stories my parents told about ‘Dybuk’ [Der Dibuk] 14 by An-ski 15, the enormous impression it made on them.

My father didn’t know Yiddish and mother had to translate for him, but the play was so intense that this did not bother him too much. At the time there were no headphones like they now have in the Jewish Theater [Reference to simultaneous interpretation of works in Yiddish offered to audiences of the Jewish Theater in Warsaw].

Moreover, my mother and father never missed a chance to go if there was a performance of some opera or operetta. My father knew all the melodies, and he could play the piano himself, we had a piano at home. Ours was, in general, a very musical family, because Natalia Imergluck, my father’s younger sister was a professor at the conservatory in Cracow.

My brother Wladek learned to play the piano. I, on the other hand, was supposed to learn to play the piano, but unfortunately, it never happened, even though I was quite musical. I considered myself a kind of cripple for this reason, but unfortunately by the time I was ready we were in financial difficulties, and my father sold the piano.

The Polski Theater was very close to our house, on Ceglana Street. At the turn of the 1920s and 1930s this theater was ran by Zelwerowicz [Zelwerowicz, Aleksander (1877-1955): actor, director, teacher. Played in about 800 theater pieces. Directed the work of a number of Polish theaters, played also in films and performed on the radio.

The creator of theater academies in Warsaw]. My father helped out in the installation of electricity in this theater, its illumination so to speak. And so, since he had business ties to this theater, he also met Zelwerowicz, the great master of Polish stage, one of the greatest actors of the old generation. Since my father offered his services to the theater, he received tickets free of charge, on an honorary basis.

And I would go to various plays with my father. I was quite young then, 8 or 9 years old. Later on, we got season’s tickets at school, both at my gymnasium and at the Pilsudski lyceum. To make things fair, they gave us different seats each time. One time you had better seats, another time you had worse ones. We went regularly with my schoolmates, at least once a month. And in the later years we would write reviews from the plays we saw.

My father also knew Arthur Rubinstein 16, way back when he was still a very young, enormously gifted musician, at the beginning of his career, a pianist – and later, as is well known, he would be world-famous. My father had such artistic connections. For instance, he knew Szyk 17, the painter, very well known in Lodz. And my mother knew Tuwim 18, but of course in those days he was just starting out as a poet.

She also knew his wife-to-be, Stefania Marchewka. But it was quite natural that my parents knew these people, because they were well rooted in the circles of the intelligetsia, and had a huge number of acquaintances.

Before the war, I also went to the cinema a lot. From my youngest years I was a great movie fan, and I had great conditions to pursue this interest. Why is that? Well, it’s quite a long story. My mother sewed very well. One proof of her skills  as a dressmaker is that she could make a model dress for herself in two and a half, or maybe three hours.

But my father wouldn’t allow her to sew, he thought it was a dishonor to himself. He believed he should be the one to support the family, and my mother should not try to make extra money. But my mother had these lady friends, and these ladies would put pressure on her to sew for them, because they valued her talent so much.

My mother would secretly make dresses for them, hiding the fact from my father. My father pretended not to notice, and when things got more difficult [financially] he pretended even more, and so my mother kept on sewing. From this work she had a huge array of acquaintances, some of them going back to her maiden days.

There were some owners of cinemas among them, or rather the wives of cinema-owners, who were good friends of my mother. The first cinema was on Ceglana, at the corner with Piotrkowska Street, and it was called ‘Czary’ [‘Magic’]. They were always playing cowboy movies there, silent ones of course and I had free seats.

Then I also went to the ‘Corso’ movie theater, on Zielona Street. I would never miss a Tarzan movie of course. Later on, when I was an older boy, 12, 13, 14 years old and a bit more, my mother had this client who owned the two largest cinemas in Lodz: one was ‘Europa,’ on Narutowicza Street, near Pilsudskiego, formerly Wschodnia Street, right behind the Lodz Philharmonic, and then the other was on Piotrkowska Street, near 6 Sierpnia Street, it was called ‘Casino.’  

I had free entry into these two big screen cinemas, and I would never miss a movie. And not only did I have free entry, but thanks to this connection, I could also sometimes bring in my closest friends, but with the owner’s permission, of course.

I also went to other movie theaters, the cinema-going-bug was so deep inside me. I saw basically all the Chaplin movies that were shown in those days: ‘The Dictator,’ and the famous one called ‘City Lights,’ and ‘The Kid,’ and so on... I remember that sometime in 1936-1937 there was a boycott of German movies and we wouldn’t see any of those.

In the summer months we stayed in Wisniowa Gora, and when the weather was bad we would go spend the day in Lodz – a whole group of boys and girls – and see movies, at least two in one day one in the morning and then another in the afternoon.

Moreover, in Wisniowa Gora, there was a summer cinema, but the films they showed there were not the most popular ones. My brothers also loved the movies. Wladek was a bit of a film-fanatic, but Ludwik was less into it than we were.

Then there was dancing. I never had to attend a dance school. When I was 9 years old, we had these boarders in our bed and breakfast in Wisniowa Gora – the Sladkowskis. They had a daughter, Stefania Sladkowska, who was about 11 years older than me. I was desperately in love with her as a child. And she loved me too. She would take me dancing with her. And it became her ambition to teach me how to dance. She started out with the hardest dance – the English waltz.

Later she taught me the foxtrot and so on. So at the tender age of 9 or 10 I was already an excellent dancer. I remember that later, at the Jewish gymnasium for girls I got a prize for classical dances and national dances. Later this would turn out enormously useful to me. My brother would come home from Cracow, for his vacation, he would take me to dances – and his girl friends were always eager to dance with me, because I was just a small kid, but such a great dancer.

In the later years in Lwow, when I was moving in the academic circles, I taught all the girls I knew, who were coming from the rural areas, from Wolyn. And whenever they got something good from home, they would bring it right to me, because I was the main dancing instructor.

As far as more serious matters are concerned, politics... It was a general phenomenon, that kids from enlightened, well-to-do homes had leftist leanings. Extreme left, in fact. Take for instance, Mieczyslaw Librach, a friend of my brother’s. His father owned a factory on Pomorska Street, and the boy was a communist.

The best joke was when he took part in the strike of the workers in his father’s factory – against his father. This phenomenon was due to enormous differences in the level of life, in financial status. There was such a mass of poverty, and it wasn’t just Polish poverty, but Jewish as well. For instance, in Baluty, it was a one of the poorest districts of Lodz.

My older brother had ties with the Communist Union of Polish Youth 19. My mother begged him to take his finals first, because he would make his views known at school, and he often got into trouble for that reason. The school principal would go after him and so on. So he promised he wouldn’t get too deeply involved.

Later he went to Cracow to pursue his studies in law, at the Jagiellonian University. He nearly graduated, he was done with all the coursework [when the war broke out]. During his studies he was active in the The Union of Independent Socialist Youth (ZNMS) [a student organization established in 1917.

Active mostly on Warsaw and Cracow campuses. Politically linked to the Polish Socialist Party. Dismantled in 1938, reconstructed in 1946]. In 1948 it became part of the Academic Union of Polish Youth.

These were the 1930s still, a period when the Polish Communist Party 20 was banned... thanks to Stalin, after all. I only remember that sometimes these messengers would show up in our summer house in Wisniowa Gora, bringing these materials, illegal papers.

Wladek wouldn’t tell me what it was, he would just say: ‘you hide it well, so well that even the devil can’t find it.’ And I would hide the stuff somewhere under the house foundations... I didn’t ask who or what, I knew you were not supposed to ask, this is how it was.

I did get involved a little. In 1937, when the war in Spain was going on [Spanish Civil War] 21, we collected money at school for MOPR – International Organization of Support for Revolutionaries [subordinate to the 3rd International, in Poland also known as the ‘Red Help’]. It was illegal. There were these tiny little photos of Spain in struggle, and we distributed those.

For a brief period I belonged to the youth Zionist organization Hashomer Hatzair 22. It was a leftist scouting organization. How did I end up in it? One of my friends told me – listen, you come, and you see. And I liked it there, they taught us dances, songs.

Later I had less and less time, because most of it was used up studying. Moreover, my views gradually shifted more towards the left, so I did not identify with the Zionist movement any longer. Although I did sympathize with them in the sense that I knew their aims were right.

At some point in the 1930s the activity of extreme nationalist political organizations became more intense. More than anything else it was the ND [Endeks] 23. But as far as Polish youth is concerned, all of this [the fascination with nationalist ideas] was really quite superficial.

In my class, besides myself, there was also Rosenblum and Rutsztajn, which made 3 [Jews] out of 25 persons. And mostly, the attitude towards us was quite decent. But in the years closer to the war, to 1939, the mood changed.

In the Pilsudski school the teachers were mostly leftist in their views, with maybe one or two exceptions. There were very few supporters of ‘sanacja’ [Derived from the Latin ‚sanus‘ (health) it means healing and refers to the political group which came to power in Poland after the May coup in 1926 and governed until the start of WWII.] and Jozef Pilsudski 24 among the teachers.

In our lyceum there were different kinds of student organizations: study groups, co-operatives, sports clubs. We made sure that after the elections each of those groups was ran by boys with left wing views. This was our political nursery, so to speak, it shaped our attitudes.

Anyway, you could always count on your friends, regardless of their views, I think. In the early days of the German occupation in Lodz I ran into Tadeusz Filipczynski, who had right wing views. Jews are already forbidden to walk the streets, and he meets me on Plac Wolnosci [Freedom Square] and says: ‘Stefek, you are putting yourself at risk of repression.’

And I say to him: ‘Listen Tadzio, you aren’t going to tell anyone that you saw me, are you?’ And he says ‘Are you crazy? Of course I’m not telling, no way would I tell anyone, don’t you know me?’ It was impossible even to consider such a possibility, of denouncing someone of Jewish descent. Political views had nothing to do with it.

• During the war

In 1939 we already knew that Hitler was going to attack Poland. Especially after the speech of our foreign minister Beck in the Parliament in May, it became clear that war with Germany was only a matter of months [on 5th of May 1939 the minister of foreign affairs Jozef Beck gave a speech in the Parliament in which he opposed strongly Hitler’s demands made to Poland: his claim on Gdansk as part of the Reich, and his plan to construct an extra-territorial railroad and highway across the coastal region].

So we were beginning to prepare ourselves a bit. In the summer of 1939 I went to visit my relatives in Cracow. My older brother Wladyslaw, Wladek, was a student at the Jagiellonian University 25 and in 1939 he was in his last year of law.

He was living in a dormitory at number 3 Przemyska Street, near the Debicki bridge, which leads to Podgorze, off from Starowislna. I was staying with him in the dormitory and visiting relatives. Wladek was a very good student, he was enormously gifted

Then I went back to Lodz. My mother was busy in Wisniowa Gora at this time, running the guest house with her friend Lewinska. My school friends were coming there to rest after the final exams. For instance Arnold Juniter, who later became an officer of the Polish army, a pilot in the 1st Army, Warsaw Contingent. My summer passed rather happily, but we all felt that carefree, normal life is coming to an end for us. We had this feeling, but we did not really know what war meant.

I mentioned already my fiancee, Izabela Handelsman, the daughter of the people who owned the restaurant on Narutowicza Street. There were two daughters – the older one, whose name I do not remember, and this younger one, named Bela. We met and we fell deeply in love.

I respected her very much, and anyhow in our family it was the rule that you should respect a girl for whom you had serious intentions. She would come visit me from time to time, but God forbid that I should even think of touching her, nothing of the sort. She went with me to the school ball held 100 days before the finals. Izabela had ties to the left, to communist youth, even more so than I did. In those days, all of that was secret. The Communist Union of Polish Youth had been dismantled already.

We quarreled over a trifle that summer [1939]. I was offended that she wanted to take her vacation somewhere else than I had imagined, and finally we spent the summer separately. But when the war broke out we made up immediately.

We made this agreement: that she would come to Lwow, that we would settle there... she was supposed to come to Lwow with my mother. But none of this worked out, and we didn’t see each other  till after the war.

In the very first days of the war I evacuated myself to Warsaw. I mean I did it on my own. On foot, and sometimes by train. I was shot at a train station between Skierniewice and Koluszki [this might have been the town of Rogow, Lipce Reymontowskie or Makow – all located about 30 km east of Lodz]. This was my first experience with real war – the Germans were shooting at the line Koluszki – Warsaw.

You couldn’t go any further than that by train, and we continued on foot at night, since the Germans were shooting at refugees in the daytime. This is how I reached Grodzisk [Grodzisk Mazowiecki – small town located about 25 km south-west of Warsaw].

I was hoping to reach my father’s school friend, Ignacy Sztrasfogel, who was a high-level official in the ministry of transport and the head of the Railroad School. He was childless, and you could say that he treated us like his adopted children.

In the years before the war I would sometimes cycle to Warsaw on my bicycle, and he always welcomed me, and showed me around the city. But this time he wasn’t there because, along with the whole regional management of the railway system, he had been evacuated to Brzesc [Brzesc on the River Bug – city located about 200 km east of Warsaw].

I reached Warsaw on 7th September. The next day, on the 8th, there was a recruitment spot of volunteers set up on Trzech Krzyzy Square, and so I joined the Army. I was in the military through the entire September campaign 26. Some men from Lodz met me and got me out – I was moved to the motorized column of general Czuma [Gen. Walerian Czuma was in charge of the Command of Warsaw’s Defense, which was created on 3rd September 1939]. We were stationed at the Citadel.

Later, in the final days of the mass air attack, and bombing of the Citadel, we were moved to underground garage, at 77 Jerozolimskie Avenue. That is where I stayed till the day of surrender [28th September, 1939]. Incidentally, it was right here that I was shot at, right on Twarda Street, and I survived only thanks to the fact that I was wearing a cavalry helmet. Because a splinter of a shrapnel hit the helmet, and merely made a dent in it.

I got a higher rank, I was even decorated with a medal for my participation in getting the wounded out, and bringing food and ammunition to the first line of battle. On 25th September, our commander, lieutenant Wysocki, told us to take off our uniforms – there was no need for the Germans to catch us.

I returned to Lodz. One had to walk on foot to Pruszkow first [12 km to the south east of Warsaw]. Once you got there, there were some trains, freight trains of course, and I got to Andrzejow that way [town near Lodz]. Wisniowa Gora was just 2 kilometers from there, and I expected to find my parents there. Unfortunately, they were not there.

In the very first days of the war they moved to Lodz and stayed with my aunt Helena Eichner, my mother’s younger sister. She had a large apartment, so there was no problem with designating a room for my parents. Things were very very difficult.

My father was an exceptionally honest man. He had some financial obligations, and to settle them he gave away the last bit of money in the first days of the war, so my parents were left with almost nothing. It was lucky that I brought with me some cigarettes.

Because in Warsaw they were being given away. I mean, not exactly given away, but when the Germans were about to take over, the tobacco monopoly was opened and whoever got a chance just took some. I took some, it was worth a few zloty and this was help for my parents.

It was clear that there was no point for young people to stay in Lodz, we knew there would be a ghetto, and so on. So I was getting prepared to cross over the eastern boarder with the Soviet Union. The idea was to get as far as possible away from the Germans.

In the meantime, we got news from Lwow [The city was in Soviet annexed Eastern Poland] 27 that Wladek and his wife Berta were there, and that I should also come – they were waiting for me. So in November 1939, together with my friend Edward Klein, we set off for Lwow.

What made me leave so quickly was that the Germans had already started persecutions of Jews. The older folks still remembered those Germans from the first world war, but these were not the same Germans, and their methods were not the same, either.

On my way east I had to pass through Warsaw once again, and this time I met Ignacy Strasfogel, and stayed at his place at 25 Sienna Street. I slept there and then got across the Bug [Border river between Poland (1939-1945 General Governmentship) and the Soviet Union after September 1939].

We crossed over during the night, more or less at the level of Siemiatycze [i.e. 200 km east of Warsaw]. We didn’t see any Germans, and luckily enough we did not to run into any Russians, either, I mean Soviet border patrols. It wasn’t so easy to cross the boarder, but at this point it was still sort of fluid.

Life was very difficult in Lwow that first year. The winter was severe and there was no work. My brother, Wladek, was receiving some kind of stipend at the Polytechnic: somehow he got a spot as a student of veterinary medicine. He did that even though he was a lawyer, but they offered food, and later he got a room as well. I don’t recall how long it took before my younger brother, Ludwik, joined us, and then also my father and my cousin Jurek Herszman.

Mother stayed in Lodz. Some time after that I got a better job – I was operating these construction machines in ‘Voyenstroy’, that is in military construction. Jurek Herszman was not able to adapt to Lwow life, so he and Ludwik went back to Lodz. And somehow the plan for my mother to join us in Lwow never worked out.

In Lwow I took the entrance exams to the Polytechnic, but I didn’t have a high enough score in Ukrainian, it was a miracle I even got a 3 [passing grade], so I was accepted at the physics and mathematics faculty of the Pedagogical Institute, on the basis of my high score in math and other hard sciences.

This was in 1940. I also worked as a stoker in a hotel... I managed to live on my modest salary, and on top of that I made some money by collecting bottles in hotel rooms. Wladek was living with his wife and our father.

As for me, at first I lived the Worker’s House [workers‘ dormitory] , and later in student dormitories, many of those. The last place where I stayed was at 12 Ormianska Street, on one of the sides of the old Square, opposite the Town Hall.

On 22nd July, Germany attacked the Soviet Union. So war had caught up with us [Editor’s note: The war between Germany and the Soviet Union broke out on 22nd June 1941]. I was preparing for my last exam. During the night of 22nd of July, Lwow was bombed...

So in those first days of the war we were trying to decide what to do next. I had lived through the Warsaw bombings, so I had a certain amount of experience with Germans, and I was trying to calm down the girls in my dormitory. The panic was enormous.

We talked it over at home with my father and my brother, and their verdict was that under no circumstances should I stay in Lwow. As a politically engaged young man, I would be killed right away. I was in the Komsomol 28. In Lwow, generally, the refugees were not welcome in any organizations, regardless of our political views.

We were still living in the shadow of the dismantling of the Polish Communist Party, and the Union of Communist Youth. But in my case, there were testimonies of activists from Cracow, who gave their word that I was ‘a decent man’ and so I was accepted into the Komsomol.

Young people such as myself were being sent over to factories, to brick-yards. On 27th June [1941] I was on my way back from this brick-yard and I was shot at by Ukrainian guerilla fighters. These were people from the OUN, Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists 29, but somehow I got home alive. In any case, it was clear I had better leave.

After I left Lwow, Ludwik did not come back again. And mother never got there, either. My father stayed in Lwow, it’s a miracle they didn’t capture and transport him away..., but since he spoke Russian so well, he showed his documents to the local head of NKVD 30, showed him his German diplomas and explained he was a Polish citizen of Jewish descent.

This man allowed him to remain in Lwow. My father, Wladek and his wife Berta, lived at 29 Na Bajkach Street in Lwow, and this is where I said goodbye to them.

When Germans entered the city, my brother, Wladek got himself some fake papers, and continued working at the Polytechnic (the Polytechnic as such was closed, but individual sections kept on functioning). Later I found out that after I left my younger brother was also in Lwow, along with his wife. But at the time I did not know this. I never met her.

Both my brothers were killed a short time before the Soviet army entered Lwow, I mean, before liberation [1944]. My younger brother was killed about half a year before the Soviet army came in, and the older one just 3 months before. Wladek was so sure of himself that he even gave shelter to a Jewish friend, Henryk Meth.

The Germans came to get this other Jew and they asked him about Wladek. He said: ‘at the Polytechnic.’ So they went to get my brother, then they took Berta, and that was that – my brother and his wife were killed together with this friend of theirs.

My younger brother was captured together with his wife in a round-up in Lwow, in a restaurant. They deciphered his papers, I mean they figured out they were fake, and so he, too, was killed. Out of my direct family I was the only one left, alone like a thumb. In Kiev I got in touch with an old school friend, asked him about my family’s fate – he found nobody. Moreover, I also tried to find out what happened to my fiancee, Izabela Handelsman, who was supposed to come to Lwow...

But unfortunately, I got no news at all. Apparently my parents did get together in the end, in the ghetto in Czestochowa. They were both killed in the early months of 1943, [the liquidation of the Czestochowa ghetto took place at the turn of 1942-43] in Treblinka. 31.

We tried to leave Lwow in an organized way, but we were under fire, so after that each one of us tried on his own. I had this friend from the Polytechnic, Jurek Berenstein, who was from Warsaw, and his parents lived in Slonim in western Belarus, as refugees. So he and I got through to Kiev together.

On foot, and also taking freight trains. We walked to Winnica. We joined a military transport. And in Kiev we went to the Ministry of Education. They gave each of us 30 rubles of relief money, and this was just enough for a pair of shoes, because my old ones were all worn out.

I was almost barefoot by the time we reached Kiev. They put us in a school. And in this school I met my future great friend – Adam Kostaszuk, a Lwow native. He knew Wanda Wasilewska 32, and he himself was politically involved. So Wanda Wasilewska made it possible for us to join the military as volunteers, I mean the Red Army.

At first they sent us to Priluki. This place is well known from ‘With Fire and Sword,’ because it was one of the homes of prince Wisniowiecki [Historical novel by Henryk Sienkiewicz, on the events in the 17th century, in Poland’s eastern borderland]. So these were historic sites.

We went through military training there, and later they sent us to the southern front, but not for long, just a few weeks. Later the order came from the main headquarters of the Soviet Army, that all volunteers born in Poland should be picked out and sent to army units stationed behind the front. Because they were afraid.

It is true that there were some diversionists, people sent by the Germans... but unfortunately they applied the Stalinist rule of collective responsibility. If they were unable to pick out the right people, they had to isolate all the volunteers. So we were taken off to Siberia, to the back units of the army, the construction battalions of the Soviet Army.

Our first job – we built fuel reservoirs for the army. The idea was to put those reservoirs far from the front, so they would not be within reach of the German air force. To be precise, it was in Berdsk, about 25 km from Novosibirsk. And later we got a new task: the Soviet Union had its strategic resources there.

They were stored in these barracks. There was natural rubber and other raw materials. So we were supposed to empty out the barracks and prepare them for receiving factories which were being evacuated from Ukraine, Belarus and western Russia. So we were taking part in that.

Within two months a weapons factory was set to work, which had been removed from Kharkov. Before the war, in Kharkov, this factory was making photo cameras, and during the war it was shifted to military production, for the air force.

They were making, for instance, some optical equipment. It was a work-commune, organized out of abandoned children, in Russian they were called ‘bezprizorni’ – these were kids left over after the victims of the civil war [Russian Revolution] 33.

These children were being raised by the NKVD, and the head of this commune was the NKVD general Berman. He made a cadre out of these kids, which later run the factory. I knew something about electric technology, and then I learned about metalwork as well, so I was involved in opening the factory’s power plant. And I had employees working under me, out of this cadre. They were working in terribly difficult conditions, sometimes the temperature would go down to 30 degrees below zero.

In the fall of 1942, we were moved to Perm, at the time it was called Molotov, on the river Kama, in the Ural. We were also building reservoirs out there. In the meantime these working battalions of the Soviet Army were transformed into construction columns of a more civilian status. In 1943 they moved us to the Udmurtia, near the town of Sarapul on the Kama, again to build reservoirs. And since I had education, knew the language and they trusted me, therefore as early as 1943 I was in charge of transport of machines to Leningrad. 

I learned to drive a car and worked as a car mechanic. In 1943 they gave this gift to Stalin, at the cost of huge human loss: on the anniversary of the October Revolution [see Russian Revolution of 1917] 34 Kiev was liberated. By then it was clear that we would be shifted over to Kiev, to work on rebuilding the city. In the spring of 1944, a few months after the liberation, we were sent over there. In Kiev I worked in the Ukrinyechestroy.

We were reserved, in Russian it was called ‘bronivarniye,’ and it meant they could not recruit us into the military, because we were working for the Army. At this time I wanted to join the First Army [see The 1st Kosciuszko Infantry Division] 35, and my efforts were already quite advanced, but then it turned out that I would not be let off.

This was a terrible disappointment. Ukriniechciestroj received the task of reconstructing Kiev’s industry. The Germans had destroyed absolutely all the factories, and we were supposed to rebuild, first of all, the ones that served the needs of the army. So Ukrinyechestroy was renamed as Kievpromstroy, that is the Kiev Industrial Construction.

While working in Kiev, I was living in a workers’ house on Kierasinnaya, and this is where I later met my wife-to-be, Maria Kipnis. She was working in Svyatoshyn (a suburb of Kiev), in a provisions base. I was enormously attracted to her, but I still kept thinking I shouldn’t be making any commitments because, after all, I have a fiancee. And I didn’t make the decision as long as I wasn’t sure, that is until I got news that I had no one left in Poland. But, I said, there was one condition: we can only get married if I can go back to my country.

She was a Russian with Jewish roots. She came from Korosten, a city in the Zhytomyr district, about 80 km from Kiev. And she said to me: ‘Alright, I’ll go with you wherever you want, but my parents have to agree to this.’ When we went over to her parents, her father, a wise old man said this: ‘A wife’s place is by her husband’s side. If he wants to go back to his country, to rebuild his country, then you should go with him.’

My last job in Kiev was in the outpost of the Union of Polish Patriots 36. I took part in the repatriation of Poles from Ukraine; most of them were actually Poles who had been evacuated to Siberia, to the Ural. These people had often lived in terrible conditions.

Wanda Wasilewska made sure that before returning home they were given a chance to stand up on their own feet again, because they were physically exhausted. So they were placed near a sugar factory in Ukraine. The supplies were good over there, and they were receiving sugar in return for their work, so they could buy other products for the sugar. And slowly they did stand on their own feet. Then, and a bit later, when they had regained some strength, they were gradually repatriated.

• After the War

After the war, in March 1946 I returned home from the Soviet Union. At the beginning I was in Lodz. There was nobody left from my closest family, and Bela, my fiancee was also gone. I was continually in touch with my uncle Adolf Fajner, the one who lived in Manchester. After the war he played the role of a link between the family members who were still alive.

Everyone would ask him to find out about the others. So he put me in touch with my uncle Samuel, my mother’s oldest brother. Uncle Adolf was also the one who told me that only two people survived, namely, the son and the daughter of my mother’s older sister, aunt Bela – Jerzy and Teofila Hershman. They were somewhere in camps in Germany, I am not sure exactly, and from Germany they went to the United States and settled in New York.

I met Teofila again some 50 years later, because in 1992 she came here and found me. I was also the guest of her daughter in 1998, and later in 2003 I came to visit them in America with my second wife.

Out of my mother’s family there was also Samuel Fajner, and his three sons, the one who had emigrated through Germany to the United States. Financially he was doing quite well: together with his friend Rogovy they were running this big construction company, which was well anchored in the market, and existed for many years.

All his sons were educated, and during the war between the USA and Japan they were all commanders of American sea units. They were captains of these small units and after the war they were decorated. The two older brothers were married, but the youngest one did not get married until 1955, and I even got an invitation to the wedding. But I was not able to go to the United States, so I sent my best wishes and this had to be all.

Oh yes, there is one more person I should tell about: Helena Eichner’s son, she was my mother’s sister – he also lived through the war. Karol Eichner. I found out he was alive from Adolf Fajner, the one in Manchester. Like many children with Jewish backgrounds, he ended up in the territory taken over by the Soviet Union, in an orphanage in Slonim [Belarus], I believe.

This orphanage was later evacuated to Central Asia, somewhere in Uzbekistan. And later, together with the Anders’ Army 37, he was evacuated further east, and then to India. Later he joined the army and fought in western Germany. He survived and found his way to Israel. He became a high rank military man, but decided not to continue his career in the army.

His name is still Eichner, if he is still alive, that is. And his Hebrew name is Amos. He lives in Tel Aviv. When my daughter, Zosia, was there, she met with him, but he was not very eager to be in touch with his old family. I am not sure why, but he gave them a rather chilly welcome.

 It’s true that out of the Imergluck family you could count those who survived on the fingers of your one hand. I told you there were four children left of Anna and Izydor Imergluck. And out of those four only Marysia Imergluck was left alive; I am not sure what her married name was. I met her near Walbrzych, where she lived, and later they emigrated to Israel, or perhaps to the United States via Israel, I do not know this exactly. Her husband was the director of a linen factory near Walbrzych.

There was also Staszek Imergluck, they were in Zlotousta in the Ural, but he died in exile... he worked in a copper mine. His wife, Anka, was alive and she returned to Cracow. Then out of the Cracow branch of the family there was also Zygmunt Minc, my father’s younger brother, and his wife Erna and their son Adam.

During the war he lived in Yoshkar-Ola, the capital of the Autonomous Republic Mari El. Later they settled in Bytom, and after that Adam came to Gliwice. We saw them after the war. There was one more of the Imergluck family, Wilhelm was his name, a lawyer who specialized in inheritance cases.

I met him in Lodz and later in Cracow, but I do not know what happened to him after that. Another one that survived was a daughter of my aunt Natalia, Nacia Imergluck, who lived in Cracow at number 8 Sebastiana Street.

This aunt Natalia, she had two daughters: Janka and Zosia. Zosia was the one who survived, she too had been in the Soviet Union, she married Walter Zybert and they had a son. They lived in Katowice. Her husband was from Bielsk.

Maria Minc was also alive, the wife of Bernard Minc, the doctor. She lived at 6 Kolberga Street in Cracow. When the war broke out, Bernard Minc had already retired, he left the city and he died in 1939, as early as September I think, in Mszana Dolna. She [the wife] had the body brought back, and had him buried in the Rakowiecki cemetery in Cracow.

I got in touch with her after the war. She was the one who was given all the family photos to keep through the war. Why her? Because, due to her birthplace – she was born in Austria – the Germans decided she was not a Volksdeutsch 38, but rather a Reichsdeutsche [A citizen of the German Reich]. And not only that. Because she was a qualified nurse, the Germans recruited her into the military, to the Wehrmacht. She got all the way to Kiev; she worked in one of the field hospitals in Kiev.

She kept helping her family and relatives, and if she could manage to help anyone else – she always did. In one of the first post-war rehabilitation trials she was immediately rehabilitated, and, moreover, her house was returned to her, and everything else, too. She was a wonderful human being. Later she made a living by knitting sweaters... She died at the turn of the 1950s and 60s.

When I realized that nobody had survived out of my closest family, I decided to go to Walbrzych, to Lower Silesia [Jews settling in Lower Silesia after World War II] 39. In Walbrzych I got registered at the Central Committee of Polish Jews 40 and they helped me a bit.

They would receive, for example, things from UNRRA 41, but as help for Jews, who had suffered during the war. So I would go over there from time to time. I was also accepted into the party [Polish Workers’ Party] 42, because I was a committed left-winger. 

The man who recommended me was Arnold Mostowicz 43. This was a pre-war communist and a friend of my brother’s [Wladek], who knew that he was a communist. I was also recommended by Kujawski, who worked in the ceramic industry union.                            

At first I was working at the Tilsch porcelain factory – it is called The Walbrzych Porcelain Factory nowadays. At the same time, I was active in the labor union. A few months later I was elected secretary of the board of the labor union section of construction industry materials, which included ceramics. Later I was elected as vice-president of the regional board in Wroclaw. And then I was picked for the national union secretary in the field of construction ceramics.

1948 was when I took my first vacation. It was also that summer that my first fiancee from before the war, I mean Bela, Izabela Handelsman, came to Poland, and showed up in Walbrzych. Prince Bernadotte [Count Folke Bernadotte (1895-1948): Vice-President of the Swedish Red Cross in 1945; attempted an armistice between Germany and the Allies. Just before the end of WWII he led a rescue operation transporting, first of all, but not exclusively, Danish and Norwegian inmates from Nazi concentration camps to Swedish hospitals. 27,000 people were liberated this way, many of them Jewish.] had rescued her out of Bergen-Belsen 44, where she had caught consumption.

The fact that she survived is probably due to her knowing German – and she was also a ‘dolmetscher.’ ‘Dolemetscher’ means translator. In the last years of the war she was shipped off to Sweden, where they cured her.

She returned to her older sister, who lived in Dzierzoniow, near Walbrzych. Bela had my address, she came to Walbrzych and found out that I had a wife and a child. But still, she was determined to see me. Our meeting was very tragic. We both cried. Fate had done it to us, she did not blame me at all, she knew I had not done anything wrong. My wife was very anxious what might come out of this. Later she told me so. But, you see, I told Bela right away: ‘I have brought my wife here, whom I love.

I never stopped loving you, obviously, but this is where things stand.’ Bela understood this and went back to her sister. Bela was even more involved in the left wing movement than I was. The shape of Poland at the time was very much to her liking.

This was the Poland she had dreamt about. But since her feelings for me had not died down, she was afraid she might cause some complications in my family life, because, after all, my wife was not to be blamed for all that happened.

We already had a child. In August 1946, as I told you, my first daughter, Anna, was born. So as a result of all the bitterness, and because of her fear that she would not be able to just watch all this calmly, Bela went back to Sweden, and stayed there for good.

We lived in Walbrzych until the end of 1948. In October 1948, at the National Convention of the Union of Construction of Ceramic Industry and Related Professions, I was elected secretary of the National Board – which meant we had to move to Warsaw. The first week I lived in Warsaw in a hotel. But apartments were already being prepared.

So I had a choice: we could get an apartment immediately in a very distant part of Zoliborz, basically in Bielany, or we could wait a bit for another apartment – in Mokotow, in the Warsaw Housing Co-operative, at Dabrowskiego Street.

I wanted my wife to decide. So I brought her here to come and explore, and decide which one she wants. My wife did not hesitate for a minute, she chose Mokotow, and said: ‘I can wait these few months.’ So in fact I brought my family here on 22nd January 1949. And this apartment I still have today.

I was in the Construction Union until 1950. In March 1949, he Union President and I went to Rome, as delegates to the meeting of the International Labor Organization of the Construction Commission. I spent over four weeks there. I was a guest of the Italian government, we were even invited to see the pope. It was Pius XII.

We decided to protest against his political attitude. He had a soft spot for the nazis, he had never said a word in defense of the Jews, and he did not officially acknowledge the fact that the Western Territories were now a part of Poland. [see Regained Lands] 45 So we did not go to see the pope. And it was not just us, the French delegation didn’t go either, and the Italians, too – it was an expression of protest.

There was one more interesting moment in my life – when I was leaving the Union [of Construction of Ceramic Industry and Related Professions] they wanted to send me off to Officers’ School, as a political employee of the military. But I refused.

The head of the Central Union Board, Aleksander Zawadzki, who was later the Head of the State Council [Rada Panstwa], spoke in my defense, and so I stayed on in the Union. In 1950 I moved to the Ministry of Light Industry, to the headquarters in charge of the whole ceramic industry. There I became the head of personnel and pay section. This ministry was later divided, but I stayed in my place – I was the head of my section, with responsibilities of vice-director of the department.

In the meantime, my wife learned to speak Polish beautifully. It was really important to her not to stand out, because people’s attitudes towards Russians varied a lot. She had completed a Ukrainian school, so she spoke both Russian and Ukrainian very well.

Besides, she was very hard-working, so she mastered Polish grammar, and she did exercises and she read in Polish a lot. If she came across a word she did not know, I would help her out. She was never annoyed when I corrected her mistakes, quite the opposite, she wanted to master the language as quickly as possible.

For a long time she did not work, she only had a job after 1960. We went to the Soviet Union a lot, because my wife had a huge family there. They would also come and visit us, but we went there every summer, to spend our vacation. Thanks to this, my children learned Russian perfectly.

In 1949, after my return from Rome, on 29th April, my son Wladyslaw was born, and my youngest daughter, Zofia, was born on 12th May 1953. We had three kids, so life became a bit more difficult. In any case, we had not intended to have three children, but the doctor advised my wife to have one more. So, naturally, we did not think about it too long, because nothing is more important than health, so despite all the difficulties we decided to have this third child.

We were living in Warsaw, and we had many friends, though not from Jewish circles any more – for the most part, our friends were our neighbors. In the ministry there was an engineer, his name was Szejwac, he became my superior later on. I was in charge of distribution of construction materials.

When the Palace of Culture [grandiose social-realist building in the center of Warsaw] was being built, all the materials passed through my hands. I had to prepare reports to my ministry concerning the influx of these materials. I was a highly valued employee. The minister would send me as his plenipotentiary to the cement factory Wierzbina, he even wanted to make me the director, but I said no out of consideration for my family.

I was very active and I devoted much time and energy to work for the party, which is why in 1958 they took me out of the regular party position and I began working in the Warsaw Committee of United Polish Workers’ Party [PZPR 46]. I became deputy head of the industry section, and I was very appreciated there.

Among other things, I was forced to get a telephone line at last. I did not want one, because I was constantly being asked to go to the ministry – in those days people worked like that, through the night. But once I had moved on to the PZPR, I had no choice any more, I had to say yes, and they gave me a phone line.

• Recent Years

In 1960 the opportunity came up for me to enroll in the Advanced School of Social Science at the Central Committee of the PZPR, and finally complete my degree. The argument went like this: I was constantly teaching people, I was lecturing, but I had never had a chance to finish my own education because the War had interrupted my studies in Lwow.

They were also offering a fairly high scholarship, more or less the equivalent of my last salary. These were not high earnings, anyway, but at least they did not lower our standard of living. It was a shortened course of studies.

So I was accepted right off, no questions asked. In 1964 I completed this school. They directed me to work in the Central Committee, and I became a senior instructor in the department of Planning and Finances of the Central Committee.

For two more years I worked on my dissertation, and in 1966 I had a degree in economics. So at last I had completed my education. There was an additional factor that mobilized me to work hard and get good results – the fact that my children were already quite big.

It was my ambition to show them how good a student one can be. I had always said to them that the difference between how hard you have to study for a 4 [good] and how hard you study for a 5 [excellent] is not so great, really, so you should always aim for better results. Anyway, they admired my achievements very much. I don’t want this to sound like I am boasting, but the truth is that when I completed this school, I had gathered 133 points out of the 135 point maximum.

I haven’t told you yet about the final period of my professional life. I worked in the party apparatus until 1970. In 1970, in the fall, I moved to the Headquarters of the Polish National Bank, because I was, after all, an economist. When I was still in the Central Committee I was taking care of the Investment Bank.

Later the Investment Bank was made a part of the Polish National Bank. For 11 years I worked at the Polish National Bank. Poland was a member of the International Investment Bank in Moscow, and my job was to obtain loans for investments, which then served mostly Poland, but also other countries associated in the Council of Mutual Economic Assistance [Comecon] 47. I retired, when martial law was still in place [martial law in Poland in 1981–83], at the turn of 1981 and 1982.

My older daughter, Anna, studied Russian Philology, and she completed her coursework, but she never finished her dissertation. My son graduated from the Warsaw Polytechnic, the department of Machines and Vehicles, and my daughter Zofia completed the Warsaw Agricultural University (SGGW).

She always said to me: ‘Wladek (her older brother) is gifted, so school is easier for him.’ But I always said to him: ‘But you work harder than he does, and I am sure your grades will be no worse than his.’

She completed the school with honors. She did her degree and she is an engineer. Later she completed a post-graduate study in pedagogy at Warsaw University, and now she works at the Lauder Foundation 48 school in Warsaw. She is a librarian and works with children.

I have, unfortunately, little contact with my son, we disagree with each other on many issues. I am closest with my youngest daughter, Zofia, and her children. I will leave my apartment to her, this is quite clear.

My children have always basically known about their Jewish roots, but of course at home we spoke only Polish. They were raised to be Poles of Jewish descent, this is what they felt they were. 1968 [see Ati-Zionist campaign in Poland] 49 was a huge shock for my children.

They even pressured us to emigrate to Israel, but I resisted this idea. And later things calmed down somehow. I took many of my friends, unfortunately, to the train station. My former boss, whom I have mentioned, engineer Szejwac – he left for Israel in those days, and others, too, Korentajel, many, many people. I saw them off to the station with a heavy heart and with mixed feelings, but we decided to stay here.

My son had a Polish wife, and my daughter Zofia, also, she married a Pole – Andrzej Jankowski is also a Pole.

My youngest daughter, Zofia, has two children. The older one is called Marta Jankowska, and the younger one is Andrzej Jankowski – he was given the same name as his father. They feel a bit more tied to their Jewishness. Marta studied in Israel, at the Jerusalem University [Hebrew University]  English Department.

When the Intifada came, she had this incident happen to her, which really affected her psychologically. She was attacked and beaten up by Arabs. She was not in the army due to her studies, but she has double citizenship: Israeli and Polish. And she will continue her studies in London: in English and Hebrew.

My daughter’s younger son, Andrzej, was recently on a trip to Israel, when he came back he was very enthusiastic about what he saw. Now he is at the Sociology Department at Warsaw University, an evening student. My son Wladek got married in 1975 and he has a son named Michal. And my eldest daughter, Anna, has a son named Rafal. Rafal Minc.

He is studying and working in the United States. He had a scholarship, he completed a school over there, and now he continues his studies in the USA, somewhere near New York, in New Jersey. What the direction of his studies is, I don’t exactly know.

All I know is that he is still studying. Anna works part time, for a long while she used to do translations from Russian. She is not feeling very well these days. We help her out a bit. Rafal hopes that he will be able to take her over to the States, to stay with him. The future will show how things turn out.

Let me tell you a little bit more about my first wife – Maria. From 1963 on she worked in the Information Center of the Construction Department; she was a translator, because Russian was, after all, her native language, and she was also dealing with international relations.

She was very sickly, she was ill when we were still in Walbrzych, and later, when we were in Warsaw it returned. And so, because of her poor health, she had to stop working some time around 1973. We managed somehow, I put the kids through school, and I helped her as much as I could.

My wife and I, we shared the same views on how to raise children. But to say the truth, she was the one who bore the main burden of child-rearing, because I was so very active professionally. And later she became incapable of helping out, so things were... as they were. My wife died in 1976, in November. And I was left alone. It so happens that my second wife’s name is also Zofia, and we are together till this day.

It all began when my former wife was still alive. Zofia is quite simply a good human being. She believed it was my God-given duty to take care of Maria, who was ill and needed me. Anyway, I always said that I never stopped loving her, it just happened this way, she is not to blame for being ill. It was cyclical depression, and it was best to treat it in the hospital.

So Maria was in the hospital, and I was coming to visit her almost every day, and Zofia would sit on the bench in front of the hospital and wait. 

My children would have preferred, naturally, if this was not the case. But after their mother’s death, and after they themselves had experienced some hard times in their lives, they did understand their father. And their relations with my second wife are now very warm.

Zofia was born in 1942, so she is much younger than me, a whole 22 years. She is an accountant. At the beginning, when we first met, she was working at the Polish Association of Youth Shelters, and later she had a job at the Headquarters of the Union of Polish Teachers, as the deputy of the head accountant. At present she is retired, but she does accounting for various social organizations, making some extra money that way. This is why we can afford to travel abroad – because we have the means.

Why did my daughter and my grandchildren return to the Jewish tradition... It’s very hard to explain. Because, after all, she had a Polish man. But it just so happened that she spent a lot of time among people of Jewish descent, and somehow it all came back...

Then there is this other thing: the prejudice and resentment from the past towards Jews in Poland. You can’t generalize, you can’t say that everyone is like this. Most people are tolerant. But in various circumstances we encountered such unpleasantness.

And this experience caused them to turn towards Jewishness. Zosia [Zofia] started coming to the Jewish community Center, etc. And her children? The children followed their mother. And they did this despite their father’s advice, and especially in spite of his uncle in London, who really wanted them to be Catholic.

But this did not work out, and Marta said to him: ‘This is my choice and you must respect it. If you don’t like it, then I can stop all contacts with you.’ So it really is their choice.

I am not in touch with Jewish circles. I know all about my roots and would never deny them. I never concealed them. In 1968 there was no way I could agree with the position of the top people in the party, especially Gomulka, that to feel sympathy for Israel is the same as to be a Zionist, and so on. Nor did I like what happened later – throwing people out of the party. [Gomulka Campaign] 50.

I was working in the party apparatus, and it was taking a real risk, but still, I never condemned anyone for their choices, for their wish to go to Israel. I always said: ‘This is your autonomous choice.’ It was a terrible blow to me, that all these highly valued people, highly qualified, and, for the most part, very loyal to the People’s Poland, that these people were being insulted and forced to leave.

To me this was a terrifying experience. My choice in my youth had been different: I belonged to a Zionist organization, but then I decided that I ought to be even further to the left, and so I got out of it. And their choice was different.

I did not want to leave, and I still do not. There is this old saying: ‘you can’t  uproot an old tree.’ I don’t speak the language, and I would feel like a third class citizen there – not even second, but third class. I feel strong ties to Poland. Of course, I am very much intrigued, and we have thought of going there as tourists, my wife and I. But to go there and just see Israel is not enough.

One should also see the [Palestinian] Autonomy. Nowadays, there are even trips being organized, to Israel, but without  a visit to the Autonomy. And now we are waiting till things calm down a bit, there is already a light in the tunnel.

And as for Jewish organizations in Poland – I do not participate in those. It is true that my wife has no prejudice, but despite this I do not want to be the cause of trouble for her. There might be some hidden resentment, especially in her family. So I prefer not to tempt my luck.

• Glossary

1 The Kingdom of Poland (other names: the Congress Kingdom, Congress Kingdom of Poland): founded in 1815 by a decision of the Congress of Vienna. It extended throughout the lands of the Kingdom of Warsaw with the exception of the Poznan and Bydgoszcz provinces and the city of Cracow. It had an area (until 1912) of 128,500 km2 and a population of 3.3m in 1816 and 10m in 1910.

The Kingdom of Poland was a monarchy linked by a personal union with Russia, with the tsar as king. It had a Polish Sejm (diet), government and army, but was not permitted to conduct its own foreign policy.

The constitution, though formally liberal, was systematically violated. The Kingdom of Poland was a center of the Polish liberation movement. In 1830 the November Uprising broke out; following its failure the Kingdom of Poland ceased to be a separate state and was henceforth to be an integral part of the Russian Empire.

After the January Uprising in 1863 the Kingdom was stripped of its separate identity altogether. In official documents the name ‘the Kingdom of Poland’ was replaced with the expression ‘the Country along the Vistula’. In the second half of the 19th century the country was subjected to intensive Russification.

In 1915 it was occupied by German and Austrian forces; the occupation lasted until November 1918. After 1918 the lands of the Kingdom of Poland became part of the independent Poland.

2 Social Democracy of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania (SDKPiL): workers’ party founded in 1893, active in the Kingdom of Poland and in the Bialystok region.

In 1895 it was shattered by arrests, and in 1899 rebuilt. It was a member of the 2nd Internationale (the radical wing). SDKPiL postulated the overthrow of the tsars and the introduction of a socialist system through a socialist revolution by the working class (it considered the peasantry reactionary), and offered a brotherly alliance between free peoples as the solution to the question of nationhood (it perceived no need or way to reinstate a sovereign Polish state).

During the 1905-07 revolution it initiated and organized strikes, rallies and demonstrations, and set up trade unions. During World War I it took up an anti-war stance, and in 1917 supported the revolution in Russia. The ideological leader of the SDKPiL was Rosa Luxemburg, and among the leading activists was Felix Dzierzynski. In December 1918 it fused with the left wing of the PPS (Polish Socialist Party) to form the KPRP (Communist Party of Poland).

3 1905 Russian Revolution: Erupted during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05, and was sparked off by a massacre of St. Petersburg workers taking their petitions to the Tsar (Bloody Sunday). The massacre provoked disgust and protest strikes throughout the country: between January and March 1905 over 800,000 people participated in them.

Following Russia’s defeat in its war with Japan, armed insurrections broke out in the army and the navy (the most publicized in June 1905 aboard the battleship Potemkin). In 1906 a wave of pogroms swept through Russia, directed against Jews and Armenians.

The main unrest in 1906 (involving over a million people in the cities, some 2,600 villages and virtually the entire Baltic fleet and some of the land army) was incited by the dissolution of the First State Duma in July. The dissolution of the Second State Duma in June 1907 is considered the definitive end to the revolution.

4 Poalei Zion (the Jewish Social-Democratic Workers’ Party Workers of Zion): in Yiddish ‘Yidishe Socialistish-Demokratishe Arbeiter Partei Poale Syon’. A political party formed in 1905 in the Kingdom of Poland, and operating throughout the Polish state from 1918.

The party’s main aim was to create an independent socialist Jewish state in Palestine. In the short term, Poalei Zion postulated cultural and national autonomy for the Jews in Poland, and improved labor and living conditions of Jewish hired laborers.

In 1920, during a conference in Vienna, the party split, forming the Right Poalei Zion (the Jewish Socialist Workers’ Party Workers of Zion), which became part of the Socialist Workers’ International and the World Zionist Organization, and the Left Po’alei Zion (the Jewish Social-Democratic Workers’ Party Workers of Zion), the radical minority, which sympathized with the Bolsheviks.

The Left Poalei Zion placed more emphasis on socialist postulates. Key activists: I. Schiper (Right PZ), L. Holenderski, I. Lew (Left PZ); paper: Arbeiter Welt.

Both fractions had their own youth organizations: Right PZ: Dror and Freiheit; Left PZ – Jugnt. Left PZ was weaker than Right PZ; only towards the end of the 1930s did it start to form coalitions with other socialist and Zionist parties.

In 1937 Left PZ joined the World Zionist Organization. During World War II both fractions were active in underground politics and the resistance movement in the ghettos, in particular the youth organizations.

After 1945 both parties joined the Central Jewish Committee in Poland. In 1947 they reunited to form the strongest legally active Jewish party in Poland (with 20,000 members). In 1950 Poalei Zion was dissolved by the communist authorities.

5 Bund: The short name of the General Jewish Union of Working People in Lithuania, Poland and Russia, Bund means Union in Yiddish). The Bund was a social democratic organization representing Jewish craftsmen from the Western areas of the Russian Empire. It was founded in Vilnius in 1897.

In 1906 it joined the autonomous fraction of the Russian Social Democratic Working Party and took up a Menshevist position. After the Revolution of 1917 the organization split: one part was anti-Soviet power, while the other remained in the Bolsheviks’ Russian Communist Party. In 1921 the Bund dissolved itself in the USSR, but continued to exist in other countries.

6 Mickiewicz, Adam (1798-1855): Often regarded as the greatest Polish poet. As a student he was arrested for nationalist activities by the tsarist police in 1823. In 1829 he managed to emigrate to France and worked as professor of literature at different universities.

During the 1848 revolution in France and the Crimean War he attempted to organize legions for the Polish cause. Mickiewicz’s poetry gave international stature to Polish literature. His powerful verse expressed a romantic view of the soul and the mysteries of life, often employing Polish folk themes.

7 Jewish Pale of Settlement: Certain provinces in the Russian Empire were designated for permanent Jewish residence and the Jewish population was only allowed to live in these areas. The Pale was first established by a decree by Catherine II in 1791.

The regulation was in force until the Russian Revolution of 1917, although the limits of the Pale were modified several times. The Pale stretched from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, and 94% of the total Jewish population of Russia, almost 5 million people, lived there. The overwhelming majority of the Jews lived in the towns and shtetls of the Pale.

Certain privileged groups of Jews, such as certain merchants, university graduates and craftsmen working in certain branches, were granted to live outside the borders of the Pale of Settlement permanently.

8 Keren Kayemet Leisrael (K.K.L.): Jewish National Fund (JNF) founded in 1901 at the Fifth Zionist Congress in Basel. From its inception, the JNF was charged with the task of fundraising in Jewish communities for the purpose of purchasing land in the Land of Israel to create a homeland for the Jewish people.

After 1948 the fund was used to improve and afforest the territories gained. Every Jewish family that wished to help the cause had a JNF money box, called the ‘blue box’. In Poland the JNF was active in two periods, 1919-1939 and 1945-1950. In preparing its colonization campaign, Keren Kayemet le-Israel collaborated with the Jewish Agency and Keren Hayesod.

9 Free City of Danzig: According to the Versailles Treaties the previously German Danzig was declared to be a free city under the mandate of the League of Nations in 1920; it did not belong to either Germany or Poland; however both countries had access to its port.

Danzig (and the surrounding area) had a population of approximately 367,000 people, mostly Germans; Poles made up about 10 percent of the inhabitants. The Polish government was represented in the FCD by the General Commissioner of the Republic of Poland.

Hitler’s demand (1939) for the city’s return to Germany was the principal immediate excuse for the German invasion of Poland and thus of World War II. Danzig was annexed to Germany from 1 September 1939, until its fall to the Soviet army in early 1945. The Allies returned the city to Poland, which was renamed Gdansk.

10 Chagall, Marc (1889-1985): Russian-born French painter. Since Marc Chagall survived two world wars and the Revolution of 1917 he increasingly introduced social and religious elements into his art.

11 Anti-Jewish Legislation in Poland: After World War I nationalist groupings in Poland lobbied for the introduction of the numerus clausus (Lat. closed number – a limit on the number of people admitted to the practice of a given profession or to an institution – a university, government office or association) in relation to Jews and other ethnic minorities.

The most radical groupings demanded the introduction of the numerus nullus principle, i.e. a total ban on admittance to universities and certain professions.

The numerus nullus principle was violated by the Polish constitution. The battle for its introduction continued throughout the interwar period. In practice the numerus clausus was applied informally. In 1938 it was indirectly introduced at the Bar.

12 Maccabi World Union: International Jewish sports organization whose origins go back to the end of the 19th century. A growing number of young Eastern European Jews involved in Zionism felt that one essential prerequisite of the establishment of a national home in Palestine was the improvement of the physical condition and training of ghetto youth.

In order to achieve this, gymnastics clubs were founded in many Eastern and Central European countries, which later came to be called Maccabi.

The movement soon spread to more countries in Europe and to Palestine. The World Maccabi Union was formed in 1921. In less than two decades its membership was estimated at 200,000 with branches located in most countries of Europe and in Palestine, Australia, South America, South Africa, etc.

Interjúalany: Várnai Györgyné
Készítette: Sárdi Dóra
Interjú időpontja: 2008. március
Interjúkészítés helye: Budapest, Magyarország

Az apukám, dr. Klein Ármin Bács-Kiskun megyében, Császártöltésen született 1890-ben. Orvos volt, általános orvos. Mikor elvégezte az egyetemet, jött az első világháború, ahol végig harcolt mindenütt, az orosz, az olasz fronton volt, és századosi rangú ezredorvosként szerelt le, nagyon magas kitüntetéssel. Az 1940-ben kiadott Magyar Hadviselt Zsidók Évkönyvében fényképpel is benne van, az egész nacionáléja le van írva, a kitüntetései, minden a világon.

Apai nagyapám, Klein Sámuel és a nagymamám, Krakaer Etel 1879-ben házasodtak össze, és Császártöltésen laktak. Sok korkülönbség volt köztük, a nagypapám 31 éves volt, a nagymama 19, mikor összeházasodtak. A nagyapám borkereskedő volt, és ahol laktak, a háznál volt szeszfőzde, borospince, lovak, kocsik, libák, kacsák, minden. Zsidó parasztok voltak, gazdálkodtak, állatot tartottak, igazi hagyományos paraszti életmódot éltek egy teljesen egyszerű, világítás nélküli, petróleumlámpás parasztházban. A házban volt hálószoba, volt egy ebédlő, konyha, meg volt az öt gyereknek egy szobája. A bútorok kispolgári, egyszerű bútorok voltak. Volt nekik egy paraszt cselédlány, aki kiment a kúthoz vizet hordani, meg karbantartotta a lakást, segített főzni a nagyanyámnak, ahogy régen ezek a kis háztartási alkalmazottak voltak – mit tudom én – fillérekért.

Nagyszüleimnek öt gyerekük volt, négy fiú és egy lány. A testvérek között egy év különbség volt, sorba jöttek évenként. A legidősebb fiú Klein Adolf volt. Adolf Kispesten lakott a családjával, borkereskedéssel foglalkozott, és volt két fia és két lánya: Ernő, Imre, Klári, Gizi. A felesége pedig Zsenka néni volt, de hogy mi volt az eredeti neve, fogalmam nincs. Adolf bácsi gyerekei elpusztultak Auschwitzban, a felesége is, de a bácsi túlélte a holokausztot, mert ő Ausztriába került, és végül Pécsen egy zsidó szeretetotthonban élt kilencven-nem tudom hány éves koráig.

A következő testvér volt a Jani bácsi. Ő is borkereskedő volt, és ők is Kispesten laktak. Jani bácsi felesége Gizi volt, de nem tudom, milyen Gizi. Ott egy gyerek volt, Bandi. Jani bácsi meg a Gizi néni Auschwitzban pusztultak, de ez az egy unokatestvérem Koltai Bandi néven – mert megmagyarosította a nevét – még hál’ istennek él.

A harmadik fiú Klein Dávid volt – mi Dódinak hívtuk –, Dódi bácsi. Neki Császártöltésen volt szatócsboltja, a felesége Stein Ella volt – véletlenül tudom a nevét, mert ő jánoshalmai volt. Nekik a gyerekük volt a Juci, és volt egy később született fiuk, Pista, aki kikerült a háború alatt Izraelbe és az Izraeli Hadsereg tagja lett mint pilótatiszt. Mikor Dódi bácsi, Ella néni meg Juci hazajöttek a deportálásból, kimentek a fiuk után Izraelbe. Ők is azért maradtak meg, mert Ausztriába kerültek. Az úgy volt, hogy Bácsalmáson volt a gyűjtőtábor, onnan indították a vonatot. Az egész Bács-Kiskun megyei részről ott gyűjtöttek össze mindenkit, és még elmentek Szegedre, felvették a szegedi gettóból az ott begyűjtött zsidókat is. Ausztriában kettékapcsolták a vonatot, egyik része ottmaradt, a többi ment Auschwitzba. És azok, akik Ausztriába kerültek, azok mind megmaradtak.

A következő az egy szál lánytestvér volt, Bella néném, aki Pécsre ment férjhez. A férje Frankfurter Ignác volt, egy nagyon jómódú bútorgyáros, és Ignác bácsi fiatalon, még bőven a háború előtt meghalt egy sérvműtétben, Bella néni pedig nem jött vissza a deportálásból. Itt volt két fiú, Miklós és László, akik közt nagyon sok korkülönbség volt, mert Miklós 1910-ben született, Laci pedig velem egyidős volt, 1921-es. Miklós hazajött a munkaszolgálatból, egy darabig a bútorgyárat vitte – kárpitosmester szakmája volt –, és azután csinált egy kárpitos üzemet. Nagyon sokáig a pécsi hitközség elnöke is volt, körülbelül olyan tíz éve, hogy meghalt. Hogy Laci hogy maradt meg a háborúban, azt nem tudom, de ő Érden volt körzeti orvos. Ő megmagyarosította a nevét dr. Faludi Lászlóra. Egy éve körülbelül, hogy meghalt.

A fiúkból az apukám volt az egyetlen diplomás, a többi mind a nagyapám borkereskedő mesterségét folytatta. Nagyon rosszul, mert örökké eladósodtak, állandóan elárverezték a házuktól kezdve mindent, és a pécsi nagynéném meg az apukám – akik relatíve jólszituált emberek voltak – fizette ki a váltókat utánuk, meg mindig ők vásárolták vissza a családi vagyont.

Az apukám a gimnáziumot Zomborban végezte, az egyetemet Pesten. Jánoshalmán – ami körülbelül 10 kilométerre volt Császártöltéstől – folytatott praxist. A megyének ebben a körzetében, ezekben a kis falukban nem volt sehol orvos, se Hajóson, se Császártöltésen. Jánoshalmán minden pénteken volt hetipiac, és akkor jöttek be az emberek, hozták az árut, és akkor jöttek az apukámhoz is; akkor értek rá betegnek lenni, meg orvoshoz menni. Apukámnak nagyon nagy praxisa volt, és nagyon köztiszteletben álló orvos volt, akinél nem számított, hogy a betegnek van pénze vagy nincs pénze, mert ha nem volt, akkor gyógyszerre is adott neki pénzt. Nagyon-nagy tiszteletben állt, 2006-ban a hitközség és a jánoshalmai Polgármesteri Hivatal emléktáblát is készített neki Jánoshalmán. A táblát a szegedi rabbi avatta fel a zsinagóga falán.

Az anyukám részéről az volt a helyzet, hogy a nagyapám úgy vette el a nagymamámat, Reiner Reginát, hogy két kislányt hozott a házasságba, Rózát és Ellát. Hogy nagyapám megözvegyült-e vagy elvált, ezt a részét nem tudom. A két testvér között egy év volt – nem tudom, mikor születtek –, és utána a nagyanyámnak 1894-ben született egy fia ebből a házasságból, Gábor, meg 1900-ban az anyukám, Szerén. A nagypapámat és a nagyapám részéről egyetlenegy rokont nem ismertem soha, mert amikor én visszaemlékszem, a nagypapa már nem volt. Az I. világháborúból nem jött vissza. Azt tudom, hogy osztrák származású volt, mert Goldschmied Manónak hívták. Pesten laktak, a Mozsár utca 12-ben, és hogy a nagypapám nem jött vissza, a nagyanyám itt maradt a négy gyerekkel. De ez a négy testvér úgy nőtt föl, hogy ha édestestvérek lettek volna, nem lettek volna jobb viszonyban.

Az anyukám leérettségizett, utána a Zeneakadémiára járt, elvégezte a hegedűművészi tanfolyamot, Hubay tanítvány volt [Hubay Jenő (született: Huber Jenő) Pest, 1858. szeptember 15. – Budapest, 1937. március 12., hegedűművész, zeneszerző és pedagógus. –
A szerk.], úgyhogy ő gyakorlatilag hegedűművész volt. Gyakorolta is egy darabig, de miután a nagyanyám itt maradt a négy gyerekkel, mellette az IBUSZ-nál, a békebeli, régi IBUSZ-nál [Több mint 100 éves, mára már holdinggá terebélyesedett cég. Fő profilja az idegenforgalom, a kül- és belföldi utaztatás. – A szerk..] dolgozott. Az apukámmal meg úgy jött össze, hogy egyszer a Gábor nagybátyám hazajött szabadságra az I. világháborúból és az apukám, mint katonatársa, elkísérte őt a Mozsár utcába. Mert ők együtt voltak a fronton.

Így ismerte meg anyukám az apukámat, és ebből szerelem lett. A háború után házasodtak össze, 1919-ben, és az anyukám leköltözött Jánoshalmára. Vidéki orvosfeleség lett. 1920-ban született egy első gyerek, aki halva született, és utána jöttem én, Klein Magda, 1921-ben. És anyukám egész családjában az anyukám volt az egyetlen, aki férjhez ment. A nagynénéim vénkisasszonyok maradtak, a nagybátyám meg nem nősült meg. Én voltam az egyetlen gyerek a családban, és agyon voltam kényeztetve.

Amire visszaemlékszem egész kicsi kislánykoromból, hogy akkor még nem volt meg a saját házunk, hanem egy parasztházat béreltünk, ahol se villanylámpa, semmi nem volt, ahol a kútról hordták a vizet. Oda születtem bele. Hogy ki segített a szülésnél, ezt a részét nem tudom, de Jánoshalmán születtem, abban a házban. Később aztán a belső részén Jánoshalmának, mondjuk az elitebb negyedén – mert falun úgy van, hogy a templom, a fiúiskola, és az egyebek az már a centrum – vett az apukám egy romos házat, és az már normális, mondhatnám nagypolgári módon volt berendezve. A háznak verandája volt vadszőlő lugassal, és nagy kert, amit a háztartási alkalmazottunk tartott rendben.

Anyukám nagyon jól beilleszkedett a falusi életmódba. Azért sem volt nehéz beilleszkednie, mert a jánoshalmai férfiaknak – a zsidóknak – majdnem mindegyiknek a felesége nem jánoshalmai bennszülött volt. Volt még rajta kívül pesti lány, a szomszédunknak a felesége szegedi volt, a családtagjai meg Újvidéken voltak, tehát így állandóan külföldi meg budapesti jövés-menés volt. De anyukám nagyon sokat kézimunkázott, biciklizett, hegedült. Nálunk otthon mindenféle hangszer volt, a zongorától kezdve a hegedűtől, a fuvolától a gitárig, és az apukám is minden hangszeren játszott. Ha csak megfogott egy hangszert, már gyönyörűen játszott rajta, és ha volt öt perc ideje a rendelőben, akkor rögtön előszedett valamilyen hangszert. Apukámnak gyönyörű hangja volt, és nagyon muzikális volt.

Én sokáig, nyolc évig tán eljártam zongorát tanulni, az anyukám meg a parasztokat, akik már valamilyen hangszeren játszottak, azokat tanította. De csak úgy passzióból. És szervezett egy zenekart, ami egészen 1944-ig nagyon jól prosperált. Csupa orvosok, tanító, állatorvos, ügyvéd, tisztiorvos, aki tudott zenélni, azokból állította össze, és úgy hívták a zenekart, hogy Úri dzsessz. Mind kiváló zenészek voltak, az anyukám volt a prímhegedűs, és minden szombaton este volt egy baráti összejövetelük, ahol zenéltek, a vendégek pedig táncoltak. Az egyik kocsmában egy helyiségben, nyáron meg a kerthelyiségben. Ez az összejövetel zártkörű volt, oda akárki nem jöhetett, hanem az úri társaság volt ott, a falusi notabilitások, a tanító, a patikus, szóval a jánoshalmai értelmiség. Ezért volt Úri dzsessz a zenekar neve.

Kiváló társaság volt, és kevesebb zsidó volt benne, annak dacára, hogy Jánoshalmán nagyon nagy zsidó közösség volt. Több mint száz család, és a nagy része nagyon ortodox vallásos, ahol nagyon sok gyerek volt. Anyukám családja mondjuk hagyományőrző volt, de nem volt vallásos. Anyukám nem vezetett kóser háztartást – arra nem emlékszem, hogy gyújtott-e gyertyát pénteken –, de az apukám úgy tartotta a vallást, hogy kiválóan beszélt jiddisül, héberül – svábul is, miután Jánoshalma sváb falu volt –, minden ünnepet megtartottunk, és apukám minden nagy ünnepnél ott volt a templomban. De ha jöttek érte, hogy: „Doktor úr! Rosszul van a Marcsa néni a falu végén”, akkor a templomból kijött, fölült a biciklire és elment a beteghez. Utána már, ha nem volt komolyabb baj, vagy nem volt szüléslevezetés, vagy valami, akkor visszajött a templomba és imádkozott.

Apukám minden imát kívülről tudott. Ő otthonról hozta ezt. A nagypapámék jiddisül beszéltek otthon – magyarul is, meg a nagypapám a parasztokkal svábul beszélt. Császártöltésen nem volt templom, de volt zsidó közösség, és a nagyszüleim nagyon vallásosak voltak. Nagypapának volt egy kis szakálla, kapele a fején és kalap is, a nagymamám parókás volt, kóser háztartást vezetett, szóval ortodox vallás szerint éltek. Ott pénteken megállt az élet, jött a szombat, és vasárnap reggel kezdődött újból. Azért is kellett cselédlány, aki eloltja a villanyt, elmegy a pékhez a sóletért, ami ott sül a kemencében, és hasonló ilyeneket elvégez.

Nagypapáékhoz Császártöltésre általában mi mentünk látogatóba, főleg ünnepekkor. A nagypapámék – amikorra én emlékszem – már nagyon öregek voltak, kicsi lány voltam, amikor az ötvenéves házassági évfordulójuk volt. Úgyhogy mi jártunk át Császártöltésre, eleinte még parasztkocsival meg lóval, később, amikor már úri módunk volt, és már volt saját autónk – a háború előtt, 40-ben vettünk autót –, akkor azzal.

A széder estét Jánoshalmán tartottuk, apámék legjobb barátjánál, apukám I. világháborús katonatársánál, Jungreiszéknél. Náluk voltunk minden évben a nagyünnepekkor, és olyankor minden úgy zajlott, forsriftosan, ahogy a nagykönyvben meg volt írva. Jungreisz Izidor felesége szintén pesti lány volt, aki nem Jánoshalmán ment férjhez, de a férjét kinevezték az ottani Általános Takarékpénztár igazgatójának, úgy kerültek Jánoshalmára. A feleség nagyon korán, 42 éves korban meghalt méhen kívüli terhességben. Ott maradt két kisgyerek utána, akiket az anyukámék patronáltak, meg ott maradt az I. világháborús hadirokkant férje, tehát tényleg segítségre szorultak. Nem anyagilag, hanem lelkileg, meg egyáltalán a gyerekek nevelésében.

Jánoshalmán nekem nagyon sok barátnőm volt, velem korabeliek, akik aztán mind elpusztultak Auschwitzban. Zsidók voltak, és az teljesen mindegy volt, hogy én orvosnak a lánya voltam, a másik meg egy szatócsnak, de általában zsidó gyerekekkel barátkoztunk, a keresztény gyerekekkel nem nagyon jöttünk össze. Nem azért, mert szelektáltuk, nem voltunk rosszban sem, hanem ez így jött ki.

Az elemi iskola, ahova jártam Jánoshalmán, zsidó iskola volt. Mivel novemberben születtem, nem voltam még hat éves, és nagyon nagy probléma volt, hogy az apukám szerezzen egy tisztiorvosi engedélyt, hogy bekerüljek az első elemibe. Az iskolában négy elemi egyben volt egy osztályban, és turnusokban minden nap mind a négy osztállyal foglalkozott a László tanító bácsi, az elsőtől a negyedikig. Amikor például az első elemistákkal foglalkozott, akkor mi nagyobbak addig valami feladatot kaptunk.

Nem tudom, hogy jutott eszükbe aztán a szüleimnek Budapestre iskoláztatni engem. Jánoshalmához 40 kilométerre van Kiskunhalas, ott volt a legközelebbi gimnázium. Nyilván azt akarták, hogy jobb iskolába járjak, és akkor a két legjobb iskola Budapesten volt, az Angol Kisasszonyok meg a Veres Pálné Gimnázium. Így kerültem a Veres Pálné Gimnáziumba. Az volt az elképzelés, hogy leérettségizek, utána megyek az orvosi egyetemre, és orvos leszek. Azért nem mentem reálgimnáziumba, hanem a normálisba, ahol latint tanultam, mert az kellett az orvosi egyetemen. És úgy volt, hogy majd ha kiöregszik az apukám, akkor az ő praxisát folytatom. De miután apukám 54 éves volt, amikor meghalt Auschwitzban, a kiöregedését nem tudtam megvárni.

Tízéves koromban, 1931-ben kerültem fel Budapestre, a Mozsár utca 12-be a nagyanyámhoz, anyukám édesanyjához, és tizennyolc éves koromig csak akkor voltam otthon Jánoshalmán, amíg a tavaszi, a karácsonyi, meg a nyári szünet volt. Az anyukám nagyon sokat jött föl Pestre, mert mi nagyon-nagyon jó viszonyban voltunk. Anyámat imádtam, a legjobb barátnőm volt, de az apukámat rajongásig szerettem. Az volt a legboldogabb percem kisgyerekkoromban, mikor elhívták a falu végére beteghez, és akkor biciklivel karikáztam el, hogy legalább odáig elkísérjem, és kint megvártam, amíg esetleg egy szülést lebonyolított. Borzasztó apás voltam.

A nagymamámnál nem volt férfi a házban, négyen voltunk lányok, én, a nagyanyám meg a két vénkisasszony nagynéném. Gábor nagybátyám is velünk lakott, de ő a Magyar Aszfaltútépítő Vállalatnak volt a főmérnöke, az összes magyarországi nemzetközi utakat az ő irányításával végezték, és ő tavasztól őszig, amíg az első hó nem esett le, addig kint volt a munkálatokat irányítani. Nem a pesti irodából irányított, hanem akkor még az volt a divat, hogy a főmérnök úr ott van, ahol a munka folyik. Nagybátyámnak nem volt felesége, és mindig mondtuk neki, hogy nősüljön, de akkor azt mondta: „Hogy nősüljek? Három nőhöz egy negyediket nem hozhatok ide.” Mindig gyönyörű barátnői voltak, de hát ő meg az apukám tartották el a nagyanyámat és a két féltestvért.

A Mozsár utcai lakás nagyon szép komfortos négyszobás lakás volt, volt benne egy hatalmas fürdőszoba fürdőkáddal, hengerkályhával, külön vécé is, a szobákban cserépkályha, és akkora szobák voltak, mint a Tattersall. Három méter magasak voltak, és a nagymama az egyik udvari szobát, az egyik utcai szobát meg a cselédszobát mindig kiadta. Az neki megélhetési forrás volt.

1934-ben az egész család átköltözött a Pozsonyi út 28-ba. A ház 1933-ban épült, és mi a második lakók voltunk, én elvileg tehát őslakó vagyok, mert azóta is itt élek. A lakás valójában első emeleti volt, de a háziúr – a háztulajdonos, akitől béreltük a lakást, és aki felettünk lakott – magasföldszintinek jelentette be, mert így kevesebb adót kellett fizetnie. Mert akkor nem hatemeletes a ház, hanem csak öt, tehát ez az emelet ilyen sunda-bunda lett. Akkor is volt simliskedés, akkor is volt adócsalás, nem csak manapság! A lakás fél központi fűtéses volt, a mellékhelyiségekben volt központi fűtés, és az egyik szoba sarkában volt egy gyönyörű fafűtéses cserépkályha, a hálószobát pedig rézszobának hívtuk, mert csodálatos rézbútorok voltak benne.

A gimnáziumban elég sok zsidó lány volt az osztályban. Ez nem zsidó iskola volt, az iskolával nem kellett járni zsinagógába és zsidó ünnepekkor is mentünk iskolába; aki odajárt, azok az abszolút neológ zsidókhoz tartoztak. Akkoriban kötelező volt a hittan, és akkor derült ki, hogy ki kicsoda. Minden vallásnak volt saját hittantanára, egyik transzport ment az osztályból a katolikushoz, a tiszinek az órájára, mi meg mentünk a zsidóhoz. Valami Klein nevű volt a tanár, nagyon vallásos. Az iskolában kötelezően mindig Bocskai-egyenruhát [lásd. bocskai ruha] kellett hordani, az ünnepeken fehéret, hétköznap pedig fehér és kék csíkosat, mint a matrózblúz. És sötétkék Bocskai-sapkát, sötétkék hosszú Bocskai-kabáttal, a kabáton sújtásokkal, a sapkán pedig középen a gimnázium zománcozott jelvényével. Ezt a felszerelést a Sütő utcában lehetett megvásárolni készen, az a bolt erre volt szakosodva, és két garnitúrát kellett venni, mert váltás is kellett.

Nehéz volt az iskola, sokat kellett tanulni, és komoly követelmények voltak. Három nyelven tanultunk: latin, német, francia. Ez kötelező volt. Énnekem a matematika ment nagyon jól, nyelvérzékem nem volt, de sok tantárgy volt, és annak meg kellett felelni, úgy a matematikának, mint a földrajznak. Volt egy földrajztanár, úgy hívták, hogy Geszti, ő is írta a tankönyvet, és fújnunk kellett az égtájakat, városokat, országokat! Bejött: „Papírt, ceruzkát!” – akkor elő kellett venni egy papírt, és meg volt adva egy téma, hogy a nem tudom melyik országnak a fekvése, a folyó, a városok, a főváros, minden, és azt le kellett rajzolni. Fejből! De előtte be kellett tanulni a könyvből, hogy az ember meg tudja csinálni.

Az igazgatónőnk nagyon szigorú volt, olyan igazi tipikus békebeli, háború előtti vénkisasszony, dr. Hajcs Ilona. Rettenetes rendet tartott. És mi fegyelmezettek voltunk. Ott nem lehetett fiúzni, hogy várjon az utcán, a sarkon a fiú bennünket. Mert utána raportra hívott, és jött a letolás. Egyszer az apukám eljött értem az iskolába – az apukám nagyon fiatalos volt, nagyon jól nézett ki, egy jóvágású fiú volt –, és másnap fölhívott raportra az igazgatónő, hogy hogy képzelem én ezt? Voltam 16-17 éves. Be kellett az apukámat vinni, hogy ez az apukám volt, nem egy lovag. Szóval más volt az iskolarendszer is, tiszteltük a tanárokat. Volt egy Molnár Erzsike nevű lány – főorvos-asszony lett –, és mi voltunk ketten az osztályban a legfiatalabbak, mert novemberben születtünk mind a ketten. Egymás mellett ültünk nyolc évig a padban, két kis félszeg vidéki kislány. Evvel a dr. Molnár Erzsike barátnőmmel minden héten órákig beszélgetünk, és utólag jövünk rá, hogy mennyi minden megbeszélnivalónk volt, amit most, 86 éves korban tárgyalunk ki. Mert hát elsősorban mi volt akkor? A két óra közt tíz perc szünet, és akkor ott szigorú dresszúra volt.

Az iskola után jártam a barátnőkkel teniszezni, télen korcsolyázni, jártam zongoraórára, németórára, franciaórára, mert ez kötelező volt az iskolában. Egészen fiatalkoromtól kezdve kedvencem volt a teniszezés. Jánoshalmán volt teniszpálya, és olyan játékos arány volt, hogy három fiú és én voltam az egy lány köztük. Teniszezni imádtunk és biciklizni minden mennyiségben, és nagyon szerettünk táncolni. Volt Jánoshalmán egy zsidó tánciskola, a Malvin néni, és odajártunk minden héten – hogy hányszor, már nem tudom –, de nagyon szerettünk odajárni táncolni. Meg volt beszélve, hogy ha olyan fiú kér fel, akivel nem szeretek táncolni, akkor akivel szeretek, az gyorsan lekér. Ilyen fifikás dolgok voltak.

Téli-nyári szünetekben otthon voltam Jánoshalmán, ahol nagy társadalmi élet volt, nagyon kellemes és ténylegesen egy nagyon jó értelmiségi társaság volt Jánoshalmán. És otthon minden program menetrendszerű volt. Pont a templommal szemben laktunk. Amikor tizenkettőt harangoztak, akkor kötelezően le kellett ülni ebédelni. Este, mikor hét órát harangoztak, kötelezően le kellett ülni vacsorázni.  A háztartási alkalmazott szervírozta az ebédet meg a vacsorát, amit közösen főztünk, de az anyukám irányításával. Mindig olyan háztartási alkalmazottunk volt, aki főzni is tudott. Vacsora után átmentünk a Jungreiszékhez, akinek a felesége meghalt méhen kívüli terhességben, kisétáltunk a vasútállomáshoz a Fő utcán, és megnéztük együtt 10 órakor a vonatot. Ki jött meg Pestről? Meg mit tudom én honnét. Akkor hazasétáltunk, és ezzel vége volt a napnak.

Kötelező program volt, hogy elmentünk este sétálni. Elöl mentek az öregek, utánuk meg mi, a fiatalok. Mi gyerekek nagyrészt csak a szünetben voltunk otthon, mert az egyik Szegedre járt iskolába, a másik Bajára, a harmadik Kiskunhalasra. A szünetekben összeverődtünk, és akkor ez nekünk is program volt, hogy este elmentünk sétálni. Hát nem volt más! Egy héten egyszer volt mozi, akkor mentünk a moziba. És volt a tánciskola. Meg volt egy libaúsztató. Strand. De bennünket kielégített ez a szórakozás.

Néha elmentünk az autónkkal Balatonra, Balatonkenesére, vagy apukám azzal hozta el Jánoshalmára a nagymamámat Budapestről, aki aztán több hónapig ott is maradt nálunk. Apukámnak volt ugyan rendes jogosítványa, de nem nagyon vezette az autót. Volt a házunkban lévő Hangya boltban egy segéd, aki teherautóval szállította az árut, a Miska, és autózáskor mindig a Miskát szedte elő az apukám. Ő volt a sofőr. Ha csak egy mód volt rá, apukám inkább a Miska mellett szeretett ülni. Ha mégis egyedül ment és bedöglött az autó, akkor otthagyta, beszólt az első parasztházba, hogy fogják be a kocsit és hozzák haza. És aztán Miskát küldte ki az autóért. Mondtuk az apukámnak, hogy milyen dolog az, hogy autót vezet, jól vezet, és ha valami probléma van, nem nyitja ki a motorházat, hogy megnézze? Azt mondta, hogy ő nem nyúl hozzá, mert neki a keze a kenyere, és az nem szabad hogy megsérüljön. Mindig ez volt a mottója: „Nekem a kezem a kenyerem.”

Jánoshalmán mentem a családdal együtt zsinagógába is, ott egy olyan jó társaság volt, jöttek a gyerekek is, és nagyon jól elszórakoztunk. Ott nem volt mese. De Pesten nem voltam zsinagógában. A nagyanyám abszolút nem volt vallásos, két nagynéném se, a nagybátyám se. És otthon mindég kiruháztak, mikor jöttem vissza Pestre. Meg Hanukakor is kaptam ajándékot, de a karácsonyt nem tartottuk. Rendes, hagyományos, nagyon jó vidéki életet éltünk, nagyon jó hely volt Jánoshalma, és nagyon szerettük, addig, amíg nem volt a vészkorszak.

1939-ben érettségiztem, akkor jött a következő numerus clausus [lásd. Zsidótörvények Magyarországon], és már az egyetemre nem vettek föl. Hazamentem Jánoshalmára, és azt mondta az anyukám, hogy minden úrilánynak meg kell tanulni varrni. Volt egy nagyon rendes keresztény varrónő, és odajártam szabni meg varrni tanulni. Ez nem volt kötelező, de szerettem menni, a többi lányokkal jóban voltunk, jó barátok, jó ismerősök voltak. Olyan 2-3 órát ott voltam, a többi időt meg kellett biciklizni menni, meg kellett teniszezni menni.

A varróiskolában addig voltam, amíg férjhez nem mentem. A férjemmel úgy ismerkedtünk meg 1940-ben, hogy kóser disznót vágtunk. Minden évben vágtunk. Mert az apukám két nagy földbirtoknak volt az uradalmi orvosa, a kalocsai érseké és a Rosenberg uradalomé, és nem pengőben, hanem természetben kapta az orvosi honoráriumot. Decemberben disznót vágtunk – nem az apukám vágta le, hanem hívtak egy hentest, aki levágta, rendesen, forsriftosan volt csinálva –, és olyankor az volt a szokás, hogy az összes barátot, mindenkit, nagy disznótoros vacsorára meghívnak. Az egyik orvoskolléga szólt telefonon, hogy nem tudnak átjönni, mert Pestről jön egy vendégük. Mondta nekik apuka, hogy ez mért probléma? Plusz egy személy, ahol ennyi ember van vacsorára meghívva?! Hát a férjem volt az a plusz egy személy, akivel percek alatt jó beszédes viszonyba kerültünk. Akkor olyan rettenetes nagy tél volt és olyan hóesés, hogy hetekig nem mentek a vonatok. Szegény férjemnek ez lett a veszte. Ott ragadt nálunk.

A férjem Weizenfeld György – Várnaira lett magyarosítva – 1908-ban született, tizenhárom évvel volt nálam idősebb. Az apósom, Weizenfeld Jakab eredetileg jánoshalmai származású volt, és miskolci lányt vett feleségül, Weisz Irmát. Apósomnak nagy textil és konfekció áruháza volt Miskolcon, úgyhogy ők Miskolcon éltek. Hat gyerekük volt, és a sors különös kegyéből öt gyerek hazajött a háború után. Az apósom, az anyósom, meg Magdi lányuk Auschwitzban maradt a kisfiával, de a többiek átvészelték. A legidősebb lány Olga volt – ő a háború után kiment Ausztráliába –, volt még a Pál – ő megmagyarosíttatta a nevét Vári Pálra –, volt még a Pista, és volt a Teréz. Ezek voltak a férjem testvérei.

Nekem – aki a Goldschmied családban, anyám részéről egy darab gyerek voltam – furcsa volt egy ilyen nagy családba bekerülni, ahol hat gyerek volt, a hat gyereknek férje, felesége, gyerekei, és rettenetesen összetartottak a testvérek. Az anyósom egy határtalanul intelligens, igazi dáma volt. Megkövetelte, hogy minden este vacsora után, aki testvérek Miskolcon laktak, unokástul, férjestül, feleségestül összeüljenek. Ha nem volt ott senki idegen, akkor is voltak vagy tizenöten, és anyósoméknak akkora ebédlőjük volt, mint a Tattersall.

A szüleim nagyon szerették a férjem, de voltak olyanok, akik megjegyzést tettek – hát akkor volt a férjem 32 éves –, hogy: „Doktor úr! Az egy szem lányát egy ilyen öregemberhez adja férjhez?” 1941-ben házasodtunk össze. Először polgári esküvőnk volt, és amikor mentünk a községházára, akkor tankok között mentünk, mert akkor kapcsolták vissza Délvidéket, elözönlöttek bennünket a menekültek, a katonaság meg ott állt hadisorrendben a tankokkal. Az egész jánoshalmai csendőrséget, akik mind az apukám betegei voltak, lecserélték, és délvidékieket tettek helyettük. Akkor már tudtuk, hogy nagy baj van. Hát már bőven ment a háború.

A polgári esküvő után forsriftos ortodoxesküvőm is volt, nem is volt téma, hogy ne legyen egyházi esküvő! De nem vallási okok miatt volt, hanem azért, mert Jánoshalma az ortodox egyházközséghez tartozott. Részemre furcsa volt. Nálunk, az egyik szobában volt felállítva a hüpe, én az egyik szobában voltam leültetve a sarokban egy fotelba, letakarva, bádekkolva – azt sose fogom elfelejteni! – és mellettem gyertya. Úgy ültem ott, mint akit felravataloztak. Egyik szobában voltak a nők, másik szobában a férfiak, és ott imádkozott a Lorgyán bácsi, a kántor (Jánoshalmán ő volt a sakter is), meg a pap. A férjem egyszerre megunta ezt, bejött hozzám, odaült a fotel karfájára és átölelt. Észrevette a Lorgyán bácsi, a kántor. Rettenetes vallásos volt! Az aztán az ortodoxoknál is ortodoxabb volt, és bekiabált: „Nem jön ki rögtön?! Eltréflizi a menyasszonyt.” Végigröhögtem az egész esküvőnket. Mikor a hüpe alatt álltunk, ott is. A férjem megbökött, azt mondja: „Sírsz vagy nevetsz?” Hát végigröhögtük az egész esküvőt. Úgyhogy el lettem tréflizve.

Utána nagy fogadás volt. Az egyik szobában volt a kóser koszt az ortodoxoknak, a másikban a nem olyan vallásosaknak, a neológoknak. Ebéd után mi sarkon fordultunk és elutaztunk. Följöttünk Pestre. Ez volt 1941. április 27-én. A férjem, annak dacára, hogy miskolci volt, Pesten lakott, a Dohány utca 20-ban volt konfekcióüzemük a bátyjával. Egy egész emelet, és ott volt a férjemnek lakása is. Azután megvártuk, amíg felépül a Kresz Géza 38-ban egy új ház, és akkor ott lett a lakásunk. Egy három szoba hallos, nagyon szép lakás.

A férjemmel olyan jól voltunk egymással és olyan nagy szerelem volt, hogy tényleg egymásnak éltünk. Nagy társadalmi életet éltünk, jól éltünk, nem volt anyagi problémánk, semmi a világon. Amikor eszembe jutott, akkor fölültem a vonatra, elmentem haza Jánoshalmára. Amikor megérkeztem, kérdeztem a házvezetőnket, a Mariskát: „Hol vannak az anyukámék?” Azt mondja: „Lakodalomban vannak, parasztlakodalomban.” Mondom: „Melyik kocsmában?” Mentem utánuk. És a férjem jött utánam hétvégén.

1942-ben meghalt Róza nagynéném vesezsugorban, és nem sokkal utána meghalt az anyai nagyanyám is. Nagyanyám 88 éves volt ekkor. Nem is volt beteg, fájt ugyan a lába, de azonkívül semmi baja nem volt, de a nagynéném halála után teljesen összeroppant. Úgy szerette a nagynénéimet, mintha az édes gyerekei lettek volna. Szegény kiment a vécére, sokáig nem jött ki, és akkor mondtam az Ella nagynénémnek: „Mit csinál az ómama ilyen sokáig?” Ott halt meg, egy perc alatt. 42-ben halt meg az apai nagyapám is, és 42-ben behívták apukámat is, mert mindig behívták, mikor volt valami rumli. Kelebiára vonult be, akkor már munkaszolgálatra, egyenruhában, de aztán leszerelt egy bizonyos idő után.

Apukámnak az volt a személy szerinti kívánsága, hogy amikor a fiam születik, ragaszkodik ahhoz, hogy Budapestről hazamenjek szülni. Mintha érezte volna, hogy nem sokáig lesz az unokájával. Mert János 1943. januárban született, és 1944-ben az anyukámékat elvitték. Jánost úgy hordtam ki, hogy még a kilencedik hónapban bicikliztem. Kutya bajom nem volt, és hazautaztam szülni. Kiskunhalason volt az apukám egyik kollegájának magánszanatóriuma, autónk volt, hogy ha ne adj’ isten valami komplikáció közbejön, meg az egyik orvos barát vezette le a szülést. Apukám ragaszkodott hozzá, hogy otthon szüljek. Most olyan nagy cirkuszt csinálnak az otthonszülésből! Hát falun hol szültek a parasztok? Még utána fölkeltek, kitakarították a lakást, fölhúzták a tiszta ágyat, aztán lefeküdtek a gyerekágyba. A másik két gyerekem a Fasor Szanatóriumban született, úri módon, nagyon előkelő körülmények között, és nem maradtak meg.

A fiam is mikor megszületett teljesen élettelen volt. Akkor – soha nem fogom elfelejteni – engem otthagytak, és egyszeriben nagyon elkezdett kapkodni a két orvos meg a bábaasszony a gyerek körül. János azóta se kapott annyi injekciót, mint akkor. Mert nagyon nehéz szülés volt, nagy is volt a gyerek. Az én testalkatomhoz egy 3 kiló 80 dekás gyerek…! Nem volt könnyű dolog. És egyszerre a hideg vízre fölsírt. Akkor láttam az apukámat életemben először sírni. Azt mondta: „Tudod, ha Pesten született volna ez a gyerek, nem maradt volna életben.” Borzasztóan szerette a fiamat!

A nyolcadik napon forsriftosan, ahogy kell, megvolt a körülmetélés. Azt mondta az apukám, hogy ha semmi másért nem, de higiéniai okból ragaszkodik hozzá. A fiamnak apukám adta a zsidó nevét, de nem emlékszem rá. A sajátomat sem tudom, a fiamét sem, pedig nagyon nagy keresztelője volt, forsriftos zsidó keresztelője, körülmetéléssel, mindennel, ahogy az a nagykönyvben meg volt írva. Jánoshalma ortodox egyházkerület volt, úgyhogy rendes ortodox keresztelője volt.

Hat hétig otthon voltam, akkor az anyukám följött velünk Pestre. De nem volt probléma semmi, mert minden olyan gördülékenyen ment. Gyuri dolgozott a konfekcióüzemében, a Dohány utca 20-ban, én meg otthon voltam a gyerekkel. Aztán mikor bejöttek a németek, apukám telefonált, hogy azonnal gyertek haza, mert itt jó helyen lesztek. Anyukám éppen itt volt véletlenül Pesten, összepakoltunk, és hazamentünk. Gyuri is jött. Két vagy három hétig voltunk otthon, amikor jöttek a délvidéki csendőrök, hogy aki nem jánoshalmai lakó, 24 órán belül el kellett hagynia azt. Akkor már Jánoshalmán kellett sárga csillagot viselni.

Apukám nem engedte a gyereket felhozni Pestre, mert már akkor tudtuk, hogy embereket leszednek a vonatról. Azt mondta, hogy nem lehet tudni, nem fognak-e bennünket is levenni. Akkor még Auschwitzról nem tudtunk. Azt tudtuk, hogy embereket összeszednek, meg leszednek a járművekről, de azt, hogy utána vagonírozzák és elviszik őket, ezt még nem tudtuk. Azt mondta az apukám: „A gyerek itt jó helyen lesz. Ti menjetek haza szépen!”

Szerencsésen fölértünk Pestre Gyurival, és hamarosan jött a telefon, hogy elviszik apukámékat. Nálunk Jánoshalmán már leszerelték a telefont, be kellett szolgáltatni a rádiót is, de szerencse volt, hogy a házunkban volt egy Hangya. A Hangya országosan elterjedt üzlethálózat volt, olyan, mint ma mondjuk a CBA. Vegyeskereskedés, ahol mindenféle háztartási gépeket, kerti szerszámokat, cukrot, mindenfélét lehetett kapni, egy falusi bolt volt. Ott volt telefon, nagyon rendes volt a vezető, avval nagyon jóban voltunk, és azok megengedték, hogy apukámék telefonáljanak. Én nem hívhattam őket, mert a lakásból nem jöhettek ki. De viszont az a kertrész, ahol a rendelő is volt, az még a mi részünk volt a házban, és ott át lehetett menni a Hangyába hátulról. Nem kellett kimenni az utcára. Onnan felhívtak minket, úgy tudtunk valamennyire kapcsolatot tartani egymással.

Feltelefonáltak anyukámék, hogy visznek minket, mi legyen? Pár napig a levegőben lógott, hogy hátha mégis maradhatnak, de aztán egyik percről a másikra összepakolták, és elvitték őket is, meg a gyereket is. Apukám az utolsó levelében, május 12-én tökéletesen leírta, hogy hogy zajlik az egész procedúra, hogy mindent leltárba vesznek, és semmiről nem adnak papírt. Leírta, hogy egész éjjel az egyik orvos-házaspárral volt, mert öngyilkosok lettek. A nagybátyámnak írta, mert azt írta, hogy nem akarta nekem írni, nem akar nekem szomorúságot okozni. „Az Úristen velünk lesz és nem hagy el bennünket és nem fogja hagyni már sokáig tűrni százezrek szenvedését.” Ez volt az utolsó levél, amit otthonról, Jánoshalmáról írtak.

Az apukámat nem vitték volna el, mert ő kivételezett volt mint első világháborús, magasan kitüntetett ezredorvos, de az anyukámat viszont nem akarták otthagyni. Azt mondták, hogy rá nem vonatkozik a kivételezettség. Akkor azt mondta az apukám, hogyha az anyukámat elviszik, ő nem marad ott. Könyörögtem neki: „Gyertek fel ide hozzánk! Vedd föl a katonai uniformisodat, üljetek föl a vonatra, mert egy ezredorvost nem fognak leszedni ezek a nyikhaj nyilasok…!” Nem. Mert ő olyan optimista volt. Akkor még nagyon reménykedett, hogy őmellette kiáll az egész falu, és nem fogják elvinni. Az az igazság, hogy tényleg még a Turul Szövetség [lásd. Turul Szövetség] is kiállt mellette, márpedig az aztán igazán elég sötét, nyilas bagázs volt. De az anyukámat mindenáron vinni akarták. Szegény anyám! Az is volt a vesztük, hogy olyan rettenetesen optimisták voltak.

Bácsalmásra kerültek gettóba, és az apukám ott a gettókórházban dolgozott, az anyukám meg az irodában volt. Úgy tudott nekünk írógépen levelet írni. És pár nap múlva egy éjszaka apukámat kvázi elhívták egy beteghez ott a gettókórházon belül, és akkor a volt háztartási alkalmazottunk egy pokrócba bebugyolálva kilopta a gyereket a gettóból, és fölhozta Pestre, a Pozsonyi útra.

Ezt írta az anyukám a gettóból: „Az idő kellemesen telik, de azért már jó lenne tudni, meddig fog tartani ez a nyaralási akció.” Ezt írta 1944. május 23-án. Azután apukámat a gettóban félholtra verték. Szerintem valaki feljelentette. Lehet, hogy a volt házvezetőnőnk, ezt nem merném ráfogni, nem merem meggyanúsítani, de ő tudta, hogy mit hova ástunk el, mit hova tettünk. Akkor raktunk el mindent, mikor otthon voltunk, március közepe fele. Mert akkor már tudtuk, hogy be kellett szolgáltatni a rádióktól kezdve mindenfélét. Hát persze hogy az ember mentette, amilye volt. Azt hittük, hogy egyszer majd vége lesz, és akkor majd lesz miből kezdeni.

Miután az apukám fogorvos is volt, rengeteg fogarany volt otthon, meg hazavittük Jánoshalmára az ékszereinket, és az anyukámnak nagymamám után volt nagyon sok családi ékszere, meg személyes ékszerek, amit az apukámtól kapott. A rendelő nagy ablakának ki lett véve oldalt a kerete, és oda rejtettük el. A rendelőben voltak nagy sterilizátorok – akkor még másfajta volt a rendelő, mint most – és abba lettek eldugva az ezüst evőeszközök. Volt ilyen sterilizátorunk több is, apukámék a kertben fölástak egy nagy részt, és ott lettek elásva. Olyan volt, mint egy temetés. És ezt nem tudta más, csak a házvezetőnőnk. Mert kellett, hogy ásni segítsen. A jánoshalmaiak szerint ő jelentett föl minket. Ez vagy igaz, vagy nem, nem tudom. De egy percig nem jutott eszembe, hogy bármit ellene tettem volna. Ő annál nagyobbat nem tehetett, mint azt, hogy a gyereket megmentette. Akkor már kijárási tilalom volt, de ő, a keresztény, hozta a karján, bebugyolálva egy pokrócba. Én csak hálával tartozom, hogy a gyereket megmentette.

Az apukámat félholtra verték, kiverték belőle, hogy mit hova tett. Azt írta az utolsó levelében: „Még többet is mondtam, mint amennyi van, csakhogy a verést abbahagyják.” Apukámat elvitték a bácsalmási gettóból Jánoshalmára, és a rendelőablaknak kiemelték a tokját. Megtaláltak mindent. A háború után hetekig jártunk a férjemmel a Széchenyi Könyvtárba megkeresni azt a 44-es újságot, amiben benne volt, hogy „Elrejtett zsidó vagyont találtak”, doktor Klein Ármin jánoshalmai lakos elrejtett zsidó vagyona. Több mint 200 000 pengő értékű arany és ezüst ékszert találtak. Megvan az az újságom, 44. július 16-i Pesti Hírlap, de minden nyilas újság megírta. És az összes nyilas újságot, minden dokumentumot, ami a jánoshalmai deportálásról volt, mindent elvittem magammal a gettóba, hogy majd egyszer jó lesz. Nem tudom, mért voltam ilyen optimista. Persze az égvilágon mindent elvitt a bomba. Mindent.

Azután mindkettőjüket elvitték Auschwitzba, apukámat meg berakták egy orvos-századba, és abból az orvos-századból egyetlenegy ember nem jött vissza. Egy se! Volt egy unokanővérem, szintén jánoshalmai, és ő mesélte, hogy eleinte még egy-kétszer küldött az apukám Auschwitzba anyukámnak üzenetet, utána eltűntek. Az orvosokat nem szerették 44-ben. Pusztavámon egy halom orvost gyilkoltak meg, volt köztük jánoshalmai is. Ez egy sötét ügy.

A férjem nemsokára elment munkaszolgálatra. Őt előtte is behívták, csak mindig sikerült neki valahogy hazajönni többször is. De utoljára először Tardonára vitték, ahol egy munkaszolgálatos gyűjtőtábor volt, onnan aztán egész az osztrák határig, és végig ott voltak. Tardonán még együtt volt Pista bátyjával, meg a sógornőmnek a férjével, meg annak a testvérével, meg Pali testvére is velük volt, aztán valahogy szétszórták őket. A férjeméknek nem tudom, mit kellett dolgozniuk, hogy mit csináltak, de mindig hurcolták őket jobbra-balra. Volt, akivel jóban lett a munkaszolgálatban, és egy kvázi alakulatot képeztek maguknak. Vigyáztak, hogy mindig együtt maradhasson ez a társaság és igyekeztek megszökni mindig, de mindig elkapták őket. Az volt róla az utolsó hírem – mert valamelyik munkaszolgálatosnak sikerült megszökni, hazajönni, és azzal üzent a férjem –, hogy elfogták és halálra ítélték őket, mint szökött munkaszolgálatosokat.

Nekem a Kresz Géza utcai lakást június 16. körül el kellett hagynom, mert az nem volt csillagos ház. Szerencsém volt, hogy a Pozsonyi úti ház, ahol Gábor nagybátyám és Ella nagynéném maradt, csillagos ház volt. A Dohány utca 20-ban egy nagyon rendes stróman volt, és a bútorainkat odavittük, mert Pozsonyi úti lakás egy berendezett polgári lakás volt. Akkor én átköltöztem a kisfiammal a Pozsonyi út 28-ba, és október 15-ig olyan extra bajunk nem volt, egész jól elvoltam. Délelőtt volt egy óra kijárási lehetőség és délután volt 4-től 5-ig kijárás, de sárga csillaggal. Én általában nem nagyon tartottam be a szabályokat, mert levettem a csillagot, nagyon előkelően fölöltöztem és többször is elmentem. Elmentem csavarogni, ezt venni, meg azt venni, meg amihez hozzá lehetett jutni. Élelmet kellett szerezni! Itt voltam a nagynénémmel, Ellával és a pici gyerekkel, a gyereknek enni kellett adni. Egy volt a cél, hogy a gyerek ne haljon éhen.

Eleinte csak mi laktunk a Pozsonyi úti lakásban, de már a proklamáció[lásd. Horthy proklamáció] előtt ezeket a csillagos házakat feltöltötték, beköltöztettek embereket. Körülbelül olyan hatvan ember lett ebben a lakásban. Akkor én kivittem a gyerekágyat a cselédszobába, és a nagynéném, én és a gyerek a cselédszobában voltunk, ahol csak a gyerekágy fért el, a nagynéném meg én a földön aludtunk. Mert azt mondtam, hogy a gyereknek a nyugalmához ragaszkodom. És mondtam, hogy a lakásba meg annyi ember jöjjön, amennyi csak befér. A szobákban a bútorokat egymás tetejére raktuk, a hálószobából a gyönyörű rézbútorokat kiraktuk a ház udvarára, hogy üres legyen a szoba, és minél több ember férjen el. És mikor a Horthy-proklamáció lezajlott, akkor mindannyian mentünk az utcára. A házban a hatodikon volt egy keresztény tanár, nála halottuk a proklamációt. És volt egy vezérezredes, aki a Radnóti utcában lakott – akkor még Sziget utca volt –, aki meglépett, nagyon rendes pali volt, és az rohangászott az utcán és kiabálta, hogy mindenki vegye le azonnal a házakról a sárga csillagot! Hát mindannyian mint az őrültek rohantunk ki, boldogok voltunk. És mire levettük a sárga csillagot, akkor egyszerre jött a fönti lakó, hogy nyilasuralom van. A szemben lévő házba bevonultak a nyilasok. Ott volt a Nyilas Ház.[lásd. nyilasház]

Az első öt percben elvittek innen a Népszínház utcai Nyilas Házba pár velem-korabeli embert, és két napig voltunk ott. A nagynéném nem akarta engedni, hogy a gyereket is vigyem magammal. Fölöltöztem elegánsan, magas sarkú cipő, kalap, minthogyha az Operaházba mentem volna. A nagynéném – szegény! – a haját tépte: „Meg vagy te bolondulva, hogy így öltözöl fel!” Mondtam: „Idefigyelj! Nem tudom, hova visznek a nyilasok, de a gyerek nélkül én egy lépést nem megyek!” Bepakoltam egy kis bőröndbe a gyerek cuccait, meg pelenkát, hát még nem töltötte be a két évét se! És akkor elvittek egy istentelen nagy hodály házba, egy óriási raktárba. Jaj, az szörnyű volt!

Rögtön elvették a bőröndöt, a gyerekholmival, mindennel együtt. Szörnyű volt, ahogy ültünk a földön a hidegben, a gyerek az ölemben, és hemzsegtek a poloskák! Másnap éjjel a Köztársaság térre (akkor Tisza Kálmán tér) összetoborozták, akiket a Népszínház utcában meg a környékből összeszedtek, sorba állítottak, és elindítottak valahova. Én úgy mentem, hogy ment a sor, és én mindig egy kicsit hátrább mentem a gyerekkel. Amikor már egész hátul voltam, az egyik utcába bekanyarodott a sor, én meg ott megálltam. És a nyilasok nem vették észre! Elegánsan föl voltam öltözve, hát egy dámát nem fognak meggyanúsítani, hogy az egy csillagos zsidó! Gyerek a karomon, a sárga csillag eltakarva, megálltam, és úgy sikerült meglépnem. A Népszínház utcából éjjel jöttem a gyerekkel haza, aki világi jó gyerek volt, és végig csöndben maradt.

Kijárási tilalom volt, üres volt a város. Egész békésen jöttem a Nyugati-pályaudvarig, amikor egy nyilas leszólított: „Nem tudja, hogy kijárási tilalom van?” Mondom: „Most jöttem, romániai menekült vagyok.” Azt mondja: „Hova megy?” Mondom: „Pozsonyi útra.” „Akkor elkísérem magát.” El is kísért. A Pozsonyi út 26. szerencsére nem volt csillagos ház, és ott egy nagyon rendes házmester néni volt. Becsöngettem a Knausz néninek. Mondom: „Knausz néni! Tessék szíves lenni beengedni!” Ő tudta, hogy mi van, azt is tudta, hogy a mellette lévő ház csillagos ház. Beengedett, és mondtam neki: „A gyereket tessék fogni, én átmászok a két ház közti kerítésen, és azután a gyereket tessék ideadni!”

Akkor már nem lehetett kiszökdösni. Volt kapuőrség, mert a csillagos házban be kellett a kaput zárni, nem lehetett kimenni. Meghatározott időben lehetett kijárni, ki volt írva, hogy mikor. Elméletben. Gyakorlatban időközönként az ember ki-kiszökött, de nagyon kellett vigyázni, mert az utcán sem volt biztonságban, hogy nem igazoltatják. Reggel, délben, éjjel, nappal, folyton jöttek a nyilas suhancok. És mindig valakit elkaptak és elvittek.

Ételt csak szerezni lehetett. És aranyosak voltak, mert azért a zsidók is meglopták egymást. De az étel nekünk nem volt probléma, mert még mielőtt az anyukámék a gettóba kerültek, nem sokkal előbb vágtak disznót és egy csomó kaját fölküldtek a háztartási alkalmazottunkkal, aki mivel keresztény volt, szabadon mozgott, ezért jött hozzánk többször is. Töménytelen kaját felküldött az anyukám, így rengeteg ennivalónk volt, aki ott volt a lakásunkban, az mind abból evett. Kolbász, sonka, minden, olyan sok volt, hogy a spejzom tele volt. Amikor bevittek minket a gettóba, akkor a gyerek mély babakocsija csordultig tele volt ennivalóval, letakartuk és annak a tetejére raktuk a gyereket.

A Pozsonyi úti lakásban a nagynéném volt a főzőmindenes, én akkor még nem nagyon tudtam főzni. Sárgaborsó volt, ha krumplit kaptunk, akkor krumpli volt, tejet nem is tudom, hogy hogy szereztünk. Már erre nem emlékszem, hogy hogy volt. De én nagyon sokszor mentem. Üzletek még voltak, ami nem zsidó üzlet volt, és az ember igyekezett, akkor még voltak az üzletekben tartalékok. Volt egy sparhelt, amin főztük, amit főztünk, latyakokat, majdnem vizet ettünk vízzel, szegény János fiam mindig mondta: „Giros kenyeret akarok!” Hol volt akkor zsíros kenyér?

A házunkban lakott egy fűszer- és gyarmatáru nagykereskedő, rajta keresztül kaptunk svájci Schutzpasst. [ lásd. svájci diplomaták embermentő tevékenysége] Mert ő felajánlotta a Svájci Követségnek meg az „Üvegháznak”[lásd. üvegház] az egész raktárkészletét – amit a nyilasok nem fedeztek föl! –, és annak fejében kaptunk legális svájci Schutzpasszokat. Le voltak pecsételve, hivatalosan rajtuk volt a Svájci Követség pecsétje, csak nem írtak rá neveket. Éjjel-nappal mást se csináltunk, mint a svájci Schutzpasszokat állítottuk ki névre. De éjjel-nappal! Mindenkinek szóltunk. A lakásban mindenki kapott, még aki becsöngetett a szomszéd házakból, az is. Elterjedt, hogy a Pozsonyi út 28-ban a Harsányi Gyula meg a Magda állítják ki a Schutzpasszokat.

Volt egy nagyon rendes pap, aki járta a csillagos házakat, hozott ennivalókat, meg ha kellett valakinek üzenetet vinni egy másik csillagos házba, akkor elvitte, és én nagyon összebarátkoztam vele. Mindig azt mondta, hogy soha ne kérdezzük tőle, hogy hogy hívják, kicsoda, micsoda, semmit ne kérdezzünk, csak annyit tudjunk, hogy Tamás atya. Ő szerzett pápai menlevelet [1944. nov. 12.-1945. jan. 16.: fővárosi és újpesti épületek, amelyekben a zsidó lakókat pápai menlevél védte a hatósági zaklatásoktól. - Az igénylők a pápai követségtől beutalókat, azután az ideiglenes lakásirodától (Pozsonyi u. 20. sz.) lakásigazolást kaptak, hogy melyik házban szállásolják el őket. A házak parancsnokai minden változást kötelesek voltak a nunciatúrának jelenteni. A ~ a zsidóknak a pesti gettóba telepítése befejezésekor (1944. XII. 2.) már 3 hete léteztek. Újpesten 12, Bpen 4, össz. 16 önálló ház, ahová oltalomlevéllel (amihez a hatóság ragaszkodott) be lehetett menni. Ezek: Pozsonyi út 20 (230 férőhely, 297 személy), Pozsonyi út 24 (195 férőhely, 317 személy, 16 fő lakott a kapu alatt) Pozsonyi út 30 (166 férőhely, 324 személy), Légrády u. 48/a (156 férőhely, 330 személy), Wahrmann u. 28. (220 férőhely, 262 személy), Wahrmann u. 29. (152 személy), Wahrmann u. 36. (62 férőhely, 129 személy, 4 fő a lépcsőházban), Phőnix u. 14. (109 férőhely, 114 személy), Sziget u. 19/b. (137 férőhely, ?), Sziget u. 25. (270 férőhely, 154 személy, 150 főt elhurcoltak), Pannónia u. 54. (180 férőhely, 124 személy, 54 főt elhurcoltak), Pannónia u. 56. (? férőhely, 130 személy); a 12 újpesti védett házban kb. 3000 személy tartózkodott. X. 30: az előzetes terv szerint 2500 fő kaphatott volna menlevelet, de 1944. XI: kb. 15.000 p. „menleveles” élt Bpen az engedélyezett 2500 helyett (a svájci követség 7800, a svéd kb. 5000, a portugál 698, a sp. 300 főt védett). A területenkívüliséget az SS-katonák nem méltányolták, ezért a 16 házból csak 12 maradt mindvégig védve. Az elhurcoltak visszahozatalára Bp-Hegyeshalom között a zsidó Újvári Sándor (1904-88) kv-kiadó pápai menlevéllel mentőszolgálatot szervezett, ebbe kapcsolódott be Zsarnay Kálmán főispán és neje. A nunciatúra házában 200 személyt rejtegettek., úgyhogy volt az is. – A szerk..] Rettenetes sokat segített, amit tudott, még a gettóba is bejött egyszer utánunk. Aztán a végén kiderült, hogy dr. Kis György, egy zsidóból lett jezsuita pap, a családjának egy része Auschwitzban elpusztult és a végén neki is bujkálni kellett. De ez csak a háború után derült ki.

Körülbelül olyan október végén jöttek a nyilasok. Hiába mutattuk a Schutzpasszot, mindent itt kellett hagyni, és elvittek minket a Hollán utca és Gergely Győző utcai házba, egy csillagos házba. De hogy milyen elgondolás alapján, nem tudom. Ott voltunk két napig, és két nap múlva azt mondták, menjünk haza. De hogy mért, ezt a Jóisten tudja. Csak.

Azután novemberben kaptam a Sütő utca 2-be hadiüzemi behívót, egy varróüzembe, kényszermunkára. Itthonról kellett bejárni, minden reggel jött értünk a nyilas. A szomszéd lakásban lakott egy nagyon helyes lány, ilyen korú, mint én, a 4. emeleten az egyik lakótársunknak a húga, aki ideköltözött, meg fönn az 5. emeleten annak a Harsányinak a sógornője, akivel a Schutzpasszt csináltuk, és aki szintén ideköltözött. Négyünkért jöttek minden reggel öt órakor, és be kellett menni a Sütő utca 2-be. A németeknek volt ott a hadiüzeme, varróüzem, katonai ruhákat kellett varrni. Töménytelen gép volt ott, amivel varrtuk ezeket a katonai vackokat.

Már körülbelül három hete jártunk oda, és amikor láttam, hogy nagyon sok nőt, embert összetoboroznak ott, akkor mondtam a lányoknak: „Idefigyeljetek! Én oda többet nem megyek, mert ha a németek ennyi embert összegyűjtöttek, el fognak bennünket vinni.” Nem hittek nekem. Nem tudtunk Auschwitzról semmit, csak azt tudtuk, hogy embereket összeszednek, elvisznek, de hova teszik, nem tudtuk. Másnap fél ötkor fölmentem a lányokhoz és – én nem vagyok sírós – sírva, zokogva könyörögtem nekik, hogy ne menjünk el. „Ne menjetek be!” – mondtam – „Én nem megyek.” Elmentek. Mi lett az eredmény? Nem jöttek soha többé haza, elvitték őket Dachauba. A németek a gépekkel együtt az embereket is felpakolták és elvitték. Egyetlenegy jött vissza, akinek később a papája szedett ki engem a romok alól a gettóban.

Közben a Pista sógorom valahogy valahonnan meglépett egy munkaszolgálatos barátjával, akit idehozott magával. A konyhaszekrényt odatoltuk az ablak elé, vagy az ajtó elé, hogy ne lássanak be, és mögébújtattuk őket. Volt egy nagyon rendes barátunk a Kresz Géza 38-ban, a szomszédunk, aki a fővárosnál dolgozott, városi főtanácsos volt. Nagyon sokszor hozott ennivalót, vajat meg tejet, meg mindenfélét. Ekkor is eljött és hamis papírokkal elvitte a sógoromat a Dohány utca 20-ba, a családjához. Úgyhogy a sógorom ott vészelte át.

Gábor nagybátyám, amikor elvitték anyukámékat, ő még dolgozott valahol, ahol utat építettek. Apukám azt írta neki az utolsó levelében, hogy ameddig csak lehet, dolgozzon. „Inkább te fizess nekik, csak dolgozhass!” De amikor a nagybátyám hazajött, behívták sáncmunkára. Akkor valahogy, nem tudom honnan, kerítettünk egy keretlegényt, aki pénzért hazahozta a nagybátyámat 1944. december elején. És akkor nagyon boldogok voltunk, hogy jaj, de jó, együtt van a család.

Naponta háromszor jöttek hol a nyilasok, hol a rendőrök – a rendőrök rendesek voltak. Karácsony előtt aztán jöttek a nyilasok és összeszedték a fiatalokat meg az időseket és vitték a Duna-partra. Lakott nálunk egy fiatalember, aki, amikor a nyilasok lőttek, beugrott a Dunába. Ott volt hajnalig, és mikor nem volt már senki, akkor egy zsákot magára húzott, úgy jött haza. Ő mesélte, hogy mi történt, hogy az embereket a Dunába lőtték. Énnekem az volt a szerencsém, hogy nem volt már akkor villanyvilágítás. A nyilasok bementek a szobába, a hátuk mögött a sötétben felosontam a 6. emeletre, és az a keresztény tanár elbújtatott. A nagynéném meg ott volt a lakásban, a karján a gyerekkel, de a nagynénémet nem bántották. Javarészt fiatalokat szedtek össze, de nem tudom, szegény Hűvös bácsi mért volt az útjukban a 80 nem tudom hány évével, de azt is elvitték.

Minden hajnalban mentünk a Váci úti kenyérgyárba, avval a keresztény emberrel, aki egy nagyon rendes tanár volt. Mentünk, sárga csillag nélkül. Hát ő árja volt! Volt egy kis tolókocsink, azt teleraktuk kenyérrel, és szétosztottuk mindenkinek, mindenki kapott. Attól függ, hogy mennyien voltunk, ha csak fél kenyérre tellett, akkor fél kenyeret. Alapjában véve mi láttuk el a házat ennivalóval. A házban csak ő maradt nem zsidó, a többi elcserélte a lakását. A fölöttem lévő lakásban lakott például a háziúr, azok elmenekültek Amerikába. Azóta se tudunk róluk.

Január 5-én volt a fiam kétéves. Hatodikán megszállták a házat a nyilasok, hogy itt kell hagyni mindent, azonnali hatállyal a gettóba kell menni! Akkor már a többi házakból is szedték össze az embereket, hiába volt svéd, svájci menlevelük, azokat is. Sorba állítottak minket a fönti emelettől végig a kapualjig. Az egyik fönti lakótársunk egy nagyon helyes mérnök volt, az is a munkaszolgálatból lógott meg, megszólalt fönn a 6. emeleten, hogy nem is érti, hogy lehet egy olyan fajt üldözni, amelyik föltalálta a sóletot. Úgy elkezdtünk röhögni lent, hogy azt hittük, ott helyben agyonlőnek bennünket.

Január 6-án bevittek bennünket a gettóba. Ha tudtuk volna, hogy 18-án felszabadulunk, akkor nem megyünk el, hogy ott veszítsem el az utolsó két családtagomat egy bombázásnál! Akkor fölmentünk volna a padlásra elbújni! A gettóban töménytelen nyilas és töménytelen ember volt, és a nyilasok szétparcelláztak bennünket. Minket a nagybátyámmal és a nagynénémmel a Síp utca 10-be, egy harmadik emeleti lakásba raktak, ahol volt még rajtunk kívül vagy harminc ember. A pincébe nem mertünk lemenni, mert minden éjjel valamelyik pincében agyonlőtték a nyilasok az embereket. Abban a bombazáporban, ami volt, az emeletre nem mertek a nyilasok se fölmenni de akik a pincében voltak, egy csomó helyen agyonlőtték őket. Tele volt sebesültekkel a Wesselényi utcai ideiglenes kórház, és nagyon sok halott volt, részben a bombatámadástól, részben meg a pincékben.

Január 13-án délelőtt 10 órakor kaptuk a bombatámadást. Szombati nap volt. Vallásos öreg nénikék, akik nem akartak a pincében imádkozni, feljöttek a lakásokba, és imakönyvvel a kezükben haltak meg. A nagynéném éppen ült a sparhelt mellett, a rántott levesbe csipetkét csipegetett. Szegénykémet a csipetkével a kezében érte a bomba! Rettenetes bombazápor volt, János rettenetesen sírt, és mondtam a nagybátyámnak, hogy: „Vidd le a gyereket a pincébe, rögtön megyünk mi is.” János így maradt életben. Mert miután őt levitte a nagybátyám, feljött, és nem telt bele két perc, amikor elrepültünk!

A Síp utca 10-be csapott be a bomba, és a ház nagy része ledőlt. Egy másodperc alatt! Nagy sötétség lett, és vége volt a világnak. Három emeletet zuhantunk! Én a romok tetejére estem, úgy, hogy szerencsémre a fél testem kint volt, ki tudtam mászni. És mellém esett – ez olyan igazi akasztófahumor – egy ruháskosár, lepedőkkel meg mit tudom én mikkel, és egy fehér lepedőt raktam magamra. Istentelen hideg tél volt, olyan hideg tél azóta se volt. Kiálltam a romok tetejére és ott rikácsoltam fönn a hegycsúcson, hogy jöjjenek és mentsenek ki. Egy Pozsonyi úti házi lakónk, Lakatos Sanyi észrevett, összeszedett egypár embert, akik földobtak kötelet, és úgy hoztak le a romok tetejéről. De a romok alól még napokig jajgatás hallatszott, és nem volt, aki a romokat el tudná takarítani! Végül két embert tudtak még kiszedni, az egyiknek (az is a Pozsonyi úti házunkból való volt, Harsányi Gyula) csákánnyal, ahogy odacsaptak, véletlenül szétrepesztették az arcát. Az egész Síp utca 10-ből összesen hárman maradtunk életben. Hetven halott volt, köztük az utolsó két családtagom, Gábor nagybátyám meg Ella nagynéném.

Levittek Jánoshoz a pincébe, mert a lábamra alig álltam, és egy padra lefektettek. János úgy irtózott tőlem, mert olyan szörnyen néztem ki, hogy a közelembe nem jött. Szürke, fekete, a szivárvány minden színe rajtam volt, ahogy én kinéztem. A hajam meg olyan volt a törmeléktől, mintha megőszültem volna. Szegény gyerek meg se ismert! És én ott feküdtem a pincében, nem tudtam lábra se állni, János meg az idős emberek öliben kuporgott állandóan. Azok hordták, mert én nem tudtam semmit csinálni. De aztán muszáj volt menni! Mikor felszabadultunk 18-án, borzasztóan néztem ki, a fejemtől a talpamig sötétkék voltam. Minden porcikám! Egy ép tagom nem volt.

Bejött a pincébe egy orosz katona, és mondta: „Budapest felszabadult, tessék kimenni!” De nekem mindenemet elvitte a bomba, babakocsit, mindent, semmim a világon nem maradt! Épp csak én maradtam meg egy szál rövid ujjú ruhában, meztiláb. Az első utam a Dohány utca 20-ba vitt. Ebben a sarokházban volt a konfekcióüzemünk, de ez a ház már kint volt, a gettófalon kívül. Fölmentem a sógoromékhoz, Pistáékhoz, adjanak nekem valamilyen holmit, hogy haza tudjak menni. Adtak kölcsön egy nagyon szép kabátot, amit aztán a következő sarkon elvettek tőlem. Levettek. Egy rövid ujjú blúzban érkeztem meg a Pozsonyi útra. Elsősorban azért jöttem ide vissza, hogy megnézzem, maradt-e itt valami, amit itt hagytunk. Ruha vagy valami. Hát semmim nem volt! Azt nem tudtam akkor még, hogy van-e lakásom, hogy a Kresz Géza utcában mi történt. Nem tudtam, hogy ott egyetlen lakás volt, amelyik belövést kapott, az enyém, és hogy az a lakás ettől lakhatatlan állapotba került.

A Pozsonyi úton a holmijaink a szomszédba voltak bedobálva, és a lakásba már beköltözött egy fiatal házaspár, a Fokán úrék egy pici gyerekkel. Biztos nyilasok voltak. Meg voltam lepődve, hogy valaki itt van, és közöltem velük, hogy a lakásnak a tulajdonosa én vagyok, és vegyék tudomásul, hogy itt az úr én leszek. Mondtam, hogy csak abban az esetben maradhatnak itt, ha normálisan viselkednek, meg segítenek tüzelőt, ennivalót szerezni. Az első utam a Wesselényi utcai kórház volt. Oda vitték a gettóból hordágyakon a sebesülteket, az élőket és a holtakat, és én nem tudtam, hogy a nagybátyámat és a nagynénémet meg tudták-e menteni vagy nem. Végigjártam az egész kórházat. A családtagjaimat nem találtam meg, de rátaláltam az egyik lakótársunkra a Pozsonyi út 28-ból. A folyosón feküdt, már haldoklott. Aztán a házból elmentek érte a férfiak és a vállukon hazahozták.

Akik túlélték a ház pincéjében a bombázást, mindenkit idehoztunk a lakásba. Mert a fönti emeleteken nem volt fűtés, nem volt ablak, minden lakás ablak nélkül volt. Elvitte a légnyomás. Itt a magasföldszinten meg véletlenül egyben maradtak az ablakok. A fél háznak a zsidó lakossága itt lakott nálam. A földön feküdtünk, egy ágy volt, amin a haldokló volt, akit aztán hat hónapig ápoltunk. Végül felépült, de nyomorék maradt. Az volt a szerencséje neki is, meg a Harsányi Gyulának is, hogy a hálószobánkban egy orosz orvos volt beszállásolva, és neki voltak valami amerikai antibiotikumai meg mindenféle gyógyszerei.

A lakásban megmaradt gyönyörű antik bútorokat szép lassan eltüzeltük a cserépkályhában. Valamivel fűteni kellett! A választásunk annyi volt, hogy vagy megfagyunk, vagy a bútort elégetjük. Hülyéskedtünk, hogy na holnap melyik szekrény lesz szétvágva? Egy nyomortanya lett itt, és be volt osztva, hogy aki épkézláb, az ide megy sorba állni, aki nem épkézláb, az megy oda sorba állni. És a Fokán úrék valahonnan annyi ennivalót loptak, hogy a szoba egyik sarka a plafonig tele volt ennivalóval. Életemben annyi mazsolát nem ettem. Fokán úr nagyon rendes volt, mert járt a Duna-partra, ahonnan sok fatönköt hozott tüzelőnek, amiket a víz dobált ki a partra. Tehát hasznát vettük, mert itt különben egy csomó szerencsétlen, sérült, beteg ember, gyerek volt, ez tisztára egy vöröskeresztes szállóhely lett. De a férjem aztán, mikor a munkaszolgálatból hazajött, kidobta innen Fokán úrékat.

Februárban az egyik üres lakásban – hogy azok hogy tudták meg, hogy az a lakás üres, nem tudom – nyilas karszalaggal honfoglaltak. Láttam őket. Utána később már nagyon rendesek voltak, ideszületett három gyerekük is, a férfi tanárember volt. No hát az a férfi lopott egy stráfkocsit lóval, de hogy honnan lopta, azt nem tudom. Mondtam neki, ha már lopott egy lovat, akkor szedjük össze a házban kinek mije maradt, elmegyünk Pest környékére és a parasztokkal seftelünk. Egy stráfkocsi kaját hoztunk, és szétosztottuk a lakók között. Én nem tudom, hogy az az ember elfelejtett-e a lónak enni adni, vagy mi történt, de megálltunk a ház előtt, a ló fújt egyet, hogy: „Fúú!”, és összeesett; mint egy luftballon, leeresztett. A finisnél szegénykém elpusztult. Megrohanták az emberek szegény lovat, és feltrancsírozták öt perc alatt.

Áprilisban a Síp utcában eltakarították a romokat. Egy csomó halottat felsorakoztattak, de felismerhetetlenek voltak, nem találtam meg a rokonaimat. Hát három vagy négy hónapig a romok alatt voltak, összevissza voltak kaszabolva, ahogy kiszedték őket. Mondták, hogy mért nem mondom rá egy férfire, egy nőre, hogy ők azok? De ha nem ismerem föl!? Egy vadidegen embert nem fogok eltemetni! És akkor megkérdezték, hogy hozzájárulok-e, hogy a Dohány utcai templomnak a kertjében legyenek? Mondtam, természetesen. Úgyhogy a nagybátyám meg a nagynéném ott vannak a Dohány utcai templomban, a tömegsírban.

Egy csomó ember volt itt a házban, és egy csomó olyan korú gyerek, mint János, úgyhogy egyik nap azokra bíztam a gyereket, hogy lemegyek Jánoshalmára, megnézni, mi van a szüleimmel? Két napig voltam kinn a Keleti pályaudvaron, és vártuk, hogy vonat, vagy valami jön, de nem jött semmi, és akkor hazajöttem vissza. Amikor megnyitották a Dunán az ideiglenes fahidat [lásd. pontonhidak], amikor már kezdtek szivárogni haza a deportáltak, akkor én minden isten adta nap elmentem oda. Egy bizonyos időpont volt, azt hiszem délután négy-öt óra között, amikor a hidat megnyitották, és csak ebben az időben engedték át rajta az embereket. Én mindennap odamentem várni a szüleimet. Azt tudtam, hogy deportálták őket, de mást nem tudtam róluk semmit! Egy-egy ember hazaszivárgott, egyik Ausztriából, a másik Auschwitzból, és mesélték, hogy mi történt. De el nem tudtam képzelni, hogy az én anyám, aki 44, és az apám, aki 54 éves volt, stramm, makkegészséges emberek, valaha is meghalnak… Nemhogy így! Előtte egy sportember volt az apukám, tornászott, lovagolt, volt egy vitrinünk, ami tele volt serlegekkel, amiket nyert. Egy sportember, meg orvos, az hogy halhat meg?

A férjemhez – akiről azt tudtam, hogy fölakasztották – a sors kegyes volt, valami rendes vezérkari tiszt megkegyelmezett nekik, és 1945. május végén érkezett haza. Először a Dohány utca 20-ba ment, mert az volt a híre, hogy engem bombatámadás ért. Nem tudom, honnan tudta, erre már nem emlékszem, de ez volt az utolsó híre. Először elment a Dohány utca 20-ba, és Pista sógorom mondta neki, hogy tényleg bombatámadás ért, de élek, és a Pozsonyi úton vagyok. Akkor a férjem mindjárt idejött.

A szüleimről akkor jött az első hír, amikor Jánoshalmán a szomszédunk felesége megérkezett Auschwitzból. Az mesélte el, hogy az apukámat elvitték egy orvos-századba, ahonnan soha többet nem hallottak róla, az anyukám meg, mikor megtudta, hogy már Pest környékéről viszik ki a zsidókat, és az, aki kisgyerekkel érkezik, az megy egyenesen a gázba, akkor az anyukám elhagyta magát, nem evett, nem ivott, és tífuszban meghalt. Azt a hírt már nem érte meg, hogy Pesten leállították a deportálást. Csak azt látta, hogy akik kicsi gyerekekkel, két-, meg három-, meg négyéves gyerekekkel kerültek ki, azok már mindjárt eltűntek. Elvitték őket „fürödni”. A mamám nem bírta a gondolatot elviselni, hogy az egy szál lánya, meg az egy szál unokája meghaljon. Abból az orvos-századból pedig, ahová apukám került, egyetlenegy ember nem jött vissza! Egy lélek sem. Én meg borzasztó sokáig, el nem tudom mondani, hogy meddig járkáltam minden isten adta nap az ideiglenes hídhoz. Nem tudtam elképzelni, hogy ne jöjjenek haza, az elképzelhetetlen volt, hogy ők nincsenek. A mai napig az.

Amikor a férjemmel először hazamentünk Jánoshalmára, otthon a kertben ki volt túrva a föld, kiásva minden, szétszedve az ablakkeret. Az orvosi berendezés megmaradt, meg a bútorok nagy része is, mert azok nagy műbútorok voltak, úgy voltak csinálva oda, hogy amekkora a fal, akkora volt a bútor, oda volt építve, nem tudták elmozdítani. Volt egy ember, az első világháborúból itt maradt orosz ember, nem tudom a nevét, de úgy hívták, hogy orosz Miska bácsi, és az orosz Miska bácsi honfoglalta a házunkat. Még a ház közelébe se mehettem, még arra se léphettem. Mert kitalálta, hogy az a ház az övé, és ő ott fog lakni. Apukám egyik orvoskollégájának a házába mentünk, és ott voltunk egy darabig, amíg az orosz Miska bácsit ki nem tudtuk paterolni, ami nem volt egy egyszerű dolog. Ő volt az, aki a házban lévő mozdítható, fekete ébenfa gobelines bútorokat az orrom előtt vitte el. Nem lehetett megállítani. A hatóság sem avatkozott bele.

Amikor az orosz Miska bácsi elment, akkor el kellett intéznem, hogy a szüleimet holttá nyilvánítsák, és én lehessek az örököse és a tulajdonosa a jánoshalmi háznak. Hát ez borzasztó volt! Maga az, hogy a szüleimet holttá nyilváníttatni?! Ezt fegyelmezetten végigcsinálni nem volt könnyű. És egy csomó procedúra volt. Bácsalmásra kellett menni, minden papírt utánuk összeszedni. Nem volt egyszerű dolog! És ehhez nagyon fiatal és tapasztalatlan voltam, egy elkényeztetett lány, akinek korábban a feneke alá raktak mindent.

Ezután bérbe adtam a házat egy orvosnak, és egy szobát fenntartottam magamnak, hogy a pici gyerekkel nyaranként le tudjak menni. De ez nem vált be, mert az orvos felesége szörnyű bolond nő volt. Nem vette tudomásul, hogy az az értékes lakás nem arra való, hogy spájznak használjon egy ebédlőt, ahol kihúzott drótokat és oda akasztotta disznóvágás után a szalonnát, kolbászt és egyebeket, és a parkettra csöpögött a zsír. Felmondtam nekik, elküldtem őket, mielőtt teljesen tönkretették volna a házat.

Annyi pénzem nem volt, hogy a házat is fenntartsam meg rendbe is hozzam. Nem volt semmim gyakorlatilag. Fenntartottam a házat körülbelül két évig, és lejártam a gyerekkel nyártól őszig. 1948-49-ben – nem is tudom, hogy volt az államosítás – egy jó ismerősöm, aki a községházán dolgozott és nagyon jó barátok voltunk, közölte, hogy a levegőben lóg az államosítás, és ha nem akarom, hogy a házat államosítsák, sürgős iramban adjam el. Szerencsém volt, mert jó helyen volt, nagyon szép ház volt, s találtam egy vevőt, aki öt perc alatt megvette. A rendelő berendezését egy zsidó orvos vette meg, aki visszajött a munkaszolgálatból, a bútorokat meg egy másik család vette meg.

Borzasztó volt megválni az otthonomtól, amit imádtam, és amibe a szüleim a lelküket beleadták. Az egy hatszobás ház volt, és úgy volt építve, hogy külön volt a rendelő és a váró. Tényleg maximálisan jólszituált család voltunk, és az tényleg egy nagypolgári ház volt. Apám rengeteget dolgozott. Szegény nagyanyám mindig mondta neki: „Mért dolgozol annyit? Nem mész bútorkocsival a temetőbe.” Milyen igaza volt, tényleg nem ment bútorkocsival a temetőbe.

Hosszú évekig lelkiismeret-furdalásom volt, hogy mit fogok mondani az anyukáméknak, ha hazajönnek, miért nincs meg a ház. „Valahonnét egyszer majd előkerülnek.” Vártam őket. De hát semmi remény. Mert akkor már mindent tisztán tudtunk, hogy mi történt. Én sajnos a szokásaimnak a rabja vagyok. Nagyon sokáig nem hittem el, hogy a szüleim nem jönnek haza. Akkor én nagyon fiatal voltam, 23 éves. És – a férjemen kívül – nem volt olyan közeli hozzátartozóm, akivel a problémákat megbeszélhettem volna. Mert más egy férj, és más egy mama. A fiam velem megbeszéli, vagy a papájával megbeszélte – ez nekem 23 éves koromtól nem adatott meg.

A férjem is reménykedett, hogy a szülei hazajönnek. Lement Miskolcra, és a szülei nem jöttek haza, de az az isteni csoda volt, hogy a hat testvérből öt hazajött. Pali sógorom együtt volt a férjemmel, együtt jöttek haza a munkaszolgálatból, Pista meglépett, bujkálásban maradt meg, és a többiek, akik hazajöttek, mind Auschwitzban voltak! Olga sógornőmnek a lánya 14 éves volt akkor, de olyan fejlett nagylány volt, hogy azt mondták, húsz éves. Vitték őket dolgozni mindenhova, aztán elvitték őket Allendorfba, és ott szabadultak fel. Ott dolgoztak valamilyen – én nem tudom milyenben – kertészetben, vagy hol.

Azután 45-ben a strómantól visszavette a férjem meg Pista sógorom a konfekcióüzemet, csinálták tovább, Pali meg Miskolcon megnyitotta az apósomék áruházát, és ő ott kezdett dolgozni. Palinak a felesége meg a kisfia Auschwitzban meghalt, és ő újra megnősült, úgyhogy ők ottmaradtak Miskolcon a feleségével. Később Pista sógorom is leköltözött Miskolcra, és ketten csinálták az áruházat. És amikor majdnem csődbe vitték, akkor kapcsolódott be a férjem. Közben eladtuk a jánoshalmi házat 100 ezer forinttért, ami akkor nagyon sok pénz volt – akkor volt új a forint –, és azt fektettük be a miskolci áruházba. Evvel a 100 ezer forinttal a férjem föllendítette a bótot, és nagyon jól menő üzlet lett.

Én a háború után beiratkoztam az egyetemre, de mikor a férjem hazajött a munkaszolgálatból, rögtön terhes lettem, és volt egy héthónapos koraszülésem. Egy halott kisbaba. 1946-ban pedig volt egy nyolchónapos koraszülésem, ami annyit jelentett, hogy a bombatámadásnál olyan károsodást szenvedtem, hogy egy bizonyos ideig tudtam a gyereket, mint veszélyeztetett terhes hordani, de életképes gyereket nem tudtam világra hozni. Azt mondta az orvos, aki apukámnak volt nagyon jó barátja és kollegája, és nekünk családi barát meg háziorvosom volt, hogy: „Idefigyelj Magda! Ha ezt az egy gyereket föl akarod nevelni, ne kísérletezz! Két halott szülés után ne kísérletezz!” Az csak pár éve derült ki egy orvosi röntgennél, hogy mindennek az volt az oka, hogy a bombatámadásnál eltört a hátsó alsó csigolyám, és rosszul forrt össze.

Amíg nem jött az államosítás, a férjem mindig hétfőn lement Miskolcra, és pénteken hazajött. És mikor már minden egyenesbe jött, akkor jött az államosítás, úgyhogy a jánoshalmai ház így Miskolcon lett államosítva. Egy az egybe elvették az áruházat, és megint a nulláról kellett kezdeni. Akkor a két fiú, Pali és Pista elment valamilyen állásba, a férjem meg hazajött, és miután ő konfekcióüzem-tulajdonos volt, egy frászban voltunk, nehogy kitelepítsenek bennünket. Mikor a felettünk lévő lakót kitelepítették – egy nagyon helyes, szintén zsidó házaspárt, azok is épphogy átvészelték a háborút meg az üldöztetést, és azok is nagyvállalkozók voltak –, akkor pánikba estem. Na, mondtam, mi leszünk a következők. Volt egy csodálatosan szép pianínóm, mert én komolyzenével foglalkoztam, úgy, mint az anyukám, és gyors iramban eladtam a gyönyörű pianínómat hat- vagy hétezer új forintért. Akkor az nagyon sok pénz volt. Mondom: „Ha elvisznek bennünket, a pianínót nem vihetjük magunkkal, hát legalább legyen pénzünk az induláshoz!”

A férjem konfekcióüzemét szintén államosították. Nem tudott mit csinálni, elment sofőrnek, mert ott nem kellett megmondani, hogy konfekcióüzem és egy nagyáruház tulajdonosa volt, így az önéletrajzába nem került be. Hála istennek, a kitelepítést megúsztuk, de a férjem végig azért nem ment el rendes tisztviselői állásba, mert mindenhol be kellett írni az előző foglalkozást. Azt nem írhatta be, hogy nem volt semmi.

Először az élelmiszer-szállítási vállalatnál volt teherautósofőr, a végén aztán a Taxi vállalatnál dolgozott mint taxisofőr. Onnan is ment nyugdíjba. Nem volt könnyű dolga a férjemnek, én meg anyagilag nem tudtam besegíteni, nem tudtam elmenni dolgozni, azon egyszerű oknál fogva, hogy se egy nagymama, se egy nagynéni, senki nem volt. Nem tudtam kire bízni a gyereket. Közben János mikor kisiskolás volt, első elemista, az ég egy adta világon minden gyerekbetegséget, amit lehetett, hazahozott. Beoltották őket első elemiben diftéria elleni oltással, következő héten a létező legsúlyosabb diftériát kapta a szérumtól, úgyhogy rohammentővel vittük a László Kórházba, ahol élet-halál között volt. Hazahoztuk, akkor viszont a László Kórházból hozott egy kanyarót. Ez a kettő kiváltott nála aztán egy szívizomgyulladást.

Ráadásul én meg kaptam egy epe- és májgyulladást és egy olyan sárgaságot, hogy hat hétig feküdtem. Én feküdtem egy kihúzható rekamié egyik oldalán lázasan a sárgasággal, a másik oldalon meg feküdt János. És a gyerek úgy járta végig szívizomgyulladással a négy elemit, hogy majdnem végig feküdnie kellett. Hála a Jóistennek, kiheverte teljesen, de állandóan figyelni kellett, és nagyon nehéz volt úgy szoktatni, hogy neked most pihenni kell, elmész iskolába, de ha hazajössz, le kell feküdni. A szívizomgyulladás nem volt egy egyszerű dolog, és hordani kellett a Heim Pál Kórházba a szívspecialistához. Tehát az, hogy elmenjek dolgozni, kivitelezhetetlen dolog volt. Csak a gyerek, a gyereknevelés meg a háztartás volt nekem. De nem hiányzott a munkahely, ezt szoktam meg.

János a nagy Szigetbe [XIII. kerület, Radnóti Miklós utca 8-10., az 1950-es évektől Rajk László Általános Iskola, ma Gárdonyi Géza nevét viseli. - A szerk.] járt általánosba, egész nyolcadikig, és utána a Bolyai Gimnáziumba. Jó tanuló volt. Tudta azt is, hogy zsidó gyerek, de abban az időben nem nagyon lehetett hittanórára járni. Mindent tudott, csak nem érdekelte. Mikor valakiről mesélt, mit tudom én, osztálytársról, rákérdeztem: „Te, mondd, ez milyen vallású? Zsidó?” Azt mondta: „Mama! Hagyjál békében! Nem érdekel engem, hogy az zsidó vagy keresztény.” De a barátaira rákérdeztem, mert érdekelt a társasága, hogy azok milyenek. János volt talán a legtájékozottabb zsidó ügyekben a családban. Ha valami van, ma is mindig elmagyarázza.

Itthon semmilyen ünnepet nem tartottunk a háború után, csak születésnap volt. Se karácsony, se Hanuka, semmi. A fiam gyerekkorában nem az ünnep volt a lényeg, hanem az, hogy élni tudjunk. Hogy a férjem meg tudja keresni azt, hogy a családját eltartsa, és hogy a gyereket föl tudjuk nevelni. Mert mindig azt mondta: „Tőlem elvettek mindent, de a fiamból urat nevelek.” És ez sikerült. De nem kis áldozat volt! Nagyon sok mindenről le kellett mondani ahhoz, hogy a fiam nyelvekre taníttassuk. Elküldtük először Németországba nyelvtanfolyamra, aztán Angliába nyelvtanfolyamra, szóval lehetőségünk szerint a maximumot nyújtottuk neki. Nem arról van szó, hogy éheztünk! De az, hogy a férjem egymaga meg tudja teremteni a megélhetésünket, az nem volt egyszerű dolog.

A férjem reggel – mivel a sofőrök hat órakor kezdtek – már elment itthonról fél ötkor, és késő este, ameddig fuvarozni kellett, addig távol volt. Így teltek az ötvenes évek. Volt társaságunk, egy komoly baráti, értelmiségi társaság. Kilencven százaléka zsidó volt, egy része az apukám révén orvosok. Mentek a kártyapartik, a férjem nagy bridzsjátékos volt, a férfiak bridzseltek, mi nők römiztünk. Mentünk kirándulni is, nyáron is voltunk több napig a Balatonnál, ahol az egész társaság összeverődött. Az államosításig, és míg a gyerek nem volt iskolás, minden májusban lementünk Görömböly-Tapolcára, ahol az egyik sógornőmnek volt villája, és egész őszig ott voltunk a gyerekkel. Jánoshalmára csak a holokauszt emlékünnepre mentünk vissza, 1989 után. Nem volt senki barát vagy rokon, aki ott maradt volna. Császártöltésen sem voltam, csak keresztülutaztam rajta, Miskolcon meg egyáltalán nem voltam a háború után. Autónk nem volt, hát a férjem reggeltől estig autót vezetett. A fiam volt az első autótulajdonos, aki autónyeremény-betétkönyvvel nyert egy autót.

1956-ban a baráti körünk nagy része disszidált. Akkor összeült a család itthon maradt Weizenfeld része is – 1948-ban ugyanis a férjem legidősebb nővére, Olga és a családja már kiment Ausztráliába. Mentek? Kiszöktek. Gyalog mentek Bécsbe! Legelőször a sógornőm lánya ment el a férjével. Ő itt már elvégzett két évet az orvosi egyetemen, de állandóan szekálták, hogy a papája bornagykereskedő – magyarul rossz káder volt. Nem a vallás számított akkor, hanem az, hogy ki milyen káder. Utánamentek a sógornőmék is, és Ausztráliában végül a sógornőm egy szál lánya Sydney legnagyobb kórházának a hematológus osztályvezető főorvosa lett. Az egész élethez tulajdonképpen szerencse kell.

1956-ban Pali, meg sógornőm, a férjem legfiatalabb testvére összeültek, hogy együtt menjünk el, disszidáljunk.  Azt mondtam: „Én itthonról nem megyek sehova. Minek? Nyelvet nem tudok, hiába tanultam még a gimnáziumban nyolc évig németül, latinul, franciául. Nekem senkim sincs, én nem akarok kiszolgáltatottja lenni senkinek. Én nem megyek.” A férjem – annak nagyon mehetnékje volt – azt mondta: „Kérdezd meg a gyereket! A gyerek már nem pici.” János akkor már 13 éves volt, és azt mondta: „Én a mamával itt maradok.” Ezzel a disszidálási téma le lett zárva. És amikor húsz évvel ezelőtt kimentünk Ausztráliába a sógornőmékhez – ők hívtak meg, és ők küldték a repülőjegyet is –, azt mondtam a férjemnek: „Látod, most elmegyünk megnézni, hogy hova kellett volna 45-ben menni.” Mert akkor kellett volna elmenni. Mert ott az ember új életet kezd. De ki mert akkor elmenni?! Vártam a szüleimet. Ha isten adta volna, hogy hazajönnek, és engem nem találnak meg? Nem volt olyan könnyű akkor külföldről kapcsolatot tartani. Ausztráliában aztán az egész család, korhatár nélkül meghalt, tehát most a differencia az lenne, hogy Ausztráliában lennék egyedül. Hát akkor inkább legyek itt egyedül. Akármilyen milliomos lennék, akkor sem ebédelnék kétszer.

Külföldre nyaralni a hatvanas évektől kezdve jártunk, előtte nem volt olyan nagyon divat külföldre menni. Én a háború előtt még a gimnáziummal iskolakiránduláson voltam Olaszországban, meg Ausztriában, pont az Anschluss előtt jöttünk haza Bécsből. Az anyagi kérdés volt, hogy az osztálytársaim közül ki engedhette meg magának, hogy elutazhasson. 150 pengőbe került egy ilyen egyhetes olaszországi út, de akkor 150 pengő nem volt kevés pénz. A férjemmel is először Olaszországba mentünk, akkor, amikor behozták a 70 dolláros útlevelet 1960-ban [A 60-as, 70-es években kétféleképpen lehetett nyugatra utazni: évente egyszer egy nyugati rokon meghívója alapján, vagy háromévente egyszer turistaútlevéllel. Ez utóbbihoz 70 dollár költőpénzt lehetett kiváltani, több valutát büntetendőnek számított kivinni az országbó. A szerk.]. Kiváltottuk az útlevelet, kiváltottuk a kétszer 70 dollárt, és három hétig végigutaztuk Olaszországot, még Palermóban is voltunk, Szicílián. Ebből a kétszer 70 dollárból. Nagyon olcsón. De akkor mások voltak az árak, akkor 1 dollárért lehetett 1 gramm aranyat venni. De mi nem seftölni mentünk. Mi vittünk egy koffer ennivalót, kajára nem kellett költeni, mert állandóan volt a táskában kolbász, sajt, kenyér. Mindig olcsó szállodákban voltunk és vettünk cirkuláré jegyet, ami 1300 forintba került. Egy hónapig lehetett éjjel-nappal utazni, és mindig éjszaka utaztunk, akkor az nem került szállásba. Életünk egyik legjobb nyaralása volt ez.

Utána aztán nagyon sok helyen nyaraltunk, végigutaztuk Európát. Miután semmi extra allűrjeink nem voltak, minden évben elutaztunk két hétre. Izraelben sajnos nem jártam, a családom volt, mindenki, csak én nem, de tán háromszor voltunk Olaszországban, nem tudom hányszor Spanyolországban, Jugoszláviában voltunk a Hvar szigetektől kezdve mindenhol. Azért maradt meg családi ékszer, amiket eladogattunk! Úgy maradt meg, hogy a nagybátyám odaadta a házmesternek. Nem tudom, mért bízott olyan nagyon a házmesterünkben. Mikor hazajöttem a gettóból, mondtam, hogy: „Mátyás bácsi! Kérem szépen vissza az ékszereket!” Nagyon sok ékszer volt, családi ékszerek. Azt mondta: „Elvitték az oroszok.” Na, amikor a férjem hazajött, mondtam neki, hogy Mátyás bácsi nem adta vissza az ékszereket. Ő akkor szerzett a rendőrségen egy valamilyen nexust, egy nyomozót, és a Mátyás bácsit bevitték. Ott is tagadta, a végén rátettek egy gázmaszkot, attól megijedt, és rögtön megmondta, hogy az ékszer a kapu alatt van. Ahogy bejön az ember, van egy rács, és az alá volt elásva. A férjem a rendőrnyomozóval fifti-fifti alapon megegyezett, hogy ha sikerül, akkor az aranynak a fele az övé. Meglett, és a fele is elég sok volt. És akkor azt eladogattuk. Hát így lavíroztunk a nagyvilágban.

Minket a férjemmel a pártdolgok nem érdekeltek. Agitáltak persze, de soha semmiben nem vettem részt, a férjem se. A baráti köröm, akik idejártak, meg később a kosztosaim is indiferens pártonkívüliek voltak. Nem volt téma. Minek politizáljak? A világot nem tudom megváltani egyedül. Véleményem van mindenről, de ha nem szólnak hozzám, akkor nem kell válaszolnom. Én nyugodt természetű, simulékony ember vagyok. Soha nem kritizálok semmit, úgy van jól, ahogy van. Igyekszem magamnak nyugodt környezetet kialakítani.

Akárcsak én, a fiam is orvosnak készült, latintagozatos gimnáziumba járt. Az utolsó évben mondta neki az osztályfőnöke – mert akkor már régen tanult németül meg angolul –, hogy akinek ilyen jó nyelvérzéke van, az menjen nyelvpályára, ne menjen el orvosnak. Így lett János külker közgazdász. Egyből fölvették, három nyelvből tett felvételi vizsgát. Jelen pillanatban német, angol, francia, oroszból van felsőfokú nyelvvizsgája. A fiam mindig magas állásban volt, mert az ARTEX-nél [Külkereskedelmi Vállalat - A szerk.] volt harminc évig, az ARTEX franciaországi leányvállalatánál is dolgozott Párizsban, és miután hazajött, akkor a NIKEX Külkereskedelmi Vállalatnak lett az igazgatója. Utána bekerült a Gazdasági Minisztériumba, ott meg a Közbeszerzési Tanács vezető főtanácsosa volt. A második MSZP választásnál [2002] azt mondta: „Na, ebből a közbeszerzésből elég volt!”, és elment nyugdíjba.

A fiam most társadalmi ösztöndíjas, ahogy én hívom a nyugdíját. Nem dolgozik semmit, majdnem ő a háziasszony otthon, mert a menyem tíz évvel fiatalabb, és ő két kerületnek az ÁNTSZ főorvosa [Az Állami Népegészségügyi és Tisztiorvosi Szolgálat (ÁNTSZ) állami költségvetésből működtetett, közegészségügyi feladatokat ellátó központi hivatal. – A szerk.], rettenetes sokat dolgozik. Van egy nagyon helyes kislányuk, Zsófi, aki 1983-ban született, és a Közgazdasági Egyetem után most végzi a második diplomáját, nemzetközi jogot Montpellier-ben. Most megy Párizsba, kötelező gyakorlatra egy nagy nemzetközi bankhoz. A fiamék hat és fél évig éltek Párizsban, kiküldetésben, úgyhogy Zsófi nyolc hónapos volt, amikor kimentek, és már kétéves korában francia bölcsiben volt. Hamarabb tanult meg franciául, mint magyarul. Az első elemit ott végezte, aztán mikor hazajöttek, a Mátyás király úton volt francia iskolában, ott érettségizett, és onnan automatikusan fölvették a francia egyetemre. Neki is megvan már franciából és angolból a felsőfokú nyelvvizsgája.

Amikor kiküldetésben voltak Franciaországban, azt mondtam a fiamnak: „Itt olyan a helyzet, amilyen, menjetek a világnak bármelyik részébe, ne gyertek haza.” De a menyem azt mondta, hogy hogy képzeljük azt, hogy ő itt hagyja a mamáját, aki akkor már özvegy volt. A fiam is közölte: „Hogy képzeled mama, hogy téged itt hagylak?” 2000-ben aztán hazajöttek. A fiam ma sem bánja, pedig igazán az egész világot körüljárta, tehát neki rutinja is volt ahhoz, hogy feltalálja magát.

Én háztartást vezettem, és ma is főzök mindennap, de az nem jutott volna eszembe, hogy főzéssel foglalkozzak. 1956-ban azonban a baráti körömnek a nagy része disszidált, és három-négy barátnőm is bejelentette, hogy elmennek, de nem tudják, hogyan alakul a sorsuk. Arra kérnek, hogy az öreg, idős hozzátartozóikkal – akik itt laktak a környéken, és akkor nekem egy 70 éves nagyon öregnek tűnt – tegyem meg, hogy ne hanyagoljam el őket, gondoskodjak róluk. Mondtam: „Jó, nem probléma. Itthon vagyok, háztartást vezetek, ha ezen múlik, hogy egy ebédet úgy főzök meg, hogy többet főzök, akkor természetes. Amennyibe kerül az alapanyag, annyit elszámolunk egymással.” Azután mindig jött még valaki, hogy: ”A barátnőmnek a mamája is itt maradt egyedül, nem vállalnád el?” Így felszaporodott a társaság harmincra, és egy nagyon jó kollektíva, baráti társaság alakult ki.

Volt egy házmesternő a Szent István park 2-ben, ő vitte el azoknak az ebédet, akik nem tudtak idejönni. Csak olyanokat vállalt, akik effektíve rá voltak szorulva, mozgássérültek vagy nagyon betegek voltak. Volt csereedény, vitték nekik az ebédet, és hozták vissza az edényt, ahogy most csinálják. Aki itt evett, az a kisszobában ült le. Turnusokban jöttek, hármasával, megvolt mindenkinek az időpontja. Percnyi pontossággal be volt osztva. Egy órakor elkezdtem az éthordókat tölteni, amit a nő elvitt. Mikor a szállítás lebonyolódott, akkor jöttek ide az én barátaim, barátnőim, a szűk baráti körhöz tartozók. És akkor én tálaltam. Kétféle kaja volt. Megkérdeztem, melyiket akarják, melyiket nem akarják. Mindennap friss süteményt sütöttem, de minden istenadta nap. Nem tudom, hogy csináltam, ma már nem működne, nem is tudom elképzelni. De olyan gördülékenyen ment. És ez ment szombaton, vasárnap – szóval nem volt egy szabadnap se. Viszont június elsején leálltam, és szeptemberig szünet volt.

Végül több mint harminc évig csináltam ezt. A kosztosaim között az nem számított, hogy ki milyen vallású, hanem aki nem volt szimpatikus, azt elzavartam. Volt olyan zsidó is. Szekánt öregasszony volt, mondom: „Köszönöm, most szakítsuk meg a barátságunkat, és ne szóljunk egymáshoz.” Egy idő múlva az öregek lemaradtak sorban, betegek lettek, meg kórházba kerültek, meg meghaltak, akkor csak gyerekekkel foglalkoztam. A szülők elmentek dolgozni, a gyerekekről nem tudtak gondoskodni, és egy csomó barátom gyereke járt hozzám. Egész az egyetemig jártak ide, míg el nem végezték. Idejöttek ebédelni, és utána itt ragadtak, itt volt a napközi, itt volt a dumaparti. A gyerekekkel abszolút baráti viszonyunk lett, a mai napig nagyon jóban vagyok velük. Amikor aztán a gyerekek maradtak ki, közben a szülők mentek nyugdíjba, akkor megcserélődött, és akkor a szülők jöttek ide ebédelni.

Úgy szerveztem meg az egészet, hogy az ebédhez én szereztem be a hozzávalót, én mentem vásárolni. Nem a piacra, hanem ide az Ági zöldségeshez. Ágival összebarátkoztam, neki mindig megmondtam, mire van szükségem, elment, és beszerezte. Mondjuk fölküldött 25 kg krumplit meg mindent. Mindig előző délután, vagy előző nap gondoltam ki, hogy mi lesz holnap. Reggel lementem az apróságokat megvenni, majd nekifogtam főzni. Két tűzhely kellett eleve. És arra is kellett plusz, hogy ha ne adj’ isten elromlik a főzőn valamelyik platni, akkor is legyen.

60 éves volt a férjem, amikor a sógornőm egy szál huszonnégy éves fia meghalt. Egy csodálatosan szép, makkegészséges fiú. Lipcsében járt egyetemre. Akkor jött divatba a számítástechnika, és ott kint elvégezte a legmagasabb fokozatig. Hazajött huszonnégy éves korában, elkezdett dolgozni, rosszul lett, és hónapok alatt leukémiában meghalt. Az egész család összezuhant. Borzasztó volt. Akkor a férjem azt mondta, hogy ő olyan idegállapotban van, hogy nyugdíjba megy, leszáll a volán mellől. És akkortól ő segített nekem. Nagyon jól tudott krumplit meg zöldséget pucolni, meg nagyon szeretett vásárolni.

Mire megtörtént a bevásárlás, addigra a férjem megpucolta a krumplit, zöldséget. Minden istenadta nap legalább kétfélét főztem. A kosztosaim nagyon szerették a vadas húst krumplis krokettel, volt rántott hús, volt fasírthús, volt pörkölt, voltak főzelékek, levesek, és mindenféle sütemény, a tortától kezdve a bejgliig, amit el lehet képzelni. Minden. Szegény anyám, mikor férjhez mentem, írt egy receptkönyvet nekem – az szent ereklyém volt – egy orvosi naplóba a saját kezével, süteményekről, és azt mindig elővettem. Amikor sütöttem, 30 évig mindennap a recept ott volt előttem, nehogy valamit kifelejtsek. Hát miért kellene nekem megtanulni, hogy 10 deka cukorhoz meg 20 deka cukorhoz, meg a nem tudom mennyi liszthez mennyi élesztő meg mennyi sütőpor kell? Elővettem a receptet, odatettem mellém, kikészítettem a belevalókat, és kontrolláltam a szakácskönyvből, hogy az ténylegesen annyi, és nem felejtettem ki semmit.

Olyan gyorsan ment a főzés, annyira belejöttem! Eleinte nem ment, amikor kezdtem az öregekkel, a barátaimnak a szüleivel. Amikor férjhez mentem, nem tudtam semmit főzni, a nagynéném és a nagyanyám főztek. Minden délben egy kis kosárkával szaladtam a Pozsonyi útra a Kresz Géza utcából, s vittem haza a kaját. Mert a férjem mindig hazajött ebédelni, és mindig egy frászban voltam, hogy nehogy előbb érjen haza, mint én. És a férjem nem tudta, hogy amit ő olyan jóízűen megevett, azt nem én főztem. Csak évtizedek múlva mondtam meg neki. Semmit, egy teát nem tudtam főzni.

A háború után volt egy nagyon jó házvezetőnőm, egy dunabogdányi parasztlány. Akkor fogadtuk fel, amikor János beteg volt, és nekem sárgaságom volt. Ő zseniálisan tudott főzni, és nagyjából tőle tanultam meg. De akkor még nem voltam rutinírozott. Mondjuk hármunknak a háztartását elvezettem. Az államosítás után azt mondtam a férjemnek, hogy inkább mindent eladok, de a Mariskát tartsuk meg. Mert ő családtag volt, és imádta a gyereket. Imádta! Az nem igaz, hogy hogy foglalkozott vele! Pedig egyszerű sváb parasztlány volt. De nagyon rendes volt. És amíg Mariska itt volt, addig nekem nem kellett főzni, csak belenéztem a lábasba, hogy mi lesz ebédre. Aztán lassan, szakácskönyvekből meg egyebekből meg az akaratomból úgy kifejlődött.

Szegény kosztosaim átvészelték a tanulóidőmet, amíg megtanultam böcsületesen főzni. A végén aztán már rutinszerűen csináltam, és ahogy szaporodott a kosztosaimnak a száma, aszerint nőttek a lábosok. Lábosméretre tudtam, hogy ekkora lábos ennyi embernek elég, ekkora fazék leves ennyi embernek elég – és ez centire ki volt számítva. Olyan, hogy másnapra valami is el legyen téve, olyan nem létezett. Elfogyott minden, úgy volt kiszámítva.

Egyik kedvenc nála a vadas hús volt: Én zsírral főztem mindig, hol disznó, hol libazsírral. A vadas húst úgy csináltam, hogy húslevesben megfőztem a marhahúst. A vadas szósznál a sárgarépát megreszeltem, rendesen a reszelővel, és a reszelt sárgarépát borssal, babérlevéllel külön megfőztem. A levesben, ami volt zöldség, azt krumplinyomóval átnyomtam, csináltam egy rántást, amibe belejött mustár, tejföl, egy nagyon pici ecet, egy kis cukor, ízlés szerint megízesítettem. A marhahúst kiszedtem a húslevesből – általában fehérpecsenyét, ami a legjobb része a marhahúsnak, nagyon jól lehet szeletelni, és nem száraz, hanem jó omlós –, fölszeleteltem, és a vadas szaftba beletettem.

Lezajlott az ebéd, utána én mosogattam, mert nem volt elég precíz ehhez senki se. Mert én minden nap minden edényt, evőeszközt lesúroltam. És utána megszűntem háziasszonynak lenni. Délután jött a társadalmi élet. Ha valaki délután megkérdezte, mi volt ebédre, annak legszívesebben elharaptam volna a torkát. Mondtam, az ebéd lezajlott, elmosogattam, kijöttem a konyhából, kész. Akkor én átmentem privátba. Az nem volt téma a barátokkal, hogy: „Jaj, mit főztél, mi volt?” Tudták, hogy nem szeretem, ha megkérdezik, mert nekem kellett akkor az az idő, hogy kikapcsoljam magam a konyhából. Vagy társaságba mentünk, vagy nagyon sokat jártam koncertre, Operába. Az Opera főtitkára volt a legjobb barátunk, és attól örökké voltak jegyek. Anyagilag én annyi operát és annyi koncertet nem engedhettem volna meg magamnak, de a kultúrigényem az megvolt rá.

A főzésből annyi pénz jött be, hogy a háztartásom ingyenben volt, arra nem kellett pénzt költeni. Ebből a főzésből nem kellett fizetnem adót se. Föl is jelentettek egyszer. Jött a nagy ÁNTSZ, és megállapították, hogy semmi szabálytalanságot nem követek el azzal, hogy beteg, idős embereken segítek. Effektíve tényleg az volt a nagy része, akiknek hazaszállítottam, hót beteg emberek voltak. Akkor bementem a fővároshoz, kaptam egy hivatalos papírt, hogy beteg, idős embereknek főzök, akik annyit fizetnek nekem, amennyi a kiadásom. Akkor volt 10 forint egy ebéd. Szóval az én háztartásom teljesen ingyen volt. Amit a férjem keresett, míg dolgozott, annak egy részét eltettük. Mindig azt mondta, hogy tizenhárom évvel idősebb nálam – ami nem számított, nem ez volt a lényeg –, úgy szeretné, hogy ha én ne adj’ isten egyedül maradok, nekem anyagi gondom ne legyen.

A férjem tizenöt éve halt meg. 1968-ban ment nyugdíjba, zseniálisan jó kondícióban volt, még a halála előtt, a 85. évében is. Nem látszott rajtunk a tizenhárom év korkülönbség, nagyon-nagyon jól nézett ki. December 14-én lett volna a 85 éves születésnapja és 12-én halt meg. Nem volt soha semmi baja, de pillanatok alatt kapott egy olyan szívritmuszavart, hogy pacemekerrel sem lehetett helyrebillenteni, és három hét alatt meghalt. De nagyon jó kondícióban lévő és végtelenül rendes ember volt. Ötvenkét évig éltünk együtt, kimondottan jó házasság volt. Nem tett soha szemrehányást, hogy mért maradtunk itt. Jól elvoltunk a konyhában.

Én alapjában véve alanyi jogon nem vagyok nyugdíjas, de szép csendben éhen halnék, ha akkor nem gondoskodott volna a férjem arról, hogy ha egyedül maradok, ne legyen anyagi gondom. Nem arról van szó, hogy a fiam nem segítene, de nem szeretnék a nyakukba szakadni. A körzeti orvosom volt jópofa, amikor a férjem meghalt. 15 évvel ezelőtt az első özvegyi nyugdíjam 7300 Ft volt. Nagyon jóban vagyok a körzeti orvossal. Azt mondta: „Magdika, most mi lesz magával? Ebből hogy fog megélni?” Mondom: „Drága doktornő! Nem azért főztem több mint 30 évig, hogy most haljak éhen.”

Amikor főzni kezdtem, elhatároztam, hogy 70 éves koromig főzök, és amint betöltöttem a 70 évemet, abban a percben abbahagytam. Azóta azért főzök magamnak, természetesen, disznóhúst is, mindent, ami nem hal. És ugyanúgy van, mint amikor a kosztosaimnak főztem, hogy az ebéd leves nélkül nem ebéd. Otthon szegény apám mindig azt mondta a házvezetőnőnknek: „Az ebéd leves nélkül nem ebéd.” Ez annyira belém rögződött, és ugyanez van a fiaméknál is. Ők is levesesek, a menyem is mániákusan húszfélét főz egyszerre. De leves nélkül étkezés nincs. Az időmbe belefér.

A zsidósághoz, a zsidó identitáshoz való viszony az én magánügyem. Nem tagadom, hogy zsidó vagyok, kiállok maximálisan minden zsidó ügyben. De én nem voltam vallásos soha, bevallom férfiasan.  A zsidó hagyományokból csak addig tudtam konkrétan valamit, hogy milyen ünnep van, mit, hogy kell csinálni, amíg a szüleim megvoltak. De őket elvitték, nem jöttek vissza. A háború után meg nem volt kitől kérdeznem. Aki tudta, a nagybátyám meg a nagynéném biztos tudta, ők a gettóban haltak meg. Itt maradtam egyedül, nem volt kit kérdezni. Akik meg Jánoshalmán az esküvőnkön voltak, meg aki a tanú volt, azok is elpusztultak Auschwitzban. Ma Jánoshalmán abból az óriási zsidó közösségből van két darab zsidó. Kettő! Mindig hívnak jánoshalmai találkozóra, de ott már csak csupa szélsőjobboldali gojok vannak. Engem nagyon szeretnek, de dísz-zsidónak nem megyek oda. Minden évben, amikor lemegyünk holokauszt ünnepre, van mit tudom én tíz zsidó, épphogy összejön annyi, hogy el tudják mondani az imát.

Itt a házban is összesen vagyunk ketten zsidók. De a másodiknak – avval együtt voltam a gettóban, s annak a papája szedett ki a romok alól – a férje keresztény volt. Nagyon rendes, nagyon aranyos volt, és nagyobb zsidó volt, mint a felesége. Akivel mostanában sétálok napközben, ő is keresztény. De nagyon rendes nő, mert a barátnőmnek – ő zsidó volt természetesen, a Szeretetkórházban halt meg – nagyon sokat segített.

Széder estére a Thököly úti zsinagógába megyek minden évben a barátaimmal. Zsinagógába egyébként nem jártam, csak megnézni voltam. Ez lelki dolog. Az én apukám olyan vallásos volt, hogy az egész imakönyvet fejből tudta. Lehet, hogy magamat büntetem azáltal, hogy nem megyek. Nem megyek el mászkerra sem 45 óta. Ebből a részből olyan meghasonlott valaki vagyok. Nem megyek, mert nem tudok menni. Nem tudom, miért. Majd az égiek megbüntetnek érte.

Egy családtagomnak sincs sírköve. Azt sem tudom, hogy hol van Császártöltésen zsidó temető. Már lehet, hogy szántóföld. A nagyanyám és az egyik nagynénim a rákoskeresztúri temetőben lett 42-ben eltemetve. Halvány gőzöm nincs, hogy hol. A férjemnek az volt a kívánsága, hogy mivel a szüleit elégették, szórjuk szét a hamvait. Én ugyanezt szeretném.

Eugenia Abravanel
Thessaloniki
Greece
Interviewer: Valia Kravva
Date of the interview: November 2005

My family name is Koumarianou. My paternal grandfather was called Kleanthis Koumarianos and he was born on the island of Andros, even though he lived with his wife in Constantinople [today Istanbul, Turkey] where he had eight children. My father too was born in Constantinople. My grandfather was a shareholder in the shipping line Aegaio. Because this was his profession, he traveled a lot through the Aegean to the Black Sea and Russia. 

Grandfather Kleanthis died in Constantinople, having injured his spinal cord after falling in the hold of the ship that was left open. I only knew him when I saw his picture on his coffin. He was a strange man. Afterwards, earlier than 1910, when I was born, my mother together with my uncles came to Athens. So I don’t remember my grandfather at all.

My paternal grandmother, Matroni Alexandrovna or Alexandrevna, met my grandfather Kleanthis in Russia. Her nickname was Mokia and she was Russian-born, from Nikolaev, near Odessa [today Ukraine]. I don’t remember a great deal because at the time children didn’t ask a lot of details. My grandmother became an orphan at a very young age. She didn’t know her father, who had died when her mother was pregnant, and she had an older brother. Her brother studied in a school in Odessa. 

One time, just before Easter, her mother, my great-grandmother, rented with a friend a carriage that would take them to Nikolaev, near the Black Sea. They were attacked, and both of them were killed by bandits, who tried to steal their money and jewelry. So my grandmother became an orphan at the age of three. 

Many years went by and the brigands were not caught, but later on they identified one of them by an ornate bottle he had which belonged to my grandfather. It was too late though because my grandmother left a complete orphan grew up among very religious families. She had a difficult childhood.

When my grandmother was sixteen she met my grandfather and they got married. I remember my grandmother from a portrait I have of her, with a big hat with feathers, European style. 

My maternal grandfather was called Dimitris Papadopoulos and was from Gallipoli in Thrace [today Turkey]. He was an Ottoman subject, and except Greek he knew Turkish and French and was appointed as an employee in a company named ‘Agents des Phares,’ responsible for the lighting of the lighthouses on the islands of the Aegean. Later on, in 1922, the islands of the Aegean became Greek. Originally, this was a private company, or maybe half-private. 

My grandfather was responsible for the islands of Lesbos, Lemnos and Aghios Efstratios and had to supervise the lighting of the Lighthouse on these islands. When a big ship reached one of the ports it had to pay certain dues, now paid to the Port Authorities. In Mytilene [today capital of Lesbos Island] my grandfather had three Turkish associates. They each had one lighthouse and were responsible for its lighting and maintenance. These three were Turks but spoke Greek, even though my grandfather spoke Turkish perfectly, since Gallipoli when he was born there, was Turkish. 

Grandfather Dimitris was doing very well financially. I remember that every month he came from the Ottoman Bank with a sealed and seamless purse. This purse had forty pieces in it, but I don’t remember if these were gold Sterling or some other coins. He would take a small Swiss knife out of his vest and cut open the string of the purse and empty its content in a bowl. I still remember the sound of the coins falling in it and him watching them fall. 

His wife was also from Gallipoli, was called Eugenia Pandermali or Pandermanli. The grandfather and grandmother on my mother’s side I remember very well because they lived with us in Athens where we stayed for many years before I went to school. Later on I remember them in Mytilene where my grandfather built a small house. Actually they both died in Mytilene, Grandfather Dimitris in 1926 and Grandmother Eugenia a few years after her husband. 

When my father was born in Constantinople around 1880, Greece was at war with Turkey. Like many other young Greeks, my father Christoforos went to the Greek consulate in Constantinople and volunteered to fight on the side of Greece. My father hadn’t told anyone at home that he was going to war. His mother was crying while preparing his clothes and asked him, ‘What do you need them for, my son, where are you going to go?’ He finally went and fought, and had a very difficult time. He left behind a diary for the days of 1897 1. 

The war ended with the defeat of the Greeks and because he could not return to Constantinople, he went to Egypt where one of his brothers, who was a pharmacist, lived. The war of 1897 became known as ‘the unlucky war.’ While my father was a soldier he kept a diary, and everyone knew him as ‘pen pusher.’ Except for Greek my father also knew Arabic and French perfectly. My father was a quiet and gentle man. 

As for his brothers, my uncle Stamatelos [Stamatis] went and settled in Abyssinia [today Ethiopia] where he married and Ethiopian. He was a carpenter and woodcarver in the palace of Haile Selassie [(1892-1975): Emperor of Ethiopia]. Once, I remember, a young man came and told us he was the son of Stamatelos Koumarianos. He was, of course, dark skinned but spoke Greek well. He brought us some presents made of ivory and after he left we never saw him again. 

Giorgos Manoussos, the husband of my aunt Efrossyni, was an important Salonican architect. Two of his household buildings made of red brick still exist in the Analipsi area. They belonged to his sister Dorothea and reached the sea. Aunt Dorina had adopted the illegitimate daughter of King Alexander of Serbia. He had an affair with a French artist, who lived here, but they had difficulties meeting each other. One of those two houses built by Uncle Giorgos became their meeting place. Every evening a car brought him and then left. The little girl we named Bebeka and her father gave her as a present a big plot of land at the corner of Petros Syndika and Queen Olga Street, where Uncle Giorgos had built a beautiful house. 

Aunt Dorothea had married Patroklos Antoniades, a civil engineer, who had a brother named Sophocles. Uncle Sophocles was a calligrapher and a sketch artist, initially with newspapers and later on in the Ministry of Naval Affairs, where diplomas were awarded. They also had a sister, Maria, who married in Germany. 

Their father was called Telemachos and was a medical doctor in the harem of Abdul Hamid [(1842-1918): 34th sultan of the Ottoman Empire]. He lived in an apartment for free, in ‘Katrian,’ a famous hotel in Constantinople. Everything was paid for him by the sultan and he had a carriage with two horses, but he was very wasteful. 

My mother, Stella Koumarianou, was born in Mytilene in 1890. My father and mother met in Mytilene. My grandfather’s brother was the family doctor of my mother’s family. There was ten years of age difference between the two of them. My mother was then very young, and when she turned 18, my uncle Nikolaos had them engaged without asking them. My mother, who was very shy, protested, ‘What does Christoforos look like? I don’t know him.’ Once, when they seated together, my father’s gun fell down – he had a gun since he had been in Egypt where everybody carried a gun – and my mother was very upset when the gun was dropped. 

My uncle Notis, my mother’s brother knew German and Italian. He had worked with a German called Richard Raibel. He had visited us in Mytilene with his wife. He was an admirer of Ancient Greek and knew Homer by heart. Uncle Notis represented many companies such as Michelin tires and Iris chocolates. The ION chocolates didn’t exist yet. Later on, Notis married Christina Klonaridou.

My parents were an endearing couple and I don’t remember my father even looking at my mother in a strict way. Couples were different at the time. Family members loved each other. Nowadays one hears things… Especially when we were young, we didn’t know what ‘No’ or ‘Don’t’ meant. My mother, on the other hand, was a mother to all the children in the neighborhood. She read fairytales to them, sang songs and advised them.

My father died six months after my mother, on 16th February 1960. Six months less nine days; he almost committed suicide. They were such a loving couple, a rare case. I mourned for both of them. They were very good parents, and had great understanding for their children. But I never cried as much as when I read my father’s diary, which he wrote for my mother, I was really sobbing. How much did he love her, how much did he suffer when his wife died, his companion in life, his angel in life. 

The truth is that whenever he went out in the garden he would bring her something, some small flower, a little mint. The way he loved her, and how he wanted to kill himself when she died, but he thought of the children… How they would suffer. 

Every day he would go to the cemetery. The women he met there said, ‘We have seen many men love their wives but none as much as Mr. Christoforos…’  And in his diary he wrote how he liked it when everybody left the cemetery, and in the quiet he could hear the birds sing for his beautiful Stella. 

I never saw them looking at each other with disrespect. And that’s why I thought that all couples are like them. Now, the things I hear… I think how we lived then and how it is now, how are the young children going to live…?!

I was born in 1910 in Egypt, in Cairo, and lived there until I was three years old. In the house we had branches of bananas and dates spread out on the floor. I remember it was a two-story house and on the top floor was my father’s office. I remember only the house, how one climbed up a curved staircase, the rooms. We also had a maid, Eleni, who came as my mother’s ‘dowry.’ She spoke enough Greek to be able to communicate. We ate at a rectangle table and there was a couch with a cover, and in the corner stood my mother’s piano. 

In Egypt, my father wrote for a Greek magazine called ‘Cosmos.’ He was in charge of cotton fields there, but my mother couldn’t stand the climate and we had to leave for Athens.

After Egypt we stayed in Athens for a while. I remember that my dad had brought from Germany balloons with a picture of Venizelos 2 on them. He had especially ordered them. He would fill them with gas and give them to us when the maid took us to Zapeion to give away to the other children as well.

We took the piano with us when we went to Athens but it got ruined when the storage room we kept it in was flooded, and all our things were ruined by mould. So the only thing that was left were the notes. These were inherited by my niece, but the piano’s loss was my mother’s regret.

In 1914, during World War I, my father had come to Salonica to visit his siblings and to supervise his business, and my mom with my brother went to Mytilene for the summer vacation. Suddenly a blockade took place because of the war and communication with the islands and the inland was broken. I was already in Mytilene, having been invited by my grandmother Eugenia, who loved me very much, and my uncle from Athens had taken me to her. 

So we were on the island at the outbreak of the war, and because of the blockade only a small boat named ‘Yperohi’ reached the island. Our house was the only one at the port, there were no other houses around us. Just coffee houses, hotels and oil cellars. 

I remember once – I must have been four or five years old – I decided to put a small rug on the balcony and lie down. I woke up because of the bombing and I saw a Turk who was wearing a fez 3 approach the boat and throwing the bomb inside the boat. I was so scared that I immediately disappeared. 

While in Mytilene my mother couldn’t get in touch with my father and the letters would come only every fortnight. Once, my mother Stella received a letter from my father saying that the next time the boat would come he would send a kilo of provisions that were not available in Mytilene. 

My mother was wondering how come my father could send such a package, and the man in the post office, Tassos Skourtelis, told her that her husband was just joking. My mother was disappointed but one day we saw Tassos running and shouting, ‘A package, you’ve got a package, Christoforos is coming home.’ When we opened it, it was like Pandora’s box: there were biscuits, matches, some coffee, sugar, rice – things that didn’t exist on the island.

The house in Mytilene was built by my grandfather Dimitris, when he was still a young man. The port didn’t exist yet. The plot of land he had bought was just sand. Later on they decided to make there the municipal garden, and when they put the cement our house became shorter. Our windows were 80 cm high from the road. It was a plain two-story house, and had four rooms on the top floor, three on the ground floor, a cellar and a wash room, a kitchen and a toilet. We also had a flower and tree garden, as well as a vegetable one. 

I stayed in Mytilene from the age of four until 1928. On 2nd September we left and on the 4th we reached Salonica. And since then I’ve never returned to the beautiful Mytilene. Ah, it was really beautiful on the island. I lie down in bed and I remember my unforgettable childhood there. We went to the countryside, jumped in the sea, went to the watermelon fields, put tobacco leaves on sticks. Five six summers in the island and they were the nicest summers of my life. An iron door separated us from my grandfather’s offices.

My brother Kleanthis was born in Mytilene in October 1911. He was fourteen months younger than me, and always a victim because he followed me faithfully in all my mischief. He graduated from the 12-grade school, the lyceum, and was trained as an accountant for a year in Salonica. During World War II he worked in the Telegraph Company. He got married twice. From his first marriage he had Elvina, with whom I am very close and she is living in Athens, from the second marriage he had Christoforos. 

I remember the school I went to in Mytilene, and two or three of my mother’s friends. We went together to parties, and we had a gramophone at home and listened to music. My mother and my uncle Notis had graduated from the French school. I remember that the kindergarten I went to on the island was in a private house, and a lady assembled a few children and taught them some Greek. 

In elementary school we did not have fire. I remember she used to take my cloak to get warm and I was very proud she wore mine. In Mytilene there were only nine grades for girls. There was no need for them to learn more. But for the boys there were 12 grades. 

When I graduated from the girl’s school, my mother wanted to send me to the gymnasium [high school] but to our misfortune the high school dean, Ioanis Olymbios, told my mother, ‘Are you crazy, Stella? Why do you want to send the girl there? What does she need more education for? We have two girls all in all and we do not know where to fit more. Never mind the fact that they continuously look at the boys. Girls don’t need high school education, Stella.’ As a result I only went to school for nine years.

We had three maids, Eleni, Katina and Yannoula. I taught Yannoula to read and write. And so she could write love letters to a sailor whom later on she married in Salonica.

My brother Kleanthis and I liked photography very much. We were young but devils. We did our own developing and printing and had our own studio. Our camera was square like a box, either Agfa or Kodak. When we came to Salonica we took a Kodak. We used to buy from Athens a special paper called zivaert. We had a dark room and melted the liquids, spread out the pictures on the lining with pins to dry. We photographed everything, scenery, and faces.

I remember when I was small in Mytilene they would illuminate a small electric lamp in the street. I remember that the whole island gathered to see it and how they cheered when they saw it. A small lamp the size of a candle and it impressed us tremendously. 

During Pangalos’s dictatorship 4 I was a student in Mytilene. They had us wear skirts, I remember, down to our ankle. If the parents had money they made clothes for their children, and if not they were outlaws just because they were poor. This didn’t happen only to the schoolchildren but also to women. I had taken a picture with my classmates in their school uniform down to the ankle. Title: ‘The sad schoolgirls.’

On the island we had dolls and played pantomime. Personally, I didn’t like dolls very much. My poor godfather had brought me a big porcelain doll from Germany. She could open and close her glass eyes and move her hands. She would be kept in her box under the bed and she would only come out when my friends came. They were crazy about the doll but I preferred playing in the garden. I doubt I played with her more than once. The children of our family friends came. 

During the catastrophe of Smyrna in 1922 5 I was twelve years old. We were in Mytilene then and were spending the summer vacation with Mother who had gone to the sea for swimming. Our father came with a two horse carriage and took us back speedily, and he was very worried. He says to us, ‘Come quickly because they will put the house under requisition and we will be left out.’ So we arrived and the coachman descended from the carriage to direct the horses on foot in Mytilene where there was such a crowd that he didn’t have a choice. A crowd of people, all of them falling down. 

We arrived at home and the place was full of people. Upstairs, downstairs. They had left us three rooms. We were better off and I remember we washed a big tank where we used to wash our laundry and cooked beans in it, and chick peas and vegetables to give to the people. I remember one could no longer see flowers or vegetables, but only people lying down. I remember one evening I was looking out and saw that the bay was full of people lying down, I cannot forget that scene. 

My grandfather had a lot of money. We did all we could to help. But these people had come with nothing. Boats arrived continuously to unload crowds and crowds of people with only a bundle of clothes. One had lost his mother, someone else his father. What can I tell you, it was terrible. There were so many people. Later on they moved them to some neighborhood. 

In 1928, when we came to Salonica, we couldn’t find a house to stay, so in the beginning we stayed with my grandmother. She lived at the corner of Chalkidikis and Gravias Street. After a while we found a house on Kretis Street. My mother went to see it with my aunt Efi. Even though at first it seemed very old to us, we stayed there temporarily, and rented it for six months. We finally stayed there for 20 years. 

It was a warm house, had upholstery and rubber floors and was long like a railway. First there was my room, after that the living room with a staircase that led downstairs, and then two more rooms, my mother’s and my brother’s. It was a two-story house, even though the downstairs part was used as a cellar. It had a very big kitchen like two rooms. Next to that the bathroom, a small storage room and a toilet. It seems they built it room after room. It also had a garden and a vegetable garden of 640 square meters. My father liked to take care of it and worked there often. We also were great animal lovers. We always kept pets, mostly cats. This area was called Exohes or Countryside.

Due to the fire that consumed Salonica’s center in 1917 6, my father’s restaurant and the cellar, where he kept provisions, burned. The room he rented in the old city didn’t burn, but the restaurant that stood by the seaside of the city did and with it all the goods that were kept there. As a result he had to start all over again. Here in Salonica he became the manager for the concentration of wheat in Langada and in Zaglivery. We didn’t ask him how much he made but we never lacked food. We didn’t ask too many things. In Mytilene, of course, we had three maids while here my mother was doing the cooking herself.

Before World War II, we had a gramophone in our house in Salonica. It was made by ‘His Master Voice,’ you know that label with the little dog listening to a gramophone. My father had brought it from Egypt. He had very nice records, many operas. Oh, beautiful things. And later everything was lost. The first nice record we bought was ‘Ramona.’ We, the children, wanted modern records because we were young, but my father didn’t want such records. And we had fights. I remember one day I took him to a small street to buy ‘Ramona,’ but the shop had only one record and that one was damaged. So even though it was damaged we bought it and listened to it with great joy.  

My father had a couple of records with Venizelos’s voice: ‘I can assure you that today’s crisis…’ . I remember that he had brought them from London. My father also listened to these records on the gramophone he had brought from Cairo. Otherwise we didn’t get involved with politics. At home there was no talk about politics, and Father didn’t go to coffee shops. He was a house cat. Maybe he discussed these matters with his friends. He read the newspaper ‘Makedonia’ 7 and Louvaris’s ‘Fos.’ He was one of our acquaintances and a royalist.

When we settled in Thessaloniki it was during September, the time of the International Fair 8, which must have started the year before, in 1927. In September 1928 we visited the fair, but most of all we visited the AGFA stand and examined the cameras. However, at another stand they convinced us to buy the KODAK model of the year. It came with a tripod so we could use delayed action shutter release and run and be in the picture as well. My brother Kleanthis created a dark room at home.

On the same day we moved, by mere but favorable coincidence, across us moved the family of Albertos Abravanel, who later became my brother-in-law. They were very sociable, outgoing and open hearted. I was then a young girl of 18. My mother started talking with Alberto and invited him to come and visit us. She was very outgoing too. 

The Abravanel family had eight children: Rafael, Alberto, Paul, Ino, Isidore, Mari Modiano, Leon and Solomon. We would see Alberto every day; either we met while shopping from mobile donkey merchants, or when we bought ice. He would always ask my mother why I didn’t go to their Saturday surprise parties, which they organized in their home together with his brothers. I was very timid. My mother had to push me to go, even though I was 18 and in my heart I wished to go. I could see them on the top floor of their house dancing, playing the piano etc. 

Carnival season [orthodox] was at hand, and I remember I disguised myself and wore a clown’s mask and went to their house. This is where we met. We all went to some dancing hall to have fun. At that time people used to stroll from one hall to the next, the notion of ‘reservation’ didn’t exist. The most popular dances were Charleston and foxtrot. This is how we met Leo and Ino. They knew Zermain, Alberto’s daughter, and her girlfriends and even though they too were disguised the boys could identify them. But not me since they didn’t know me. Throughout the night they tried and tried to identify me. I was the new face in their company. 

Alberto had dressed as a medical doctor. He wore a Republican hat and held a box with his medical tools, which contained chocolates in reality. I remember that after the ball was finished we entered a tramway wagon and he was fooling around, wanted to check the pulse of the passengers, telling them what was the disease they suffered from. To cure them he would give them a small chocolate. Some people laughed and took it as a joke, others were a bit afraid. 

Leo’s family was not very religious, maybe only his father and his brother Isidor was. They read the Bible [Old Testament] and went to the synagogue. My father-in-law had built a small synagogue at the end of Mitropoleos Street and Pavlou Mela. He was a religious man, my husband was not, though he was a believer. Leo was a fanatic Jew, but not a fanatic believer. Neither were the rest of his siblings. The older one, Raphael – the only one I didn’t meet – had gone to Spain during Franco’s regime and he was killed there; I suppose because he hid priests, rabbis. 

My mother wasn’t very religious, but she believed. In the meantime the love affair with Leo had grown, and when one of my mother’s friends informed her, you won’t believe what she said to me, ‘We know the family. Leo is a very nice man and often comes to our house. If you want to live with this man, we cannot tell you no. You decide.’ Neither did my father or brother say anything. I don’t know if you can believe it, nothing. We were from a different planet.

I remember another young neighbor in Thessaloniki, Erricos, who would calm down only near my mother. I remember that when Thessaloniki was bombarded by the Italians 9, the neighbors joked that it was Erricos’s doing. He was a very naughty child, and then my mother said, ‘Erricos would never do such a thing since Grandmother Stella lives here.’

Leo and I loved each other and had a very good time together. We didn’t think of what could happen in the future. We had a very nice company of friends and we had great fun when we met. He [Leo] would come to my house, my parents knew him, even though they didn’t at first know we had an affair. Maybe they did think something was going on, but my father and my brother never made a comment.

When my mother learned we had an affair she said, ‘My child, we know Leo and he is a very nice chap. It is you who is going to live with him, and we won’t interfere to tell you either yes or no. You are to decide. We do not care if he were a Jew and you a Christian. You will live with him.’ Neither did I hear my other relatives, uncles, grandparents say something. Only the landlady of our house said “Good, one more will become Christian”. But my mother did not speak, she laughed and did not speak, because the landlady was a nice woman and meant well. 

My husband’s family descended from Spain. In fact my father-in-law’s name is registered in a book in the synagogue of Toledo. I saw it with my own eyes when I visited Toledo with my niece several years ago. I entered a hall with mosaics and there was a bookstand with the name Jacques Abravanel. It was in Latin characters. I always had paper and pen with me so I could make notes on whatever I saw and be able to read them later in my old age. So I copied part of this text. During the reign of Isabella, the Catholic, one of my father-in-law’s ancestors, was Minister of Finance. So upon my return I asked Mari to go to Spain and find this synagogue. 

My husband’s family would speak Spanish very rarely – especially Isidor’s wife – they would speak in Greek between them. They never spoke in Spanish in order to keep something a secret from me. And Leo had learned to write in Greek very well. His father had sent him and his younger brother to study in Switzerland and they stayed there for many years. When they returned to Greece, they had forgotten their Greek. 

When they disembarked from the boat in Patras they went to a restaurant and couldn’t read the menu. They wanted eggs. So at first they spoke to the waiter in literate Greek asking for ‘oa’ [almost ancient] and he didn’t understand them. And then they started moving their hands like wings while making chicken sounds. 

During the occupation my mother undertook to teach Leo Greek. Sometimes Leo spoke with his parents in Spanish. Mari chose to speak Greek properly, she used to speak with a French accent. She sang operas very nicely. 

The ‘151’ 10, ‘Baron de Hirsch’ and ‘Campbell’ were Jewish neighborhoods. Poor neighborhoods, very needy people. I never went there, I only heard about them, especially ‘151,’ which was on Aghia Triada Street; I remember the girls that came from there and were my clients. They would come on Saturday when they received their weekly salary and would buy cosmetics, their face cream and their eau de cologne. 

The rich neighborhoods were situated beyond Markou Botsari Street, and area which was known as ‘countryside’ – Exohes in Greek. Many of the houses there were Jewish. We then considered this area as out of town, and it would reach up to the Votsi area. 

I remember that when we came from Mytilene, we could buy a house in Votsi quarter with the money we had, but it seemed very far away to us. I remember that I had gone only once to the Old City to a visit my sister-in-law Mari, who had an aunt there. One could only go there on foot because there was no tram connection. The tram would only reach Depo, even before one gets to the municipality building. There was also a line that would go through 25is Martiou [25th March Street] Harilaou, and Vassilissis Olgas. 

Most of the time, even up to the age of 20, we went by climbing the back of the tram ‘Scala Maria’ and traveled without paying. Why should we pay [the interviewee chuckles]. Until the ticket collector reached us, we would climb out on the stairs and hold on to the door knob. Then we would let go and jump down on the ground, and run to greet him. Follies, many follies. We played ‘cherki,’ ‘snail’ [something like hopscotch with stones] and ‘pendovolo’ [with five stones].

I remember the seaside road reached all the way up to Antheon Street, back then it was called Georgiou Papandreou. Whatever construction waste was there would be thrown away to the shore. I remember we intended to buy a plot of land on Gravias Street, which was then a ship courtyard. Back then, if one wanted to take a walk by the seaside the only way was towards Nikis Avenue. All the brothels were in the Vardari area, and so were the whole sellers. It wasn’t a well reputed area. In what is today the Ladadika there were also wholesale commercial houses. 

There were refugee neighborhoods in Constandinopolitika, beyond Harilaou. I was never there. The 3E 11 set the Campbell neighborhood on fire 12. It was a nationalist organization. I remember that people were very upset after that. Thessaloniki had so many Jewish schools as well as synagogues. They were all destroyed during the German occupation. The people would travel by tram; there were very few cars until the war. My family didn’t own a car. Leo bought one only after the war.

The Jewish cemetery 13 was where the university is today. The Germans ruined all the graves. I used to have a nice picture of my mother-in-law’s grave. A nice marble grave and all around it the children and their brides standing at the grave, looking sad. I think I gave this picture to Nelly Sephiha as a gift. 

Famous ballrooms at this time were the ‘Olympus Naussa’ by the seaside and ‘Remvi’ out of town. We went there with Leo. We could sit outside in the summer. There was music and we used to dance. The two of us went to ‘Remvi’ in the beginning. Afterwards the company grew. I remember that in ‘Flokaki’ there were performances by Domenico de Thomas. He was an Italian and we went to listen to him. 

Other ballrooms were the ‘Luxembourg’ and the ‘Phare’ near the Allatini flower mill. They served delicious fried muscles; I’ve never eaten any quite as tasty anywhere since. In ‘Luxembourg’ we danced foxtrot, tango and Charleston. Leo was an excellent dancer, and so was Solon Sevi. Ah the poor one, he was lost for no reason.

I remember the lighters [type of boat] carrying wheat at the Allatini mills 14. We would get on the boat and take a ride from Koromila Street to the Mills. There we would jump in the sea, swim and climb up the lighters and dance there. Oh what follies we would do there. There the wheat was grounded and the flour was given to the bakeries.

I cannot say there were no differences between Christians and Jews before the war. There are always differences. Rumors had it, even in Mytilene, that during Easter a Christian boy would be missed, that the Jews slaughtered him and prepared matzot with his blood. I’ve heard of that rumor. I believe that someone who was mad at a Jew spread this rumor. Besides, an evil rumor is spread instantly, but never a good one. Luckily this rumor has disappeared now. 

I remember that when we were in Athens and the maid took me out on the balcony, she pointed at a field, where there was a wall and a man with a bag on his shoulder. The maid told me then, ‘Be careful, if you are not a good kid, the Jew will put you in his sack and into a barrel with nails and will roll you over and drink your blood.’ I remember I was very scared and cowered in a corner and didn’t make any trouble. This is what I remember; I was very young then, maybe four years old. 

With Leo and his friends, we went on many excursions. We had a big company. My brother and some of his friends had bought a big sailing boat. We went everywhere in the summer. We went to this beach towards Koromila innumerable times and knew it by heart. I was an excellent swimmer, I even competed with boys and won. I also ran fast. 

Peraia wasn’t known then, we showed it to the world. It is not a lie; our company used to rent a boat, some 45 people shared the cost. People from Salonica didn’t know Peraia, and there was no other way to communicate with the village. In Peraia there was only a ballroom called ‘Cote d’Azur,’ where we used to dance. We stayed there for many hours and the boat would take us back in the evening. All day we ate and danced in the ‘Cote d’Azur.’ 

One night the boat Poseidon didn’t show up. My brother and a friend, who later became his brother-in-law, Pavlos, came back in the early hours, with a carrier filled with watermelons and notified the port authorities, and in turn notified the owner of Poseidon, who came and picked us up. For his parents it was an agonizing wait. We usually returned at midnight, one o’clock at night, but not in the morning. 

We also went to the mountains, to Asvestohori, Peristera. We went on day trips.

Aunt Doudou, Leo’s aunt, had a house on Koromila Street. It was built upon a rock and one got the impression that half of it was built in the sea. The windows overlooking the sea were always closed because when the waves hit them the water would get inside the house. We had a ball there. Every summer we would gather in the house and would create a chaos. Watermelons, melons, bread and cheese. The nautical club was very near and we did whatever we wished. And my aunt was also there, where should she go? It was a small house. 

When we left, her complaint was that we simply left and afterwards didn’t ask her how she was doing. Not even her nephew. Only a friend of ours, Odysseus Papadakis, who took pictures, he was the photographer of our company, but also our tyrant until he had us posing, he was the only one who went to visit her. 

There was a lot of matchmaking going on among the people of our company, Christians and Jews, from various neighborhoods. I remember Sol Levi, poor one, he didn’t return [that is, didn’t survive the Holocaust]. I remember we used to tease him because he stuck his tongue out and we laughed. Pavlos Yiotaris. Then came Jackos Gabai, who used to call my parents Mom and Dad. He was a good friend of mine who did survive.

As a young girl I became a member of the YMCA, in the section exclusively reserved for women. I registered there for French language courses, decorating and photography, and assisted the Italian School. During that time I was appointed in the Third Army Corps as a secretary. I remember that the Ierissos earthquake took place at the time [in 1936] and we had to publish a news report. All this happened before the war. At the time, I was a typist in the army headquarters and was making good money. All my friends were unemployed. It is I who used to take them to the ‘Luxembourg’ ballroom by the seaside and to ‘Floka’s’ where Domenicos used to sing, as I mentioned before. 

I don’t know how Leo’ s family took our affair, maybe his sister was the only one who was surprised and didn’t wish it. I didn’t have any such reaction with the rest of his siblings. They welcomed me and spoke to me nicely, they defended me when I had disagreements with Leo – as every couple does – they always defended me. 

His father was very good person. His mother died of cancer shortly after I met Leo. I didn’t meet my mother-in-law, I only know her from her photograph. She had breast cancer and didn’t accept a nurse cleaning her wounds. She only allowed Leo to do it. She had a weak point for him. We lived a few years with his father, and I often went to Leo’s house to cook. Meantime they had left the old house and only Albertos, the second son, continued living there. 

Many Jews lived in Salonica at the time. I cannot say there were no arguments with the Christians, even today people cannot make peace. They say about the Albanians that they are all thieves, murderers, bad people. There are very good families that have settled here, they are not all evil. Unfortunately there is always a racial hatred among people. For me the three evils are fanatic priests, independently of religion, fanatic politicians of all parties, and money. These are the three world evils, at least in my opinion. 

I remember my father-in-law very well. I closed his eyes when he passed away. He was a very good man, and a good eater too. He had to watch his diet and he never did, that’s why his eyes were always red. When we had a shop in Aghia Triada, a Jew named Manuel had a grocery shop there. He went there and bought pickles and goodies and ate them secretly at the shop. 

My father-in-law had a picture showing him with his brother Haim, who was thin and short. Haim had two daughters, Sarina, and I don’t remember the name of the other girl. They left as a family, all of them, to the camps and didn’t return. Maybe they were Greek citizens, not Spanish. My father-in-law was a kingly man; we had a very good relationship. He died sometime just before the occupation. He lived in a house on Athanassiou Diakou Street, together with Aunt Doudou and her two children. 

Aunt Doudou taught me how to cook Jewish dishes, mainly sardines cleaned of bones, dipped in egg and fried in oil, beans with fried onions and Jewish meatballs made of leek and spinach, and of course lake fish, sazan [carp] which everyone cooks for Pesach, but also throughout the year. 

I also had vine leaves stuffed with rice and onions, spring onions and dry onions, dill and parsley. I prepared at least 150 pieces, because we had many big climbing vines, and plenty of grapes. 

Doudou taught me how to prepare carp in a ceramic pot covered with crushed walnuts and matzah. During that time we bought matzah from the mobile merchants in the street: they sold it in big pieces covered with a piece of cloth – nothing to do with the way matzot are sold today. You have to fry the fish, then place them on the matzah with the walnuts, cover them in the same way, then pour a good amount of oil over it and let it cook until the oil has disappeared. After that you had to put it in the refrigerator, or, before the war, into the ice-cupboard. 

Somebody passed by everyday selling ice and we usually bought one quarter. They used to divide every large piece of ice into four pieces. Of course there were some thieves. As was Manuel, whom I mentioned before, who used to divide it into five pieces. And he would say, ‘Never mind, I make more money this way.’

As long as Doudou lived she used to cook, then I cooked and I also cooked them Christian dishes. They didn’t say anything and ate them with pleasure. Except for the fish we also made ‘enhaminados’ eggs, which were put in water to boil with lots of onions and we added a little salt too. They had to boil on a low flame, or, like we did in the old days, when we cooked them slowly in the oven. I remember my niece Lilica used to tell me how in Israel they used to bake them in the oven. We liked these eggs, and often put them in salads. My father-in-law asked for those Jewish dishes. But he also ate others. He never complained; he was a very easy-going person.

As far as sweets go, I only learned the ‘toupischti,’ and my recipe was published by Fytrakis publishing house, and I even got a price. Mari had taught me this recipe when she stayed in my house. It was very tasty and very easy to make. I didn’t like preparing sweets, but I liked to eat them. I never made cookies or other sweets.

Leo was ten years older than me, he was born in 1900. He had gone with his father to Germany, to spas, and that is how he knew German. He had pimples then and a German doctor had given him an ointment, the recipe of a face cream. We started from that: he prepared this cream and distributed it to barbers at first, for men’s skin after shaving. As time went by we were successful with cosmetics and started making face creams for women too.

We started selling face creams together. At first we didn’t have a shop, and prepared them in the basement of our house and sold them from home. Later we asked for a permit from the Ministry of Hygiene. This happened between 1930 and 1932. I remember we sent some specimens and the permit – which we had to renew – was sent to us. Of course we also had to pay a Greek chemical engineer because the permit had to be issued in his name. 

I remember that we used to pay the income tax every week then. Barbalias, a tall man, came with his notebook and we gave him a hundred drachmas every week. We had a book for expenses and entries. After the war the income tax office charged Leo a fine of 75,000 drachmas. 

I remember it was when the Queen of England got married to Philip. My brother-in-law, Paul had rented a room in London, on the street where it would take place so he would be able to watch. We were supposed to go also, but our trip had to be cancelled because of the income tax fine. After that we went to court and they reduced it to 61,000 drachmas, but it was taken by the lawyer. So we neither got to see the royal wedding nor did we get the three-story house in Olgas for which we were negotiating. 

Afterwards, when we opened a shop on Aghia Triada Street, our business grew and we had many employees: Marika and Toula, Efharis, Kostas, and Iordanis in a workshop on Kapodistriou Street. Later on, in my shop, I had Rebecca, Nino and Alberto. There was a lot of work and I should not boast but I was the one who used to make everyone work. I had to guide them. I told them that work is different when one has to deal with two hundred or with five hundred pieces. So I used to manage the staff when we had a lot of pieces to produce. I was always in the shop. Later we opened a soap workshop, a small one, not a big factory. 

At the time we had Davico Beja, who later converted and became Christian under the name of Dimitris. He was very clever. One couldn’t find someone better in the world. He could turn a piece of shit into a jewel. He wasn’t an employee, he was a traveling salesman with a percentage. And he traveled everywhere. He bought face creams from our stores and sold them cheaper. It became known that Beja sold cheaper and in addition to the face cream he also sold other cosmetics. From those he made a profit. Finally we had to stop providing him with our face creams. 

After the war he came back broke. He left his watch to his uncle and borrowed from him 200 drachmas. With this money he did great and beat all his competitors. His first shop was a warehouse on Frangon Street. He was smart, he created things out of nothing. That is what one needs in commerce. The well-known ‘Bejas’ shops probably belong to his children. His children too were baptized Christians. His wife was a Christian, a very nice lady. Unfortunately I never met her. 

On Sundays she would visit the house in Harilaou, which my father bought so we could hide Leo, but finally he never hid there, so she could see her husband Dimitris or Mimis. He would hide there and managed to survive. He was so bright, so competent…

Leo, who was a Spanish citizen, didn’t have the right to vote and hadn’t fought in the Greek-Italian War. When the Germans entered Salonica in 1941 our life changed. We were all upset and had a bad feeling in our heart. After that things started to get more rigorous, Jews had to wear the star of David. Leo’s family wasn’t so scared because they had Spanish citizenship and the Germans were allies of the Spanish. 

At the time, we rented two rooms near the shop, because there was no transportation up to 25th March Street, where our house was. We rented two rooms in a Jewish house, which belonged to Jacques Levi, a doctor who was very old, almost blind. He lived there with his wife and their house was very big. Later when they deported everyone, his wife was already died, and blind as he was they took him on a carriage… 

After the star was introduced, they gathered people on Freedom Square [Eleutherias Square] 15 near the city center. These things we didn’t see, we only heard of them. They had them make exercises. Leo didn’t have to present himself because he was Spanish. Some time later they sent all the Jews to Poland, and only then did they send for the Spanish Jews. 

The Spanish citizens had remained in Thessaloniki, among them Leo and his family. His two brothers, Albertos and Isidor, went to the synagogue where all Spanish Jews had to present themselves under the pretext that the Germans wanted to speak to them. But Leo didn’t go, he went to the building across, where his dentist, Fanis Anagnostopoulos, was and from his window he could see what was happening. In the meantime, while many went to the synagogue with their own cars and others on foot, Leo suddenly saw they were driven away on trucks that the Germans had brought. 

I was at home, in the two rooms we had rented, and suddenly my father came and started telling me what had happened in the synagogue. In the meantime Leo had left the dentist’s place and gone straight to my father’s house. My father reassured me that Leo was with him. 

In my neighborhood, which was between Aghia Triada and Fleming, it became known that the Germans had caught the Spanish Jews. The neighbors knew we were Spanish and started bulging into the house, taking this and that. There were many doors and verandas. I would scream at them ‘Wait, we are not leaving!’ In the meantime, my father came, he closed the doors, and in that way we saved certain things. 

The people probably thought: ‘Since you are going to leave only with a bunch of clothes and the furniture will stay behind, why should the Germans take it.’ I don’t blame them on account of the looting, partly they were right. Meanwhile the Germans had requisitioned one room in the house of Jacques Levi – after he left for the camp – and Leo and I were still staying in the other room. 

The German who stayed in our house – he was a carpenter – knew that Leo was a Spaniard, but not that he was a Jew. Maybe he was suspicious of that. I remember that in a neighboring small house, also requisitioned by the Gestapo, lived another Jewish family with its children that didn’t return – there too lived an Austrian or German. A good one. He was a painter, may have painted my house close to ten times, and he also gave me as a gift a painting with a boat in the sea. The carpenter fixed and mended whatever was broken. 

Individually we maintained a certain friendship with certain Germans, and they gave us a lot of things. Leo knew German and they spoke with him. Some showed us pictures of their children. Whenever they heard shooting outside their house by Gestapo men, they would freeze and become different people. They were terrified of each other. They were afraid that their friend would denounce them of treason. They were terrified of their own friend. That is how Hitler strengthened his power, which was based on traitors. One would fear the other.

Leo couldn’t stay at home any longer when they kicked out the Spanish Jews, because he was afraid that someone in the neighborhood would betray him. No one of course had threatened us in the open, until the very end no one did. Maybe because my mother was a very lovable person, and so was my father. My family didn’t have close relations with any one. It was a good neighborhood. 

I cannot say we had great difficulties during the occupation, even though there were things that were missing. But we kept on working – especially with the cosmetic products – which were very much in demand, especially in the countryside. We continued and I later even did so on my own when Leo was hiding in Athens. I sold face creams, colognes, perfumes and they gave me wheat, barley, corn and beans in return. Those I sold or distributed to people I knew. I never took money, everything was done by barter, and I only took money from certain clients. I bought the required material for the preparation of cosmetics. 

We lived conventionally, we only cared to go through the day. One couldn’t plan for the day after. Once I mixed certain products with paraffin oil and gave it to a German in exchange for olive oil. One should not get the impression that there was no hunger and shortages: I remember a young lad dying in front of me from hunger. We ran to assist him, and when he passed away we all continued our life… Seeing carriages with corpses was a common sight.

In the meantime, Leo had to leave Salonica. At first he had to hide in the villages of Aghia Triada. My brother knew a boatman whom they called ‘black,’ because he was very dark. So Leo went to Aghia Triada and there he rented a room. He spoke German, went openly to coffee shops and the Germans didn’t know he was a Jew. On the other hand the peasants watched him speaking German with the Germans and thought that he may be a German spy and they brought him figs and grapes so he would not turn them in to the Germans. He was scared. 

Leo was audacious. Once we went on a boat to take a ride to the big Karabournou. We never reached it. In the meantime it became dark and there was a blackout. The peasants got worried. We were still somewhere in the Thermaic Gulf, and to think that all we wanted to do is take a ride.

I had two Armenian girlfriends, who were acquainted with the Italian consulate, Rosel and Meliné, and they told us that if we gave a sum of money to the Italians – I don’t know who took the money in the end – he [Leo] could go to Athens which was under Italian occupation, and the Germans hadn’t reached it. Indeed, one day they called on Leo and handcuffed they took him out of the Italian consulate and to the train station. On the train to Platamon they took of the handcuffs and told him he was free. We considered the Italians our friends not enemies: ‘Una faccia una razza’ [Italian proverb commonly used in Greek, meaning ‘one face, one race’].

This is how we moved to Athens, to Nea Ionia. We were led there by a woman who agreed being promised a loaf of bread as a reward. But when we finally went there I also gave her beans and wheat. She was overwhelmed with happiness. There was serious hunger in Athens. Almost every week I had to bring them food provisions from Salonica. 

It was in Athens where the two brothers of Leo were hidden. This is where they accidentally met in the street. At first Leo stayed in the house of an uncle of mine called Notis Papadopoulos. His wife, Christina Klonaridi, and he had a son called Mimis from Dimitris, which was his grandfather’s name. This child from the time he was four years old had a heart and kidney problem because of his tonsils. When this bad thing happened Mimis didn’t want to play, go to school, he couldn’t get excited or laugh. 

I went to visit them regularly to take provisions to them, but Leo had to leave from there because one evening a friend of my uncle’s came and said, ‘Quickly, Kostas has to leave this place.’ He had issued for him two false identity cards in the names of Nikos Raftopoulos and Kostas Mavromatis. The Raftopoulos one was real, it belonged to my aunt’s husband. The other one was issued from the 2nd Police Precinct of Salonica. It was a false name on a false identity card. They knew he was a Jew, but they wanted to help him. Many Jews issued false identity cards at the time. Someone who wanted to get back to my uncle, turned in Leo. Of course I was surprised because my uncle was a good person, a saint. It could be that it was a bad neighbor. 

A little while before the Germans showed up to blockade the area, my uncle’s friend came and told them to leave. I remember it was at night just before curfew time. Luckily the house had two doors, one good one and another one that led to a small passage that led to a small bridge that took you to Patission Street [the longest street in Athens]. So we both left in the dark, there was a blackout and there was no moonlight either. My husband held me, and we walked very slowly so that I wouldn’t fall into the river. That’s how we, step by step, got to the little bridge; it was the first time we took this road. It was completely deserted, not a soul on the road. 

Where should we go? Should we go to Adela – her father and mother were siblings of my husband – her surname was Mano. She lived with her Christian husband. Adela was a Spanish citizen. For us to get to Athens was very difficult, a long way and there was no road from Nea Ionia to Skoufa Street in Athens. We did not have anywhere else to go. 

Zermain with her brother Jacko, Leo’s nephews – they too lived in a house, they were the children of Albertos Abravanel. I used to take some food to the people we knew in Athens. Luckily while on excursions or swimming, or in the Langada Thermae with friends, my husband had met someone called Sotiris Christianos, who lived in Athens, on Koliatsou Street and my husband had once gone to his house. Luckily, he remembered the house, even though it was in a small street, and we knocked at the door – it was past midnight.

We had set off to go to Adela’s house but ended up in the house of Christianos, that was his family name. We knocked on the door, someone from inside jumped out and asked, ‘Who is it?’ ‘Leo,’ my husband answered. As soon as he heard the name he opened the door and took us inside. 

He started asking how come we were there at this hour, and says to Leo, ‘This is where you will stay.’ He kept him there for a long time, two months. I was commuting. He lived in a house of two rooms with his wife and daughter. And he gave Leo his daughter’s room; he pulled her out of bed literally to give it to us. Sotiris, he is the one who saved us. 

In Athens, I remember, once we had gone for a walk in the National Garden and we met an SS man from Thessaloniki – near the shop there was a Gestapo station, and they used to come to our shop – at the corner of Aghia Triada and Velissariou Street, and this is how they knew us. This man recognized Leo and he asked him whether he had come to Athens and where was he staying? We approached him and felt terrified, thinking it was the end. Leo froze. And before Leo could think of an answer he said, ‘Actually, don’t tell me,’ and disappeared. He surely guessed that Leo was a Jew, and didn’t want to be seen by some other German.

In Athens I tried to sell certain things I made by myself. Once, I remember, I had brought many walnuts and Sotiris had a license for a carrier because he had been wounded in the war. We put the nuts on the carrier and sold them, and to make more money we cleaned them before we sold them. 

There was great hunger during the war in Athens, that’s why I brought provisions from Salonica. Except for the little money I made at the shop, I also had some traveling salesmen that took some goods to the villagers that worked in the black market. They asked for our face creams and gave us wheat and barley in return. I would take that to my parents but also saved some for Leo and his niece’s children, Dimitri and Despoina, who were baptized, but after the war they became Jewish again. Despoina married a man from Larissa, some Moise Moissis. A very nice chap. I went to their engagement party. I and Mari were the only relatives, and they really took good care of us.

So it was time for him to leave Athens, and he returned to Salonica. My father thought we should open a hole in the wall big enough for Leo to fit in lying, so he could hide there whenever some Gestapo men should come looking for him. We shut this hole with an iron sheet and in front of it put a chest we had at home so that it wouldn’t show. 

From a certain point that wasn’t covered one night I managed to see Germans in our courtyard and heard a shot. They had seen the light that was turned on. It was difficult for me to pull the chest on my own. In the meantime the Germans jumped in our courtyard and started kicking at our door downstairs. 

Then my mother went down to open the door for them. Our cat had given birth and my mom had put it at the entrance, so she told the Germans, ‘Be careful please, don’t step over the cat and its kittens.’ They were surprised: Germans come in your house in the middle of the night and my mom tells them to be careful of the kittens. She showed great courage. I couldn’t believe it. She was such a fearful woman that we used to tie her head so her jaw wouldn’t tremble from fear. 

It was clear that someone had turned us in, because the Germans must have had gotten some information from someone. They searched the house, all the rooms, thoroughly. Our hearts were beating faster. I forgot to tell you, they were not all Germans, there were Greeks with the Gestapo too. Afterwards they went to Filellinon Street and caught a few people. 

In the meantime the sun rose and the whole neighborhood started asking us about Leo. My husband was very restless: though we hid him, he would take a stroll in the courtyard, look out the windows. And he went outside too. I once met him in Salamina, on the street. We had a warning signal, this is how I knew, because it was night and he couldn’t be seen, he was across the street. We had to use the hiding spot at home just once. But if we hadn’t had it that night, the Gestapo would have caught him for sure, and none knows what would have happened… 

Before the war, when my husband’s father was still alive, I got engaged to Leo. The ceremony took place in our home. His father was present, and his brother Isidor with his wife. My relatives too were there, my grandmother, my uncles, and we exchanged rings. There was no discussion with regard to religion, and we hadn’t really thought of it. We got engaged so that people would stop talking, because Leo visited us frequently at home. 

We married after the war, and just before the wedding I became Jewish in a public bath, in Charilaou. I remember it only vaguely, like a dream. I only remember Mari. There were others that I didn’t know and they spoke a language I didn’t know. It happened in the afternoon. 

After the war when I converted to Judaism I didn’t feel any difference. The Jewish religion is very similar to the Christian one. Almost the same holidays and the same ceremonies, the beginning of the holiday on the eve of the holiday. After the war, I started going to the synagogue with my husband, especially during the fasts but also on other festive occasions. I hadn’t been to church as many times as I’ve been to the synagogue.

The issue was never raised with Leo who would become Christian or Jewish. It never preoccupied me. I remember I was still young, when I heard my mother say, ‘We must respect all religions.’ I remember we were very young then but this impressed us very much. We were tolerant. We were not a religious family. My mother lit a candle, but very rarely lit incense, because it bothered us. I remember once I had fainted in the church. 

What was really important for me was my love for Leo. I believe that if there is a God, he is there for the whole world. The priests divided the world for their own interest. They all say, ‘I spoke with God and this is what God told me.’ It is all a matter of power, that’s how all religions were formed. Everyone claimed that he was God’s representative. They did well to guide us to be good people. In the beginning we were like animals. Religion holds people back from evil doings. 

I remember our wedding was among the first that took place in Thessaloniki after the war 16. Before that the two sisters who had returned from the camp got married: Iza, who married Dario Pinhas and Marika, who married Jim. 

After the war we went to stay with my sister-in-law for a while in the house my father had bought for Leo to hide in Charilaou. It was one of these houses that belonged to the allies, something like a bunker. It was at the end of Charilaou, during the occupation, when my father had bought it, it was almost in the countryside. It was going to be turned into a big park, but I don’t know what happened. The past owner had treated my father badly, and this made him decide that Leo should not hide there, because he considered it dangerous. 

After the war my husband and I continued the same business. We were so successful that wholesale shops had bigger stock of our cosmetics than Nivea. They sued us and took us to court because we were using Nivea’s tin jars and just added a sign with our name. We had four different face creams: Leonar, Neo Leonar, Kathrine and Jane. Ours was neither as thick nor as white as Nivea because as soon as you used it for acne it was absorbed. 

There is no doubt that after the war Salonica was empty of Jews. I remember that a short time before they were deported Jews entrusted us with the gold sterling savings and their jewelry to hide. These people didn’t know where they were going, they didn’t know they were destined to be turned into soap. [Editor’s note: During World War II it was widely believed that soap was being produced on an industrial scale from the bodies of Jewish concentration camp victims. Soap from human fat was never produced industrially. The Yad Vashem Memorial has also officially stated that the Nazis did not make soap from Jewish corpses, saying that such rumors were used by the Nazis to frighten camp inmates. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soap_made_from_human_corpses] We always called on them to check, but they trusted us even though we insisted. They came to the shop to sell us useless things, empty bottles or jars, but we bought them just to support them. 

We had invented a technique to hide gold sterling inside the soaps we made and which we stored in some wooden boxes where Germans kept cheese. In each soap one could fit three to four sterling coins, which we put inside just before the soap got cold, wrapped in some delicate piece of cloth. We also manufactured laundry soaps and bath soaps. We manufactured many such things. We wrapped the soaps in nice paper and sealed them. 

We even put gold coins in toothpaste. We opened them at the wide end to take out the toothpaste so the gold coins would fit in, and then we closed them again to fit in the box. It is certain that some of them fell in the hands of the Germans. Imagine their surprise. Later the Germans – when an uncle of ours betrayed us – destroyed our machinery for manufacturing soap. I won’t say his name, God should forgive him, because both him and his son are dead.

Leo wasn’t drafted to fight in the war because he was a Spanish citizen, for the same reason he wasn’t drafted to fight in the [Greek] Civil War either 17. The biggest mess took place in Athens. At the time we lived in Charilaou. They had requisitioned our house, and I don’t know how the resistance people got in. The house had three rooms, and us they gave only one bedroom. They would come and go from our house, which they had turned into a transit center, but I don’t remember how they got inside. Who they were? I don’t remember. We didn’t face any problems, neither I at work, nor Leo.

Leo and I didn’t have children. Unfortunately, I don’t like them. I couldn’t imagine myself taking care of children. I feel for them, I pity them, especially those that starve and grow up in divorced families. From my balcony in the old people’s home I can watch some gypsy children playing music. How I pity them and how much I admire them. 

If you remember the story I told you about the doll, you will know that I didn’t like dolls either. Once, when my girlfriend broke the porcelain doll’s head they all cried so much that even my mother got worried. It didn’t trouble me at all. I had never played with it. I can’t stand watching people mistreat children and I want that all of them get educated. 

After the war we stayed at Charilaou. Because this house was bought during the occupation the state took it and gave us some indemnity. Needless to say they gave us much less than what it was worth. They gave us 3,000 drachmas whereas we had paid 7,000 for it. 

Originally the house belonged to a certain person named Pavlos Yannatos, whose in-laws were friends of the family. Normally we should have sued him, but not only didn’t we do any such thing, but Leo also tore Yannatos’s checks apart. My uncle Giorgos Manoussos, who was an architect, saw the house and he told us that the price we had bought it for was fair. 

Leo had a passion for photography. He always took pictures, but didn’t print them himself. He had them developed somewhere. After the war he used to take many pictures of the places where we used to go on our summer vacation, in Mihaniona. He would photograph everything; I don’t think anybody took so many pictures. He was also a photographer at weddings and took pictures of all our friends during excursions. He may have forgotten to put on his trousers, but he never forgot to take along his camera. 

At the time I used to keep the shop and I would come and go. My husband was very sociable, the opposite of me. He also used to take pictures of foreigners, from Yugoslavia, Romania. He made friends with them when they came to Mihaniona for a vacation. Usually he went to Mihaniona with his sister Mari and his brother-in-law Henri. He made copies and send them the pictures after they went back to their home countries. They kept a correspondence. I tore some of the photographs and others I threw away. Do you know how many albums I had, how many family pictures? Now I don’t have any, not even of my parents or my wedding…

My husband knew many foreign languages, he could manage many things. He knew Spanish of course, German, French and a little English. Leo had to become an interpreter at the Thessaloniki Fair. I remember he had bought a Linguaphone, because he wanted to go to London and told them that he would learn English in two months. He would study and listen to the records all day long. 

My husband’s oldest brother was Rafael, who was killed in Spain. He was married to Corina, whom I put up in our house in Thessaloniki for a while. After him was Albertos, who was married to Bella, and they had four children: Zermain, Jacko, Lilika and Gaston. Gaston, poor him, died in Hirsch hospital. They didn’t manage to save him. The oldest, Zermain, married her cousin Moise Abravanel, and Lilika married a widower, who had a child in Israel. She had a child with him called Jacko. They are all dead now. 

Jacko had married a Polish woman who was tall and virile. He was very tall himself and very thin. He got killed by a bomb. They had a daughter who became an air hostess. We don’t have any contact with the children of Jacko and Lilika, who must still be alive. 

After that was Paul, that handsome man who was honorary vice consul and had a Swiss wife, Jeanne. Leo and Monis had gone to Switzerland during World War I to study. My father-in-law was very wealthy. Paul was already there when he met Jeanne, a petite and very likable lady. I only know one of her sons, Eve. What a sweet kid, happy and smiling. 

He received a hotel in Beaulieu – between Nice and Monte Carlo – as dowry from his wife. A huge two-story hotel, with swimming pool that had been built with blue tiles, and two hundred people for personnel. When Leo and I went there for a visit we could see the water falling like waterfalls. The hotel started in the mountains and ended by the sea. 

Once when Eve offered us a meal in a different suburb in Beaulieu, where it was a little cold, and my husband, who was a little talkative, told the waiter I was cold. So the waiter returned with a fur to warm me up. I think my husband spoke in French, maybe even in Italian. Paul stayed in France because when we went there he was already retired. 

Inos married twice. He first had a Jewish wedding, as he got married to a niece, Marika Evgenidou, of my uncle Manussos. Together they had a child, Jacques. After that they divorced and the child was taken in by my sister-in-law Marie, who didn’t have any children, and she brought him up with a nanny. She lived in a house on Vassileos Georgiou Street opposite Sarandaporou Street. 

At the time we didn’t ask too many questions. Marika’s grandparents stole the child from the hands of the nanny when it was still very young, maybe two years old. The child grew up and was baptized Christian under the name Dimitris, and he was also raised a Christian. He then went to the military, the navy. 

After the occupation, a young man came to the house in Charilaou and asked us if we had any family ties with someone called Ino Abravanel. He was this child that had been stolen and found out about it in a mature age, as he was by then a married man with children. He found out that he wasn’t his grandparents’ child but the grandson and child of the woman whom until then he had considered his sister. While his alleged nephews – in the meantime the mother had married a Christian banker and had two children with him – were his half siblings. Not a word about his real father. 

I remember him crying at the threshold of our house in his wish to learn about his roots. In other words, that he was not Evgenidis, but Abravanel. He had come to the house in Charilaou. He looked like his father. Ino was then living in Paris where he had married a Spanish woman and had with her two children, Jacques and Rachelle. I remember that the young man didn’t even want to sit down in our living room. We gave him the address of his real father. I don’t know what happened after that. 

Izidor married a certain Dora, she was Jewish and they had two children, Jacko and Sylvio. They had decided to leave for the USA. They made all the preparations and sold their house and they were going to leave by boat. In a week both children got diphtheria and both of them died. All of this happened before the occupation. Dora didn’t want to leave for the USA after that and leave her children buried here. And so they didn’t go. 

Time passed and they had two more boys whom they named once again Jacko and Sylvio. Very spoiled kids. Their mother wanted to bring down the moon for them and Jackos was a monster, but Sylvio was quiet. They went to the Stratis restaurant, to the Terkenlis patisserie and the children ate what they wanted and Izidor paid afterwards. All this happened before the occupation. 

Leo’s family, except for himself, Ino, Solomon and Paul, who was in France, were Spanish. Jackos and Zermain also didn’t leave; all the rest were deported. They returned because they were Spanish citizens. 

Marie, who was four years older than Leo, married Henri Modiano and they had no children. All siblings had married before the war. Only Leo married afterwards. In France, Monis, who was the youngest, met Andree, a widow with two little boys. They married and I remember she was very kind, she came here with Monis twice and we met her. 

I also went to France, it’s a different thing to shop there, and they treat you differently. Greeks, as much as they try, don’t manage to behave in the same way. I went to shop with my niece Eveline, and while we watch to take somebody else’s turn, there they watch out not to take your turn. Greeks don’t do that. My friend Vassilis Tsilis who was a radio operator and traveled to London used to tell us that people were queuing even on the road in the rain.

Ino’s nephews are still alive. He remarried, a Spanish woman, and has two children, Jacko and Rachelle. Jackos lives in France and has a souvenir shop for tourists. Some time ago he used to send us nice presents. I remember he sent me a very nice Spanish fan in a luxurious box. I went to Spain but never found a similar one. He also used to send us crystal objects. We corresponded but then we stopped. 

We were also in touch with Jacko Izidor’s child, who was in the USA, this very naughty child who became a simply perfect person when he grew up. I remember I used to tell my husband that this child would shame the family. He was a mischief-maker and a rebel, because their mother Dora had a weakness for her children. When he went to the USA, I remember, Izidor received a letter from his professor congratulating him because he came first among 2,000 candidates. I cannot believe it. He was brilliant. His brother became an electrician. Now I maintain contact only with my brother Kleanthis’s daughter. 

The truth is that only Marie seemed not to approve of my relationship with Leo at first. She was a little cold with me and we didn’t have talks together. She didn’t show that she despised me but she was never close. I never remember her saying, ‘Ah, I have a nice sister-in-law.’ But all the rest of the siblings and their wives treated me very nicely, and so did Henri. 

However, when Marie met my mother she became very excited. My mother was very nice. I was a little wild, maybe because they ‘took me from the gypsies.’ I wouldn’t give in. So they met and were enchanted by each other. 

Marie also had very good relations with my brother Kleanthis. She adored him. I remember once I invited them for dinner at home and I had cooked fish. My brother found it was very tasty even though I had used frozen and not fresh fish. He said, ‘Very nice fish, and it smells of the sea.’ Mari had a soft spot for fish, but fresh fish. So just because Kleanthis liked it, she pretended to be thrilled herself. 

I remember that Henri and Marie had a cottage in Mihanionia, where she would go out on the balcony and sing arias from operas. And since her name was Marie everybody said, ‘Here is Maria Callas.’ All this took place after the war. She would sit in the sun and get tanned. When we first arrived in Salonica, tanning was not in fashion. 

Marie didn’t do any housework, she stayed in a hotel, because Henri couldn’t stand her complaining about the maids. When I sent her the woman that cleaned for us, she threw her out, and guess why. She said that the woman worked too fast! ‘No, I want the work to be done slowly,’ she told to us.

After the occupation I had her staying in my home for a year while her husband lived in Charilaou. After that they went to the Hotel Continental and Henri got sick and unfortunately he died there. 

They went to Athens, to Kifissia, to spend the summer. Henri smoked like a chimney. They went to see a doctor in Ascleipeion and he said Henri needed an operation and kept him there. At night he felt unwell. Mari ran to find a clinic on Alexandras Avenue. We were in Salonica at the time. I was there on my own and Leo was in Israel. Mari called me the next day and told me: ‘Come to Athens fast, Henri is not well, he is swollen and has become like a ball.’ She also called Kleanthis. When Kleanthis got there he found Henri swollen and black. 

A whole hospital and Henri had a suite on the top floor. They operated on him and from then on Henri did not speak again. They used to feed him with tubes. When they returned in Salonica they went back to the Continental Hotel and took another room with two nurses day and night. When he died none of them was on his side. Roula Shoel’s mother, who was a niece of Henri [Roula’s grandfather and Henri were brothers], went to see her uncle and found the nurses smoking in the living room, and Henri dead. None was there next to him. He could not speak, he did not drink water, whatever he wanted he had to write it down. 

Henri was in real estate, but not in renting apartments. He rented offices and big plots of land. The monks from Athos mountain came with gold sterling coins and bought offices on Aristotelous Street. They brought Marie presents, handmade embroideries. I remember a very nice mortar, and a grater 

During World War I my father-in-law had a boat called ‘Marika’ in honor of his daughter Marie, and brought wines from Crete. This boat sunk and after that the way down started. I remember my father, who had a restaurant during World War I, used to buy his wines from Abravanel’s cave. 

I remember we used to keep kosher, mainly on certain days, not all year round. But I remember there was a kosher butcher on Aghia Triada Street, owned by two brothers. I remember them all day cutting and cleaning the meat. It was hard. Many Greeks used to buy meat from the Jew because they considered that meat cleaner. The meat they give us here every Sunday has no fat at all. The old people cannot chew it and there is trouble. Jews don’t eat pork or salami, but neither do Muslims.

My husband ate salami. He was nevertheless a true Jew, you could not touch him, but to the synagogue he wouldn’t go. All the family were true Jews, but only Isidor went to the synagogue regularly, the others didn’t.

Marie too was very Jewish, oh one should not touch her. She kept on saying, ‘I am a Jewess.’ But go to the synagogue – no. They also didn’t have friends that were Jewish. Leo too only had Christian friends. Maybe he got it from us. We only had two Jews in our company, Jacko Gabai and Sol Sevi. They were very nice people. My mother and father used to call them ‘mom’ and ‘dad.’ 

My husband went out with Christians mainly, he was a merry man and spent a lot of money. He wanted to show he was very generous. He may have wanted to disprove the stereotype of the stingy Jew [the interviewee laughs]. He was a steady customer in the ‘Opera Nest.’ He even went to their home. I didn’t follow him always. I didn’t like this way of having fun. It is not that I feared the money wasted, but he could have given it elsewhere, where it could have been more useful. 

Alberto Ouziel was one of our Jewish friends. He sold locks for suitcases, and his wife Loulou was like my sister. I would call to visit and the tray was behind the door already: with sweets and everything. They had a daughter, Roula. We also socialized with Nissim Menashe, whose wife was Christian, Kaiti was her name. We went out together and went on excursions. Alberto was a bit difficult, but Loulou was a treasure of a human being. We had great times. When we were visiting her, she’d say, ‘Oh I forgot to offer you some candy, to sweeten your life… it’s New Year’s today.’ And things like that.

In Loulou’s house together with Roula we celebrated Jewish holidays. There I could feel it was a holiday. Where I am today, I can’t. At home we would invite friends and we didn’t have a maid. I would prepare everything by myself. But my husband never warned me in time. Because I would have to clean, to take out the silverware, nice table cloths, prepare the salads etc. At that time everything was prepared by the housewife: the mayonnaise, the Ikra salad. And I worked all day. 

Albertos and Loulou had hidden in Athens, like the grandparents. Take into account that Alberto on Pesach, used to go where Marie was hiding and where Loulou was too, somewhere in Erythrea, and I don’t know where Loulou was   – he had to prepare the matzah by himself, without yeast – and bake it in the oven, so he wouldn’t have to eat bread. They really sounded like true Sephardim, especially the grandparents, who spoke Greek in a singing way. 

During the holidays Albertos read in Hebrew, and there was a deadly silence. I didn’t understand, and maybe Loulou didn’t either, and even the grandparents didn’t know Hebrew. They were Spaniards and spoke Spanish between them, more than Greek. In the Book it is spelled out what is the order one must follow during the celebration: how to set the table, and what exactly one ought to do. One has to pick some lettuce, the lamb’s leg, the egg, the charoset, the matzah, cut a piece and eat it with charoset, and put the rest under your table towel. 

Loulou cooked nice Jewish dishes. Meatballs from chicken breast, and those made of leek and spinach. Albertos wanted everything to be precise, and looked for detail. This is the way to cut the lettuce, the matzah should be placed over there, and the charoset over there. 

I learned how to cook beans with fried onions, and sardines with eggs. And of course peche en salsa, with a lot of nuts and matzah, and plenty of oil. 

Leo too wanted those dishes, one always seeks what one is used to, but he never refused eating other dishes either. I was a good cook. 

My favorite holiday was Pesach. If I compare it with the one we celebrate in the old people’s home – they don’t understand anything. Here, the rabbi reads and the rest of the people eat. ‘Eh, wait a minute my dear, close your mouth, nobody is going to take it away from you.’ But back then I could understand the holiday, and I was very sorry once when Elvina, my niece, was in Thessaloniki that Albertos didn’t want her to come and see how we celebrate, because she wasn’t Jewish. She was very sad, because she would have liked to watch other customs. It’s a long time ago. At the time when both Roula’s and Elvina’s parents were still alive. 

I remember we went on excursions. Once we went together to the Patras Carnival. Leo didn’t especially like excursions and usually all our friends joined the excursions. So this excursion was organized and we went together with Loulou, her husband and their child. My brother lived in Athens and I called him, saying that we would stay in a hotel for the night and then leave for Patras. We took a bus, which was in a bad state and broke down all the time. So I called my brother to ask him not to meet us since we were still in Lamia because the bus broke down. 

Finally we arrived in Athens in the morning and got to Patras dead tired. On Easter Monday we had arranged to go to a restaurant somewhere between Athens and Patras so that my brother Kleanthis could come and meet us with his wife and son. But we ran out of time and my brother had to pay a big sum for canceling the reservation. 

We got to Patras only in the afternoon to watch the parade. Everybody went off the bus, except for me, because Leo wanted me to watch the suitcases. They all went to the parade, apart from me. When they returned it was already dark and I didn’t even feel like watching the carnival scarecrow burn.

I remember we used to go to a place called Poroya. Our company had grown, but except for Loulou and her husband all of them were Greek Orthodox. Along with us to Poroya came Antoniades with his wife and daughter, Panayotes and Marika with their two boys, and Apostolos with his wife and their son.

Among the few events I remember well is the engagement of Mazaltov, who was the niece of Leo’s cousin, in Larissa. Mazaltov was the daughter of Adela, who was Leo’s first cousin. It was a very nice engagement. They had a lot of trays with delicacies, pies and everything. 

I also went to Roula’s wedding. She married a Jew called Jacko Soel and their son was also named Jacko, after his father. They got married at the big synagogue on Syggrou Street and afterwards a small feast took place in a ‘taverna’ but the food wasn’t typically Jewish, it was mainly Greek. Roula’s uncle had a jewelry shop in Athens so they brought her as present many jewels. I remember the house was full of flowers.     

Neither Leo nor I were involved in politics. We only cared about our work. Law-abiding citizens. I remember I used to buy the newspaper ‘Makedonia.’ I don’t know how, but one day I bought ‘Thessaloniki,’ and there I read that in Chalastra they tortured and killed animals so they wouldn’t get rabies. The teacher and the priest of the village were present. I was at the shop and in came Mrs. Olympia, the mother-in-law of Nikos Gadonas, a high-ranking military official during the time of the dictatorship 18, and I said to her, trembling, ‘How come Mr. Nikos allows this barbarism. These are acts performed and watched by criminals.’ It seems she spoke to her son-in-law because we didn’t hear of this again. 

Would you believe it that, even though I visited Athens I never heard of the Polytechnic events 19 and neither of Papadopoulos’s doings. When my niece in France asked me about these events I didn’t know what to answer. Maybe I didn’t read the papers thoroughly enough. But people here didn’t know. Not even in Athens. At the time my uncle and my brother lived there. 

My husband went on many trips. I joined him in France and in Turkey; our first trip together was to Istanbul. We went there because my husband wished to see some relative, a cousin. We stayed for one week. We saw Aghia Sofia and the Blue Mosque. We would take our shoes off, how nice that everybody prayed! During the Ramadan one could see them all bending down. Me too, I listen to music with my eyes closed. Especially when I used to go to a concert, I remember I used to close my eyes. This is the only way to enjoy it. One uses one’s imagination … 

We went to Italy, to Spain, and to Paris I went with my niece Elvina. Leo even traveled as far as America. He went to the United States with friends because he knew English. His friends found out that in New York they sold things cheaply in certain shops. They left Greece and went shopping in New York to save money. Leo had brought with him only a light jacket and there was snow. He was freezing. 

Luckily he met his friend Nissim Menashe, who only had a bench when he first got there and later opened a huge shop. Before he left for the States he had a clothes shop on Leoforos Stratou and Aghia Triada. He too had married an Orthodox Greek and they had two small children, little Jews. Very good children. At first it was very difficult for him in America and he suffered a lot. In the cold, in the snow. 

He had Blacks as clients and because they had many children they bought not one pair of socks, but socks by the dozen, blouses, many things. The owner of the shop where he parked his carriage died, so Menashe bought his shop and then another one and started selling furs and clothes. That is how Nissim got rich; he became a big businessman though he started as a mobile merchant. But he was smart and thrifty. He didn’t spend his money, he was a true merchant. 

He came twice or three times to see us. But both he and his wife died in the States. Kate, however, left a will to be buried here in Thessaloniki, her home city, where her mother had died and where her sister and her nieces lived. 

After the war Leo socialized almost only with Greek Orthodox friends. Everyone asked for him and wanted him to join them. If Leo didn’t go there was no way an excursion would take place. He wanted me to join him on the excursions, but I didn’t go. 

I had a good time in my marriage. Maybe because I was a tough character and he would not dare say anything. He knew that if Eugenia said something, that was it. 

Leo and I were a very loving couple, but not like my mother and father. He told me some things for fun, but I was unyielding and very stubborn. Often I regretted it, but I never gave in. I wouldn’t give in, ever.

Leo said to me one day, ‘I’ve had enough, I want to have fun, get away, I can no longer work.’ So I told him, ‘Let us split the shop. I will take the small wares, which I had introduced in the business during the occupation, and you take the cosmetics. Which do you prefer?’ Finally he sold me the cosmetics for 2 percent less than we sold them. I paid every penny, slowly because the truth is that I didn’t have all the money. 

I gave him the money when he stayed here in the old people’s home and had three ladies look after him. No one has three ladies looking after him! One squeezed him oranges, the other came in later to bring him his newspaper to read – even though they give us a newspaper here he wanted his ‘Makedonia’ to be bought – and the third came in the afternoon. She was married and had a child and when the weather was nice she took him for walks and also to ‘Jani,’ the patisserie. There, Leo would eat an ice-cream cone. She was worth it because she took him out for walks and took him around. 

What can I tell you, every time I saw dust in his room he would say to me, ‘Eh what is there to say, we talk so that the time passes.’ Otherwise he would ask Eugenia to sew his buttons. 

As I told you, I was very stubborn. I did everything, squeezed his grapefruit, prepared his salad, I always prepared food to have in the refrigerator so he could eat at lunchtime, even though he usually ate out with Kleanthis Anthomelidis at the Athenaikon restaurant, opposite the Continental hotel, where Henri and Marie lived. 

I remember one morning when I didn’t leave early. While I was making his bed, I must have said something and he replied: ‘Women’s work is not such a big deal.’ If he had said that only about me, maybe I wouldn’t have reacted. But since he underestimated all women, I said to him, ‘Oh is that what you think?’ And I remember it as if it was yesterday, I had my back turned to him, grabbed the bedspread and threw them down, saying, ‘Go ahead then, do it yourself.’ And he replied, ‘Oh women, they just don’t get it when you are teasing them…’ 

At the time we didn’t have a help. A few days went by, and I didn’t squeeze grapefruits, nor did I do anything else. I ate by myself at the shop and didn’t pay any attention to him. ‘Well, won’t you come home for a while, as before?’ he asked. ‘No,’ I said. ‘There are feathers under the beds, and soon there will be cockroaches.’ ‘I’m an animal lover,’ I answered. 

He started asking his friends for a help. Finally he found one that had a sister in Kilkis. He paid her to come once a week from Kilkis with her daughter, she did the housework and left. At night when I returned at home we only said good evening and goodnight. We loved each other, but there is a limit. He came to the shop, left the merchandise and went. This went on for a while. 

Of course these women that cleaned the house did nothing: the bathrooms were filthy, the balcony full of dust, and even the neighbors commented. ‘So,’ I told Leo, ‘What do these women do?’ After this lady from Kilkis, the barber’s wife came to clean for him while she left their two kids with the barber. She left too. 

So, he didn’t know what to do and went to the old people’s home. My husband stayed there for three years. I stayed outside, because I didn’t want to leave the shop. I kept it until 1994 when a car hit me and I broke both my legs. I wouldn’t have left it otherwise. We made face creams. The same cream with four different names. The same thing is done with medicine. After the car hit me and broke my legs, I closed my little shop and didn’t open it again. 

I used to go to the old people’s home and celebrate the high holidays there, such as Pesach and New Year’s [Rosh Hashanah], I gave something to the institution, something to Maria the cook, and Leo asked for a 500 note. It was a good salary at the time. I always came on the high holidays and we celebrated them together. But I would never sit in the restaurant during weekdays. Besides, no outsider is allowed to sit in the restaurant. Only Alvo’s mother-in-law came and ate with us. She used to be delighted with our salads. How nice the oil is, she used to comment. It was ‘Altis.’ And she would say, ‘I use the same, but it doesn’t taste as good.’

Sometime after my husband’s death in 1992, I think it was on 15th January, because I remember that he wanted to have a big party on 17th  January, which was his birthday, I decided to come here myself. It was in November 1993. Now that I am here permanently, I don’t feel the holidays, but I participate. Some time ago I went to the synagogue, on the ground floor of the building, when there was a commemoration of a friend’s death anniversary…

Here in the home, we prepare for Sabbath and on Friday we get together in the dinning room and eat. First of all we light two candles. Not the men, only the women. The woman is the pillar of the house. After that Bourlas reads a blessing. If he is away Iakovos reads in Hebrew. He holds the glass of wine and then drinks a little. 

We then take the bread, the challah, which we have to break by hand. We are thirty people here and we each must have two little challot, and I thought, ‘Why would we break it by hand?’ So I took the knife and cut them in 15 pieces, and instead of hearing a praise, they reproached me that I’m supposed to break it with my own hand. So, we drink the wine, I don’t, I only touch on the glass with my lips, and then we tear the bread by hand. The give us an egg each, an ‘enhaminados’ egg, spinach and cheese pie, bourekitos 20, and yoghurt at night. And then we leave and go to our rooms.

My best friends in the old people’s home are Mois Bourlas and Mr. Zak Bensussan, who died a few days ago. I remember that when we came from Mytilene I was registered in an athletic club, in Panlesviakos, and we had as a coach Kleanthis Paleologos. When I was to come to Salonica he advised me to get registered at Heracles. 

Indeed, a week after we arrived I went there, and at the time I got registered the president of the club was Mr. Cosmopoulos, the father of the former mayor. I remember that until I got used to the environment, I would see some young man and everybody said, ‘Ah, look Isaac has come, Isaac has come.’ And the president would come out of his office to welcome him. This one Isaac Bensussan was the father of Mrs. Rena Molho. When he walked in it was as if there was a demonstration. 

The truth is that I met him there for the first time, I appreciated him, I admired him. He was a tall handsome guy. Our eyes never crossed, I only saw him from a distance. Also I didn’t stay at Heracles long. 

In Mytilene we were a different group. When I came here I was a stranger among strangers. I also registered in the YMCA and took gymnastics. Afterwards I started working. I didn’t meet Isaac in person back then, I met him here, in the old peoples’ home. We used to say then, ‘I love Heracles and I always want the team to win.’ And it is here that we spoke a few words together, but always in connection with Heracles, if they won or lost.

In the past I used to tell stories about Mytilene to friends here, about excursions to Molyvos and from there to Eftalou, the home city of the poet Argyris Eftaliotis, whose real name was Kleanthis Michailidis 21. Maybe they were a little bored, I don’t blame them, as they didn’t live in these places. How can one explain to them that we went fishing for squid and crabs, how we threw the net? When I told them I could visualize these scenes.

I’m a Spanish citizen and therefore I don’t vote, but until now I vote in the Community. I watch if we are having a good time with some committee, but if someone else offers me something else, well, it depends. I care about how the Community is doing, because I live here. This is my home, and who supports me here now? Greece? No, the Community. 

By the way I have a complaint: Here in the old people’s home they don’t let us know about the death of our friends. For instance, when Mr. Jackos died, I found out about it on the day of his funeral from Bourlas. Shouldn’t I have known? 

Last night I saw by chance a documentary on the Jews of Thessaloniki and their hardship in the camps. Why didn’t they let us know? I saw Bienvenida who was also here and died last year, on the table where she sat. She used to live in the Baron de Hirsch neighborhood 22, and because it was a Jewish neighborhood she always spoke Spanish. She had a lot to say, and she spoke Spanish, even in the interview they made with her. She only learned Greek here. She was very nice, very joyful. We truly miss her. She had asthma since the time she was in the camps. This is what she died of. 

People came from various places to learn something from Bienvenida. They conducted interviews with her and with Bourlas. They had a lot to say. We spent a lot of time with Bienvenida. She was very tidy. She wanted everything to be tidy, and her bedspread tightened up. If her pillowcase was a millimeter larger than her pillow, she asked me to alter it with the sewing machine. She wanted everything to be perfect. And I was happy to do so, because I don’t like sitting around doing nothing. 

I love work. With my sewing machine I altered everything in the first years. I sew curtains for them, hangers for the towels. All the towels were torn when they brought them from the cleaners and I mended them, for the whole house. I also embroidered. I sew sheets and pillowcases, and put two button holes in each pillowcase. My wish was that they bury me with my chair at the shop and my sewing machine. Later on I gave it away, because I started not to see well.

I am a fanatic ecologist, which is why I keep the flowers even when they have withered. You see, I have aged, maybe they too have a reason to do so. Maybe there’s a purpose behind it. 

Glossary:

Anna Mass
City: Warsaw
Country: Poland
Date of interview: November 2005
Interviewer: Magda Cobel-Tokarska

Mrs. Mass is a wonderful old lady, charming, cheerful and witty. She lives alone in Warsaw.

Following her husband’s death, she has developed an interest in alternative medicine, parapsychology and astrology.

She keeps learning new things. I was entranced by her fascinating stories, interwoven with numerous digressions.

Her story is like herself – full of humor, irony, and tenderness.

• My family history
• ​Growing up
• During the war
• In Komi
• My husband
• After the war
• Recipes
• Glossary

My family history   

Ab ovo? Where was I when I wasn’t there? I know little about my paternal family.

My father’s name was Szwarc. Jankiel. Everyone called him Jakub, the Polish version of his name. Interestingly, my grandmother, my father’s mother, was also nee Szwarc. Her first name was Ita.

My father was born in 1893, 13th March. In the 1890s there was flu pandemic. His father died, leaving his mother a widow. My father was born in Przedborz [ca. 130 km south of Warsaw], that’s near Piotrkow Trybunalski.

He was raised by his grandparents, because his mother was busy working as a teacher. But I think it was in a Jewish school because I can’t imagine she could have been working in a Polish one.

My father was brought up in an orthodox home because his grandparents, as was standard those days, were religious. From age of 3 years old he went to the cheder. Then to a yeshiva in Przedborz.

Also he told me that if, on his way home in the winter, he wanted to go sliding on the Pilica, his grandfather would grab him by the ear and say, ‘You shaigetz, you hoodlum, there’s no ice-sliding for you!’ His job was to pore over the Torah and learn, nothing more. A little kid! I know that by the age of 16 he was already a practicing watchmaker.

I didn’t know my father’s grandparents, the age difference was too great. My grandmother Ita, this is his mother, I saw only once, just one time. It was such a long way from Piotrkow to Lublin that visiting each other was out of the question [ca. 200 km].

So my father wrote his mother, she wrote him, and that was it in terms of staying in touch. It was only one time, so it happened that I was down with scarlet fever, that Grandmother Ita came to visit us. There was an orange on my bedside table. And I remember she said, ‘I don’t like oranges.’

As if it was for her. During that stay, Grandmother used an old dress to make a beautiful, huge woolen scarf for my mother. A brick-red one. (That scarf would later prove of service to me in the Soviet Union). I was 6 then and thanks to Grandmother I learned to crochet.

At first I only managed doll hats because instead of adding line so that it was flat, I went round and round in circles. Then I finally caught on and by the age of 10 I was dressing the whole family in sweaters.

As far as my maternal family is concerned, I know a little bit more. My mother was nee Rot, no ‘h’ at the end, just like that. Her grandparents were well off, owned a tenement house.

Because Jews aren’t allowed to turn on the lights on Saturday, if my grand-grandfather, whom I never met, my grandmother’s father, wanted [to turn on the lights], he invited the caretaker for a glass of vodka.

The caretaker knew, came, turned on the light – you had to have light to drink the vodka, didn’t you? If he was mean, he turned it off when leaving. And returned like that several times until he drank enough, then he left it on.

My grandmother, Perla Kac nee Rot, had two brothers. She was married at the age of 15 to a boy not much older than her who knew the whole Talmud very well, but I don’t think ever had any job in his life.

Before getting married, my grandmother had such beautiful hair that the caretaker’s wife came to comb her. Braids to the very ground. She cut her hair before the wedding and made three sheytls with them, for wearing in turns. A married orthodox Jewess couldn’t go around with her head bare.

Grandmother Perla received a dowry and the couple’s parents decided they would live ‘one year with us, another year with you,’ as was the standard those days if the bride and groom were young.

I remember my grandmother told me on the first day after getting married they simply sat on the floor and played gite. The stone game. That’s the mature married couple they were. Eventually, however, they picked the apple from the tree of knowledge and my grandmother had ten children.

Not every year but, let’s say, every two years, because as long as she breastfed, she didn’t get pregnant. And when she had the tenth child on her lap, her husband died of tuberculosis. He developed it while poring over the Talmud.

Grandmother’s brothers had all married by then and squandered their money. On cards, things like that. So, Grandmother told me, not only was she left with a child number ten in her lap, she also had her mother to feed, because where was the old lady supposed to go?

Grandmother wasn’t lucky as far as her children were concerned. Two died at young age, my mother Sara was the third from the end, it is the eighth child. My mother had one sister and besides her only brothers.

Unfortunately,  I don’t know, I don’t remember their names. My mother’s sister got married. Grandmother married her off to a wealthy widower, she didn’t want to, she was unhappy, but those days they didn’t care whether the girl liked the match or not.

She’ll be well off, she’ll have everything, won’t live in poverty. She gave birth to a son and on Yom Kippur – well, it’s autumn, cold – she went to the synagogue barefoot, caught a cold and died. All of her brothers died at the age of 15, 16. One was 18, had a wife, and a baby on its way. So in the end of the whole ten only my mother was left.

We were Grandmother’s most beloved part of the family, she lived with us in Lublin. She loved my father like her own son. And she was really very good. She remained active until the very end. She was 90 when the war broke out [in 1939].

She was selling newspapers on the street, in Lublin at Lubartowska, but not in a booth. She had a place on the sidewalk, and the newspapers lay on a special rack. During winter time, she was keeping a bucket with hot coals between her legs to warm herself up.

Whether she was murdered by the Nazis or died of old age, I don’t know. I know that throughout her life she was a very cheerful person. She was religious, but didn’t force religion upon us. Which didn’t prevent her from saying things like, ‘How good God doesn’t live on earth.

If he did, people would have long smashed all the windows in His house. They’d be taking revenge for everything.’ I’m old myself today but I’ve taken it to heart what she used to say. ‘Don’t curse, curses create a bridge. Whom they leave they return to. He who curses is cursed himself.’ And I never went beyond ‘Oh brother!’ I haven’t learned to curse to this day.

My mother… well. She was 9 when she had to go to work. So she got a job at a stockings factory. Unfortunately, I know nothing more about the place. There obviously was some progress because I went to work when I was 13.

So that was a bit later. Always when there was poverty at home or something, my mother went to the factory, took the yarn, she had a machine at home for making socks, and made some extra money that way.

How did my father meet my mother? Father went from village to village and earned his living by repairing clocks and watches. And, traveling so, he ended up in Lublin, where he met my mother. He fell in love, and he was very shy.

My mother was about 27, he was 24. He was still a young boy, and it was my mother who finally told him it was necessary to decide: this way or that way. So he, of course, agreed to marry her.

Mother and Grandmother lived in a small apartment at the time, and a month before the wedding someone broke into it, but he stole nothing.

Those days, when a girl reached a certain age, she automatically started preparing her trousseau, just in case. And my mother did too. When she saw there had been a break-in but nothing was stolen, she was afraid to leave the place unattended at all.

But once, just one time, she allowed my father to convince her to go out somewhere. And when she returned, there was nothing. Nothing! Not even the matches. Everything had been stolen.

She wanted to postpone the wedding, because, well, she had nothing but the clothes she wore. Bit my father disagreed, said, ‘What it’s going to be it’s going to be,’ and they got married.

But the best thing was that my father’s last name was Szwarc, and my [maternal] grandmother’s married name was Kac. So my mother was nee Kac. Szwarc Kac is ‘black cat.’ So when they went somewhere together, people called, ‘The black cat is here!’ They even called me ‘Blacky’ at school.

My father had dark hair, and my mother’s hair was so dark her neighbor called her ‘Ms. Navy Blue.’ Because her hair was so black it was almost navy blue. My father started turning gray very early on, and my mother, when she was already around 50, had one white streak that she could comb back and hide it from sight. She never wore a wig.

• Growing up

My sister Elka was born 18th May 1919 and was a small baby when the war started in 1920 [Polish – Bolshevik war]. My mother told me that she had nothing to eat, so she gave the baby water to drink because she had no milk.

My sister suffered from serious stomach problems. Then I was born. It was on 23th May 1921. Mother had the two of us and, to say the truth, she was happy. Because there would have arisen the problem of circumcision had she had a boy.

My father, as I said, was a watchmaker. At first he went from village to village to earn money, then he set up a small shop where he worked. It was at Pijarska Street in Lublin. As we always barely made the ends meet, if we bought something, it was on credit.

Those bills of exchange had to be eventually repaid, and there was always some hectic searching for the money. In the summer, my father always went to Kazimierz [resort town on the Vistula, some 100 km south of Warsaw], there was work there. People dropped their watches into water, into sand, you had to clean them.

And that’s why Kazimierz is like a second home town for me. I always spent the whole summer there. After I had gone to work, I took a free leave in the summer and was able to spend two months in Kazimierz.

Mother went with us, chiefly because of me, because I was very sickly. She was always worried I’d stop eating in Kazimierz and get even thinner.  And I hated the beach, to this day I don’t like baking in the sun. In the water I felt cold, on the beach I felt hot, I lost my appetite. My mother could sit on the beach for hours, she loved the sun.

Kazimierz was also a Jewish town. It was inhabited almost solely by Jews. There were some Poles there, but those were rather the peasants from the nearby villages. The soil there was excellent. But I saw how the peasants lived.

The peasant ate a chicken only when he was dying or when the chicken died, if he slaughtered a pig, he salted the meat and stashed it away in a barrel for winter, for Christmas. Normally they ate fatback. Or used the blood to make blood sausage. The peasants were poor.

There was a family that went by the name of Gorecki there, the grandmother was a converted Jewess – she fell in love, married a Pole. And the whole family had the characteristic looks – black hair and blue eyes.

We lived with her in the summer. I was very bold – perhaps too bold – and one day I asked her whether she didn’t regret having changed her religion, living among the Poles. And she told me, ‘Well, you know, my child, yes and no.’

Because the issue looked like that: there was that writer, Leo Belmont [born Leopold Blumental, 1865-1941, writer, translator, lawyer, founder of the Polish Esperanto Society]. I remember a preface to a book where he wrote that after he converted to Catholicism, he lost friends among Jews but didn’t gain any among the Poles.

For the Poles, he was forever a Jew, and for the Jews he was a convert. And, interestingly, I was from a non-religious home but I also believed it was a transgression. You were born that way, you should stay that way. Why change your religion?

Though Jewish, Kazimierz was a clean town. There was a disastrous flood in 1933. And the market square, which is far above the Vistula level, was all flooded. I’ve never learned to swim.

My father swam quite well. When a child, he lived on the Pilica river, when he was 2 or 3 he played with kids, they used to push each other into water near the mill, he had to learn to swim if he didn’t want to drown. But I was afraid to, I had seen too many drowning swimmers.

The swimming suits of the era were the suspended, tricot kind of ones. You didn’t wear what you wear today – bikini, or even topless. Here, breasts and stomach, everything had to be covered, even though I was flat as a board. There were boats, kayaks… Even though I couldn’t swim, I liked the boats very much. And, strangely, I wasn’t afraid.

In Kazimierz I saw for the first time how they made the so called eiruv. Those days, a religious Jewess couldn’t even pick her purse up on the Sabbath because that would have amounted to working. So you cheated God.

You surrounded an area with a fence and led God to believe, as if He could believe that, that it was a living quarters, so you could carry things there. And I saw it for the first time in Kazimierz how they surrounded the downtown, where the synagogue was located, with a wire fence so that you could go to synagogue carrying a purse or a prayer book.

For me, that was a new thing, because I saw nothing of that Lublin, living in the Polish quarter, playing with Polish girls at school.

The Saski Garden in Lublin… It certainly wasn’t smaller than the Lazienki in Warsaw. In the summer there was always a military band on Sundays, a concert bowl, you could listen to concerts. In the winter there were toboggan runs. Huge ones. You could really go far…

Before the war, the garden was open until dusk. Then a janitor went around with a clapper, announcing it was time to leave. And everyone went, they closed for the night. If someone uttered a profanity on the street or dropped a cigarette butt, a policeman would spring up out of nowhere and you had to pay two zlotys. A fine.

The Jewish quarter was down Swietoduska to Lubartowska and the surrounding area. And the Poles who lived there spoke fluent Yiddish. They played with Jewish kids from early childhood. I always laughed that a Jewish Friday smelled of kerosene and cake. Kerosene, because you washed children’s hair and rinsed it with kerosene, which allegedly prevented lice. I also had my hair rinsed with kerosene. Perhaps that‘s why it was so black?

I lived in the Polish quarter. At a small street called Peowiakow. Grandmother had wealthy relatives, nieces. One of those owned a tannery plant. But a wealthy family wants nothing to do with the poor one.

I mean, when my mother got married, they wanted to give her an apartment in their house, but my mother rejected the offer. She simply didn’t want anyone’s generosity. We lived in the very center of Lublin, but the apartment was rather small, two rooms with a blind kitchen. We lived there until the war.

There was an iron warehouse in the back of our house, owned by a man named Wolman, a distributor for the entire Lublin province. I remember a story how an anti-Semitic priest said he wouldn’t buy rails for his house from a Jew, he’d go to the factory and buy straight from there. 

And later Wolman bowed deeply before him and thanked him for sparing the trouble, because he got his money anyway and didn’t have to deliver the goods… and the other guy almost exploded. [The factory was owned by Wolman too].

The iron warehouse was closed after 7 pm and on Saturdays. And all the kids from our street, there were seven or eight houses alongside it, came to us to play. You could really play great hide-and-seek among all that scrap. I was a major hoodlum. I was small and thin, in fact I’m even more petite today. Still, even boys were afraid of me.

Near where we lived was the Bernardynski Square. Lublin is within the reach of the continental, Russian climate rather than the oceanic one. In early December there was already snow. And on Bernardynski there stood green trees, the Christmas ones. It was beautiful!

The cawing crows, the green trees, and the white snow. Ours was a Jewish home; there was no Christmas tree or anything of the sort. But in the afternoon, after getting back from work, Grandmother took me and my sister by the hand and led us to the city.

The shop window displays were all set for Christmas and were full of movement. Sleds riding out from behind little houses, snowmen dancing, everything was moving in that window. And Grandmother led us down Krakowskie Przedmiescie so that we could watch the displays.

As we weren’t rich, I stood in front of the store and wondered how the pineapple could taste if one ring cost one zloty. The sweet canned ones were sold by ring. And for one zloty you could buy one kilogram of sugar. Or twenty buns.

So on and on – it was expensive. Oranges, lemons, in turn, you could buy from street vendors, for 10 groszy [100 groszy = 1 zloty], so I could afford to eat an orange. There was also St. John’s bread.

A pod-shaped, oblong loaf, you gnawed at the sides, a sweetish taste. It’s no longer, I don’t regret, it wasn’t anything to die for. You bought it by piece and ate it. There were no deli stores before the war. There was either the usual grocery, or the so called colonial store which sold all those imported foodstuffs.

What can I say about our Jewishness?  Though we lived in a Polish neighborhood, we had many Jewish friends, and they visited us. My father spoke poor Polish. He spoke, as was typical for Jews before the war, ungrammatically, poorly.

There are four cases in Yiddish, and seven in Polish. He couldn’t always decline the cases properly. And at home we spoke Yiddish. If father had gone somewhere, say, to Kazimierz, and I wanted to write him a letter, I had to write in Yiddish; otherwise I wouldn’t have received a reply.

Those days I spoke Yiddish fluently, but today I don’t. Today I stutter, am at loss for words. When my father died, I was in my thirties. And for so many years I spoke and wrote and read Yiddish. Read I can to this day. If a friend from Israel writes to me in Yiddish to spite me, I can read what he writes.

I prefer to reply him in Polish. Because if I do it in Yiddish, it’s ‘Noah seven errors.’ It’s this Jewish saying: that in the word ‘Noah,’ which has only two letters in Hebrew, you make seven errors.

On the Sabbath you sang all kinds of songs. It was the only day when my father was home because on the other days he was either at the Bund 1 or at work.

My mother had the habit of taking us to picnics. On a nice spring day, on a Saturday, when father wasn’t working, we took rucksacks with a blanket, with food, and went to the woods. There were plenty of woods around Lublin. I remember how we drank spring water, it was tasty, cold and good. I liked those excursions.

On weekdays I had an hour’s lunch break, but to eat lunch at home I had to wait for my father to come back because you didn’t eat without him. By the Jewish custom, the father was the master of the house.

But I and my sister knew that the true master of the house was our mother, that she, the saying was, ‘wore trousers.’ Because she always asked him about things in such a way that he agreed with her and did what she wanted.

I remember this silly story: my father was a ‘Jewish drunkard,’ this is he never drank, and if he did drink a single glass, he was instantly drunk. He wasn’t able to hold his liquor. We had a neighbor, a Jew, worked as an upholsterer.

And he could have lived well and earned well, but he was addicted to cards. His wife, who had three kids, learned that if he had any money on him, she had to grab the opportunity to buy whatever she needed, because on the next day the money wouldn’t be there. And one day, on some feast, he knocked to us and asked my father to come to his place for a moment. Mom said, ‘Don’t go, it’s going to be a bash.’

‘Well, you know, I don’t have to drink much.’ Off he went and vanished. And Mother got malicious and whoever came to see Father, she sent them there. And that person went there. Later, in the evening, came Father, completely drunk, and a good friend of ours – also drunk.

We had a large double bed, so my mother put them both there, gave them a wet cloth to put on the head, placed a bowl near the bed, and left. They weren’t used to drinking, so they upchucked [threw up] for a long time.

On the next day, my father, all with a hangover, was saying it was all my mother’s fault. Whoever she sent, that person paid for another bottle. And later, when there were so many of them, they brought a whole crate…

So they got drunk well. And that was he first and only time that I saw my father drunk. But my mother did what wise women did those days. You shouldn’t argue with a drunk man. You should tell him, ‘Go to sleep.’

My father was an active Bund member before the war. The Bund was something like the PPS 2 for he Poles. Socialist. I think he joined as a young boy. In truth, he had communist inclinations.

But because he was a coward as far as physical pain was involved, he was afraid that if they arrested him for communism – and so much as threatened with torture – he would give everyone away.

So he preferred to be on the Bund, which was socialist but not communist. I’m not the party member type. I joined the Jung Bund on a follow-up basis, but I wasn’t particularly active, after all, I had to work.

Off peak season I worked for eight-ten hours a day, but in peak season, carnival, holidays, I sat there until midnight. In fact, I was busy all the time. Young people came to visit us. We talked, sang. I once knew very many Yiddish songs but today I can no longer sing.

Our place was a communist den before the war. Whenever someone was to come from Lublin and didn’t have a place to stay – the five of us lived in two rooms – my mother would set up a cot and sleep the person.

We didn’t know their names, it was all conspiracy, after all. And in a Bund member’s house they wouldn’t look for a communist, so they could stay there safely. I remember one whom we dubbed ‘comrade X.’

Because he told us, ‘I can give you a name, but it won’t be mine anyway, so what’s the difference?’ I don’t know whether ‘comrade X’ survived the war or not. If he fled to Russia, they murdered the communists there, said they were all spies, and if he stayed in Poland, he could have died too, as a Jew…

I know Pilsudski 3 has a mixed image. I remember a drawing in the Robotnik, the PPS newspaper, before the war: the PPS are riding on the train, and Pilsudski leaves at the station ‘Independence.’ I know he can be blamed for Bereza Kartuska 4, for various other things, but as long as he lived, Poland wasn’t a fascist country.

It was a country where Jews could live. There were the endeks 5, the ONR 6, various excesses, but, all in all, you could live. After Pilsudski’s death, however, the country took a sharp turn towards fascism.

Then I, who was always very valiant, constantly picked up street fights, if someone leapt at me or slapped me with a newspaper – ‘oh, you this and this’ – I hit back. And as you read and derive some knowledge from those readings, I learned that if you kick a boy in a certain place, he will be in too much pain to continue fighting.

So I simply assessed the distance and always kicked infallibly. He cried, ‘Oh God’ and ran to the nearest gate. Thus I defended myself.

In the Saski Garden we had the following encounter once: I was with a girl friend of mine, Andzia Borensztajn, we were about to go home. We were sitting on a bench, the last five minutes. And there suddenly come two girls with two boys.

We are to vacate the bench because they want to sit here. And there were empty benches around. We said, ‘We sit here. If you don’t like it, don’t want to sit next to us, very well, there are empty benches around.’

So they attacked us. And what I liked the most about the situation was that the two of us fought against those two girls, and the boys stood at the side and didn’t interfere. We won, and we ostentatiously sat on the bench for five more minutes, only for five because we had to go home. And then we got up and left. We won so we could leave.

As far as religion is concerned, I don’t know much. Once, when my paternal grandmother visited us, for those few days my father had to put on the tephilin in the morning and pray before going to work. And she immediately asked which utensils were for milk and which for meat, and so on.

Well, there were enough utensils, so my mother divided them and didn’t interfere with the cooking anymore, afraid to do something wrong. We didn’t have separate milk and meat cutlery.

True, there was a special basket for the holiday matzah, the apartment was cleaned up for Pesach, but it wasn’t cleaned up the Jewish way. Because the traditional way you have to boil, bake the plates to remove any traces of flour, and so on.

At the very end you find some piece of bread in some corner and throw it out triumphantly. This is the classic Jewish holiday clean-up. We did it without all those stunts. We ate matzah, but we also ate bread.

Grandmother fasted, didn’t eat, didn’t drink. And our home was always full of people, they couldn’t eat at home so they came to us to eat and drink. Unfortunately, I remember none of them – only Wajsman, who died in the Soviet Union.

When my grandmother went to the synagogue, she threw a silk shawl over her sheytl. I was in synagogue once or twice in Lublin. I think it was on Lubartowska – certainly in the Jewish quarter, but I don’t remember precisely where.

My father didn’t go. I was talked into going by Grandmother, so I went with her once, but I didn’t like it that the men sat and saw everything whereas the women, off to the side, saw nothing. But the boy choir was beautiful. Because there was no organ.

After the war, I was surprised when at the Nozykow synagogue 7 in Warsaw I saw a choir, I don’t remember whether they were from Wroclaw or Jelenia Góra. A mixed synagogue choir. With women. Strange, because it was different before the war.

In the Jewish quarter, I remember, I once saw through the basement window a rabbi dancing with his students. They were dancing to music. These days they don’t dance at the synagogue. They only dance with the Torah [on Simchat Torah]. It had to be somewhere on Lubartowska, but I don’t remember precisely where.

Once we successfully begged our mother to consecrate the candles on a Friday. There were candles in everybody’s windows, only not in ours. So she showed to us how to do it, after all, she was brought up in a religious home, wasn’t she?

So she lit the candles and said prayers for the family, and I have to say me and my sister liked it very much. Besides that, we once asked our father to prepare a genuine seder. It’s a holiday, let him show us how the festive dinner looks like.

And because there was no son, I was the youngest child, it was me who asked the four questions. I remember how we looked at the chalice to see whether Elias had come and drunk some or not. I liked the holiday, there had to be raisin wine, of course, Grandmother made it herself, and besides that there was cherry liqueur.

Mother didn’t give us, the children, alcohol, but she permitted us to crumble the matzah into the liqueur and eat. I liked it very much. Cherry liqueur and matzah.

Purim. The hamantashen was a wonderful thing, Mom made a triangle-shaped pastry with poppy seeds, very tasty, and you went around with rattles… On the streets, in the Jewish quarter. Everyone had them.

In the Polish quarter the Polish kids bought them too sometimes, simply because they liked them. You could buy them in the Jewish quarter in stores, of course. I also remember that you made pastries, whatever one could do best, and went to visit friends with that pastry.

On the Purim, you could trick others. I cheated our neighbor several times that I had seen her husband, he had come back, and she was all unhappy. Her husband was a wheeler-dealer, she liked it when he went away to Warsaw and wasn’t home.

There were the masqueraders, there was theatre. You can have fun, it’s a good thing. I can be an atheist and do not care about a religious holiday but the food and everything else – why not?

It’s the same with those masqueraders on Epiphany day these days [traditionally, children dressed up as Biblical figures visit neighbors’ homes on Epiphany day, a religious feast falling shortly after Christmas].

For Whitsunday [Shavuot] you made a cheesecake. Around June. Take half kilogram of cottage cheese, a quarter kilogram of butter, mince. Add half glass of sugar, some aroma, whisk in an egg…

Heat up slowly until the mixture boils. When it does, it becomes transparent. You take it off the heat, and for half kilogram add a spoon of either potato flour or pudding with a little bit of water, and put it away for a moment to thicken. Then you line up the form with butter cookies, pour in the cheese mixture, and put away. After it has chilled, you put in a fridge.

For a wedding, you made a sponge cake. The best food for me, when I was still a small kid, was sponge cake spread with marinated herring. I know one thing: some foods we never ate. And not even because my mother observed kosher, but because of habit.

You didn’t add either butter or gelatin to fish because that was something you didn’t do. Today there are no seasonal foods, you can eat everything fresh or frozen all year round. But in the past it was like that:

in the spring there was only chicken, in the summer it was only duck, in the autumn it was goose, and in the winter it was hen and of course rooster. There was a season for everything. And in the autumn, the goose-slaughtering season, you bought goose fat in the Jewish butcher shops.

You could buy it with skin and have beautiful cracklings, or just the fat, which melted fully. Whole stone pots of that fat stood in the basement, and it didn’t go rancid.

Fish is the so called parve food, neither meat nor dairy. You can eat anything after fish. Because ours was a Jewish home, there had to be fish on Sabbath. And for many years, as long as my father lived, I had gefilte fish on Saturday.

Of vegetables, you take: a bit of parsley, a lot of carrot, and even more onion. At least a tablespoon of sugar per one kilogram of fish. A lot of pepper. Fish should be relatively salty, sweet, and peppery. You hash raw fish with onion.

For a kilogram of fish, two or three eggs, to hold it all together. We also added matzah floor. And you cook it. I make compressed balls and put them into boiling water with vegetables. Fish should cook for two hours.

No one mixes fish with a spoon. You shake the pot lightly. When it’s cooked, you take the fish out carefully and leave the sauce. It will turn into aspic automatically if you’ve added carp’s head. Carp’s head is the Jewish treasure. At home, everyone fought for the head. It’s fatter and better than any other part.

Meat used to be meat. Prystor’s meat… Prystor was a parliament member who said that it was unaesthetic to slaughter animals, that it was better to electrocute them 8. And as electrocution wasn’t kosher, because blood wasn’t drained, Jews had a limit, so much to kill. Hind beef was non-kosher, even if ritually slaughtered.

That was because it’s impossible to remove the veins from the hind part. It’s easy, though, with the front part. So Jews ate the front meat, smoked the brisket, and that was the Jewish ham.

I don’t remember where we bough meat, whether in the Jewish quarter or the Polish one. There was this butcher called Suchodol in Lublin, he made really good cured meat. The bet cured meat in Lublin. I know I ate Polish cured meat too, because it wasn’t like it’s forbidden.

When Grandmother prepared meat, it was the Jewish way. There was a wooden box, with walls, legs, and a groove for the juice to trickle. After washing the meat, you salt it thoroughly from six sides and put away for two hours. Then you rinse it and only then cook. Whether my mother did it like that, I don’t remember, but my grandmother certainly did.

It was worse when she prepared liver. First she salted it well, then – we had a coal stove – she put it on the coals to roast, so that there was no blood, and only then started to fry. As a result, liver was always tough. But good. Salty, good. And tough – well, what could you do. That was the way they prepared it.

My mother prepared all kinds of things. Goose necks. Mince flour with poultry fat, add salt and pepper, stuff the neck with it and cook in broth. Yummy! Or sweet rice. Cooked with raisins or apples, with eggs, and casseroled.

Cooked noodles, mixed with eggs, layered with fruit like a layer cake, and baked sweet. When my mother made something like that and I took it to work, I had to take a really large chunk because all my colleagues wanted me to treat them. Because it was really very good.

Dumplings with matzah flour. To serve four, you take half a liter of water, four eggs, some chopped onion fried on poultry fat, add salt and pepper to taste, and matzah flour about a cup, a cup and half.

This is at first rather runny, but after it has stood for some time with the matzah flour, it gets thicker and you can form dumplings. I also add a pinch of baking soda. You cook it in salted water, and then pour broth over it. This is an Easter dish.

My mother also made potatoes to accompany chicken soup. Potato pancakes. You make it like that: one mid-sized potato per person and one eggs per person. You mix the cooked potato with the egg, salt, pepper, to taste of course, add a beaten egg white, and fry the pancakes on fat.

Then you pour chicken soup over it. This is an elegant potato dish for a festive chicken soup, not for Easter, but for Sabbath.

My mother also made a buckwheat groats pie. She certainly made it with rough puff pastry. She cooked the groats beforehand. Then she roasted them with onion. That she baked and cut into pieces, and it didn’t fall apart, it held together, so I guess she added eggs. It was quite good.

Chopped liver with egg and onion, fried liver of course, always with chicken fat, very good. Kidney beans cooked and then minced – to hull it – in a mincer, and then with egg and onion, also other things.

Those were the appetizers, my mother made them. Sometimes she fried a piece of meat, because my father could abstain from eating for the whole day but dinner had to be with all the supplements, an hors d’oeuvre, and dessert.

You made all kinds of things. My mother made something that today would be regarded as a poor man’s dish. If she had any stale bread or challah, she cut it into pieces, poured boiling water over it, added salt and a piece of butter.

That’s a kind of poor man’s soup. For me, it was great. Not because she made it out of poverty, she simply had various uses for that stale bread. And war taught me that you never throw bread away.

My grandmother made borscht. She never cooked it with raw beets, but always pickled them first. And she didn’t season it – as the Poles do – with cream, but with egg yolks. Cream was forbidden because that would have made the soup a dairy dish.

That borscht was like wine. My mother always said, ‘Mum, how many yolks have you added?’ ‘Not many, only two!’ came the answer. Eggs used to be cheap. For three eggs you could buy a pack of cigarettes.

The best thing was matzebrei, my daughters like it to this day. Matzebrei means ‘fried matzah’ in German [editor’s note: actually ‘matzah mash’]. I make a lot of onion with fat, chicken fat is the best, goose fat as a last resort, you have to brown the onion a bit, so that it gives off the scent.

You add soaked, broken matzah, fry it a little so that the matzah absorbs the salt, pepper and fat, then you add an egg, mix it all, and you have a delicious dish.

We made cholent, the classic one, with kishke. My mother peeled the potatoes, onion was added too, of course. Salt, pepper to taste. You bought beef intestine by the meter, with suet on the surface.

My mother stuffed the intestine with flour, salt, and pepper, and – stuffing – turned the suet side inside. She sewed up the ends. Then she scalded it again and cleaned thoroughly. That intestine went on the top, on the potatoes, you wrapped the pot with rags, newspapers, whatever, to make it tight.

In the Jewish quarter you took the pot to a baker, to a bread oven, but we had a stove with an oven of its own. You put the pot into a hot oven and on Sabbath you took it out, and you had regular cholent. Crisp brown kishke and crisp potatoes.

That was Jewish cholent, our own. But when I lived in Warsaw, my sister-in-law made it differently. Hulled barley, fat flat rib, kidney beans, and potatoes. Simmer the meat with the beans and the barley, so as to boil away almost all water.

Add raw potatoes, salt, pepper, onion, of course, then wrap it up tightly and put into an oven, on a very low heat, 100 degrees Celsius, no more. It roasts for a whole day, then another – I turn the heat off for the night just in case – and on the third day the guests come and eat. As my birthday falls in February, when it’s cold – I won’t be making in the summer – I make cholent in the winter. For my birthday guests. They love it.

I completed an elementary school. My sister, who was two years older than me, went to a Jewish school in the Jewish quarter. An ordinary school, elementary, it was called at the time. It was at Lubartowska, far from home.

Because my father was a Bundist and above all he was a Jew. We were never ashamed of being Jews. Even today, when I strike up a friendship with someone, I tell them right away, so that there’s no embarrassment when they say something about Jews, and here I am, a Jew. So my father believed we should go to a Jewish school.

I spent two years at the Jewish school together with my sister, even though they didn’t want to admit me, I was only 5. But my sister went, so was I to sit at home? I went with her. And because the teacher was a friend of my mother’s, she tolerated my presence in the classroom. I kept very quiet, unlike on the street. I kept very quiet so eventually she started asking me questions.

And then a decision was made that we should change the school because there was a Polish one right near our house, at Bernardynska, we wouldn’t have to walk to the other side of town. So we transferred to a Polish elementary school number 9.

My sister was taken back a year because her Polish was poor. And I was admitted to first grade. In that school, I was a particularly shy kid. Quiet, calm. I went to the teacher and told her I didn’t want to be in first grade, because I was bored. 

That I could read and write, and count, so that perhaps I could be moved to second, to be together with my sister. Later I regretted it a bit when I saw how the first graders played, and there was none of that in the second.

But I went together with my sister and it was like that: I was small and skinny, but had a strong fighting spirit. I mean, at school I was quiet. But if someone stepped on my toes, I knew how defend myself. I was always ugly but I laughed a lot.

I always looked well in photos, I was photogenic. Trousers were unfashionable those days; I had a pair made by a tailor because I wanted to wear trousers. Elka was more similar to my mother’s brothers, whom I didn’t know. She was very non-photogenic, though a pretty girl. Brown-haired. She had plaits so thick you could barely grab them with your hand. She was tall, taller than our parents…

At first she was also slender. Only after turning 11 she put on weight, blossom. At 11 years old, she was 165 centimeters tall and weighed 70 kilograms. And if someone tried to pick up a fight with one, the other stood in her defense.

My sister irritated me a little. If we went for a walk to a park together and I disappeared from her sight, she’d run and around shouting, ‘Where’s my child!’ I am her child! Well, but still we lived harmony, we were two sisters, we lived together.

We studied together, but it looked like this: when she was reading out a poem or anything to memorize it, I wasn’t. I had already memorized it.

I was a very good student throughout school, straight As. I loved math, physics, chemistry. All science subjects, but my smooth talk shows I wasn’t bad at Polish literature either. My essays were always ten pages long, the teacher always said, ‘Write shorter ones!’

Because how long would it take her to read them if all were that long? We had our own religion teacher. The other girls had a priest, whom they loved very much and whom we loved as well. A really good man. But we had our own [Jewish] religion teacher.

I had a grievance against her once, very serious. It was Easter and I came to school with kosher matzah with scrambled eggs. It happened so that I swapped that matzah with a friend of mine for a butter-and-ham sandwich. And that friend then told on me to the religion teacher.

The religion teacher put me to kneel in the corner. She explained to me later that I had committed a sin, more than a double one: not only did I eat ham; it was also with butter and bread, all of which is forbidden on a high holiday. A triple sin with a single sandwich! Isn’t this horrible?

For thirty students in my class, there were seven Jews, and the history teacher never called us ‘Jews’ but always ‘Israelites.’ Every time she said that, I felt like someone slapped me in the face. Why Israelites? Why not Jews? I assumed she was a Jew-hater.

Today I think I was wrong, she simply tried not to hurt our feelings. But I couldn’t study history. When I studied it, it went in this way and out that way, leaving little in the head. And she kept asking me, ‘Szwarcowna, you’re good at all other subjects, why aren’t you good at history?’

What was I supposed to say? ‘Because I don’t like you, madam’? For the final report card, however, in order not to spoil it, she gave me a B instead of a C. I had all As and that single B. That I will never forget her, in the good sense, that she didn’t want to hurt me.

And then it began. My tutor called my parents and told them, ‘Because your daughter has been such a good student, she should go to gymnasium.’ The tuition fee was forty zlotys a month. An unimaginable sum. I knew I wasn’t good for giving private lessons, because it annoyed me that my pupil didn’t know what I knew.

I knew that if I proved a good student, they‘d reduce the fee after several months to just ten zlotys a month. But that was still a lot of money. So I sat down with my parents, like a grown-up with grown-ups, talked to them.

I told them I knew there was no money at home. If I went to work, I’d start earning. Otherwise, I’d be studying for four more years and there’d be even less money. And it was me who convinced my parents rather than the other way round. And I went to work.

Though a friend of my mother’s believed I’d make a great dressmaker, judging by the dresses I made for my dolls, I said had no patience for that, and that I’d go mad before I made a dress. I better make hats, I said.

I went to make hats to a milliner. But because I was 13 and the age requirement for an official contract was 15, I didn’t make any money until I turned 15. Except as tip from time to time for delivering a client’s hat to her home.

My boss was such a person that she kept me in the shop until midnight. And there was still of a way to walk home. I worked near where we lived, one bus stop, let’s say, but who used buses before the war. You always walked on foot.

Twenty groszy the single fare was a lot of money. Until one day my mother went to ask her, that I’m only 13, to let me go home earlier, and on that same day she kept me until after midnight, and she asks me whether I’m the only child that my mother is so protective towards me.

She herself had just one son and was really overprotective towards him. But I didn’t matter. I don’t know her name. I’ve never had a good memory for names, not that I’ve forgotten because of old age.

My last boss was the best one. I was already 15, so during those two years when I worked for free I had already learned something. When she took me, I could sign a proper contract. It was called an apprentice course.

I started actually making the hats. But not only that. As I had good visual memory, she’d send me on the street to look out for original designs. Every [milliner shop] had its own designs which were made in very short series. So I’d return to the shop and use a kind of rigid muslin to form a semblance of what I had spotted.

My boss was very satisfied with me, shortly before the war I was making thirty zlotys. So I was able to pay for myself. All those milliner shops were very elegant. All my bosses were Jewish, and I know that the last one survived the war. She lived in Warsaw at Waszyngtona Avenue.

I learned, don’t remember from whom, that she still lived there, and I went there. She was glad I had survived, I was glad she had survived, and that was it.

My sister too had already gone to work by the time. Elka was serious, quiet, my opposite, because I was a little devil, which you can tell even today. She had a boyfriend, but believed he laughed a lot, was unserious.

She went to gymnasium after completing elementary school, but we didn’t have money for that. Finally, after a year she gave up and went to work, first as a babysitter, and then she worked at some hops plant.

I had a boyfriend, he was my father’s apprentice. Berek Rainer. When he started working for my father, he was 20, and I was 13. At first he treated me as the boss’ daughter, but then, slowly, slowly, we became a couple.

He never proposed to me, never said he’d marry, but everyone laughed Szwarc was rearing himself a son-in-law. And shortly before the war within three months that boy lost both his parents. He had three younger siblings and had to take care of them. And he stayed in Lublin.

• During the war

The war broke out and everything ended. We didn’t know yet what Hitler would do to the Jews. We knew it would be bad, but we didn’t anticipate just how bad. When my father was fleeing east during the war, a friend of his wrote him that it was a pity my father had left because, as a councilor, he’d be on the Judenrat 9.

He’d be on the Judenrat and would be very happy sending Jews to camps and everywhere, right? A pity. How did people imagine that business?

My best friend was Andzia Borensztejn. On the eve of the outbreak of the war, they announced a call-up in Lublin. And the two of us were just returning from Bystrzyca, which was a small river. We were walking down Krakowskie Przedmiescie Street and someone made us a photo.

We saw those large call-up posters. And then I ask her, ‘How do you think, Andzia, will you survive the war?’ And she says, ‘No, I won’t.’ ‘And I will.’ And that proved true. She didn’t survive, I did.

My father was rather sickly, and my mother was terribly worried that if they took him – they were taking men as hostages – he wouldn’t survive. And it was my mother who forced my father to flee from Lublin. Eastwards, beyond the Bug [1939 – 1942 the border river between Germany and USSR].

My father went with a group of friends and vanished. Others were sending letters, my father was sending nothing. My boyfriend ran the watchmaker’s shop and German soldiers were coming to us.

One was telling me poor Jews had nothing to fear because Hitler was only interested in the rich ones. He didn’t know himself what he was talking about. And one day it was so: it’s after curfew, and there’s a knocking on the door.

A soldier. He must have his watch because tomorrow he goes to the front. And the keys are with my boyfriend in the Jewish quarter at the other side of town. We tell him it’s after curfew. He’ll accompany me.

So my mother begs him to then escort me back, because what, I’ll have to sleep at the shop? And so we’re walking, in the night, through the town, there are guards everywhere, with dogs, German soldiers, and time after time they stop us.

Those dogs were trained: the dog stands in front of you, sideways, so that you can’t pass. When the guard had been through – he talked only to the soldier, not me – he patted the dog, the dog stepped back.

When we got close to the Jewish quarter, there was no ghetto yet, it was really swarming with them. They were staging pogroms, all kinds of things. I went into the alley where my boyfriend lived. I started calling him.

Finally someone answers me. Who am I? I introduce myself with my full name and say I want to talk to Berek. ‘Just a moment.’ A gate opens, they let me in. I say, ‘You have to go with me.’ He told the others he might have to spend the night at my place, and off we went.

He put that watch together, and the soldier saw me off. He refused to see Berek off, though. ‘What, I’ll be walking like that the whole night?’ he said. So Berek spent the night with us.

I remember one more picture from the occupation period. I was in Poland for only a short time, because the Germans entered in September, and in November I left in search of my father. So I remember, a German was walking down the street – an elderly man – and he dropped something.

So I, a well-mannered person, picked it up instinctively and ran to hand it to him. God, how a Polish woman got down on me. How she hurled abuse at me for lackeying the Germans. And I simply didn’t think about that.

Then my mother comes to me one day at six in the morning. He wakes me up. ‘You’ll go to the headquarters and obtain a paper that you have to go to the border.’ I say, ‘Why me? My sister’s older than me.’ But my sister was saying all the time, ‘I’ll die because of the Germans;’ she wasn’t leaving the apartment at all.

I walked around, worked in the shop with Berek. I was the brave one, so it was me who’d go. I secured the paper, brought it home, and my mother says, ‘Alright, and now pack your things and your father’s things.’

And so: warm clothes for me and him, his winter coat, warm boots, for me too, all the watchmaker’s tools, for what kind of a watchmaker are you when you don’t have the tools? A gloomy, rainy day, you know how it is in November. Someone will take us across the Bug.

And they’ll take us somewhere. Not true. They only took the money for getting you across the river, and on the other side they left you, and do what you want.

I traveled with strangers. The smugglers took us to a German checkpoint, because they had a deal with the Germans they’d rob us first and then we could go. First of all they asked who had a pass, it turned out only I had it.

And because it said they also had to assist me with my luggage, they said to me, ‘Take your things and step aside.’ Someone put his suitcase next to mine, he was delivering clothes for his wife, so that they didn’t take it. On the next day they took us across the Bug. And left there.

We walked around in circles for the whole night. And as I have good visual memory, I kept telling them: ‘Listen, we’re walking in circles, returning to the Bug all the time. We must go straight ahead.’ But who will listen to a teenage girl!

I was 18, so who was I, those were grown-up people, after all! Eventually, in the morning, we arrived at some village and spent the whole day there.

And in the evening I went to Brzesc [presently Belarus, city on Polish border, 200 km east of Warsaw] by train. I get off at the station and meet the man my father went with! He says, ‘Your father is here!’

My father told me later, ‘Yes, I felt on that rainy night that someone was going towards me.’ Because I found my father, it was like that: it didn’t make sense to return to the Germans. And it was impossible to bring my mother to that side.

My mother was born in Lublin, they wouldn’t let her pass. If she had been born, say, in Brzesc… She could also pass if she married someone fictitiously. But those days a thing like a fictitious marriage was out of the question.

So we stayed with my father in Brzesc. There I went for some time to a Jewish school, learned in Yiddish about our beloved Stalin, even received an award at the end of the term. After which it turned out they were telling us to accept Soviet passports. Some people did.

And immediately they had to go into the interior, to Kazakhstan, other places… because “uncertain elements” couldn’t stay near the border. And those who didn’t accept the document, they were “potentially hostile elements”, and had to be sent somewhere far.

They started preparing freight trains, the kind of ones you use to transport cattle. I had a friend in Brzesc who was courting me, wanted me to marry him and go away with him. Instead, he joined the army and died, I think. And he comes to me and says, ‘Listen, they’ll be taking you away!’ I say, ‘How do you know?’

‘Those trains, they’re preparing so many trains at the station.’ And indeed they were. They came in the night, told us to pack our things and leave with them. I had stashed a medical insurance ID.

Birth year 1921, I added a dash, first I tried the ink so that the color matched, now it was a ‘4’ and I was three years younger. Because I was afraid they’d separate me from my father. And so: families they sent to the north, to Komi [republic west of the Ural mountains], to Siberia, various places. And singles – to a camp.

• In Komi

We traveled for a month. At first by train, in the night. We’d stop somewhere and they’d bring us something to eat. A soup made of nettle or some other weed, we could draw some water.

At first they locked the cars and set up a semi-toilet in the middle. What – everyone will sit and look at the others looking at him? So we kept losing the locking rings. Until they gave it up and left the door unlocked. But no one ran away.

Where were we supposed to run without any papers? They’d have caught us right away. Then we sailed for so many days on a ship, a kind of hollowed out barge, there was one toilet on the top and that was it. Then they let us off in the taiga and we had to walk for some… Twenty five kilometers? Into the taiga.

There we lived in barracks, some twenty families per barrack. Those who had sheets, had sheets; those who did not, did not. And work, usually in the forest. All women didn’t have their period for a year after coming to Komi.

The different climate. I was a maiden, I knew I wasn’t pregnant, but the married ones were worried. And there, in Komi, we stayed in the forest for something like two years.

Perhaps it’s the flow of time that it seems to me like ten years, but no. And then they let us go to the countryside. And in the countryside we started working as watchmakers. I also worked as a watchmaker. I could install a spring, clean a watch.

But I didn’t do much because my father never wanted to agree for me to be a watchmaker. I was for a total of four years in Komi with my father.

The local ‘folklore’ is the more pleasant part of the story. We rented a room and lived with a family. Unfortunately, we had to sleep together because we had one blanket, one pillow, and one bed. The blanket and pillow were ours.

Later they gave us a little single-room house, we made a partition with boards, and here you worked and there you slept. At the side stood an iron stove that during the winter you heated around the clock. With wood of course. We kept chopping and sawing wood.

The houses there were built with logs. A stove in front and a bread oven. Under the house there was a clearance, a meter and half tall. If there was a pig or a cow, it stood there, underneath.

The clearance had to be there because the stove not to stand on the ground because it would have collapsed. It would collapse during the spring thaw. There had to be some isolation between the oven and the living room.

That isolation was a pigsty or a cow shed. Moss was stuffed between the logs, and in the winter, when it was -50 degrees Celsius outside, those houses were very warm. Wood is a poor conductor.

The windows were tiny, just two vents, but they didn’t open them during the winter at all, couldn’t imagine you could air the house. The house is a semi. You enter from both sides up the stairs to a hallway where there stand barrels with sauerkraut, barrels with cranberry, because you store cranberry in spring water during the winter, and so you do with blueberries.

Dried mushrooms hanging from the ceiling. Salted mushrooms. Huge numbers of brooms. All kinds of things, everything you can store, stood in that hallway. The toilet is behind a partition wall, there’s a bench made with wood blocks, you sit on it, and there, in the bottom… hmm… it all drops there. There’s even no stink. In the summer you spill it over with something, in the winter it freezes.

From there you enter the room. The winter part has a large bread oven. Where I was were two rooms: one tiny one where we lived, and another one a little bit larger. The floor is clean, scrubbed so you can lie on it, no problem, and the oven is covered with bearskin coats. And there you can sleep. It’s snug-as-a-bug-in-a-rug there. It’s the top part, up under the ceiling.

That’s the winter part. The summer one is similar, only there’s no oven. There are plenty of bugs, though, because it’s warm. So in the middle of the winter, during the worst cold, they move to the summer part for a couple of days and here it all freezes out. For a couple of years you have nothing to worry about, no bedbugs, no cockroaches. Nothing.

One more thing about those houses. Each had its own bathhouse. But the bathhouse was a hundred and fifty meters from the house. Also made with logs. You entered a hall where you drew water to barrels, because otherwise it would freeze.

The surface was frozen anyway. In the main room there were large holes in the walls which normally you plugged with pegs, but when there was fire under the round stone oven into which a huge cauldron with water was set, you had to unplug them to let the smoke out. That’s why it was a black bath, ‘chyornaya banya,’ because the walls were all in soot.

You burned wood until the stones were red hot, and after all wood had been burned, when there was no more smother, you plugged all the holes, brought the cold water from the hall in bowls, poured it onto the stones and made a steam bath… like hell! And now: who will endure for how long. They sat at the very top. I sat at the bottom and thought I’d die! And it’s like this: everyone bathes together.

‘What, you want to bathe alone, and who’ll wash your back?’ So there went the peasant, his wife with a three-month child on her hand, they entered the bathhouse. Then I jumped in, didn’t last long, I felt like water was running from my eyes, nose, ears. And I ran the hundred and fifty meters back home. Who thought about dressing! The housewife went out in an undershirt, naked and barefoot.

Almost -50 degrees Celsius. He in his underpants, barefoot and naked. The baby had a diaper. And so you went the hundred and fifty meters home. And only there you could catch your breath, dry yourself, get dressed. And you didn’t catch cold. You were so hot you didn’t have time to freeze.

When one time I popped out while washing the floor to throw out the water, the way I was dressed and barefoot, the next day I had 40 degrees Celsius fever. A Russian woman who lived with us applied the following remedy: one third glass of spirit, two thirds hot tea. And an aspirin. She told me drink it. And the next day I had no fever. Miraculous therapy. My father caught rose of the face.

A very dangerous disease. When he went to a doctor, she gave him Prontozil, the first sulphamide; it tinted your pee red. And she told him to use the common, folk method – take a copybook cover, red or blue, pour a lot of chalk on it, cover the face, wrap around so that it didn’t slip off, draw the curtains. And my father got well. When I got twilight blindness, the village women told me I had to have seal fat and they brought me some as well.

It was a shaking kind of jelly, almost transparent, amber-colored. Dripping with stinking, fish oil. And believe me, after the first spoon of that fat I started seeing again. But you don’t throw something as good as this away. I fried potatoes on it; they had a fish aroma, yummy.

It was like that: you work, but in the summer they send everyone to the forest for the forest produce. I fell in love with the forest only in the taiga. Most of the trees there are of the northern variety, spruces. They were sky-high.

Covered to half-height with gray moss, they looked like standing whitebeards. Beautiful! There were water holes, swamps. There was permafrost. During the heat of the summer there was still snow in the deep ravines. Doesn’t it look strange? Berries larger than cherries. It was there that I saw the bog bilberries for the first time.

When it’s, say, harvest time, everyone goes to help. The first time I took a sickle, I cut myself here and I still have a mark. I cut it to the bone. Because I couldn’t operate the sickle, I handled it the wrong way. 

They said I didn’t deserve to eat bread if I couldn’t harvest it. No peasant there owns his own cow. He doesn’t because during the two summer months he won’t be able to mow enough grass for food and litter.

So, if the family has many members, he owns half a cow. If the family has few members, he owns quarter of a cow. What does it mean? It doesn’t mean the cow is today here and tomorrow there, because everyone would count on the other to feed it and the cow would starve to death.

The cow spends one week with one farmer, one with the other one, one with the third one, and so on. And when it goes to graze, it knows perfectly well: this barn is closed, so it goes to the other one, the second one is closed, she goes to the third one.

They milk those cows but don’t know what to do with the milk. They’ll pour some for the dog, some for the cat, drink some themselves, and in the winter freeze the rest. They take a one liter bowl, pour milk into it and put the bowl into snow.

The milk freezes, you shake it out of the bowl and put deep into snow, so that the dogs don’t reach it. In the winter, you dig it out and melt it. I remember how once a peasant brought a sack in return for repairing his watch.

My father says, ‘You’ll see it’s milk he brought.’ ‘In a sack?’ I ask. And the guy shakes out ten pieces of milk. So I did like that: I put the whole ten liters to curdle. I gathered the cream and made a bit of butter.

With the rest I made curd cheese. How happy we were. We had cheese, we had butter. And the peasants looked at us puzzled. And if that were not enough, my friend’s son took all the whey, mixed it with buttermilk, we drank some, he took the rest, went to the train station and sold it for some kopeks per glass. And he made some money. So you can make do everywhere if only you want to.

Once they gave us a patch of land. It’s called a ‘whole,’ land that hasn’t been cultivated yet. We planted some potatoes, and had our own. How many did I get? Ten kilograms to plant? You were hungry…

So you cut those potatoes in half. There are many spots on one side, so you cut that part off and planted it carefully on a handful of ash. The rest you ate. And from those cut-off pieces – those were Michurin’s varieties – I obtained a huge amount of potatoes.

There were four or five tubers under each plant. You don’t wait there for them to ripen in the soil because in September temperature already falls below zero degrees Celsius. You plant them in late June and you have to pick them in late July, and each potato weighs almost one kilogram.

I knew the Komi language, or Zyrian. So they said to me, ‘Te, Aniuta, achid mort, you’re our guy. You speak our language.’ They treated me like one of their own, taught me all kinds of things.

How to salt the mushrooms, because for them, no mushroom is poisonous. Either you have to boil them several times, changing the water each time because the poison moves to the water, or place them in a sack and put the sack into fresh water, and the poison will rinse away. They have a thousand ways. The boiled mushrooms are then heavily salted.

There’s no dill, for where would they be supposed to take it from, in fact no spices whatsoever. In the winter, when I already had my own potatoes, when I boiled them and added a handful of those salty mushrooms, it was a feast! Who would have thought.

If you managed to get hold of some rutabaga in the summer, you did like this: you peeled it, cut into pieces, stuffed into a pot, wrapped the pot up in rags, in the morning placed the pot in the oven, and went to work.

When you returned in the evening, that rutabaga looked like cholent! It was dark, sweet as honey. Fantastic! I don’t know whether I’d eat it today, but I loved it then!

When you repair a watch, you have to put it on, carry around to see how it works, what’s wrong with it. I went to the forest and I come back without the frame with the glass. My God, it’s somebody’s watch! What am I to do? They’ll kill us. I followed my own tracks back to the forest. And there it was! Miracles happen.

The river was beautiful. Vychegda, much broader than our Vistula and very deep. We, a team of ten girls, worked for some time making bricks. That was work for women. You had to dig out the clay, tread it through with water… horrible work.

Then you formed a brick, placed it in a frame so that it dried, discarded the frame and only then fired the brick. Then they gave us a horse to tread on the clay. Ten girls stood around him with whips lest it jumped out of that hole, because it wasn’t stupid to tread on coal.

It was a mare and she left a colt in the stable. So they told us to milk her because otherwise she’d get sick. No one wanted to do it, only I agreed. And when I tried the milk, it was very good. Something like tea with milk and sugar.

But when the girls started teasing me, I poured it all out, though with regret because it was really good. It was then that I understood what they said there.

That a bucket of water is a kilogram of bread, and a ton of water is a kilogram of fatback. I didn’t drink a bucket of water, but when we sat in the evening around the samovar to drink tea… it wasn’t really tea, it was a kind of herbal tea, made with remnants from various fruits if you had made a compote or whatever.

Dried peelings, stones and pips, all that was pressed together, brewed, and you had a kind of sour tea. And if we sat and drank like that, we could easily drink a liter each. What’s a liter? You drank it and you felt full, didn’t you?

Six hundred grams of bread, our daily allowance, was a small piece. And my father forced me to divide that into three and have a thin slice of bread three times a day. So that I don’t eat it all right away because I’d be hungry for the rest of the day.

And the soup in the canteen was very good. As the Russians say, ‘Shchi da kasha, pishcha nasha.’ [Shchi and kasha is our food]. Shchi is cabbage soup, and kasha is groats. Cabbage soup was a bit of water with two cabbage leaves, we ate the cabbage, but what to do with the water? And kasha… it was the first time I saw oat groats.

They were clumped together into a mass, they gave you some with a large spoon, you made a hole in the middle and it was just enough for a spoon of oil. Mmm… How good it was! You dipped every spoonful of kasha in that oil and ate.

Sometimes they gave us fried cod. Stinking. I can’t eat fis], I feel sick right away. But my father stood over me, ‘Eat, or you’ll be hungry, eat, you must have strength.’

That was the life in freedom. Because we were in exile, but free. My husband [Borys Mass] spent several years in a [Soviet] camp. It was like that: you have to cut so many trees, so many cubic meters.

If he cut that many, he got his allotment of bread, some unsweetened coffee in the morning and evening, and a spoonful of soup for lunch. A table spoon, I mean, not a ladle… Of some wish-wash thin cabbage soup.

If he did more than the quota was, he got an extra piece of bread. But if he did less, he got less. The weaker you were, the less you did, and the less you did, the more hungry you were and the less you did. People eventually starved to death. That’s how it looked in the camps.

Once we were trimming a tree trunk, one guy stood behind another, and when the one in front stepped back – the axes were sharpened every night, they cut themselves – the other took a swing… and cut half of his buttock off. Fortunately, not entirely.

They took him to a hospital, sewed up and it grew back together. But he spent as month in a hospital. And there was also an investigation whether that wasn’t an act of sabotage. We, the female brigade, had a similar story. We were working in the forest, grubbing out small trees.

The area is marshy, of course, there’s a rivulet, a narrow one, if you take a good run-up, you’ll jump over.

But it’s deep, there’s permafrost there, so it washes it away deeper and deeper. It meanders and we have to cut and grub out all the trees around it because there’ll be a meadow here. We threw the trees over the water to bridge it.

We were taught to keep our axes behind our back, tucked behind the belt. You mustn’t carry the axe in your hand because it’s very sharp. The slightest loss of balance and a girl could cut herself.

One was passing over the river and stepped on a free branch. And fell into water. We ran to pull her out, and it was deep. She went with her head down. We pull her out, and she cries: she’s lost her axe. She pulls her leg out of the water, and the boot is all bloody.

Blood trickling out of it. We look, and she had stuffed her axe right into the boot. So we say, it’s five kilometers home, as long as it doesn’t hurt you yet, we made a tourniquet with handkerchiefs, for what else did we have? We took her under the arms and went running home.

She walked some two kilometers herself, and then we had to carry her. She was in a hospital for a month. Sewing up and so on and we dived for the axe the following day and we found it. But still there was an official investigation, how did it happen that she had lost the axe in the first place?

Why was the axe in the hand instead of behind the belt? Sabotage! It was frightening.

I had a very close relationship with my mother, also a telepathic one. One story: I caught a cold before the war, got very high fever. And it turned out I had pleural exudate. I was ill for a very long time then. I was in bed for almost eleven weeks.

I put on eleven kilograms of weight because that’s how they fed me. Then I went to Miedzeszyn, there was a Bund sanatorium there. There I caught quinsy, had an ulcer in my throat. I was choking. And that last night, the worst one, I was pacing around the room and thinking: if only my mother was here, she’d surely help me.

And I hadn’t written home I was sick. I didn’t want them to worry. Besides, what am I, being sick while in sanatorium? And my father woke up in the night, my mother stands by the window and says, ‘You know, I feel she’s choking there.’ And she sent me a wire.

The ulcer burst in the morning. Another time it was a different kind of story. That was during the war. We were in Komi, two thousand kilometers from Lublin. I remember, it was April 1943, we were sitting besides a smoking lamp and reading.

My host said, ‘Aniuta, if someone comes, take a note.’ And left. They never lock the door there. And a moment later I hear how the door opens and closes, and I hear steps. I was engrossed in reading, so I raised my head and said, ‘Is it mum?’

And only my father’s astounded look made me realize… What am I saying? Have I gone mad? But after the war, after I had returned home, I found out that it was at that time that my mother was murdered in Belzec 10. I don’t remember the day, but it was April 1943.

So, dying, she said goodbye to me. Whether she was happy we’d survive, I don’t know. But I did receive her last thought.

There was one Polish guy up there in the north, Piotr Kobzan, I fell deeply in love with him. But he joined the Anders army 11 and later wrote me on his way that it was because of me. He was a career cadet officer. And I was a great patriot, I was telling him I’d join the army myself if it weren’t for my father. And my beloved felt embarrassed, he went to fight, only because of me.

Well, obviously I wasn’t meant to marry a Pole. After the war, his family was looking for him. He was from the Vilnius region, and I even wondered whether I should write them to tell them what I knew. But I already had a husband and a baby, and I thought, and what if he decides to contact me?

Returning to those Komi peasants. Were they bad people? No! People like people. A mixed lot. First of all, the kind of teeth they had I haven’t seen anywhere else. All their life they chew tree resin.

Just like it’s fashionable here to chew American bubble gum. They collect it when it congeals slightly on a spruce. It cleans the teeth and protects them. Even old people have white, strong teeth there. In the spring, it’s birch juice: you cut a birch like you cut a tree to collect resin, hang a bucket, and drink the juice that has dripped into it. That was really good!

And if you walked or rode through the forest, the world was beautiful! The trees all in snow, the roads white. And I sang, sang out loud, because I used to have a very nice voice. Soprano. The world was beautiful, so what that it was hungry, cold, and far from home?

White nights, superb. And the northern lights. It’s so wonderful. The colorful, beautiful curtain hanging in the sky. You saw many things. And what you saw, no one will take away from you. Everything there was interesting.

I could go on and on… Then Sikorski 12 and Wanda Wasilewska 13 finally arranged for us to be released from Komi. In 1944 people were going where they wanted. Some went to Central Asia, and that was really stupid.

From the northern climate into the sweltering heat, to Tashkent. And some didn’t survive that change of climate. We decided we wouldn’t go to Asia but closer to Poland, so Ukraine at most. At first we worked on a farm, or rather a kolkhoz 14, in Ukraine.

Near Bakhmach [small town 100 km north-east of Kiev]. It was two hours’ way to town. Because there were no horses following the German occupation, we drove cows. You yoked a pair of cows and they pulled the cart.

We were hungry as usual, I tried to milk a cow in the field. But either I didn’t know how or she didn’t want to give milk to a stranger. In fact, they don’t use boiled milk there. It’s melted milk, they call it ‘toplyenoye.’ [Russian for heated] When you take milk out of the bread oven, there’s a skin of butter on the surface. Melted butter and brown milk. I didn’t like it.

Ukraine was beautiful. I loved to sing. And they sing so much there. Like the lead singer, the ‘zapevaylo’ they call him. It’s like in the army: one soldier starts to sing and the others follow.

The same was here. One girl sings first, the others follow. A strong alto is the first voice. I was a soprano, but such a powerful one I had to be the first voice because otherwise I drowned the soprano out. Overall, to be honest, I received no harm from the Ukrainians.

But I don’t like them. I don’t like them for the UPA gangs 15 and all that. Though they didn’t harm me… But when I hear that we [the Poles] don’t love the Russians, I think to myself: my God, you don’t have to like your neighbor, but you have to live in harmony with him, and we can’t do that.

• My husband

We spent the summer in that kolkhoz. Then they allowed us to move to the village, so we moved there to work as watchmakers. But soon we decided there wasn’t much to do there and it was decided that my father would go to Bakhmach.

He went there and at the station got all confused: where he should go, what he should do. He met a young man at the station. The man saw that my father stood helpless, so he asked him in Russian whether he was looking for something.

When he heard my father’s Russian, he switched to Polish. But my father’s Polish wasn’t much better. So they switched to Yiddish and they were home. That young man told my father where he should go, what he should arrange.

Upon his return, my father told me he had met a very good man at the station, his name was Mass, and that he liked him very much for helping him. And as I have good intuition, I thought, ‘That Mass will be my husband.’

We moved to Bakhmach, and there was a sugar-making kolkhoz there. I knew that guy Mass worked there. There were two girls from Poland there against thirty boys. So when I suddenly turned up, the boys immediately beset me.

And that boy Mass isn’t showing up! So I thought, ‘You scoundrel! I can do without it!’ I started meeting another boy and suddenly there turns up Mass. I still remember that unbuttoned shirt and freckled chest. He said hello and went.

Oh, so you’re like that? Okay, no big deal. But then any time he learned I was to visit friends on Sunday, he’d show up there. And as I was meeting another, he always crossed our path. And my then-boyfriend started pulling out. So I thought, ‘Well, what kind of a boyfriend are you if you don’t fight for me?’ And so I started meeting Mass.

And then he proposed to me. And that’s how I met my husband. Those features, besides the physical looks, that I had chosen at the age of 13 that my boyfriend should have, he had them all. Strong will, a sense of humor, that’s very important, and a good ear, because I used to sing a lot.

What else can I say? My husband’s name was Borys Mass. He was born 10th December 1910 in Warsaw. In fact, he spoke Polish better than Yiddish. He was brought up in a rather progressive family… How to say that?

He knew more and was more religious than myself. Because his family, though seemingly assimilated, cared more about religion than mine. They were rather poor.

He completed the Wawelberg college before the war, it was a very good  school for mechanics (which proved useful to him during the war). He worked as a mechanic, then he moved to a textile plant where he worked as accountant.

They lived in Warsaw at Leszno Street. It was such a large apartment that if the phone rang in the anteroom, they were seldom in time from the living room to pick it up. I don’t know why they didn’t install the phone in the living room.

My husband had three sisters, all younger than him. The first sister, Emilia Mass, completed a gymnasium run by nuns. And by mistake, when filling out the graduation certificates, instead of ‘Mosaic denomination,’ they wrote ‘Roman-Catholic.’

She didn’t continue her studies, she started working as a seamstress. Her name after the war was Helena Marganiec. It’s an interesting story. Under her own name, as Emilia Mass, she was pulled out of the Warsaw ghetto 16. And she was caught by the Germans in a street round-up.

And when she sat in a cell waiting whether they’d send her to Germany for forced labor 17 or anything else, she sat with a Polish woman. And that woman cried that she wanted to go to Germany so much, that she’d have it good there, but she had epilepsy and they wouldn’t let her.

So they swapped their papers. That woman went to Germany as Emilia Mass, and my husband’s sister became Helena Marganiec.

The second sister, Marysia – my younger daughter is her namesake – studied in Warsaw and became a bacteriologist. She was murdered in Bialystok. When the Germans entered [in 1941], they didn’t look at who was Jewish and who wasn’t but killed everyone at the hospital – doctors, everyone – and her too.

And the youngest one, Wanda Mass, she started her studies before the war but earned her psychology degree only after the war. She left the ghetto using the same ID as her elder sister. And she became Emilia.

Mass they changed to Majewska, so Emilia Wanda Majewska. The oldest one and the youngest one survived. On the Aryan side, thanks to Wladzia. Our Polish ‘sister-in-law.’ She pulled her out of the ghetto, but she wasn’t in time to pull out the parents.

They spoke poor Polish, so they would have been conspicuous anyway. But she tried. But the mother had been taken to Treblinka 18 and the father didn’t want to leave the ghetto, wanted to join his wife. So my husband’s parents both died.

My husband believed that the eldest one, Emilia-Helena, had survived. She had brown hair and didn’t look like a Jewess, plus that Roman-Catholic school diploma… Yet the second one survived too, thanks to a Pole, and he didn’t know that.

They survived the war and neither married, they lived all together and were happy. At first they lived in Gliwice [industrial city in the Upper Silesia region, 300 km south-west of Warsaw], then the younger one got a job as teacher in Warsaw.

They found a burned-out house at Narbutta Street in Warsaw, took a part of an apartment they renovated with our help, and moved in there. And after they had renovated it, the pre-war housing cooperative showed up and took over the house.

• After the war

I remember, in Ukraine, there was a loudspeaker in every house, always on. And suddenly, at three in the morning, Stalin spoke. He said an agreement had been signed, the war was over.

When the war was over, the whole village took to the streets. At first we drank moonshine, because that was all they had. From three in the morning to twelve noon I drank moonshine.

At twelve noon the moonshine ended, they started drinking beer. I don’t like beer… So I said to myself, ‘Anka, you’re drunk, go to sleep.’ God! How much we drank then! Everyone with everyone. Ukrainians, Russians, Jews, refugees… People were kissing each other and drinking on the street. The war was over. Wasn’t it? That was joy.

But they didn’t let us go just then. We left only the following year, 1946. They said if you couldn’t prove you were Polish, you couldn’t go. And they had taken whatever IDs we had. Only I had hidden the medical insurance ID.

When I showed it to them, I though they’d kill me [out of wrath]. The NKVD 19, I mean. But they couldn’t do anything. And so we returned home. They sent us to Lower Silesia 20, to Rychbach…

Originally the town had a different name, then it was called Rychbach, and eventually it was renamed to Dzierzoniow. To honor Dzerzhinsky. [Editor’s note: contrary to what Mrs. Mass believes, it was called so to honor Jan Dzierzon (1811-1906), the parish priest of the church of Karlowice, Europe’s most outstanding apiculturist of the time].

Very many Jews had come from the Soviet Union, and [Dzierzoniow] was full of them. My husband worked in a textile plant. Then he started working with my father as a watchmaker.

My father was a member of the Bund but when the Bund merged with the PZPR 21, he didn’t join. In 1948, when Israel was founded, many Jews started leaving. In 1949, his sisters brought my husband to Warsaw and he started working in the accounting department of the Office of the Council of Ministers [URM].

In 1950, we [Mrs. Mass with her daughters and then her father] moved to Warsaw. My husband wasn’t a party member, but he managed to get a job at the Office of the Council of Ministers. We lived in the Zoliborz neighborhood.

Then we moved to our second apartment, and then here [Mrs. Mass’s present dwelling place]. For a short time in 1968, during the anti-Semitic campaign 22, my husband left the URM and worked at the Measures and Weights Office on Filtrowa.

He spent perhaps a year there, and then they brought him back to the URM. My father, in turn, upon coming to Warsaw didn’t have a job for a year. The doctor said it wasn’t Parkinson [Parkinson’s disease] but his hands and the head slightly too were shaking.

And no one wanted to give him a job, because what kind of a watchmaker are you when your hands are shaking. Eventually, a certain jeweler gave him a job as watchmaker, and he worked there almost until his death.

He was active until the very end at the TSKZ 23. When my father died, on 30th December 1959, and I notified them, no one came for the funeral. No one from the TSKZ was present. I felt a bit sad, I thought: he was such an activist and all…

Me and my husband got married after returning to Poland. And a daughter was already on the way. I believed we should have four children. Because if my husband’s sisters have no kids, I should have more, but my husband didn’t want to.

I had light deliveries, could go on. But my husband worked, and I didn’t. He provided for us. That’s how it looked. I have two daughters, Irena and Marysia, and three grandchildren. Irena was born 30th October 1946, and Marysia 18th April 1949.

When I was pregnant with my second daughter – in Dzierzoniow, after the war – one of the tenants in our house was a young man who was a shochet and also made circumcisions for the whole Wroclaw province. And he asks me, ‘What will you do if it’s a son?’ And I say, ‘There’ll be no circumcision.’ The war taught us that it’s a distinguishing mark.

If I lived in Israel, among Jews – yes. But here – no. How many Jews on the Aryan side died, perished because of that? I thought his eyes would pop out, so angry he was at me for saying that. Well, but I delivered a daughter and the case was closed.

Irena completed a high school, and Marysia has a law degree from the Warsaw University. And she has also recently completed a two-year psychology course. Irena is a healer and works three times a week in her son’s shop.

Marysia held a directorial position at the bank PKO SA [one of the biggest banks in Poland], and today she’s retired and she’s involved in… things of beauty, her latest hobby are watercolors. Irena has one son, Radoslaw Adam Zabawa.

He was born in 1978. He runs a store called Fraida where you can buy all kinds of New Age stuff, for healers, and so on. He completed a high school but didn’t want to take the graduation exams. Marysia has two kids, Katarzyna Liwia Bucyk, born in 1977, and Marek Winicjusz Bucyk, born in 1981.

My whole family perished. Some cousin of my father’s from Przedborz had survived, he was looking for relatives through press ads after the war. But when he came to Poland in 1946 and got hold of that newspaper, it was already a year old.

He was no longer there. Whether he left to America or somewhere else, I don’t know. All the others perished, friends, relatives, everyone. In Lublin we were on friendly terms with the caretaker of our house. He helped my mother in the ghetto, brought her food, and so on.

So after the war I wrote to the Lublin city hall to ask about my family, and stated his name as the person who might know something. It turned out he had landed in Gdansk. He didn’t write us, but they sent us his testimony that my mother and sister had gone to Majdanek 24.

After some time it turned out it wasn’t Majdanek but Belzec. I learned from a distant [maternal] cousin of mine who had survived the war in Lublin. He was given shelter to by a Polish woman whom he later married, he changed his name from Rot to Rotkowski.

He came to Dzierzoniow and I met him. I don’t know whether he later broke off any ties with us because he didn’t want his children to know he was Jewish? Or wasn’t there enough enthusiasm from my side?

In any case, I know nothing more about that this sole, distant cousin who survived the war in Poland. I survived only because my mother wanted me to go and search for my father. Had I stayed at home, I’d have faced the same fate as all others.

My sister didn’t have Semitic looks, could have survived, but she didn’t want to leave our mother. I don’t return to that these days, I didn’t even tell my children much. I didn’t want them to share my pain. I didn’t want them to experience all that. Telling the story, I’d be conveying the emotions.

My daughters knew from the very beginning they were Jewish, we never made it a secret, and also my grandchildren know they are half-blood Jews. Or even full-blood ones according to Israeli laws, because their mothers are Jewish.

My elder grandson feels half-Jewish, half-Polish. My younger daughter’s children don’t feel Jewish, but my granddaughter told her boyfriend she had Jewish roots. He said to that his roots were Romany.

Marysia got married, took a civil marriage, and changed her religion for the father-in-law. She didn’t even tell us. She knew I wouldn’t react,  but that her father would be angry. I learned only after my husband’s death. The grandchildren have all been baptized. Even Irena’s daughter. She baptized him so that he’s no different from the other kids at school.

After the war I completely accidentally ran into Frajnd, my pre-war friend from Lublin, two years younger than me. He left in the 1950s, in the early days of Israel. He left with his two kids. So he had a hard life there. And because he’s a textile plant worker by profession, he eventually got a job at a plant and his life changed for the better.

After he left for Israel, we lost contact, my husband worked for the government, couldn’t show he had any contacts with Israel. We had no relatives there, there was no one to write to.

I’ve never joined at Zionist organization. I really wish Israel the best, because it’s the Jewish state. But I believe you can’t come after two thousand years and say: this is my land. We see what’s going on there. I don’t know who’s to blame, the Jews or the Arabs. It’s certainly both.

But a nation that suffered the worst moments because of racial discrimination should not treat other people like that. There was a time, after the war, when there was talk of us emigrating to Israel. But my husband’s sisters lived with that quasi-sister-in-law of theirs and didn’t want to leave her.

And my husband didn’t want to leave his sisters. Then we could go to Australia, we even received the immigrant visa promises. But it was the same story: they didn’t want to go. We gave our children, already grown-up then, a free hand.

If you want to go, go. But then they didn’t want to go to a strange country. And so we stayed in Poland. Is it good or bad? Hard to say. I manage, my daughters manage too, don’t they? So I don’t complain.

Young people today have no idea what communism was about, they only want to hear about the empty store shelves. But everyone had a job. ‘Do or don’t, it’s two thousand every month.’

Everyone had an apartment, you got it for free. I had a month’s summer leave, went on vacation. As a non-working mother with two children. Only they didn’t let us go abroad. Jews weren’t allowed to go abroad.

My husband worked at the Office of the Council of Ministers, and if he’s a Jew, then certainly a Zionist. But he never joined the party. People believe today that it was Solidarity 25 that restored capitalism in Poland. Solidarity wanted communism with a human face. ‘Socialism yes, distortions no.’ And young people today are for what’s happening, and the old are against it. But we’re passing away anyway.

I’m already old, I’ll be 85 in February 2006! Isn’t that old? I’m also a war veteran today for spending all those years in the Soviet Union. I’m not one of the Children of the Holocaust 26, I was grown-up.

Though I was lazy all my life, I never had time to yield to laziness. At first I studied, then I went to work, worked with the crochet, knitted. You made a shawl collar, kimono sleeves – a dressing gown.

A great lady, upon getting up from bed or when she was sick, put on a dressing gown. The material cost me two zlotys, and I put that into a shop for ten. And I kept doing something.

If I had any free time, I liked to read. Then there was my husband to take care of, the house… Now that I’ve been left alone I no longer have to do anything, I will prepare food for several days in advance, won’t I? I haven’t had to clean either now that I don’t have a dog anymore.

I’ll vacuum clean once a week. So I can finally indulge in laziness. I have the right to do that now, haven’t I?

We spent almost fifty years together with my husband and we lived in harmony. He really was a good man, my father was right. My intuition that he’d be my husband proved true. My husband died twelve years ago [1993].

Even Jews who never experienced the war don’t realize what it means to lose not only your relatives and friends but to lose the whole Jewish-Polish folklore. Russian Jews are different, Israel is completely different, America is different. There’ll be no Jewish folklore in Poland anymore. Never. And this ‘never’ literally sits deep in my heart and hurts me.

Recipes:

For Whitsunday [Shavuot] you made a cheesecake. Around June. Take half kilogram of cottage cheese, a quarter kilogram of butter, mince. Add half glass of sugar, some aroma, whisk in an egg… Heat up slowly until the mixture boils. When it does, it becomes transparent. You take it off the heat, and for half kilogram add a spoon of either potato flour or pudding with a little bit of water, and put it away for a moment to thicken. Then you line up the form with butter cookies, pour in the cheese mixture, and put away. After it has chilled, you put in a fridge.

And for many years, as long as my father lived, I had gefilte fish on Saturday. Of vegetables, you take: a bit of parsley, a lot of carrot, and even more onion. At least a tablespoon of sugar per one kilogram of fish. A lot of pepper. Fish should be relatively salty, sweet, and peppery. You hash raw fish with onion. For a kilogram of fish, two or three eggs, to hold it all together. We also added matzah floor. And you cook it. I make compressed balls and put them into boiling water with vegetables. Fish should cook for two hours. No one mixes fish with a spoon. You shake the pot lightly. When it’s cooked, you take the fish out carefully and leave the sauce. It will turn into aspic automatically if you’ve added carp’s head. Carp’s head is the Jewish treasure. At home, everyone fought for the head. It’s fatter and better than any other part.

But when Grandmother prepared meat, it was the Jewish way. There was a wooden box, with walls, legs, and a groove for the juice to trickle. After washing the meat, you salt it thoroughly from six sides and put away for two hours. Then you rinse it and only then cook. Whether my mother did it like that, I don’t remember, but my grandmother certainly did.

It was worse when she prepared liver. First she salted it well, then – we had a coal stove – she put it on the coals to roast, so that there was no blood, and only then started to fry. As a result, liver was always tough. But good. Salty, good. And tough – well, what could you do. That was the way they prepared it.

My mother prepared all kinds of things. Goose necks. Mince flour with poultry fat, add salt and pepper, stuff the neck with it and cook in broth. Yummy! Or sweet rice. Cooked with raisins or apples, with eggs, and casseroled. Cooked noodles, mixed with eggs, layered with fruit like a layer cake, and baked sweet. When my mother made something like that and I took it to work, I had to take a really large chunk because all my colleagues wanted me to treat them. Because it was really very good.

Dumplings with matzah flour. To serve four, you take half a liter of water, four eggs, some chopped onion fried on poultry fat, add salt and pepper to taste, and matzah flour about a cup, a cup and half. This is at first rather runny, but after it has stood for some time with the matzah flour, it gets thicker and you can form dumplings. I also add a pinch of baking soda. You cook it in salted water, and then pour broth over it. This is an Easter dish.

My mother also made potatoes to accompany chicken soup. Potato pancakes. You make it like that: one mid-sized potato per person and one eggs per person. You mix the cooked potato with the egg, salt, pepper, to taste of course, add a beaten egg white, and fry the pancakes on fat. Then you pour chicken soup over it. This is an elegant potato dish for a festive chicken soup, not for Easter, but for Sabbath.

My mother also made a buckwheat groats pie. She certainly made it with rough puff pastry. She cooked the groats beforehand. Then she roasted them with onion. That she baked and cut into pieces, and it didn’t fall apart, it held together, so I guess she added eggs. It was quite good.

Chopped liver with egg and onion, fried liver of course, always with chicken fat, very good. Kidney beans cooked and then minced – to hull it – in a mincer, and then with egg and onion, also other things. Those were the appetizers, my mother made them. Sometimes she fried a piece of meat, because my father could abstain from eating for the whole day but dinner had to be with all the supplements, an hors d’oeuvre, and dessert.

You made all kinds of things. My mother made something that today would be regarded as a poor man’s dish. If she had any stale bread or challah, she cut it into pieces, poured boiling water over it, added salt and a piece of butter. That’s a kind of poor man’s soup. For me, it was great. Not because she made it out of poverty, she simply had various uses for that stale bread. And war taught me that you never throw bread away.

My grandmother made borsht. She never cooked it with raw beets, but always pickled them first. And she didn’t season it – as the Poles do – with cream, but with egg yolks. Cream was forbidden because that would have made the soup a dairy dish. That borsht was like wine. My mother always said, ‘Mum, how many yolks have you added?’ ‘Not many, only two!’ came the answer. Eggs used to be cheap. For three eggs you could buy a pack of cigarettes.

The best thing was matzebrei, my daughters like it to this day. Matzebrei means ‘fried matzah’ in German [editor’s note: actually ‘matzah mash’]. I make a lot of onion with fat, chicken fat is the best, goose fat as a last resort, you have to brown the onion a bit, so that it gives off the scent. You add soaked, broken matzah, fry it a little so that the matzah absorbs the salt, pepper and fat, then you add an egg, mix it all, and you have a delicious dish.

We made cholent, the classic one, with kishke. My mother peeled the potatoes, onion was added too, of course. Salt, pepper to taste. You bought beef intestine by the meter, with suet on the surface. My mother stuffed the intestine with flour, salt, and pepper, and – stuffing – turned the suet side inside. She sewed up the ends. Then she scalded it again and cleaned thoroughly. That intestine went on the top, on the potatoes, you wrapped the pot with rags, newspapers, whatever, to make it tight. In the Jewish quarter you took the pot to a baker, to a bread oven, but we had a stove with an oven of its own. You put the pot into a hot oven and on Sabbath you took it out, and you had regular cholent. Crisp brown kishke and crisp potatoes. That was Jewish cholent, our own. But when I lived in Warsaw, my sister-in-law made it differently. Hulled barley, fat flat rib, kidney beans, and potatoes. Simmer the meat with the beans and the barley, so as to boil away almost all water. Add raw potatoes, salt, pepper, onion, of course, then wrap it up tightly and put into an oven, on a very low heat, 100 degrees Celsius, no more. It roasts for a whole day, then another – I turn the heat off for the night just in case – and on the third day the guests come and eat. As my birthday falls in February, when it’s cold – I won’t be making in the summer – I make cholent in the winter. For my birthday guests. They love it.

GLOSSARY:

Iosif Yudelevichus
Kaunas
Lithuania
Interviewer: Zhanna Litinskaya
Date of interview: October 2005

My family background
Growing up
During the war
After the war
Glossary

Iosif Yudelevichus lives in a beautiful antique house in the downtown Kaunas. I was met at the threshold by a handsome elderly man in house outfit and a bandana on his neck instead of a tie. The apartment was in chime with the looks of the host. It reflected his inner world. The apartment was spacious. There were high ceilings with stucco moulding. The furniture looked antique. It was likely to look better in the past. There was a lot of dust everywhere- it was palpable that there was no hostess. There were pictures, purchased by the host’s father. Most of the pictures were landscapes painted by the host as he was fond of art. There were a lot of bells all over apartment- in the cupboard, on the bookshelves. They ranged from the tiniest and up to the big ones. The host had collected the bells for many years. There was a gorgeous curio set of dishes in the cupboard. It was felt that it had not been used for quite a long time as it was covered with dust. The host served tea in cups of different size and style. The host got ready for my visit. There were pictures and a drawn lineage tree on the table. Iosif is a good story-teller. He had a connate romanticism and the sense of humor. But still, I could feel that Iosif ‘guarded’ his life and inner world cautiously so that there would be no intrusion from the outside. At any rate, he delicately dodged from discussing his private life, letting me understand that I should not broach the subject.

My family background

One of my distant relatives, who lives in Israel, had a goal to make our family tree. It took him many years and efforts. The maternal lineage made by him and sent to me does not say much. I knew just my grandparents, so many of the names mentioned in the lineage are not known to me. My paternal and maternal ancestors are from Latvian Jonava [about 80 km from Vilnius]. In late 19th century Jonava was a picturesque town being on the junction of two rivers-Nevis and Villia. It was a small town, inhabited mostly by Jews. My maternal grandfather Aba (he was called Avel in the family, so I used to hear that name oftener) Pagirskiy was born in 1866. Judging by the family tree, grandfather had a lot of siblings. But all of them most likely had died long before I was born. At any rate there is nothing I know about them.

Grandpa Avel owned a rather large house on one of the central Jonava streets. It was a solid log house, which could stand for centuries. Avel was a well-to-do merchant. He owned a large hardware store as hardware goods were in demand. Nails, horseshoes, fastenings, buckets and other inventory were mostly purchased by peasants. The store was in a five-minute walk from the river. There was a warehouse in the yard of the store as well as big scales, on which peasants used to weigh cattle. It was also income-bearing for grandfather. Elderly Jew Avrumke worked with the scales. He also was slightly mistaken saying that the weight was less than the scales showed. Then perturbed peasants went to complain of him to grandpa and he tried to find out, who was right. Avrumke used to say that the cow had much to eat, so there was a lot of food in its stomach. The food would be released soon, therefore he considered that factor in the weighting. No matter how grandpa scolded Avrumke, he always did what he wanted. Apart from Avrumke other people worked for my father-some in the store and several in the warehouse.

Avel’s wife, my grandmother Sarah Pagirskaya, nee Krasko was born in 1865. Sarah had sisters. I just know their names from family tree. I had not known them. Sarah was a rather educated woman. She could read and write in Yiddish and Russian. She spoke Polish. Her Lithuanian was not good though. Sarah ran the house as grandparents had servants. Grandmother was a tall, buxom, stately woman- a true beauty. She and grandfather had their own honored seats in the synagogue. Avel and Sarah were rather religious, trying to keep Jewish traditions. Neither grandmother nor grandpa covered their heads all the time. When they went to the synagogue, grandpa put a kippah on and grandmother wore a hat or a nicely tied kerchief. Grandpa had a modern beard- short and neat. Avel and Sarah often went abroad on vacation. As a rule they went to Karlovy Vary (at that time that resort was called Karlsbad) 1. Grandpa had problems with stomach. He was recommended by doctors to drink healing water every year. In 1935 Avel was operated on in Konigsberg 2 –he had a carcinoma behind his ear, which looked like a big plum. It was a malignant tumor, so grandpa lived only for a year after operation. In 1936 he passed away.

After grandpa’s death grandmother Sarah did not live in Jonava for a long time. She moved to Kaunas with her daughter’s family. Here she bought a house for lease and lived on the rent fee paid by the tenants. She helped children and pampered her grandchildren. In 1941 grandmother did not manage to get evacuated and was imprisoned in Kaunas ghetto 3. During assortment within a big action in September 1941 she happened to be among the Jews, whose lives were spared. She probably was not willing to go through ordeal having anticipated inevitable death or for the reason of being very proud, she just waved her hand and went to the group of the people to be executed. She was taken to the forest along with other people and shot there. The house of Sarah and Avel and their store burnt down during the bombing in Jonava. It was a huge fire, after which only a cathedral and dilapidated synagogue were spared by miracle.

Sarah and Avel Pagirskiys had ten children. All of them got an excellent for those times  education in lyceum. They were literate and cultured people. When children grew up, they were not religious, like their parents merely sticking to the traditions and marking Jewish holidays. I did not know two daughters –Hava and another one, whose name was unknown to me. They died infants. There were five daughters out of the eight who reached adulthood. The eldest was Masha, born in 1887. Masha married a Jew Reuben Leib Granevich. I do not know what he did for a living, but he was rather well-off. Reuben Leib died several years before the outbreak of Great Patriotic War 4. Masha, being single by that time, remained in the occupation. She had lived in Kaunas ghetto for three years and only in 1944 she was sent to Nazi concentration camp Stutthof 5 along with the group of Jewish women. My aunt died there not having lived for only couple of weeks to see the liberation. Masha had three daughters. The eldest Ester, born in 1908 left for Vienna to study. There she married Italian Jew Gulyemo and had lived with him happily ever after in Paris. They had several children. Ester died several years ago in Paris. She was almost one hundred years old. Masha’s younger daughters- Nadya (Jewish name Nehama) and Anna (Hanna) being unmarried left for Palestine in the 1930s. Both of them got married there – Nadya’s husband name was Blat, аnd Anna’s – Zimrani. Nadya died in 1978. Her son Ilan, a doctor and a musician, is living in Israel. Anna is still alive. After her husband’s death she did not want to be a burden for her children. She is not living in kibbutz on her own.

The next daughter was Frida, born in 1890. Her husband Boris Shlapoberskiy was rather feeble. He had heart trouble, which could not be cured. Boris died in 1935. He was a pretty wealthy man. He owned a house in Kaunas and Tel-Aviv. Frida lived in Kaunas several years before Great Patriotic War. When on the first of September 1939 fascists unleashed war beginning with the occupation of Poland 6, she left Lithuania for Palestine that very day. When the war was over, she got married again. Her second husband’s name was Eremei Shochat. He was a good friend of the family. His wife perished in occupation. Frida, remaining active and energetic even when being over the hill, was the so-called ‘connecting link’ in our family. She wrote letter to us and other relatives, dispersed all over the world. Until death she remained kind and good-humored.  Frida had lived a long life and died in Tel-Aviv in 1970. Two sons lived in France– Aria, born in 1913 and Eliahu born in 1915. Both of them got an excellent education in Europe. The eldest became a doctor and the younger opened up printing business in New-York. During Great Patriotic War both of them happened to be in the army of the allies- the youngest on the part of the USA and the eldest was enrolled as a volunteer in British army in Palestine, which was a mandated territory of Great Britain. The world is close- the brothers met in Italy during deployment of Soviet troops. Both of them survived war, but none of them had a long life. Brothers, like father, suffered from heart trouble. Aria died in 1959 and Eliahu in 1963.

Mother’s sister Malka was born after Frida in 1891. She married a man from Vilnius- Lipman Maysel and they lived in Vilnius with their children- son Efraim and daughter Miriam (we called her Mika). Mother had not seen her sister for a long time, when Vilnius belonged to Poland 7. We went to see Malka as soon as Vilnius again became the capital of Lithuania in 1939. The most vivid memories I had from that time was our trip on the small diesel train, consisting of one or two cars. I made friends with Miriam, who was my age. We saw each other rather often before war. Unfortunately aunt Malka, her husband and Miriam did not manage to get evacuated. Malka and Lipman perished during one of the first actions. Miriam lived in Vilnius ghetto and perished in 1943 before liquidation of ghetto. The only survivor from their family- Efraim - left for Palestine in 1936 at the age of 20. He lived in Tel-Aviv and died there in 1973.

My mother was the last-but-one daughter, and the youngest was Bluma. She was born in 1904. Bluma’s husband Jacob Epstein was an expert electrician engineer. He had lived and worked in France for couple of years with his family. He was involved in lineup of high-voltage power lines. When grandfather died, grandmother insisted that Bluma came to Jonava. By that time Bluma had daughter Anna, born in 1930. She and her family came back to Jonava. In 1937 their younger daughter Dalia was born. Jacob was a very gifted man. He was fond of theatre. He had the main parts in town Jewish amateur theatre. Jacob sympathized with communists. He had connections in communistic underground. Thus, when the Soviets came in the Baltic countries in 1940 [Occupation of the Baltic Republics] 8, he was assigned Jonava’s mayor at once. Jacob had not worked for a long time. [Great Terror] 9 commenced in Lithuania as well as all over USSR. He was also getting involved in the process. He was supposed to make the lists of people who were not wanted by new regime, walk from one house to another, taking away people’s things and exile people to Siberia [Deportations from the Baltics] 10. Jacob, being a truly decent man, quitted his job and focused on theatre. Soon he and his family moved to Kaunas, where he also had a part in amateur troupe. Thus, Jacob was able to save his face. When Great Patriotic War was unleashed, Jacob sent Bluma and younger girl in evacuation, and left shortly after them. Aunt was against it, but still she was finally convinced to leave. The matter was that elder daughter Anna was in summer camp in Palanga. As it turned out later, children left the camp and had been walking along the coast towards Latvia. Many of them died on their way during bombing. Those who survived, were captured by fascists and returned in occupation. Bluma and Dalia lived in Middle Asia. In 1942 Jacob was drafted in the army. When military band was established in Lithuanian division11 he was enrolled there. Thus, he was not involved in military actions, he gave performances with the band. When Vilnius was liberated, he invited Bluma and his daughter there. Bluma had been grieving over her elder daughter all life long. They tried tracing her via Red Cross, also asked those people they knew about her, but it was useless. No information was found about Anna. We assume she perished in June 1941. Bluma died in 1985 in half a year after Jacob had died. Her daughter Dalia is currently living in Vilnius. She is working in Jewish museum.

Mother had three brothers. I did not know the eldest, Benjamin, born in 1892. He left for Palestine with his wife Ella Sagalovskaya in early 1930s. Benjamin died in 1953. His wife survived him by 10 years. Their children – son Efraim and daughter Rahel - live in Israel, but we do not keep in touch.

Middle brother Haim Itshak (he was called Mitya in the family) was born in 1902. He graduated from Vilnius university. Haim served in Lithuanian army, in medical battalion. He married a Jewish lady Haya Feinstein rather late, when he was over 30. In late 1930s Haim and his wife left for Palestine. He settled in there pretty well. He worked under his specialty. Later on he bought orange-tree grove. Haim and Haya had two sons- Izya, 1935 and Aba, 1937. Before the outbreak of Great Patriotic War Haim came to Lithuania for a visit. I remembered his peculiar looks and Southern tan. Haim took part in Great Patriotic War. He served in the troops of the allies as a military doctor. He perished in Egypt in 1942. His wife had lived a long life. Their children live in Israel, but we do not keep in touch.

My mother’s youngest brother David Pagirskiy was born in 1907. David married a Jew Maya Kanber. They lived in Kaunas not far from us. In 1937 daughter Ilan was born and in 1940 – Dalia. When Great Patriotic War was unleashed, David decided to stay in occupation. Like most of the Jews who remembered Germans from the World War One treating Jewish population rather loyally, David’s family remained in occupation. David perished during the first action in Kaunas ghetto. His wife Maya perished in concentration camp Stuttgof, when the war was about to end. The girls were rescued. They were taken out from ghetto by turns and sheltered in Lithuanian families. We had been looking for them after war for a long time. It did not take that long to find Ilan. The family of Epsteins adopted and raised one the girls. It was harder to find Dalia as she stayed in orphanage, then in some Lithuanian family, she even did not know where she came from. When the girl was found, mother took her in our family. She was treated like a younger daughter. Being an adolescent, she left for Israel. Dalia died there in 1980s. Ilan married Leo Rozental, they is currently living in Vilnius.

My mother Tauber Pagirskaya was born in 1898. Mother as well as her siblings got a good education at Russian Commercial Lyceum. Upon graduation mother lived with her parents before getting married. She did not work. I do not know exactly where my parents met. I think they knew each other when they were young. I have the picture of my young parents and mother’s siblings, taken at the beginning of the 20th century by the boat, traveling to Jonava across river Neris. My parents got married in 1923.

I have never seen any of my paternal ancestors. I know that my grandpa Lazar Yudelevich, was born in the 1860s in Jonava. He was a rabbi. His wife, my grandmother Gitel Chazan was ten years younger than grandpa. She died rather early, in the 1920s or earlier. When she died, grandpa left for Palestine. He got married there for a second time. I do not know his second wife’s name. There was grandfather’s portrait in the house. I vaguely remember him. He looked stately having a beard, wearing a kippah on a small beautiful grey-haired head. He was as if still in grief, whispering something to himself. This is all I know about my grandparents.

Lazar and Gitel Yudelevich had three children. The eldest was my father Abram Yudelevich. Isaac was the middle son. He was born in 1896. He was a subcontractor before war. He took the orders for construction of the houses. He was in charge of a construction crew, practically having the functions of the foreman. Isaac lived in Kaunas with his wife Raya Melamed and daughter Giten, born in 1929. When Soviet army came to power, he had to be in hiding as he might be deported for being rather rich. He stayed with us for some time, but mother was against it thinking that our house could not serve as a shelter putting our family in danger. I do not know how, but Isaac was able to escape repressions and arrest. During Great Patriotic War all of them, including Raya’s elderly mother were in Kaunas ghetto. Being rather active Isaac understood at once that they should get out from ghetto at any cost. He managed to ingratiate with Lithuanians, who were helping out Jews. All of them left ghetto in different time and by different means. Uncle Isaac was in hiding for a long time. He was sheltered by Lithuanians, passing from one reliable person to another. In 1943 he lived on a picturesque island on a farmstead of two Lithuanian brothers. Somebody gave away Isaac and he was found by politsei. Both Isaac, and brothers, who sheltered him, were beaten black and blue and imprisoned. He was sent to Estonian concentration camp from the prison, and then to Dachau 12. There he lived to see the liberation. All those years Isaac had known nothing about the fate of his family and he was sure that all of them perished. Uncle was afraid to come back to his motherland understanding that Stalin’s camps would be imminent for him instead of the fascists’ ones. He left for Palestine upon liberation. Being there he found out that Raya and Gitel were rescued. They lived in Vilnius. The family reunion took place only in 1972 as before that time Raya and Gitel were not issued a permit to depart for Israel. Being tortured by yearning for her husband in long separation, Raya had lived with him for ten years. Uncle Isaac passed away at an old age - 89 or 88.

Father’s younger sister Pera, born in 1900, married Emmanuel Katsnelson- a mirthful and witty man. He well-read and possessed encyclopedic knowledge. Pera and her husband lived in France for a while. Emmanuel was involved in revolutionary movement in Russian and was an adherer of communist party, so he talked Pera into leaving for Russia. In 1926 Pera and Emmanuel happened to be in Moscow. They were lucky not to have come in the period of repressions. Emmanuel and Pera had a serene life in Moscow. Emmanuel was acquainted with outstanding activists of Soviet regime and communist party. He knew most of them from the underground. Either somebody gave him a hint, or Emmanuel himself understood what was going on, he decided ‘not to stand out’. Thus, he was assigned to inconsiderable positions and escaped almost inevitable arrest in his position – native of bourgeois Lithuania and resident of France. Emmanuel died at the age of 70. Pera died shortly after him, in 1997. Pera’s son Yuri, born in 1930s, is currently living in the USA. Younger daughter Nina, born before war, is currently living in Israel. She was not happy in her marriage. She got divorced. She does not have children. Now Nina is living in kibbutz.

My father was born in Jonava in 1894. He has been an atheist since early childhood, and that strongly displeased grandpa, who was deeply religious. I do not know if father went to cheder. He went to Russian lyceum in the town of Suwalki [Poland, 10 km away from the border of Lithuania and Poland and 170 km from Vilnius]. Upon graduation he decided to enter university. He dreamt to become a lawyer. Grandpa Lazar was very displeased with father’s decision. He hoped that his son would follow in his footsteps, but my young father was adamant. That is why grandfather practically cut him off a shilling. Father went to Russia to enter the institute. I do not know how he happened to be in Siberia. He entered Tomsk university [about 3000 km from Moscow]. Father studied there for couple of years and got transferred to Yekaterinburg [Russia, 1500 km from Moscow], where he graduated juridical department. Father came back to the motherland in 1918 right after Lithuania became independent [Lithuanian independence] 13 In couple of years, namely in 1923 father proposed to mother. Parents had never told anything about their wedding. I think it was carried out in accordance with Jewish traditions. At any rate before war at home there was parents’ wedding certificate issued by the rabbi.

My parents did not stay in Jonava for a long time. They moved to Kaunas shortly after wedding. They rented an apartment in the heart of the city. They barely stayed there for a year. In 1925 my elder brother David was born. The family needed a more spacious apartment, so they had to move. Another apartment was in the house leased by Boris Shlapoberskiy. Father was a private lawyer and made pretty good money. The amount of rent was 800 litas. At that time it was a lot of money. Parents could afford a trip to the spa. It was in style and decent to take a vacation for couple of days or weeks to go seaside in any season. My brother was a feeble and in 1928 my mother expecting a child in couple of weeks, took brother to the seaside. They went to a village not far from Klaipeda [300 km from Vilnius]. Soon father came there as well. I, Iosif Yudelevich, was born in that village on the 25th of December 1928. Before long the family came back in Kaunas.

Growing up

I remember myself from the age of five. Since early childhood my brother I had been close. We were called – Dodya and Osya, pronouncing our names separately. I remember the apartment, where I spent my childhood. There were five rooms in it- one room was after another. The first two rooms were occupied by father: one room was a reception, where his clients and visitors were waiting for him, and another room was father’s office. Father’s secretary Kozlovskiy was at the reception desk. Father’s customers sat on the leathern couches waiting for my father to receive them. At that time my father was one of the most famous lawyers on civil cases in Kaunas. There was a large desk in father’s office with a lamp and ink well ,a small adjoining table for negotiations and book shelves containing the works on jurisprudence, books by ancient Greek and Roman philosophers and regulation documents. There were few fiction books. Most of them were written by Russian classics - Tolstoy, Turgenev etc. I do not remember whether there were books by Jewish writers at home. There was a large dining-room behind father’s office. There was a large round dining table, the one we are sitting now, arm- chairs, chairs, beautiful carved cupboard, bedroom furniture and children’s furniture used by brother and I . Of course, there was a kitchen, but I cannot recall my being there. There were servants and a cook in the house so there was no need to go in the kitchen, as the food was served in the dining-room. The servants changed with time and the only maid I remember was a cook- Lithuanian lady Elya. She treated us very good and cooked tasty food. Mother only ran the house, giving orders. Sometimes she went in the kitchen to make some corrections. We, children, had the governesses. Our first governess was a Russian girl Irina. She was very kind and tender. I loved her a lot. Even now I cannot get why she was fired by my mother. Maybe she thought that brother and I were grown-up enough to have a nanny and she wanted a governess for us. After Irina German ladies worked for us. The first one was froelein Zina, then Gerta. They also were very kind. They had stayed by 1934 or so. When Hitler’s power was strengthened in Germany and Kristallnacht 14 came to place, they were fired. In 1937 they left for Germany. By the way, a kind Zina, subsequently joined fascist party and became Gestapo agent. Later on, when brother was a lyceum student, I was taken care of Froebel lady 15 Doba, a young Jewish girl. One of her duties was to take strolls with me. Mother requested that we should stay outside as long as possible in the park or in the street. Mother said– «the child should breathe some air». Young Doba was mostly interested in cinema. German, American and even Soviet comedies were demonstrated in Kaunas. She and I watched a lot of movies. We agreed that mother would not know about that. Doba and I went to a café to eat ice-cream. There was Italian ice-cream café in the park. There was delicious ice-cream there, but mother would not approve of it so she thought there was a risk to have a sore throat. So, we did not tell her about that either.

I was growing a good and a robust boy, but mother being frightened by brother’s feebleness (he was afflicted with rickets in early childhood and was constantly getting ill), looked into the way we were dressed and fed. In summer our family went on vacation for two months. The first month was spent in Kemery and then we went to Buldury- the spa with salves, baths and all kinds of treatments. At that time it was customary to spend summer on the coast. Many of our relatives came there with children, so we were not bored. Later on we spent summer vacation in Palanga. Parents often had rest and recreation abroad. They went to Karlovy Vary, to the spas in France, Switzerland. Usually they went on vacation separately. There were few times when they went together.

When mother came back from vacation in 1934, she decided that brother and I should be taught music. There was no musical instrument. We went to a lady, who taught us music. We were as if glued to a piano for an hour. Both brother and I were against it. We did not like our music classes.  Father, having decided that it was useless, talked mother into giving up our music education.

My parents were not religious. Moreover, they did not observe Jewish traditions. That is there is nothing for me to say on family traditions, or Jewish holidays marked in the family. Only in early childhood, when brother and I went to Jonava with parents, grandpa took us to the synagogue. I enjoyed those times, when we went to the synagogue. I liked carrying his prayer book for him. I took it as a game. We went to Jonava couple of times. At that time the distance of 35 kilometers was considerable. First we had to hire a cabman, then there was a bus traveling between Jonava and Kaunas. The trip was always like a holiday to us as we spent the night in grandparents’ place and played with grandpa. If we came on Friday, we met Sabbath. Beautiful grandmother in white laced kerchief lit the candle, grandpa said a prayer and our Sabbath dinner started. There were all kinds of different dishes on grandmother’s table, but I cannot remember what was there since I was pampered with chicken cutlets at home. We did not mark Sabbath at home. There were no candles on Friday. Though, there was a silver candlestick in the drawing-room and judging by that I could say that mother used to light candles. I do not remember if father worked on Saturdays. As a rule, he sat in his office, read and wrote something, if needed as he was an active atheist. He must have continued his inner argument with his father Lazar. I did not know anything about kashrut in my childhood. There were all products at home, including sausages, ham, pork. I just heard from my cousins that chicken was to be cut by shochet in the synagogue, meat was to be eaten separately from milk, but Jewish traditions were alien to me. Sometimes, when uncle Isaac was going to the synagogue, he would take me with him. But it was rare. I think that father was strongly against my going there. Though, when I was a child we celebrated Chanukkah. Mother lit beautiful silver chanukkiah, which was placed on special round table. The cook made potato fritters, doughnuts with jam. There was an air of holiday at home. I do not remember if we were given money the way it was with other children. We marked Purim for couple of times. As a rule there was a pageant for us and neighboring children. But it was arranged only in early childhood, in elementary school I should say. Parents did not observe mandatory fast for Jews on Yom-Kippur. They did not mark Rosh-Hashanah. On Pesach we were always invited to uncle Isaac. There was matzah on the table as well as different dishes from matzah, gefilte fish, delicious stew, all kinds of tsimes and deserts. Uncle Isaac reclined at the head of the table carrying out seder. Some of the children asked him questions on the origin of the holiday. We also looked for afikoman and waited for prophet Iliah in accordance with the holiday traditions. Father came to Isaac without kippah. He did it deliberately, empathizing his negative attitude to Jewish traditions. When grandmother Sarah moved to Kaunas, father could not refuse marking holidays and family festivities were moved to her place. Father contributed a lot of money to Jewish mutual aid fund. Both religious Jews and atheists donated money for revival of the Jewish state. Later on, when brother went to Ivrit lyceum, he took an interest in religion. It was easy for David to be carried away. He started talking on Judaism and asking father a lot of questions, which irritated him. Father took a lot of efforts to convince brother in malignancy of the religion. Father tried to persuade us that religion was created by domineering classes in order to subordinate common people. In general, he had his own views, which were in compliance with the ideas of global revolution 16.

I was a rather developed child. I often was present at my brother’s studies and I had learnt letters before going to school. When parents were to choose where I should study, they chose secular Jewish lyceum Shvabes right away. There were several schools for Jewish children in Kaunas– Ivrit Realschul, commercial lyceum, Lithuanian Jewish lyceum, where children were taught in Lithuanian, religious school Yavne. As for the last one, there was no way I could go there. There used to be German lyceum in town and many Jewish children from privileged families went there. My brother David finished the first grade there. As soon as Hitler came to power in Germany, parents took all Jewish children from lyceum. Brothers Shlapoberskiys and other our friends left that lyceum, and brother was transferred to Shvabes lyceum. I went to Shvabes lyceum in 1934. Our wonderful teachers and headmaster Rutskus made a real team of like-minded people. The ideas of repatriation to Israel were delicately nurtured in the lyceum. Other than that it was an ordinary school, where subjects were taught in Ivrit. We had religion classes taught by Lipskiy. He was not a very educated person. He was only knowledgeable in his subjects, so we boys often were frolicking. For instance, I came to school without a kippah and said that I had left it at home (I followed my father’s example). In general, neither I nor my comrades were awed by religion. I was not a bad student. I liked to spend my spare time running around with my friends in the hallway and play children’s games. Here in lyceum I got a better understanding of Jewish holidays and traditions. Chanukkah was marked in lyceum. There was a pageant on Purim. I also knew about Pesach as there was a general seder in lyceum, carried out by director or some of the teachers. Shavuot was marked as well. On the eve of every holiday we were expressly told about the history and origin of the holiday. There was a period of time when I was the member of Jewish Scout organization. We marched, learnt all kinds of sports techniques, went hiking and were explained the rules. There was a strong Zionist spirit 17 in lyceum. There were members of Beitar 18 organization. They wore brown shirts, without even knowing that brown color would be soon disgraced by fascists. I did join Zionist organizations.

My father did not pertain to any political party-neither to Zionist nor to Communists. Though, he was one of the people who sympathized with communists. He was interested in anything in connection with the Soviet Union, Russia, new socialistic camp. He even donated money to international revolutionary aid organization. Father had no idea what was going on in USSR –mass arrests, repressions. Knowing about actions taken by Hitler followers and about the way they treated Jews, parents had hopes for Russia. They often talked about Russia with each other, made plans, even thought of sending brother and I to Soviet Union. In 1939 mother went to Moscow for a visit. She processed visa in accordance with the rules and went to Pera and Emmanuel. Mother had stayed in Moscow for two weeks. When we met her in Kaunas train station, she leaving the train, sighed and said that there was no way we could leave for Russia, and in general we had to kiss Lithuanian land for living here.

We were subscribed to several news-papers – some Jewish paper, Lithuanian press of the left wing, Russian immigrant paper Echo, published in Riga. Father, brother and I closely followed the events in Spain war 19. There was Spain map at home, where we daily marked the course of the battles. Even now I can see that map and remember demarcations on it. I did not have any particular hobbies. Once I was taken to Jewish theater- but I did not enjoy it -either the performance was not for children, or I did not like the actors’ play. It was in style to go to the opera in the theatre seasons in late 1930s. Parents took brother and me there for couple of times. I liked opera and in spite of my unwillingness to study music, since childhood I came to liking opera genre.

During the war

In 1939 the war started from captured Poland. Vilnius became the capital of Lithuania again. Parents and I went to see aunt Malka. I enjoyed traveling by train. I met my cousins. Parents were getting more and more concerned. There were vivid fascist and anti-Semitic moods. They had not reflected on us so far. There appeared anti-Semitic slogans, calling upon buying goods from Lithuanians, not to use Jewish stores and enterprises. But not further actions had been taken yet, there were mere slogans. When in June 1940 Soviet Army came in Lithuania, most Jewish people, including intelligentsia, where my parents belonged to, were happy welcome the Soviets. Nothing changed for us. Though, products had vanished from the stores. Wives of Soviet officers appeared in the streets looking dowdy and ill-kempt. Of course I did not like to see Soviet officers to be uncultured people, who often even did not know how to use tableware. There were times when almost all of us considered Soviet people to be ideal. The most amusing thing that lower strata of society, like our servants, were mostly perturbed with the brusqueness and ill manners of Soviet people. Mother often had to comfort Elya, who quite often came across their harshness. Now almost every day the proletarian meetings were held in the city. Nationalization of property commenced, but people had not been arrested and exiled in Kaunas yet. Later on at the beginning of 1941 the family of mother’s cousin Shapiro and his family, who lived in Ukrmerg, were exiled. He had a tiny store, which barely brought any income, but still he was considered a capitalist. Father was not afraid of the exile as he was a lawyer, owning no property and being no Zionist, so he was of no danger to the Soviets. Our tenant’s house, where we were living, was sequestrated. In 1940 we moved to the apartment in a small wooden house not far from the train station. There were a lot of changes in the life of mine and brother’s. All educational institutions had been shuffled. Some of them were closed down and the assignment of the rest of the students was not clear. In fall 1940 we went to school. Most of my classmates went to other institutions, but I met new boys and girls. I was not pleased with the ongoing, as there were a lot of friends among those who left. I had to get used to new friends and teaches and to teaching in Yiddish. When Soviet regime was in power, there was teachers’ congress, were some of the teachers took the floor against the innovations in the educational system, introduced by Soviet regime. Many participants of the congress were arrested when it was over. In general, the pre-war year was tense. Then many of my comrades turned 13 in 1941. I was invited for celebration of bar-mitzvah and started thinking what I should do next. Father even did breathe a word of celebration of my bar-mitzvah. Brother’s bar-mitzvah had not been marked either. My anxieties were of no importance. My thirteenth’s birthday was in December and on the 22nd of June our life took a sharp turn- Hitler attacked Soviet Union.

We found out about the war via German radio from Hitler’s speech who was crying that the war would be over in couple of weeks after Soviet Union had been totally ruined. Soon there was Molotov’s speech 21 and there was no doubt that the war was unleashed. Bluma’s husband Jacob Epstein came to us shortly after Molotov’s speech. He swiftly talked parents into leaving at once. We packed documents, some precious things- mother’s jewelry, father’s golden watch and necessary things. We took uncle’s Chevrolet and went to the train station which was in a stones’ throw. We were not going to leave for a long time as we were convinced in a quick victory of the Soviet troops. There was a passenger train at the station, full of wives and children of the Soviet officers. There were not very many people as they had hopes for the better and did not think that the should run away. We calmly bought the tickets and got in the car. We decided to get to Vilnius and stop by aunt Malka as Vilnius was a little more far away from the border and it would be calmer. When we reached Vilnius train station, we came out to the platform being on the point of going to aunt Malka. There were a lot of panicking people and parents decided to go further. We came back in our car and went on to Minsk. At the frontier station Kena all citizens of bourgeois Lithuania, including us, were taken out of cars and our seats were given to Soviet militaries and their families, who were carrying huge suitcases. Only families of militaries were leaving on that train. We were locked in some shed. We were worried, though we were promised that we would take the next train. Father decided not to wait for anything. He took mother and us, told us to climb in the window. There was a train, crammed with fugitives. Lithuanian Jews from pioneer camp Druskeninkae were on that train. We could hardly find the seats. Many people, including our neighbor from Kaunas George and his parents had to stand in tambour all way through to Minsk. When we got to Minsk, we still were doubting whether to leave further or not. There were a lot of fugitives from Poland and Lithuania. People were gossiping , so we were scared to stay and moved on. As it turned out, shortly after our departure Minsk was fiercely bombed. Several trains were crushed. There were a lot of wounded and killed. Thus, I can say that we left at the right moment.

It was a long trip. Fortunately, my parents had enough money, which was not devaluated yet, for father to buy food for us at the stations. Sometimes the fugitives were given soup or gruel. I quickly got used to eat anything I was given, without picking and choosing. Thus, we reached the town of Sarapul in Udmurtia [about 1300 km from Moscow]. We had stayed in Sarapul evacuation point for couple of days. Father decided to head to Sverdlovsk – first of all his distant relative Chazan lived there, and secondly there were some of father’s friends from student times. We came to Chazan’s wife in Sverdlovsk. Chazan was dead. His wife Maria Genrikhovna accommodated us and parents looked into other arrangements. Father found his old fellow student, who was working as a doctor, and he helped us go to regional center Rehta. It was an industrial town, having several plants and factories. The first thing mother did was going to the market. It was empty. We could not even get potatoes. We understood that the war would not be over soon, and we had to get ready for a long life in evacuation. That is why mama said that we could not stay in the town, where it was problematic to get even potatoes. We came back to Sverdlovsk to Maria Genrikhovna, who hospitably received us again. Father again addressed to his friend, who suggested that we should go to Sukhoy Log, Sverdlovsk Oblast [about 2000 km from Moscow] in couple of days. It was a large settlement in agricultural area and father’s friend said that we would have potato there for sure. Sukhoy Log consisted of industrial community and couple of dispersed hamlets. First we were sent to the resort area Kuryii, a scenic place at the bank of the river. Here we stayed for a while. Father was looking for a job. Every day he asked if there was anything for him. He was promised the position of a lawyer, but he had not got the offer. We came back to Sukhoy Log.

There mother took over. Even now I am wondering, how she having been pampered by life in the pre-war period, changed completely and became a tough mother and wife, who knew how to get what she wanted. She went to the officials, made a scene saying that we ‘westerners’ hardly escaped fascists and had to die by hunger because of some officials. Her demarche brought results. Father was almost immediately offered a job as a lawyer. He started getting food cards 22, including dependent’s cards for us. It was getting a little easier for us. By that time we almost ran out of money and started exchanging precious things for food. Luckily, mother had enough jewelry so we were not starving. I was not picky, and had to eat anything they were able to get. In a while father got another job at fish factory and the situation with products became much better as the employees of the factory got much better rations. Besides, father was on some odd jobs- making applications, filing claims etc. and people were paying him with products.

We were not lodged in the settlement, but in an adjacent village. I do not remember the name of our hostess. We were given one through-room and the hostess had to walk across our room to get to hers. She was a grumbler, constantly complaining that we were making her hut cold. I cannot say that she treated Jews in a bad way. I think she did not care what nationality we were. Like many other dwellers of that area she associated her aggravated material position and the lack of products and food with the arrival of crowds of evacuees. They maltreated fugitives of all nationalities. It was strange, to put it mildly, and it spoke for the shallowness of people. The war was on and their husbands and sons were dying in the lines, and they, at any rate, did not see the true reason- the war, but thought that our arrival was to blame. Though, our neighbor Anna Stepanovna Berseneva, who lived next door, was marvelously kind. In my soul I have always pictured her as a true image of a real kind Russian peasant woman. Anna Stepanovna always tried helping mother. First, mother did not know how to cook on stove or do gardening. She gave us a small plot of land where we planted potatoes and other vegetables. Having followed her tips we had a good yield. Sometimes Anna Stepanovna asked brother and I to come over and treated us to pies, pancakes and other food she cooked.

Brother and I went to local school. We did well. It was easy for us to study Russian and our level of education and development was much higher as compared to local guys. We became adults quite fast. Our childish anxieties and pranks vanished we had to think of daily bread and help mother. The second year of my stay at Sukhoy Log I found a job of the assistant of the secretary of the cement plant committee, where father was working. I also was a bread-winner of the family. Within that time father was drafted in the army on a number of occasions. There was one and the same scenario. He got a notification from military enlistment office, we saw father off and in a day or two he would come back as people from the territories annexed to the USSR in late 1930s were not admitted in the lines as they were not trusted by Soviet regime. In late 1942 David was drafted in the army. He happened to be in Balakhna, in Lithuanian division ,which was positioned there. Soon brother got seriously ill, he had tuberculosis. David was demobilized and he came back to Sukhoy Log. Brother was really unwell, on the brink of death and again mother used her mettle. She wrote a letter to her sister Frida Shlapoberskaya in Palestine asking her for help. Frida started sending us parcels with products, fats, canned fish and meat – everything which was needed by David. She also sent medicine. Brother had stayed in the hospital for almost a year and fortunately tuberculosis process stopped and brother got better. We had stayed in evacuation until summer 1945. By that time mother had known about death of grandmother Sarah and her relatives.

In summer 1945 we came back to Lithuania. We decided to come back to native town Kaunas. The Epsteins family had been there already. Jacob was deputy director of cooperative society, and that position was very important. Uncle and his family lived in a posh 4-room apartment in a beautiful two-storied mansion in the downtown area. We also moved in there. We did not have to leave with another family for a long time. In half a year uncle was transferred to Vilnius, their family moved out and we started equal owners of the apartment. I lived in that apartment after war and I am still living here by myself.

After the war

First postwar years were hard. Our family did pretty well, father worked as a lawyer and made pretty good money. Brother was given the certificate of secondary education in evacuation. He finished school pre-term. I had studied for a year in Kaunas and finished school. That year I joined Komsomol 23, I was not eager to be involved in social work, but I had to do it for me to enter institute. I was not attracted by communistic ideology. I was always fond of art and could draw pretty well, so I entered Kaunas construction institute, the architecture department. Later on the institute was reformed into polytechnic one. I got the specialty of the architect. I worked with layouts. During my first years after graduations I made designs for agricultural arrears in Lithuania. I traveled a lot and communicated with people.

We had a calm life trying not to get attention. Father worked a lot and met with his colleagues after work to play poker and preference. Very often the company of lawyers kept late hours in our place, well past midnight. In 1950 father got into trouble. I do not know if it is connected with anti-Semitic campaign 24 [Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’], launched in USSR at that time. There was information against my father sent by Jew from Jonava, party activist. I do not want to mention her name. She sent a letter to KGB saying that father owned shares of foreign capitalistic companies. He was called by KGB and interrogated. Father explained that before war he really owned shares of German Sanitary Engineering Company, which representative he was. Father was called in KGB again. He was called by the investigator who told him that his defense was done in a wrong way and that he did not choose the right clients. Besides, in early 1950s father submitted document for getting a permit to see his brother Isaac in Israel. The response was negative. So, father was getting nervous. In 1950 he had a first heart attack as father was affected by that story. In 1955 father died. His death was easy and sudden, but too early- he was only 60. He was buried in Jewish cemetery in Kaunas without any rites.

I had lived with mother since that time. In 1957 my mother managed to get a permit for guest visit in Israel. Of course, she had to use connections. Mother’s pal Kaganene, who was in charge of protocol department in Ispolkom 25, knew somebody in the Ministry of Foreign Affaires. She convinced him that mother would be coming back and said that she would be her guarantee. Mother was issued a visa 1957 and she spent two months in Israel. She saw Isaac, father’s brother and all her relatives. Upon return from Israel, mother started marking some Jewish holidays. We bought matzah on Pesach, lit candles on Chanukkah the way it was before war.

My brother graduated from institute, drama department and became an outstanding drama critic. He married Lithuanian lady Laima. They have two children – son Leon and daughter Irma. My brother is a famous man in literature and theater circles of Lithuania, the member of the council of Lithuanian writers, the author of several books. Brother lives in Vilnius. His son is an entrepreneur. He has his own house out of town and spends half of the year there with his wife. His children have their own families. Both of them are successful both in private and professional life.

I always got along with my brother, but mother had always been an only true friend. Maybe that was the reason why I had always compared her to women, who came across in my life. I remained a bachelor. I do not regret it. I do not like answering question regarding my private life in the sense that I do not have it. Believe me, my private life was rather boisterous, but I had not met a woman with whom I wanted to live together. I was not interested in social life. Moreover mandatory komsomol meeting, I had to attend, made me sick and giddy with their slogans and phrases on the bright future. From the very beginning I took Soviet power with irony. Unlike most Soviet people I did not grieve over Stalin’s death in 1953. I understood who he was, judging by hundreds of repressed and unjustly convicted people. Though, the truth of his activity was revealed only after ХХ party congress 26, where Stalin’s cult of personality was divulged. When I turned 28, I withdrew from komsomol organization and never tried to become party member. Of course, it was not absolutely possible to be absolutely free in the social life in Soviet society. I had to attend general and trade-union meetings, events, dedicated to the anniversary of October revolution 27, 1st of May. We also went to demonstration. We were compelled to do that. Instead of carrying flags and crying out slogans, my friends and I had fun watching people who were gradually getting drunk. Usually workers of plants and factories went to demonstrations and by the end of the day they had been pretty drank and their behavior was invariable. In the 1970s my friends immigrated to Israel, USA. I understood that my negative attitude to the Soviet regime required some actions from me. Israel always appealed to me. But I am a conservative man and it is hard for me to imagine that I have to break things conventional for me, get used to new town, country, language, friends. Besides, my mother had been rather sick in the last years of her life and I had to take care of her. Mother died in 1976. She was buried next to father. I have lived by myself since then.

I always had different interests. Being adult I learnt how to play accordion and I played classic repertoire pretty well. Music was my passion. I attended all opera performances. Another passion of mine is art. Having some penchant for that I have always painted some pieces, mostly landscapes of my native Kaunas. I have always traveled at lot. I was in many cities of former Soviet Union. I liked old cities most of all, where I enjoyed architectural masterpieces. Gradually I came to liking bells and I started collecting big, small and diminutive ones. Collectors are crazy with their hobby. I remember one story about it. I went on a tourist trip to Czechoslovakia in order to meet my friend collector who lived in Austria and give him some of my exhibits. In Soviet times KGB 28 agents were in every tourist group being on vigil to follow the morale of Soviet tourists. I had to exert my every effort to slip out from the group and to meet with the guy. Fortunately, the meeting with my friend was not noticed.

I am currently living in bourgeois Lithuania and I am happy with that. I also treated Soviet regime as something negative and temporary, so I took the independence regained by my country in 1991 as long-awaited and wishful. I think, when being the member of European Union my country will become a true European country with European ethic standards. Recently I became the member of Jewish community not because I started being religious, but out of solidarity. There are few Jews, and there are getting less of them in Kaunas, and in Lithuania in general. That is why we have to stick to each other, learn Jewish culture and history. I make my contribution the way I can. The first thing I decided to do was to find people, who saved my relatives - uncle Isaac, his wife and daughter. I met uncle Isaac in the 1960s in Leningrad. He came there from Israel and was still scared to come to Kaunas. Uncle invited me in Leningrad and we met couple of times. He was constantly saying how grateful he was the people, who rescued him. Uncle asked me to do my best to find them. It was impossible in Soviet times. In the 1990s I found two brothers, who saved him on the island and other people who saved our family. I plead for them to be recognized as righteous among the nations. 29, some of them posthumously. Then I enjoyed doing that. I spend a lot of time in the archives, meet people, help them find those, who saved Jews in Lithuania. Owing to my modest work, many people became famous and got recognition and gratitude from the state of Israel. It is my last hobby. I think this is the most important thing in my life. Besides, I help out community members with some legal issues. I was raised in the lawyer’s family and was taught how to make applications and claims. I also do it voluntarily.

Glossary

Életrajz

Anyai nagyapámat úgy hívták, hogy Altman Ignác. Szent-Domonkoson [Heves vármegye] született 1879-ben. Vasúti fékezőként kezdte. Ebből kinőtte magát, főkalauzként halt meg. Azt hiszem, négy polgárija volt, de magasabb iskolai végzettsége nem. Viszont az volt a feltett szándéka, hogy az ő idősebbik lányából orvos legyen. És lett is. Altman Ignác feleségét úgy hívták, hogy Glatter Róza, ő Gyöngyösről származik. A nagyapámék több helyen éltek Magyarországon, mert a vasúti alkalmazottakat tették ide meg oda meg amoda. Voltak Dunaszerdahelyen, aztán Zsolnán, bár legnagyobb részt Pesten, Rákospalotán [Rákospalota 1950-ig önálló település volt, nem tartozott Budapesthez. – A szerk.] a MÁV-telepen. Nagyanyámról egy emlékem van, egy fénykép. Mosolygós, kerek az arca. Amennyire tudom, nem voltak nagyon vallásosak. Polgári ruhában jártak, Jom Kipurt tartottak, széderestét is, Hanukakor gyertyát gyújtottak. Mást nem nagyon tartottak. Altman Ignác 1926-ban halt meg, a felesége 1936-ban.

Glatter Rózának volt egy testvére, Glatter József, aki mozdonyvezető volt. És kommunista lett. 1919-ben, a Kommün [lásd: Tanácsköztársaság] alatt igen magas beosztása volt – hogy pontosan mi, azt nem tudom. A nagyapám pedig nemhogy nem volt kommunista, de ráadásul legitimista volt [Legitimizmus – az 1920–1930-as években a Habsburgok visszatérését követelő politikai mozgalom. – A szerk.], ezért a politikán mindig összevesztek. Miután megbukott a Kommün, Glatter József lebukott, azt hiszem, 1920-ban. A szegedi Csillag börtönben volt fogva tartva. Az anyám meg a nagynéném – mert az anyámnak volt egy húga is – ugye vasutas lányok, nekik ingyen vasúti jegy járt, s jártak hozzá a Csillagba. A nagyapámnak nagy protekciója kellett hogy legyen, mert Glatter Jóskát közben halálra ítélték, viszont a börtönben maradt. A nagyapám elkezdett kilincselni, hogy Glattert mégse akasszák föl, hiszen három gyereke van.. Ekkor a mozdonyvezetők összedugták a fejüket, hogy nehogy már közülük egyet kivégezzenek. Küldöttség ment Horthyhoz, hogy ez a szégyen mégse essék meg, és hogy kapjon kegyelmet. Ez meg is történt, mert életfogytiglant kapott, majd amikor a hadifogoly tiszteket kicserélték Magyarországon elítélt politikaikra, Glatter Jóska, a felesége meg a három gyerek elkerült Moszkvába. [Glatter József ferencvárosi mozdonyvezető, a Tanácsköztársaság alatt a MÁV osztályvezetői testületének tagja. A Tanácsköztársaság bukása után a főügyész elrendelte a letartóztatását, de vádemelési okok hiánya miatt később elengedték. A MÁV a Tanácsköztásraság alatti tevékenysége miatt felfüggesztette és fegyelmit indított ellene. 1920-ban kapcsolatba került a KMP Ideiglenes Központi Bizottságával Bécsben, és megszervezte a meggyilkolt, elítélt és internált vasutasok családjainak segítését, valamint kommunista lapok és propagandaanyagok Magyarországra szállítását és terjesztését. 1920 szeptemberében több társával együtt letartóztatták, és a budapesti büntető törvényszék 1920 októberében halálra ítélte. Az ítélet ellen az európai vasutasszervezetek és a szovjet kormány is erélyesen tiltakozott. A szovjet közbelépésre Horthy először kegyelemből életfogytiglanra változtatta az ítéletet, majd 1922-ben hozzájárult Glatter és mások Szovjetunióba távozásához, cserébe a Szovjetunió elengedte a magyar hadifogoly tiszteket. (Gadanecz Béla: A magyar vasutas munkásmozgalom 232 old., 277–278 old.) – A szerk.] A vasúton összeismerkedtek egy fiatalemberrel, akit úgy hívtak, hogy Weinberger Zoltán, aki később mint Vas Zoltán lett miniszter. [Vas Zoltán: illegális kommunista, a Szovjetunió első ízben 1922-ben szabadította ki a börtönből (másodszor majd 1940-ben), 1922–1925 között élt először a Szovjetunióban, illegálisan hazatért, 1925–1940 között börtönben volt. 1945–1946: Budapest közellátási kormánybiztosa, majd polgármestere, 1949–1953: az Országos Tervhivatal elnöke, 1953-ig magas párttisztségek birtokosa. – A szerk.] 

Amikor Magyarországon felszámolták az illegálisan szervezkedő pártot [lásd: Kommunisták Magyarországi Pártja], Moszkvában elővették Glatter Jóskát, s azt mondták, hogy a pártot újra kell szervezni. A legidősebb fiát, Glatter Endrét, aki akkor már huszonvalahány éves volt, illegálisan Pestre akarták küldeni a pártot újraszervezni. Azért nem az apját, mert az halálra volt ítélve. Erre a feleség, Nelli néni azt mondta, hogy ebből neki már elég volt egyszer, és otthagyták Moszkvát. Ez azért volt lehetséges, mert olyan lakásuk volt, amiért egy ismerős GPU-s, akinek lakásra volt szüksége nősülési szándéka miatt, szerzett útlevelet. 1926 vagy 1927 elején megérkeztek New Yorkba, majd onnan nem sokkal később elkerültek Kanadába. Az egész háborús idő alatt nekik az volt a legnagyobb nélkülözésük, hogy nem lehetett banánt kapni. Mindezt főleg onnan tudjuk, hogy Glatter Erzsi, a legfiatalabb gyerek, aki fodrász volt, 1965-ben vagy 1966-ban eljött Pestre a férjével, megkeresett bennünket a telefonkönyvből, mert azt tudta, hogy az anyámat hogy hívják. Tudott magyarul is, ő mesélte el ezt az egész történetet. Még annyi érdekesség ehhez, hogy a Tanácsköztársaság hatvanadik évfordulóján, 1979-ben megjelent az Esti Hírlapban egy cikk, hogy az évforduló alkalmával a Ferencvárosi pályaudvaron egy emléktáblát lepleznek le a munkásmozgalom jeles alakja, Glatter József tiszteletére. Én el is mentem megnézni. Nincs rajta se az, hogy mikor született, se az, hogy mikor halt meg – mert ugye erről nem maradt nekik adatuk. Elkezdtem röhögni ezen, mert akkor én már voltam Kanadában meg New Yorkban, tudtam, hogy Glatter mindenféle kommunista múlt ellenére a zsidó temetőben van eltemetve.

Glatter Erzsi, a lánya összeismerkedett a háború után egy Izsák Feri nevezetű zsidóval, aki Szatmárnémetiből került elő, és férjhez ment hozzá. Ő sem volt olyan ortodox, de azért tartotta a vallást. Nagyon gazdagok lettek. Izsák Feriéknek valami földjük volt itt Szatmárnémetiben. Ő 1946-ban kerülhetett Kanadába, s az első dolga volt, hogy neki saját földje legyen. Elkezdett földet venni. És ez bejött. Mégpedig azért, mert a kanadai–amerikai határ túloldalán, Detroitban a Ford gyárnak szüksége volt munkásokra, Kanadában pedig a munkaerő jóval olcsóbb volt. A Ford ott házakat kezdett építeni, és beköltöztette az alkalmazottait. Izsák Ferinek a földjét elkezdték megvenni.

Anyám testvére, Gizella vagy Giza 1904-ben született Dunaszerdahelyen, és Budapesten halt meg 1983-ban. Amikor született, a nagyapám Dunaszerdahelyen, illetve Pozsonyban [lásd: Pozsony város] volt a vasútnál. Giza néni négy polgárit [lásd: polgári iskola] végzett, ő nem óhajtott különösebben tanulni. Viszont kifejezetten szép nő volt, és mihamarább férjhez akart menni. Volt is neki három férje. Az első Horváth Ferenc volt, nem zsidó, a második Szántó Dezső, ő zsidó volt. Az elsőhöz az 1920-as évek végén ment hozzá, rövid ideig tartó frigy volt, a másodikhoz 1936-ban, erről van valami emlékem. Nem tudom, mi lett velük. A harmadik férje Altman Károly, aki unokatestvére volt. Altman Ignácnak ugyanis volt egy testvére, akit Fáninak hívtak, s annak volt Károly a balkézről való gyereke. Azért volt Altman, mert az apáról nem tudunk semmit, hogy ki volt. Fáni állítólag feslett nő volt, azt hiszem, Pesten élt. Károly az első unokatestvére volt Giza néninek, de amíg a nagymama élt, nem engedte, hogy összeházasodjanak, mert az a hit talán még sok helyen most is, hogy az unokatestvér-házasság egészségtelen. Amikor a nagymamám meghalt, rögtön összeházasodtak, 1937-ben, azt hiszem. Akkor is csak polgári esküvő volt, s én ott voltam. Aszódon volt, mert Altman Károly autószerelő volt, és ott volt egy társsal közös műhelye.

Károlyról nagyon sok emlékem van. Barna, magas, jóképű ember volt, volt egy öreg Citroën kocsija. Kurblis volt. Az 1930-as években azért az nagy szám volt nekünk, gyerekeknek, hogy autóval mentünk kirándulni. A háborút megelőző években, tehát 1939-ben már Pesten is dolgozott. Rögtön behívták katonának, mert autószerelő kellett, aki vezetni tud, hogy zsidó-e, nem zsidó, az nem volt érdekes. Olyannyira, hogy ő még 1941-ben is rendes katonaként került Ukrajnába, nem munkaszolgálatosként. Amikor hazakerült 1941–1942-ben, tőle hallottuk a történetet, hogy a magyar katonaság hogy viselkedett ott a megszállásban. Hogy a csecsemőket a lábuknál fogva vágták a falhoz. Később se hívták be munkaszolgálatra, valahogy mindig mentességet kapott, gondolom, az autószerelő mestersége miatt.

Apám édesapja Friedman Lajos, aki 1866-ban született Sirokon. Nagyapa kárpitossegéd volt. Azt hiszem, önálló sosem lett. Az István út 20-ban lakott Budapesten. Élete végén velünk lakott a Teréz körúti lakásban. 1937-ben halt meg Budapesten, de ragaszkodott hozzá, hogy Gyöngyösön legyen eltemetve az ortodox temetőben. Apám anyja Klein Zsófia, nem tudom, ő hol született, de Budapesten, a Kozma utcában [a zsidó temetőben] van eltemetve. Őt én már nem ismertem, az 1930-as évek elején halt meg, a nagyapámat igen.

A nagyanyám apja Klein Móric volt, akinek sok testvére volt. Ezek között két érdekes személy van: az egyik Kellner Sándor – ő aztán magyarosította a nevét, sőt más címet is kapott: Sir Alexander Korda lett. Túrkevén született. A nemzetközi filmgyártás jeles személyisége, az apám volt is nála Londonban, 1939-ben. Neki volt két testvére – Zoltán meg Vince –, akik a Londonfilmhez kerültek. Zoltán is rendező volt, Vince meg díszlettervező. A „Bagdadi tolvaj”-t Korda Zoltán rendezte. Ennyit Kordáékról. Klein Móricnak pedig volt egy másik testvére, és annak is volt gyereke, több is. Köztük Klein Ottó. Van egy előneve is: Korvin. 1919-ben, a Kommünben népbiztos volt. Megfogták, kivégezték, kész. [Korvin Ottó (1894–1919): a Kommunisták Magyarországi Pártjának (KMP) egyik alapítója, a Tanácsköztársaság alatt a belügyi népbiztosság politikai osztályának volt a vezetője, megszervezte a tanácshatalom védelmi apparátusát, irányította a forradalmi terrort. Testvére volt Kelen József elektromérnök (1892–1939), szintén a KMP egyik alapítója. A Tanácsköztársaság alatt a szociális termelés népbiztosa volt, életfogytiglani fegyházra ítélték, 1922-ben fogolycsere révén került ki a Szovjetunióba. Magas állást töltött be, majd a törvénysértések áldozata lett. – A szerk.]

Nagyapám testvére volt Friedman Anna. A lánya Grossmann Mariska volt. Grossmann Nándornééknak, született Grossmann Mariskáéknak – mert az unokatestvéréhez ment feleségül – Gyöngyösön volt házuk meg szőlőjük. 1918-ban vette meg ezt a házat Grossmann Nándorné, majd 1944-ben államosított zsidó vagyon lett, 1951-ben pedig államosított kulák vagyon. Aki közülük a családból megmaradt [a holokauszt után], 1949-ben elment Izraelbe. Mariska nénivel 1974-ben találkoztam. Netanján lakott, nem ismert meg, csak a lánya.

A nagyszülők szerintem négy polgári iskolát biztos végeztek, miután írni-olvasni tudtak. A nagypapa vallásos volt, mindig sapka vagy kalap volt a fején, otthon is. De szakálla, pajesza nem volt. Polgári öltözetben járt: nadrág, zakó, ing, nyakkendő. A háztartás kóser volt, de nem ortodox. Disznóhúst nem ettek, péntek este gyertyagyújtás volt, de sájtli meg a tfilinnel való reggeli imádkozás nem. A nagypapa nem az ortodox templomba, hanem a neológba járt, a Dohányba [lásd: Dohány utcai zsinagóga]. Böjtölt is [Jom Kipurkor].

Apámnak egy húga volt. Friedman Erzsébetnek hívták. 1898-ban született. Skizofréniát kapott, felnőttkorában kezdődött. Friedman Erzsébetnek nagy bánata volt a férjhez menés, hogy most hogy lesz gyereke. Szép asszony volt a fénykép alapján, de beteg. Apám egy ismerőse összehozta egy fiatalemberrel, akit úgy hívtak, hogy Klein Jenő, az elvette feleségül, és lett is egy fiúgyerek. Az anyámék az anyja betegsége miatt adoptálták. Klein Endrének született, 1930-ban, az adoptálás után Földes Endre lett. Szüleimet Bandi is szüleinek tekintette, és a mai napig is úgy beszél róluk. Az édesanyja több helyen feküdt, Lipótmezőn is. Az elmebetegek a mai napig is, de abban az időben különösen, tébécét kaptak. A 16 meg 24 ágyas kórtermekben nem volt kellő felügyelet, egymást fertőzték. Ő is megkapta, és amiatt halt meg 1942-ben. Jenő bácsiról tudtuk, hogy Bandinak az apja, mert minden héten jött hozzánk Rákospalotáról, ahol lakott. De azt hiszem, azt azért nem akarta, hogy a gyerek nála legyen. Feltehetően látta, hogy a sógora jó anyagi helyzetben van. Azt nem tudnám megmondani, hogy Jenő bácsinak mi volt a foglalkozása. Valamikor 1943-ban újra megnősült. Aztán miután Rákospalota is gettósításra került [Rákospalota önálló község volt, nem tartozott Budapesthez, innen 1944 nyarán Auschwitzba deportálták a zsidókat. – A szerk.], elvitték őket és elpusztultak. Azt hiszem, Auschwitzba kerültek.

Az apám, Friedman Tivadar 1894-ben született Istenmezején, a Mátrának az északi oldalán, Pétervásárától olyan 15 km-re. Ez annyira pici hely, hogy amikor szükségem volt most a jóvátétellel kapcsolatos dologra, kiderült, hogy nincs is anyakönyvi hivatal. De Pétervásáráról nekem megvolt a születési bizonyítványom, mert egyszer az 1939-es választásnál ki kellett mutatni, hogy nem tudom, mióta élnek a felmenők Magyarországon, és akkor ez megvolt. [A „zsidók országgyűlési választójogi rendelkezésének végrehajtásáról” szóló, Teleki Pál által aláírt miniszterelnöki rendelet értelmében a választójogosultsághoz szükséges volt a születési bizonyítvány – mivel csak az 1867. december 31-e után születettek szavazhattak –, a szülők, nagyszülők házasságlevele, hitelt érdemlően arról, hogy 1867 óta Magyarországon élnek, és a „lakásbizonylat”, amivel az adott személy igazolta az állandó Magyarországon lakás tényét. (Pintér István: A kényszerpályára szavazó ország. In Földes György–Hubai László (szerk.): Parlamenti választások Magyarországon 1920–1998. 184–185 old.) – A szerk.] Én Istenmezején nem voltam soha. Pétervásárán igen, az járási székhely most is.

Apám 18 éves korában leérettségizett, és belépett az Angol–Magyar Bankba. Földesre magyarosított, amikor a bankba került Fiuméban. Ez 1912 körül lehetett. [Az Angol–Magyar Bank 1920 májusában alakult meg, úgyhogy valamilyen másik bank alkalmazottja lehetett. – A szerk.] Nem várták ezt tőle el, csak úgy magyarosított. Valószínűleg azért, mert a banknál jobban hangzott a dolog. Egészen addig ott dolgozott, amíg ki nem tört a háború 1914-ben. Akkor, vagy utána, hogy ne kelljen katonának bevonulni, fölkerült Pestre, és attól kezdve alkalmazott volt itt az Angol–Magyar Banknál, majd egy-két évvel azután, hogy összeházasodtak az anyámmal – ami 1927-ben volt –, a bank egy leányvállalatához, a Magyar Kenderhez került mint hites könyvvizsgáló. A hites könyvvizsgálatot az 1930-as évek második felében kötötték vizsgához. Neki megvolt a bizonyítványa erről. A vizsgabizottság elnöke egy bizonyos Antos István volt, aki a felszabadulás után a kommunista pártnak volt a pénzügyi szakértője, és pénzügyminiszter is volt, azt hiszem. [Antos István 1957–1960 között volt pénzügyminiszter. – A szerk.] Apámnak, mint egész családjának is, magyar volt az anyanyelve.

Anyámat úgy hívták, hogy dr. Altman Júlia. 1900-ban Gyöngyösön született, és 1970-ben Budapesten halt meg. Általános orvos és fogszakorvos is volt. Az Üteg utcai polgáriba járt, aztán a IV. kerületi községi leánygimnáziumban érettségizett. Az apjának, Altman Ignácnak eléggé jó kapcsolatai lehettek, mert ő azt mondta, hogy ő a lányát mégiscsak szeretné, ha orvosi egyetemre fölvennék. És tekintettel arra, hogy ő nem csatlakozott a kommunista mozgalomhoz, ezért 1919 őszén anyám bekerült az egyetemre. 1924-ben diplomázott a budapesti Pázmány Péter Tudományegyetem orvosi karán, később megszerezte a fogszakorvosi képesítést. Csoporttársa volt Németh László [író, 1901–1975], aki abban az időben igencsak antiszemita volt, ennek megfelelően viselkedett is. Voltak az egyetemen zsidók, de nem túl sokan. Anyám évfolyamtársai közül csak egy bizonyos Neumann Sáriról tudok, aki egy rabbi lánya volt, s az apja szintén azt akarta, hogy orvos legyen. Anyám mondott olyasmit, hogy a neve alapján pikkeltek rá, meg rosszabb feltételekkel mehetett egyes vizsgákra. Az egyetem mellett dolgozott is, például libát tömött. Volt, hogy úgy tanulta az anatómiát, hogy közben tömte a libát.

Amikor az egyetemen végzett, akkor nem rögtön Pestre került, hanem szokás volt, meg lehet, hogy előírás is, és el kellett mennie vidékre körorvosnak. Nyírbátor mellé, Vajára került. Ott volt neki egy lovagja, keresztény fiú volt, egy évfolyamtársa. De abból nem lett semmi, nem volt komoly. Aztán anyám fölkerült Pestre, a József utcában volt a börtönöknek egy fogorvosi rendelője, és odakerült.

Anyám meg apám a[z anyai] nagyapám halála után, 1927-ben házasodtak össze. Nem tudom, miért, de Rákospalotán esküdtek. Megvan a házassági anyakönyvi kivonat, és azon az szerepel, hogy a polgári házasságkötés helye Rákospalota. Tudomásom szerint nem laktak soha Rákospalotán. Rabbi előtt a [budapesti] Bethlen téren, Schwartz Benjámin előtt esküdtek, mert az István út viszont oda tartozik, oda jártak. Anyám 1933-ban szült.

Egész életükben bérlakásban laktak, és ezt a mostanit leszámítva én is. Mielőtt én megszülettem volna, a Király utca 82-ben laktak. Ott két szoba volt, az ablakok a Csengery utcára néztek. Onnan azért költöztek el a Liszt Ferenc térre, mert nagy cirkuszok voltak abból, hogy a ház mellett működött egy kocsma, a részegek rajcsúroztak, az anyámék meg vödörrel öntötték le őket. Én még a Liszt Ferenc tér 4-ben lévő lakásba születtem. Egy kisebb lakás volt, s az apám úgy gondolta, meg a nagypapa is, hogy nagyobb lakás kell, s a környéken nézett volna egyet. Ajánlották neki a Teréz körút 6. alatti lakást, ami akkor már hónapok óta nem volt kiadva. Azért nem, mert a lakásban lakott egy prostituált, akit a barátja megfojtott. Ennélfogva nem nagyon akartak odaköltözni az emberek. Apámat meg anyámat az ilyesmi nem nagyon zavarta, viszont olcsóbban megkapták a bérletet. 1934-ben költöztünk oda. A lakás ötszobás volt, benne az anyámnak a fogorvosi rendelőjével meg váróval, két előszobával. A rendelői praxis Földesné dr. Altman Júlia néven ment. A háztulajdonos egy bizonyos Sugár úr volt, agglegény. Nem volt szimpatikus ember. Volt egy randa kiskutyája, amit egy barátommal mindig üldözőbe vettünk csak azért, hogy a kutyát is bosszantsuk, meg a Sugár urat is. A házmesterrel, a Sárkány bácsival mindig csinálták a cirkuszt, hogy csend legyen, ne rendetlenkedjünk. Lift ugyan volt a házban, de jobb szerettünk lefele szaladni.

Az anyám, akire a nevelés egyébként is hárult, szigorú volt, pofonokat is adott. Példának okáért a következőért. 1937-ben lehetett, hogy Szálasi és a nyilas párt [lásd: nyilaskeresztes párt] megnyert egy választást [lásd: 1939-es parlamenti választások Magyarországon], és a körúton felvonulást rendeztek a nyilasok. Ez feltehetően nekünk nagyon tetszett, s a belső folyosón, ami a lakáson belül volt, a Bandival mi azt játszottuk, hogy „Kitartás, éljen Szálasi!” Az anyám meg éppen rendelt, és azt mondta a betegnek: bocsánat, de maradjon itt. Nyilván betette neki a nyálszívót, ő meg kijött, és kaptunk egy-egy hatalmas nagy pofont azzal, hogy ne ordítozzatok.

Volt gyereklányunk, akit úgy hívtak, hogy Bukó Ilonka. Főleg velünk foglalkozott, de házimunkát is végzett. Úgy került Pestre, hogy a szülei felküldték egy rokonukhoz, itt könnyebben tud majd megélni. Középfülgyulladása lett, amit nem kezeltek kellőképpen, így a Pesti Izraelita Hitközség Alapítvány közkórházába, a Szabolcs utcába került operációra. Nem volt persze zsidó, de a zsidó kórházban feküdtek keresztények is, nem is kevesen. Nálunk lakott 1943-ig, amikor is a Giza nénivel [anyja húga] valamin összevesztek, s akkor elment. Vénlány volt. Valami történhetett vele, amiről soha nem beszélt, 1944–1945-ben, az ostrom ideje alatt. Az oroszokkal valami balhé adódott. [Talán, mint oly sok magyar nőt, őt is megerőszakolták az orosz katonák. – A szerk.] 1946-ban visszajött, de már nem mint alkalmazott. Anyám igazolta neki, hogy gyermekgondozással foglalkozott, meg valami iskolát is végeztetett vele, s akkor csecsemőgondozó lett a Vas utcai kórházban, onnan is ment nyugdíjba. Lett lakása, és majdnem minden nap jött hozzánk látogatóba.

Amíg a nagyapám élt, a konyhában volt külön tejes meg zsíros rész. Volt két cseléd is, akik nem voltak zsidók, de be voltak tanítva, hogy ezt hogy kell tartani. Bár külön mosogató nem volt. Egy ideig volt külön szakácsné is, Mariska, aki szintén ott lakott velünk a Teréz körúton. A péntek esti két gyertyát nem mindig a sábesz bejövetele előtt gyújtották meg, mert rendelő is volt, anyám fogorvosi rendelője, és ha jött a páciens, akkor ott nincs helye annak, hogy bocsánat, most éppen gyertyát gyújtunk. Olyan se volt, hogy anyám pénteken korábban fejezte be a rendelést, mert ő rendelkezésre állt bármikor. Szombaton is dolgozott.

Bandi bár micvója 1943-ban volt. A bár micvóra Schmeltzer Izsák főtisztelendő úr [Érdemes figyelnünk a szóhasználatra. – A szerk.], a Barcsay utcai gimnázium hittantanára készítette fel. Nagy vendégség volt utána nálunk a Teréz körúton. Legalább ötvenen, nemcsak zsidók, apám keresztény kollégái is. Volt, aki Jókait, a „Mégis mozog a föld” című könyvet hozta Bandinak ajándékba. Nekem is volt bár micvóm, 1946-ban, de csak azért, mert ragaszkodtam hozzá. Egy 13 éves gyerek azt gondolja, hogy a külsőségek is megerősítik őt a hovatartozásában. Engem is Schmeltzer főtisztelendő készített fel

A szüleim főleg magyar szerzőket olvastak. Az anyám és a nagynéném azt szokta mondani, hogy Jókai emlőin nevelkedtünk. Mert nagymama azt olvasta nekik „A kőszívű ember fiai”-tól „A magyar nábob”-ig, Kárpáthy Zoltánig. Én meg újságon nőttem föl. Akárhol vagyok a világon, az újságot meg kell venni. „Az Est”, a „Pesti Napló” meg a „Magyarország” járt, miután apám az Est-lapoknál is dolgozott az újság könyvelési részlegén. [„Az Est”: 1910–1939 között megjelenő politikai napilap, délutáni lap, kiadója Miklós Andor; 1919-től az Est-lapok – „Az Est”, „Pesti Napló”, „Magyarország” – egyike. A „Pesti Napló” (1850–1939), 1920-ban került Miklós Andor tulajdonába, reggeli lap, a két világháború közötti irodalom jelentős fóruma volt; a „Magyarország” (1893–1944) esti politikai napilap, 1918 után a polgári ellenzék lapja, 1920-tól az Est Lapkiadó Rt. adta ki. Az 1930-as években a népi írók sajtóorgánuma, 1939-től nacionalista kormánypárti lap. – A szerk.]

A szüleim szerettek a Monarchia különböző üdülőhelyein nyaralni. Divat volt akkoriban Marienbadba vagy Karlsbadba menni. Azt hiszem, évente jártak ilyen helyekre. 10 napig, két hétig maradtak ilyenkor. Minket Ilonkával, a gyereklánnyal hagytak. Sose mentünk együtt nyaralni, együtt csak a rokonokat mentünk meglátogatni, főleg Gyöngyösre, ahol 2-3 napot maradtunk ilyenkor.  Nyaralni minket külön küldtek, két hétre. 6-7 évesen voltunk először, iskoláskorúak voltunk. 1943-ig még nyugodtan lehetett ilyesmit csinálni. Budán, a Mátyás király úton voltunk, egy nagyon komfortos villában. Voltak foglalkozások, egy hivatásos óvónő vezette, voltak sportversenyek, lehetett rajtuk díjakat nyerni. Gondolom, nem volt azért olcsó mulatság ez az üdültetés.

Gyerekkorunkban nyelvtanár jött, hetente kétszer, két-három évig, azt hiszem, és németet tanított. Hála Istennek, nekem zenét nem kellett tanulni, mert az anyám azt mondta, nem kínoznak vele, őneki sem volt valami nagy érdeklődése. Nekem olyan konyhanyelv maradt a német, Bandi pedig szerintem elfelejtette, viszont ő a franciát, angolt azért megtanulta. A gimnáziumban már angolt tanultunk, nem sokáig, utána pedig jött az orosz, nyolc évig, meg a latin.

A Barcsay utcai [Madách Imre] Gimnáziumban, ahová 1943-ban kezdtem járni, zsidó volt az osztály körülbelül több mint egyharmada. Eredetileg zsidó osztályt is szerveztek, a zsidótörvények miatt ide csak zsidó gyerekeket vettek fel. A német megszállás alatt [lásd: Magyarország német megszállása], 1944. áprilisáig jártunk elsőbe, aztán a zsidók kimaradtak. Én mentem még iskolába sárga csillaggal.

1944-ben Hevesből elvitték apám unokatestvérét, Rubinstein Józsefet, a feleségét, a két lányát meg azok gyerekeit. Egyvalaki jött vissza, az egyik lány, aki most Izraelben egy elmegyógyintézetben van. Rubinstein József első világháborús hadirokkant volt, mert elvesztette az egyik szemét, és arany vitézségi érmet kapott. Ennek következtében ő bizonyos mentességet élvezett [mentesség zsidóknak], ami abban állt, hogy zsidó létére sörlerakatot tarthatott Hevesen. Amikor a háború után Böske néni visszajött, akkor ő, a lánya folytatta. Apám, aki elég világosan gondolkodott, 1944 áprilisában elküldött egy keresztény nőt Hevesre, hogy mondja meg Rubinsteinnek: küldje fel a két unokáját Pestre, mert úgy gondolta, hogy Pesten jobban megmaradnak. De az azt mondta, hogy nincsen igaza, mert a hitközségi újságban az volt, hogy nem lesz ott semmi bántódása. Holott a Pesti Izraelita Hitközség vezetése, élén Stern Samuval, pontosan tudta, hogy mire lehet számítani. Böske azért maradt meg, mert a hatéves kisfiát, akit Hertz Lalinak hívtak, a nagymama vezette kézen fogva, ő meg a csomagot vitte. A húga, Zila a karon ülő gyerekével ment, ennélfogva Mengele a bal oldalra küldte őket. [A koncentrációs táborokban megérkezéskor volt az úgynevezett szelektálás, amelyet SS orvosok végeztek. Az egyik oldalra küldték azokat – általában az időseket, gyerekeket, kisgyerekes anyákat, betegeket – akiket rögtön elgázosítottak, a másikra a munkaképeseket, akiket munkatáborokba vittek kényszermunkára. Auschwitz-Birkenauban, ahova a magyar zsidók többségét vitték, attól függött, hogy melyik oldal jelenti az életet, és melyik a halált, hogy éppen melyik krematórium működött. Ha a 2-3-as krematórium, akkor a jobb oldal jelentette a halált, a bal az életet, ha pedig a 4-5-ös krematórium, akkor a bal oldalra állókat gázosították rögtön el, és jobb oldalra küldték a munkaképeseket.  – A szerk.]

A Teréz körúti ház nem volt csillagos ház, ezért el kellett költöznünk abból a lakásból. A Jókai utcai ház, ahova költöztünk, a Foncière biztosítóé volt, a II. emeleten volt az irodájuk. Még akkor is, amikor csillagos ház lett, 1944 júniusától. 1944. október végétől [lásd: nyilas hatalomátvétel] viszont a svéd követségi alkalmazottaknak volt a menedéke, diplomáciai védettség alatt, Raoul Wallenberg működése nyomán. A Jókai utcai lakás kisebb, háromszobás volt. Olyan kényszercsere volt ez. Az apám, az anyám, a testvérem, a nagynéném meg a nagybátyám, Károly lakott ott rajtam kívül. Amikor Wallenberg működött, akkor már túl sokan, legalább 20-25-en laktunk a lakásban. Ekkorra mi, a család egy szobába szorultunk vissza.

A házban maradtak keresztény lakók, akik nem mentek el – történetesen a házmester is. 1945. január 7-éről 8-ára virradó éjszaka a házmester „jótékony cselekedete” nyomán megjelent egy fegyveres nyilas társaság. Vagy ő szólt nekik, hogy itten vannak zsidók, jogtalanul, és egyébként is, hátha itt lehetne még valamit rabolgatni, miegyéb. Nem tudom. A lényeg az, hogy ezen az éjszakán megjelent ott pár nyilas. Én akkor voltam 11 éves. Az egész társaságot – már aki mozdítható volt, mert aki meg nem, azt agyonlőtték, ez már így szokott lenni – elvitték a Városház utca 14. szám alatti nyilas házba. Ez aWallenbergnek is a tudomására került, és megjelent a nyilas házban, így másnap átvittek bennünket a gettóba [lásd: budapesti gettó], az Akácfa utca 54. számú házba. Az apámat meg a nagybátyámat a Duna-partra vitték a rákövetkező napokban, és a Dunába lőtték őket. [1944 októbere, a nyilas hatalomátvétel után szabadon garázdálkodtak Budapesten, és sok zsidót kitereltek a Dunapartra, majd belelőtték a folyóba. – A szerk.] A holttest természetesen soha nem került elő. 1945. január 18-án történt meg a felszabadulás.

A gettó felszabadulásakor, január 18-án reggel jöttünk a Jókai utcába az Akácfa utcából. Sok mindent széthordtak, de a bútor érdekes módon békén maradt. Nem tüzelték el. Akkor már az oroszok nagyon közel voltak. Csak az ingóság tűnt el. A rádiót, ilyesmit, még májusban le kellett adni, de az olyanok, mint a ruhaneműk, eltűntek. Később, azt hiszem, azon a nyáron, egyszer a gangon az anyám fölnézett a második emeletre, és ott fölismerte az egyik „kedves” lakótárson a ruháját. Ilyen azért volt. Lett abból egy kisebb csetepaté, ordítozás, aztán azt hiszem, visszaadta. Az ezüsttárgyak, porcelán, ilyesmi részben megmaradt, az anyám fogorvos volt, elég nagy pacientúrája meg ismeretsége volt, odaadta másnak, és ha nem is teljesen, de később visszakapta.

A háború után, amikor kiderült, hogy senki nem él, anyám és a húga, Giza néni úgy döntöttek, hogy nem maradunk Magyarországon. Volt kapcsolat a Kanadában lévő Glatterékkal, akik hívtak is, meg nem is, tehát nem volt igazán komoly az a szándék. Megpróbálták akkor a cionistákat, Bandi benne volt egy cionista társaságban [lásd: cionizmus], amelynek két oszlopos tagja volt Hermann Pista [Hermann István (1925–1986), filozófus, esztéta, az MTA tagja. – A szerk.] és Heller Ági. 1946-ban összefogtak tizenvalahány gyereket azzal, hogy akkor induljatok el Palesztinába. Otthon pedig akkor még maradt valami arany, anyám odaadta Bandinak, aki akkor 16 éves volt. Majd ment a Giza néni is, de ő nem a cionistákkal, hanem az oroszokkal ment, valami közvetítők révén, teherautókon Ausztriába, de nem a szovjet megszállású zónába, hanem az amerikaiba. Az volt a szándék, hogy ők (Bandi és Giza) majd összetalálkoznak. Bandi a cionistákkal elkerült Brüsszelbe. De a sliách nagyon furcsa, inkább nem túl jellemes ember volt, mert azt mondta, hogy gyerekek, annyi pénz meg arany van nálatok, adjátok nekem oda, mert nálam jobb helyen van. Oda is adták, majd Brüsszelben a sliách meg a barátnője eltűnt. A 12-13 gyerek ottmaradt egyedül, pénz meg minden nélkül. A rendőrség megfogta őket, és bevitte a fogdába. Közben Giza néni Németországon keresztül elment Párizsba, mert az apámnak volt három unokatestvére, akik ott éltek, és ezt ő tudta. Azt is tudta, hogy őket Friedmannak hívják, de azt, hogy hol laknak, mit csinálnak, azt nem. Párizsban a menekülttáborban megkérdezte, hogy ismerik-e Friedman Imrét, és – mert azért van szerencse is a világon – volt ott valaki, aki azt mondta, igen, ő tudja, hogy ki Friedman Imre. S elvitte hozzájuk.

A három unokatestvér 1929-ben került ki Franciaországba. A háború alatt bujkáltak, Jóskát egy keresztény nő bújtatta, akit aztán elvett feleségül. Nagyon helyes nő volt, megvan még most is, de gondolom, már idős lehet. Miklós bácsira is pontosan emlékszem, Imre bácsi pedig rendes szervezett kommunista volt. A háború után Jóska, a legfiatalabb taxizott Párizsban, Miklós bácsi, azt hiszem, nyugdíjban volt. Imre bácsi eredetileg bőrdíszműves volt, aztán partizán lett, és miután ottan nagyon aktívan részt vett a dolgokban, neki becsületrendje is volt, amit a Párizs felszabadítása körüli harcok miatt érdemelt ki. Szerzett utazási igazolványt magának, elment Brüsszelbe Bandiért, és elhozta Párizsba. Mindez 1946 őszén történt, ott volt Bandi, Giza néni is, akkor meg már eszük ágában nem volt Palesztinába menni, meg Kanadába se, hanem maradtak ezeknél. Párizsban a nagynéném szakácsnő lett egy zsidó menhelyszerűségen. Elég jól ment neki, még Bandit is tudta támogatni. Abból volt pénze, hogy fánkot sütött, meg valami mákos süteményt. A mákor annak idején nem ismerték mint ételt Franciaországban. Giza a virágpiacon vette, ahol madáreleségként árulták, és felhívta anyámat, hogy hogy kell mákos süteményt csinálni. És valami Purim ünnepségre csinált ilyet, és annyira ízlett a zsidóknak, hogy rendszeresen csinálnia kellett.

Bandi maradt Párizsban. A középiskolát kint befejezte. Jelentkezett kémia–fizika szakra a Sorbonne-on, de aztán közbejött egy dolog. Összeismerkedett egy lánnyal, aki zsidó volt, kommunista is, és az 1950-ben elvitte őt egy Tito-ellenes tüntetésre. És kit fogtak meg a tüntetésen a rendőrök? Bandit meg még két palit, és miután ők menekültek voltak, szépen bevitték őket a Santé börtönbe a tárgyalásig, de közben értesítették a hozzátartozó Giza nénit, aki csapot-papot otthagyott, és ment érte. Bandit két nap elzárásra ítélték, egyben kiutasították Franciaországból.

Közben Giza néni a zsidókkal összeveszett, mert azt mondták neki, hogy egy ilyen istentelen ember, aki ilyet csinál, mármint hogy tüntet, azt hagyni kell, hadd vesszen el.  A nénémnek több se kellett, ilyen zsidók meg olyan ortodox vallásosak vagytok ti, otthagyott mindent, és visszajött Magyarországra. Így aztán 1950 augusztusában mind megjelentek Pesten. Giza néni könyvelő volt, el is helyezkedett, a Ganz Villamossági gyárban.

Bandi itt elvégezte az egyetemet. Bandi feleségét Krausz Ibolyának hívták, matematika–fizika szakos tanár volt, itt ismerkedtek meg az egyetemen. 1955-ben házasodtak össze. Aztán 1957-ben elmentek Montrealba. Bandinak nagyon jó ajánló volt, hogy angolul és franciául is perfekt volt, úgyhogy ő egy hét múlva már dolgozott. Az Ibinek ez egy kicsit későbben sikerült. Montrealban, a zsidó kórházban volt asszisztensnő. Amikor De Gaulle elérte, hogy Québec francia lett, 1966-ban azt hiszem, akkor a tőke elkezdett menekülni nyugat [az angol nyelvű tartományok] felé. [1967-ben a francia elnök, Charles de Gaulle québeci látogatása alkalmával szeparatisták nagy tömege előtt beszédet mondott, amelyben québeci útját Franciaország náciktól való felszabadításához hasonlította, és kijelentette: „Éljen a szabad Québec!”. A kanadai miniszterelnök elítélte De Gaulle beszédét. A beszéd azonban feltüzelte a québeci szeparatistákat, és egy évvel később megalakult a Parti Québecois, amely az 1970-es években jelentős erővé vált a kanadai belpolitikában. – A szerk.] Még előtte Ibi elvégezte a legelső computer-tanfolyamot, amit az angol nyelvű egyetem tartott Montrealban. Amikor a tanfolyamot elvégezte, magas állása lett a Northern Electric vezető telekommunikációs cégnél. Amikor viszont a tőke elkezdett menekülni nyugatra, akkor ez a cég is áttette a székhelyét Torontóba. Ahol azóta is élnek, Bandinak is lett ott állása. A végén egy nagy gyógyszeripari cégnél lett kutatási igazgató. Úgyhogy őneki bejött a dolog. Egy fiuk és egy lányuk született, a fiúnak volt brisze. A körülmetéléssel különben egyáltalán nem értek egyet, elsősorban is azért nem, mert ez olyan visszavonhatatlan cselekvés, amihez talán annak is hozzá kellene járulnia, akin végrehajtják. Természetesen ez kizárt csecsemő esetében. A másik ok meg az, hogy egy barátom rokonát azért lőtték főbe 1944 decemberében Pesten, mert egy ismerőse felismerte, és a nyilasok meg levetkeztették, utána agyonlőtték.

Ibi apukája, anyukája elég vallásos emberek voltak. Nem voltak ortodoxok, de Vili bácsi, az apukája tartotta a vallást. Pestiek voltak egyébként, jártak templomba, böjtöltek. Az 1960-as években a lányuk után mentek. És ők tartották az ünnepet, amíg Vili bácsi élt. Bizonyos kóser alapdolgokat (is) megtartottak. Vili bácsi felesége, Emmi eredetileg zöldséges volt. Ő a mi családunkat nagyon utálta. Tulajdonképpen ez volt az oka annak is, hogy én 1970-ben nem maradtam ott, amikor kilátogattam. Emmi 1977-ben meghalt.

Második gimnáziumba 1945. májustól június közepéig jártunk egy nagyon csonka tanévet. Ötödikben választás elé állítottak minket, hogy mit akarunk tanulni: oroszt vagy görögöt. A baloldali eszmék híveként mi úgy véltük, hogy klasszikus nyelvnek elég a latin, ami a felsőgimnáziumban benne volt a tantervben [A latin nyelv a nyolcosztályos gimnáziumban mind a nyolc osztály tananyagában szerepelt, a görög a humán gimnáziumok felső négy osztályában. – A szerk.], így természetesen az oroszt választottuk. Az osztály meg is feleződött: a többség az oroszt választotta, mert úgy gondolta, hogy nem kell a latin mellé a görög. Azért volt az osztályban aránylag több zsidó gyerek, mert a zsidók inkább ezt választották, illetve átjöttek máshonnan is az orosz miatt. Tulajdonképpen itt nem voltak antiszemita dolgok. Abban az időben legalábbis már nem. Mert előtte azért volt, a Monoki tanár úr, a tornatanár úgy pofozta főleg a zsidó osztályt, hogy fölállította a gyerekeket, és az egymás mellett állók fejét összecsapta. Schmeltzer főtisztelendőt nem számítva zsidó tanárra nem emlékszem, hogy más is lett volna. Olyan, hogy legkedvesebb tanárom, nekem nem volt. Az orvosira is inkább csak anyám hatására kerültem.

Az elemi iskolából két kapcsolatom maradt meg. Az egyik Held Péter, most New Yorkban él, és 1939. szeptember 1-je óta vagyunk barátságban. Akkor kezdtük az iskolát, s aztán még ráadásul egy házban is laktunk. A másik Hollander Pali névre hallgat, most ugyancsak Amerikában él, egyetemi tanár, most már nyugdíjban van. Helddel együtt mentünk először kuplerájba 1948. október 6-án, amikor tanítási szünet volt. A Király utca 84-be, Madame Clarisse-hoz. Többször is voltunk, amíg be nem zárták a nyilvános házakat, Péter meg 1949-ben el nem ment. Az 1940-es évek végén teljesen bevett dolog volt, hogy fiatal fiúk kuplerájba járnak. Apám unokatestvére, Arnold bácsi, aki gazdag ember volt, adta rá a pénzt, száz forintot. [1946. augusztus 1-jén a teljesen elértéktelenedett pengő helyett vezették be a forintot mint új fizetőeszközt. Egy dollár 1945 júliusában 1320, novemberben 108 000, 1946 januárban 795 000, márciusban 1 750 000, májusban 59 milliárd, júliusban pedig 4 600 000 quadrillió pengőt ért. Az új árrendszert elszakították a világpiactól, kormányzati döntéssel a háború előtti árakhoz viszonyítva állapították meg a forint vásárlóértékét. Egy mázsa búza ára 40 forint volt. – A szerk.] Aztán jártunk kártyázni egymáshoz Szinetárral, Polgár Péterrel, Sommerral, Szabados Gyurival is – osztálytársaim voltak. Szinetár Miklós édesapja, Szinetár Ernő elmegyógyász volt, a János kórház igazgatója. Polgár Péterből adószakértő lett.

A cionistákkal, a Heller Ági-féle társasággal elég rövid úton összevesztem. Én például nyakkendőt a mai napig is szívesen hordok, oda is nyakkendőben mentem, mire mondták, hogy ide márpedig nyakkendőben nem lehet jönni. Mondom, akkor csókoltatom. Ez 1947-ben vagy 1948-ban volt.

1951-ben kerültem az egyetemre. Nem akartak fölvenni, annak ellenére, hogy az anyám párttag [lásd: Magyar Dolgozók Pártja (MDP)], a Csengery utcai rendelőben pedig párttitkár is volt. Akkoriban volt az a „bölcs” rendelkezés, hogy nem csinálunk orvosdinasztiát. De az egyik unokatestvére az anyámnak, Zádor Imre magas állásban volt az egészségügyi szakszervezetnél, jóban volt az orvosi egyetemi dékánnal, úgyhogy én minden további nélkül föl lettem véve az egyetemre.

Anyámat titkos szavazással választották meg párttitkárnak. [Munkahelyi pártszervezeteket 1950-től hoztak létre. – A szerk] Egyedülálló asszony volt, gyerekekkel, rajta volt a súlya az eltartásnak. Nem került magasabb kategóriába ezzel, de békén hagyták. Azt nem vették igazán jó néven, hogy a testvére meg a másik gyerek nem él Magyarországon, de a végén megbocsátották.

Az egyetemen volt antiszemita áramlat. Népi kollégista [lásd: népi kollégiumok] társaság volt az egyetem pártvezetősége. De az egyetemen sok zsidó tanár volt egyébként. A Rajk pert hittük is, meg nem is. Sejtettük, hogy valami nem stimmel, de igazából nem voltunk érintve. Nem foglalkoztunk azzal, hogy itt milyen nagyszabású becsapás zajlik.

Anyám 1954-ig folytatta a magánpraxist, aztán felszámolta, mert teljes, nyolcórás állásba ment, először a Csengery utcai rendelőbe, aztán Kispestre. Rákosiék alatt a rendelőt nem fenyegette veszély, nem államosították. Akinek bejelentett praxisa volt, avval nem csináltak az égvilágon semmit. Az Egészségügyi Szakszervezetnek persze anyám tagja volt, s 1945 óta a pártnak is. Rákosi aláírása szerepelt a tagkönyvében. Úgy vélte, hogy baloldali gondolkozású embernek a kommunista pártban van a helye. Hogy miért nem a szociáldemokrata pártban, azt nem tudom. Valószínűnek tartom, hogy ezért, mert olyan kollégái meg baráti köre volt, akik inkább a kommunista vonalhoz vitték. Volt az egészben némi ilyen elégtétel. Nem bosszúvágy, de az, hogy vissza lehet adni azt, amiben részünk volt. És erre inkább a kommunista párt volt alkalmas, vagy legalábbis annak látszott.

Nekünk az ég egy világon semmi bajunk nem volt se Rákosi [lásd: Rákosi korszak], se Kádár alatt [lásd: Kádár korszak], Kádár alatt pláne nem. Legföljebb annyi, hogy anyámnak nem vették túlságosan jó néven, hogy a másik gyereke nem él Magyarországon. De hát akkor, amikor Bandi visszajött 1950-ben avval, hogy kiutasították Franciaországból, akkor anyám írt Rákosinak egy levelet, hogy legyen a segítségére, hogy Bandi Rákosi-ösztöndíjat kapjon. Egy évig kapta, az egyetemre fölvették minden további nélkül. Tehát nem lehetett azt mondani, hogy nekünk nagy bajunk volt.

Ami 1956-ot illeti [lásd: 1956-os forradalom], én magam láttam az Üllői út 26-ban, az orvosi egyetem földszinti vécéjében kiírva, hogy „Iccig, nem viszünk mi Auschwitzig”. 1956. szeptember 1-jén a Szabolcs utcai kórházban kezdtem a gyakorlatot, az első három hónap a sebészeten telt. Az október 23-át követő napokban a baleseti sebészeten voltam, és amikor 25-én a Kossuth Lajos téren volt az a tulajdonképpen mai napig sem tisztázott dolog [A Földművelési Minisztérium tetőteréből a tömegbe lőttek, minden bizonnyal rejtőzködő ávósók. – A szerk.], akkor nagyon sok sérültet hoztak be. Mindjárt ott halt meg a kezünk között egy ember, nekem az volt az első ilyen élményem. Hozták be az embereket, ők meg meghaltak, úgyhogy én fogtam magam, otthagytam az egészet, és a Podmaniczky utcán végig szaladva mentem haza. Otthon is maradtam jó darabig, az anyám azt mondta, hogy „maradj a fenekeden”. Ő is otthon maradt.

1956 után ki se kellett lépni a pártból, egyszerűen kimaradt, aki akart. [Az MSZMP ekkor alakult, és megszűnt az MDP]. Anyám már nem lépett vissza. Én 1974-ben léptem be, amikor kicsit fel akarták javítani a pártot [lásd: MSZMP], s 1989-ig tag is maradtam. De azt előre megmondtam – akkor, egy évvel előtte [1973-ban] volt Izraelben a Jom Kipuri háború, hogy szerintem a zsidók nem követtek el agressziókat. Azt mondták a kollégáim, ők is zsidók voltak, akik a belépést szorgalmazták, hogy ők is így gondolják, ez nem számít, ettől még beléphetek a pártba. Egyikük azt mondta korábban, hogy a belépés nem olyan, mintha egy társasutazásra jelentkezne az ember. Ugyanis előírás volt, hogy előzően jelentkezni kell. Semmiféle pártfunkciót nem vállaltam, sima párttag voltam. Minden évben a nyári szünet után, szeptemberben volt az első párttaggyűlés. Mindig az első sorba, az igazgató mellé ültem azon egyszerű oknál fogva, hogy ne aludjak el. Az igazgató, aki ugyancsak zsidó ember volt, ilyenkor megkérdezte tőlem, mikor van ünnep, mert akkor kimegy a temetőbe a szülei sírjához.

1979-ben a MÁV-kórházba kerültem, a nagyobb önállóság miatt. A MÁV-kórházban ugyanis történetesen megürült egy állás, elment nyugdíjba a főorvos. Kapcsolatokkal, végül is pályázat nélkül kerültem oda, a gyermekosztály vezetőjének. Pedig a kórház hagyományosan antiszemita kórház volt, korábban Horthy Miklós Kórháznak hívták. Velem annyi antiszemita eset történt, hogy amikor jött egy új sebész, azt kérdezte egy műtősnő: ez is vágott faszú? Erre mondtam, hogy nem, de én igen, úgyhogy most szíveskedjék az ajtón kívül fáradni. Én többet a köszönését sem fogadtam. Kétszer megpróbálta, én keresztülnéztem rajta

Izrael mint kivándorlás sosem merült fel. Anyámnak volt egy kollégája, az ő lánya vagy unokahúga elment Izraelbe a cionistákkal. A ciszjordániai határ közelében lelőtték. Aztán a Bandival kapcsolatos párizsi történet sem volt igazán nagyon szimpatikus a számunkra. De azért 1974-ben illegális módon jártam Izraelben. Úgy mentem, hogy voltak barátaim Zürichben, akik ott intézték a vízumot, amely egy nagy papírosból állt, hogy az útlevélben ne legyen nyoma. Soha nem derült ki senki számára. Annak, hogy Svájcig kapjunk útlevelet, nem volt különösebb akadálya. Háromévente kaphattunk, miután az akkori barátnőmmel mind a kettőnknek maradt családtagja Magyarországon. Én akkor már a Szabolcs utcában voltam gyermekorvos, az É. pedig bőrgyógyász főorvos volt egy másik kórházban. A Szabolcs utcai kórházból képzelheti, milyen referenciát adtak, miután a társaságnak a nyolcvan százaléka zsidó volt. [Ez volt ugyanis a háború előtt a Zsidókórház. – A szerk.] A MÁV kórházban később már osztályvezető főorvos voltam, ott eszükbe nem jutott, hogy valami rosszat mondjanak. Énnekem visszautasított útlevélkérésem csak Izraelbe volt, 1967 előttről. Úgyhogy én akkor, 1974-ben már meg sem próbáltam, hogy én most kifejezetten Izraelbe akarok menni.

Az első feleségem V. Anna. A nagyapja rabbi volt. Apja is rabbi volt. Az apja elpusztult koncentrációs táborban, az anyja egy budapesti elitgimnáziumban volt tanár. Annuskával 18 éves korunkban kerültem össze, 1951-ben. Hétévi udvarlás után, 1957-ben kötöttünk házasságot. A Sportuszodában, baráti ismerősökön keresztül ismerkedtünk meg. De az egyetem alatt nem lehetett összeházasodni, sem ők nem voltak gazdagok, sem mi. Annuska is gimnáziumi tanár. Háromévi házasság után elváltunk.

Rédei Évivel 1984-ben házasodtunk össze. Ez is szerelem volt. 1947-ben született, régi könyves, 18 éves kora óta. 1988–1989-ben már a Pozsonyi úton dolgozott (ahol ma is van a bolt), s árulták többek közt a Láng Kiadó könyveit is. A kiadó tulajdonosa mindig bement a boltba az Évihez, akit akkor még csak látásból ismert, kérdezni, hogy hogyan mennek a könyvei. S egyszer az Évi azt mondta neki, hogy ide hallgasson, vegyen meg engem a könyvesbolttal, és akkor mindjárt egyszerűbb lesz a dolog. Erre az másnap visszajött, azt mondja, maga egy nagyon jó ötletet adott, majd gondolkozom rajta, meg fogom ezt csinálni. S akkor alakult a Téka Vállalat – benne volt az a Láng Kiadó, a Könyvterjesztő mint állami vállalat és az Évi meg két alkalmazott, kisebb pénzzel. 1989 szeptember 1-jén megnyitották, ez volt tulajdonképpen az első olyan magánüzlet, amiben egy állami vállalat is benne volt. A Könyvterjesztő részét közben megvették, és most már Évi a többségi tulajdonos az üzletben.

Évit onnan ismerem, hogy könyvesboltban dolgozott, én pedig abban az időben elég sok olyan könyvet kaptam honoráriumként, amiből kettő volt, s mentem Évihez, hogy cserélje be. Majd amikor az első férjével összekerült és kezdett nőni a hasa, azt mondta – miután már tudta, hogy itt mindenkinek én vagyok a gyerekorvosa –, hogy ugyan legyek már én náluk is. Megszületett a fia 1976-ban, és a végén addig jártam oda, amíg Évike elvált. A fia végül is a kezem között nőtt föl, közös kezünk között. Nyolc éves volt, amikor összeházasodtunk.

Én a hittel meg vagyok hasonulva. Tudatos materialista, ateista vagyok. Nem tagadom, ez érzelmi alapon indult. 1945. január 8-ára virradóra mindannyiunkat elvittek. Hogy az apámmal pontosan mi történt, soha nem tudtam meg. A Jahrzeitet is úgy tartom, hogy nem a halála napján – mert azt nem tudom, mikor van – gyújtok mécsest. Az ünnepek nekem neuralgikus pont. Nem vagyok hajlandó tartani. Például a Hanukakor vagy a szédereste együtt a család. Nekem 1944 decemberében volt utoljára ilyen. És én úgy gondolom, hogy én 10 évesen nem azt érdemeltem a Mindenhatótól, hogy erre a sorsra jussak. Aztán mikor orvos lettem, a 42 évi szolgálatból 11-12 évet kórbonctannal töltöttem el. Aki kórboncolással foglalkozik, az tudja, hogy mi van az emberen belül. Innen az Isten-hit nagyon távol esik.

Valaki, aki megmenekült a Városház utcai nyilasházból, elmesélte, hogy az apám böjtölt. Nem mintha olyan sokat adtak volna neki enni, de ő azt sem vette magához. Ennyi aztán nekem untig elég volt ahhoz, hogy a zsidóságnak a szervezett részével, inkluzíve a pesti Izraelita Hitközség múlt és jelenlegi egész vezetésével ne ápoljam a kapcsolatot. 1949 óta, amikor fakultatív lett a hittan, nem jártam templomban. Esetleg demonstratív célból elmennék Jom Kipurra, Kol Nidrére. Én attól, hogy nem tartom be a vallási előírásokat, még pontosan ugyanolyan zsidó vagyok mint az, aki betartja. A zsidó nevelés az, hogy igenis tudd meg, hogy mi történt a nagyszüleiddel, meg mi történt az apáddal.

Egyetlen egy dologhoz ragaszkodom, ahhoz, hogy zsidó temetőben kell engem eltemetni. Azt is megmondom, hogy hova: a nagyapám sírjába Gyöngyösön. Anyámat eltemetni nem volt könnyű. Ugyanis elmentem a Hevrához, és hamvasztásos temetést akartam, mivel az ő kérése volt, ha ötmillió zsidót elégettek, neki nem kell ettől különböző temetés, mire a Hevrában azt mondták: ilyen temetés hétfőn van, mi viszont zsidókat hétfőn nem temetünk. „Mi az, ő ezek szerint nem zsidó?”, és mondtam is remekbe szabott gorombaságot, és rájuk csaptam az ajtót.

A rendszerváltást mi örömmel éltük meg, de a negatívuma, hogy a hagyományos antiszemitizmus Magyarországon igencsak erőre kapott. De – sokunkkal szemben – mi abba a 13 és fél ezerbe tartozunk, aki a legutóbbi népszámláláson beíratta, hogy zsidó. A baráti körben amúgy „vegyesen vagyunk”. Mondjuk, a többség zsidó. Három-négyhavonta összejövünk, tizenketten.

Matilda Israel
Sofia
Bulgaria
Interviewer: Leontina Israel
Date of interview: March 2003

Matilda Meshulam Israel is a pensioner. She worked as a laboratory assistant. She is a very friendly, hospitable and elegant old lady. She looks much younger for her age. She lives alone in a large apartment with three rooms in the center of Sofia. Sometimes her son who lives in Spain comes to visit her during the holidays and on his vacations. Her other son lives with his family in an apartment in Sofia. There are tapestries on the walls, which she has sewn herself and some pictures of her family - her sons, granddaughters, her late husband. There is always a vase with fresh flowers in front of his photo. In one of the glass cupboards there is a collection of dolls from various parts of the world dressed in folk costumes. She says that it was her husband's collection and he bought most of the dolls during his trips. She is a captivating speaker, and does not even wait to be asked a question. It seems that her most vivid memories are those from her childhood, because she talks about it in such minute details and ever so often returns to this period to tell another story. She also insists on talking in detail about her husband's professional achievements, who appears to have been a distinguished scholar and a remarkable man.

Growing up in Karnobat
Our religious life
My school years
My husband
During the war
Post-war
My children
My present-day life
Glossary

Growing up in Karnobat

I was born on 20th October 1921 in the town of Karnobat, where I grew up. It was a small town in southeastern Bulgaria then, a cattle-breeding center with around 10,000 citizens. All the Jewish families - around fifty - lived in the same neighborhood. Now there are no longer Jews living there. We formed this neighborhood ourselves, based on our own initiative and will. It was on the outskirts of town but at the same time it was near the center. We were all very united and perhaps the years of my childhood were the happiest in my life. The yards of our houses weren't surrounded by tall fences and we could pass from one part of the neighborhood to the other by crossing the backyards instead of walking along the streets. The whole Jewish community was very united and we all helped the poorer families among us. I remember that when I was a child, I played all day from morning until late in the evening, when I went home for dinner, as my father insisted that the whole family should eat together. All of my friends then were Jews, the older and the younger children all played together. Every evening we visited some family or they came to visit us. We didn't arrange the visits beforehand; we just decided to visit someone and went there. We ate cooked corn, popcorn, fruit; the children gathered in one of the rooms and the parents in the other. And we did this every evening! Even when there was a curfew, we could pass through the yards and no one would know that we weren't at home. All children from the Jewish neighborhood played together and got sick together. We quite often passed various viruses to each other - measles, tonsillitis, and mumps. We went through all the children's diseases. If a child went down with an infectious illness, all the other children also caught it and our mothers treated us together.

My father, Meshulam Sabetay Yulzari, was born in Karnobat in 1864. He became an orphan very young and I know nothing about his parents. Probably his kin was from Karnobat. I have no idea if his parents were religious or how they lived. They died when my father was a child and this is the only thing I know about them. My father was the oldest brother in the family and he had to work to support the others - his brother Yako and his sister Duda, who, as far as I remember, moved to Yambol later. Like most of the Jews in Karnobat, my father became a merchant too. He had a textile shop, which was quite big. My brother, Sabetay, also worked in the shop. My father and Sabetay were partners.

I remember that my father was always neatly dressed in a suit, with a bowler hat and a cane. He was very strict, but also a very nice man. All children in the neighborhood loved him, because he always had sweets in his pockets to give them. I was his soft spot, because I was his youngest daughter. When I was born, he was quite old, almost 60 years. He was a widower when he met my mother in Plovdiv on one of his business trips. My father's first wife had passed away. I don't know the exact cause, but I know that she had been bedridden for quite some time, because my sisters used to tell me how they did all the household chores then. From his first wife my father had six children: Sabetay, Jacques, Sophie, Buka, Ana, Albert.

Neither of the women worked, they were all housewives. Jacques was a dentist; he graduated in France and in 1951 moved to Israel with his family. His son, Mihael Bar Zoar, was a deputy in the Knesset. He wrote a book on the salvation of the Bulgarian Jews - 'Outside Hitler's Grasp'. A movie was made based on it two years ago. He often comes to Bulgaria and we always see each other when he is here. Albert died very young, only 17 years old, of typhus. I know from my mother that he was a very good man. Once she noticed that the cheese supply at home ran out very quickly and that Albert would wear one and the same shirt. She asked him about that and he admitted that he had given all his clothes as well as the cheese to a poor family. My other sisters and brothers moved to Israel in 1948 where they settled. Now their families live there. I feel closest to the children of my brother Haim, Yitzhak and Rebecca.

My mother, Rebecca Solomon Yulzari [nee Perets] was born in Asenovgrad [a small town in Southern Bulgaria] in 1887. She was a very beautiful and delicate woman. She was blond, with fair eyes and smooth skin. Later she moved to Plovdiv, because the family was more likely to find work there, I guess. I know nothing about the school and younger years of my mother. I don't know why, but she never talked about them, probably, because I never asked her. She was the oldest child in the family. She had two brothers - Jacques Perets, who was a leather worker, and Israel Perets - and three sisters, Regina, Sophie and Mazal.

My mother's first husband was killed during the war [WWI] and left her alone with a one-year-old son. My mother and her sisters worked when they were young. I know that they even worked in the factory of my husband's father, Marko Israel, in Plovdiv, where they produced umbrellas and other articles, which I don't remember. Later, when they had their own families they didn't work. My uncle Jacques saved my mother's life once during a big flood in their hometown Asenovgrad. He carried her out of the house, which collapsed soon afterwards. My mother couldn't walk on her own, because she was about to give birth to my brother Haim. This happened before I was born and before my father met my mother.

Jacques got married to a woman called Mary, but only after a tragic event happened. He had a fiancé in Sofia who was extraordinarily beautiful. They were very happy and they loved each other a lot. But she was short-sighted and so once when she lit a gas stove; she didn't see that there was already a flame in there. She continued to feed gas and then a flame jumped so high that it burned her severely. Soon after that she died from her wounds. My uncle never overcame her death. Not long afterwards he got married. He loved his wife, a good woman, but I think that he never forgot the lovely Anushka.

My father met my mother by chance, at the kiosk where she sold cigarettes. Gradually, he persuaded her to marry him and together they moved to Karnobat taking my half-brother Haim with them. I suppose that my mother felt nervous about what she would find there, because she was the age of my father's daughters. At first they treated her quite distantly, but gradually she became part of the family.

I guess the news that my father was about to have both a daughter and a granddaughter at the same time was a big scandal during those times, but it is a fact that Mati, the daughter of my sister Buka, was born almost at the same time that I was. My other niece, Viki, the daughter of my sister Ana is also about the same age as me, and some time after my birth the two sons of my brother Sabetay, Leon and Misho, were born. We all grew up together. In the beginning I was also not accepted very warmly by the family, but gradually they became attached to me and they couldn't stop hugging me. I am named after the first wife of my father. My sisters insisted on that and my mother didn't mind.

Our religious life

We celebrated all Jewish holidays and observed almost all traditions related to them. My father was very religious and was a gabbai in the synagogue. We had a wonderful synagogue in Karnobat and a chazzan, who was in charge of everything there. There was only one rabbi in Bulgaria then, who was in the Sofia synagogue. So, the chazzan in Karnobat had to perform all the rabbi's duties. In the synagogue the women sat on the balcony and the men downstairs. We, the children, had a special bench. I remember that we were always giggling and fussing during the service and my father scolded us or teased us. My favorite holiday, like that of all children, was Purim, when we all dressed in fancy costumes. We were all looking forward to Purim, because we knew that when it was close, spring was also near. There was a family that on occasion of the holidays made various figures from sugar - such as lambs, scissors and birds. We children always bought some. This is a holiday of the sweets, so people make various desserts out of sugar. We all put on fancy dress clothes; whatever we found at home. It was most fun in the evenings, when our parents also put on masks. They made rounds from house to house and everyone had to try and guess who was hiding behind the mask. We had such a good time! At school we always prepared a play about Ester, Haman and Mordecai.

I also liked Tu bi-Shevat. On Fruitas 1 my mother sewed satin purses for all sisters, brothers, cousins and children of our friends, which she filled with different fruits. In fact, this is the New Year of the trees. I remember that on the eve of Tu bi-Shevat my father took me to the yard and made me listen to the whispers of the trees. He told me that they were just about to blossom and were talking to each other, because this was their holiday. At that time there were kinds of fruit, which our children nowadays have never seen. For example, there was a fruit called 'roshkovi'. It looks like the fruit of the acacia - long brown pods with seeds inside. They were dry, but very tasty. There was quite a lot of fruit on the table on that holiday. We also brought out home-preserved fruit in jars, which we had prepared in the fall.

One week before Pesach we cleaned the whole house so that not a single breadcrumb could be found. We even ate in the yard the day before Pesach. We had different dishes for Pesach, which we kept in a separate cabinet, which we took out only on the holiday. Afterwards we washed it and put it back. There was no matzah produced then. We bought special bread from the bakery, made without salt and yeast - boyos [similar to matzah]. It was prepared in small loaves, which were very hard and my mother heated them over steam to make them softer. My sister-in-law, Liza, Sabetay's wife, didn't observe the tradition and ate bread at home during Pesach, which annoyed my father. We celebrated Pesach in the traditional way. We observed all the traditions and read the Haggadah aloud on Pesach. On seder my father and sometimes my brothers read the Haggadah and we sang songs. There was a tradition to dress up for the holiday or buy new clothes. We rarely invited guests on Pesach. This is a family holiday and we gathered only with our closest relatives. On Sabbath my mom lit the candles. We always had supper together. My father went to the synagogue, but the others didn't. Mother rarely went to the synagogue. My father blessed the children. On Saturdays the Turkish girl, who looked after me, helped us with the household work.

On Yom Kippur we all kept 'taanit' [fast in Hebrew], but it wasn't obligatory for us children, because we usually couldn't bear to stay hungry all day. We had dinner early and then we went to the synagogue. When we returned the tradition didn't allow us to light the lamp ourselves and so a Turkish child came to light it for us and later to put it out. Now this sounds strange and even a little funny, but we observed it very strictly. On Yom Kippur all the children were very happy, because we were left without anyone to look after us. All the grown-ups were in the synagogue and we did whatever we wanted to. We were also released from school on that day. We, the Jewish children, were rather privileged, because we celebrated both the Jewish and the Christian holidays, that is, we were let out of school on both holidays. We played all day long! Since the day my father died, I have fasted in his honor on every single Yom Kippur, because he died on Yom Kippur.

On Rosh Hashanah our parents didn't always buy us new clothes. Usually they bought us shoes. We cooked traditional dishes - chicken, a cake with walnuts - tishpishti. Another holiday, which was my favorite, was Sukkot. This is the holiday of the harvest. The yard of the synagogue was large and every year we made a tent out of canvas and small boards. We hung different fruit and vegetables from its ceiling - grapes, apples, pears, peppers, onion, garlic and everything that the Earth and the trees gave us. It was very beautiful! There were benches inside, on which the men sat and they often read the prayers there. Afterwards they treated themselves to some mastika 2, bread, goat cheese, yellow cheese and grapes. We, the children, played outside and very often the more naughty boys pricked their fathers' backs from outside with needles and the men scolded us. Now we also make a sukkah in the yard of the synagogue in Sofia, but this time we, the women, also enter it. It was different when I was a child. There was overgrown grass in the yard in the synagogue in Karnobat and after the prayers each child picked some grass and gave it to his or her father. He took it, sprinkled the head of the child with it and said, 'May you grow up like the grass!'

On Chanukkah the Jews in Karnobat always lit candles and sang songs. Usually we made halva 3 then. Here, in Sofia and in Western Bulgaria as a whole, the halva is made from flour, while in southeastern Bulgaria it is made from semolina.

Our house was very comfortable, with one floor. My father didn't build it himself, but bought it when he went to live in Karnobat. We had a large glazed foyer, three rooms, a summer and winter kitchen.

There was always a big baking tin full of fruit on the table in the kitchen. We had a big garden where we grew fruit trees - cherries, morello cherries, peaches and many other things. This garden was the pride of my father. We all worked in it and we liked being in it very much, even if there was a lot of work to be done there. I remember many summer evenings when all the family was gathered at the table under the vine; there was laughter and there were games. There was also a big well in the yard, because there was no water in Karnobat at that time - only later the problem was fixed with water being supplied from the Kamchiya dam. We carried drinking water from a water fountain in the center of the town and this was the most tiresome work that I sometimes had to do.

When I was young, a Turkish girl, Mirem, looked after me. I learned Turkish from her, which I spoke very well, although later I forgot it. She learned Ladino from us - the language in which we spoke at home. My father sheltered her, because she was an orphan and in turn she looked after me, although she was only ten years old. She was like a sister to me and we were together the whole day. My father had even promised her that he would introduce her to some boy and if she liked him, he would marry her and prepare a dowry for her. But one day she eloped.

We knew many Turkish people in Karnobat, because they lived near us. I remember a Turkish woman who was a famous fortune-teller. She was really a phenomenon and was also right many times. My sister-in-law Liza, Sabetay's wife, had a wonderful ring with a diamond but she had the habit of taking it off when washing her hands. But once when she took it off, she forgot it and the ring disappeared. They blamed a Turkish girl, who helped them with the household work, but she denied it. Then my sister went to the fortune- teller and she was told that the ring was in the house and some day they would find it. And they really did find it one day when the roof broke down. When they climbed up to fix it, they found the ring there. It was impossible for a person to throw it up there, because although the house had only one floor it was very tall. We decided that maybe some magpie had stolen it, attracted by its glow. That same woman also told my brother where to find an overcoat he was looking for. She told him that it was a beige coat and that he would find it buried under a lot of things. And this is exactly what happened!

My mother did almost all the household work at home. My sisters, of course, helped her, but most of them were married and lived elsewhere with their families. They didn't call her 'mom', because they were almost the same age as her, so they called her by her name. When she came to my father's house, she couldn't cook at all and my sisters laughed at her, but gradually she became an excellent cook. My sons still remember her dishes. I learned many Jewish dishes from her and passed many Sephardi recipes to my daughter-in- law. Some of them are: 'apio' - an hors d'oeuvre of celery and carrots, 'agristada' - white chicken meat with white sauce and gumbo, 'albondigitas con merengena' - veal meatballs with eggplant, 'pastel' - meat pastry, 'borecas' - cheese pastries, 'boicos' - cheese crackers, 'bormoelos' - made of matzah for Pesach, 'roskitas de alhashu' - sweets, 'the ears of Haman' - sweets for Purim, 'leche papeada' - condensed milk, 'friticas de prasa' - leek balls. We ate only kosher in my father's house. The chazzan slaughtered the animals. We all did the shopping from the Hali [covered market]. Everyone had their favorite butcher, from whom they bought meat and the kosher meat was marked with a purple seal. Most shops in Karnobat were small grocer's shops. Meat was sold in the Hali. There were also shops for dairy products, where you could buy yogurt that was so thick that it had to be cut with a knife and everyone went there with a baking dish to put it in.

My school years

When I was seven years old and it was time for me to go to school, they enrolled me in the Jewish school in the town. There was one class in each grade - from first to fourth grade. We studied in two rooms, two classes in a room. We were around ten children in a class, the boys and the girls studied together, but in high school the boys studied separately from the girls. While the teacher taught one of the classes, the other students did written exercises. Our teacher was a young woman of Jewish origin from Kazanlak. Several years later, I don't remember when exactly, the school was closed because there weren't enough children there. This was also the time when the laws against us were adopted [see Law for the Protection of the Nation] 4. All of us, the children who had studied in that school, had excellent marks later in high school. I remember many of my friends then - Sarah Konfino, Nora Konfino, who was my 'milk sister', because my mother suckled her too; Rashelina, Mari Behar, Benji, Miko and many others. Both the girls and the boys played together. We, the girls, played boys' games too. My father would often scold me for that.

In the winter we went sledding and I put on baggy trousers, so that I wouldn't have to wear a skirt - all the girls wore skirts then. We often organized something like 'evening parties' in the schoolyard and I played folk dances until late with my Jewish friends and with my Bulgarian friends too when I was in high school. I know all kinds of Bulgarian folk dances and I love them very much. We also organized plays in an improvised theatre. Once we acted out some script in which the beloved of a young man was shot and was all covered in blood. The man was carrying her in his hands and cursing the murderer. But since I, in the role of the woman, was all covered with red paint, the older women who knew me thought that something bad had happened to me and started crying out loud and lamenting my death: 'Negra dea de Matika la matoron. Esta entera en sangre.' [In Ladino: Poor Matika, she is dead. She is all covered in blood.] And I was saying to them, 'Keep quiet, I'm alright' and couldn't stop laughing. So the play was a comedy for some and a tragedy for others. I also very much loved the celebrations of 24th May 5, when we played Bulgarian folk dances on the square until late.

During the holidays we often went to Bankya with Liza, the wife of my brother Sabetay. She went there to have her sick heart treated. I mostly loved the weekends when we went to Bourgas [a port town at the Black Sea coast]. We caught the train which passed through Karnobat at 6am and in an hour we were in Bourgas. It's a very nice town, where we used to go sunbathing. We spent the whole day there and we returned with the last train. Sometimes during the holidays I also went to Sofia to visit my maternal grandmother Ester, who I loved very much, because she indulged my every whim. She lived with her son Jacques in the Krasna Poliana living estate. She was a very lean and small woman with light blue eyes. Her husband, my mother's father, left for Palestine and never returned. We never received any news from him and we don't know what happened to him. My mother, who was the oldest child, had to work to support the family. There was a rumor going around that my grandfather married an Arab woman in Palestine, but we never found out if it was true. I don't know why he left. Since then my grandmother lived at my uncle's home in Sofia. Grandma Ester died in 1942.

My happy and easygoing childhood ended on the day when my father died. He had developed diabetes and after a long and painful battle with it, died of a shock to his brain. I was very close to him and mourned his death deeply. I was only 15 years old and I was left without the man who always protected me. Then my brother Sabetay took up that role. He wanted to send me to a tailoring school. There was no high school in Karnobat then and I had to go to study in Bourgas or in Sliven or in Kotel. However, I stood up against my brother's decision to become a seamstress.

I applied to the high school in Bourgas, but all the classes were already full and I had to go to a high school in Kotel. I gathered my luggage and went there. I was very scared and disappointed when I saw my classmates, because they were children expelled from other schools in Bulgaria and I soon found out that I wouldn't be able to learn much. I wanted to go home very much. Fortunately, soon after that I learned that a high school had been opened in Karnobat and without any hesitation I returned to my hometown. I was the only Jew in the class, but I became friends with the other children very quickly. We wore uniforms, black overalls, white collars or black skirts and white shirts and berets. We also had a number on the sleeve. Even nowadays I keep in touch with some of my high school friends. We were a very united class.

My favorite classes were Bulgarian and French. I had problems only in zoology, or to be more precise, with the zoology teacher. Apparently, he didn't like Jews, because he often insulted me and gave me bad grades. My homeroom teacher advised me to request to be examined in zoology by a commission at the end of the year. In this way I got an excellent grade. The other teachers were very nice and we felt very close to them. Until some years ago one of my teachers was still alive and we telephoned each other from time to time. Even nowadays my friend Vaska and I keep in touch through letters.

At that time I was also a member of Hashomer Hatzair 6, the Jewish youth organization. We spoke only in Hebrew during our meetings and I learned the language there. We often went to a hut near Karnobat, where we spent some days playing and having fun. We often played the following game: We had to find an object that had been hidden by someone. The person who hid it directed us by giving us hints, which we tried to figure out. I learned the Morse code then. I suppose that our games were similar to those of the present-day scout organizations.

When I was 19 years old, I graduated from high school and was appointed a teacher in the Jewish elementary school in Karnobat. I taught four classes and ran from room to room. It wasn't easy, but it was very pleasant. However, I didn't teach for long. The school was closed, because there were too few children. I no longer had a job and I realized that there was nothing more for me to do in Karnobat. I decided to go to Sofia and to continue with my studies. I rented an apartment there with the money my mother had put aside for me and enrolled in a six-month course in accounting and typewriting. After I finished it, I started looking for a job by searching the ads in the newspaper. I was turned down in four or five places and realized that it wouldn't be easy for me to find a job. The war [WWII] was about to start and when the employers heard my name they sent me away because of my Jewish origin. I worked for a while in a pharmaceutical laboratory, where I was appointed by my brother Jacque's father-in-law. I lived in Sofia for a few months more, but when the laws against the Jews were adopted as part of the Law for the Protection of the Nation, I realized that it would be better if I was closer to home, and I returned to Karnobat.

The times were very troubled then. People were wondering whether we would be sent to work in Poland. My mother had sewn rucksacks for each of us, so that we could put the most necessary things in them if we had to leave. Some months after that I met my future husband. I met him by accident in Karnobat. He was working in a neighboring village and a mutual friend introduced us. We got engaged three days after we were introduced to each other. He charmed me with his sense of humor, his intellect and his interesting stories about his family and his life.

My husband

My husband, Salvator Marko Israel, was born on 2nd April 1908 in Plovdiv in the family of the respected merchant Marko Israel and the Hungarian Sephardi Jew 7 Leontin Demayo, who had lived in Budapest and Vienna before the marriage. They met in Vienna on one of Marko's business trips, married and Leontin came to Bulgaria.

My husband had five sisters - Rashel, Sarika, Rene, Elizabeth and Hanika, who died very young. The others went to live in Israel after the war and later Elizabeth moved to the USA with her husband, who was a German Jew. Their children Kamea and Mickey also live there. I didn't meet my mother-in- law Leontin, because she died young, but I know that my husband was very attached to her. She was very nice, respected and beautiful woman. I know from my husband that his grandfather, whose name I don't remember, was a very good man. He was very religious and lived some time in Jerusalem, but he returned to Bulgaria, I don't know why. He loved his grandchildren very much. His daughter-in-law Leontin, the mother of my husband, looked after him and tried to please him so much that she often washed his long beard thoroughly.

Rene got married to Iosif Israel, who was a first cousin of hers, the son of her father's brother. Everyone was against their marriage, but they did it at the cost of not having any children, because of the blood relationship between them. My husband's father, Marko Israel, was a very strict man, but he wasn't able to prevent their marriage. When they lived in Bulgaria, Iosif was a very respected lawyer.

After World War II Rene, Iosif and Sarika went to live in Israel. Sarika worked in some kind of ministry but I don't know exactly which. She was very well educated and knew many languages. One year later, after they had moved to Israel, Iosif got paralyzed after a heart attack. Sarika and Rene devoted their lives to look after him. Both sisters and Iosif lived together. Rene had a pharmacy on the first floor of her house and so she could work and look after Iosif, who was bedridden until the end of his life.

Rashel also went to live in Israel after World War II, in 1948. Rashel's husband is Solomon Perets. They have two daughters, Lunchy and Hanika.

Their family had a wonderful house in the center of Plovdiv, which has been demolished. Salvator went to study in France, Montpelier, and graduated in Paris as a medical doctor. He lived in France for ten years and after he graduated, he became an assistant in the university. Then he had to go back to Bulgaria, because he could not support himself. On his return in 1938, he worked for a while in the state hospital in Plovdiv and then opened his own medical practice where he worked until 1941. That year he was mobilized as a district physician and later as a municipal physician in Karnobat during the war. That is how we met. In 1942 we married in Karnobat.

During the war

During the war [WWII] there were no clothes to be bought in the shops. I was young and wanted to dress as a bride according to the traditions. I borrowed a dress from a friend, and the groom also borrowed a friend's suit. We looked quite funny. Salvator had hemmed the trousers, because they were too long and the bowler hat, which belonged to his father, was also too big for him. Two days before the wedding my brother invited relatives and friends. On the wedding day we left from the house of my sister Ana, which was close to the synagogue and we were accompanied by some Turkish and Roma people from the nearby neighborhood, who knew us. After the ritual in the synagogue we gathered in Sabetay's house. It was summer, June, and we celebrated in the yard. We had a marvelous time.

The next day we went to the village Nevestino where my husband worked as a physician. This was our honeymoon. The people there welcomed us very warmly, but they didn't like me at first. They thought I was ill, because I was very thin and pale and villagers generally think that healthy people should be more plump and ruddy. Gradually, they took to me and loved me very much. We also had a wedding celebration there. There was a Turkish woman who was a very good cook and had prepared two enormous baking tins with baklava and we treated the whole village for the occasion. They gave us a lot of presents. It was a wonderful day, from which I keep some very dear memories. The celebration in the village seemed to me even warmer than that in Karnobat.

My name and my husband's name were changed twice during the war. They wanted to give us names, which sounded different from the Bulgarian ones so that everyone would know that we were Jews. First, on 29th December 1941 I became Meshulam, instead of Meshulamova as I was registered. The second time, on 14th April 1943 I was renamed to Mazaltof Sabetay Meshulam. After the war I regained my real name, Matilda Meshulam Israel [nee Yulzari].

Our life in Nevestino was relatively calm. The village was located at the foot of Stara Planina Mountain. There was a fountain in the center of the village, from which we all collected water. There were no wells in the yards. The streets were covered with gravel and there were no lamps. There was a big school with a yard in the center, in which sometimes the young gathered and danced folk dances. The municipality was in the neighboring village. I remember that once we were invited to the neighboring village, together with our teacher. When it became 9pm, one of the guests stood up and said that my husband and I should leave, in order to keep the curfew. At that time, in accordance with the Law for the Protection of the Nation, the Jews weren't allowed to go out after 9pm. Then, out of solidarity with us, all the guests left with us. I will never forget this gesture. Such acts kept our spirit up during the hard years, because they convinced us that there were people who sympathized with the Jews and found the laws against us unfair.

My brothers and all Jewish men were sent to labor camps [see forced labor camps in Bulgaria] 8 and many people from the capital were interned in 1942 [see Internment of Jews in Bulgaria] 9. Even my brother Haim wasn't able to come to our wedding, because he was sent to a labor camp. Some Jews were accommodated in Karnobat. I remember that my sister Ana shared her house in Karnobat with six other families. Three families were living in one of the rooms in Ana's house, hanging sheets from the ceiling to have some privacy. They didn't work and had no money. They had free lunch prepared for them every day. [Editor's note: The Jews interned to small towns throughout Bulgaria usually lived with Bulgarian families, but the authorities in Karnobat decided to accommodate them in Jewish houses, as Karnobat had a higher than average number of Jews.] My husband was also sent to work as a physician in Svishtov [a small town on the Danube]. At first I wasn't allowed to leave with him, but after four months of writing requests to different ministries, they allowed me to accompany him. I didn't feel the humiliating force of the yellow star in Svishtov. The people were very kind to us in Svishtov. We often listened to Radio London at our neighbors' place - the Finance Minister Ivan Stefanov and his wife. Our landlords were also very nice people. I felt absolutely at home there. We lived in Svishtov until 31st December 1942 when my husband was sent to Gorna Oryahovitsa [a small town in central Bulgaria]. We left Svishtov right away.

We arrived in that unfriendly town at nine thirty on the frosty evening, on the eve of the New Year. These were our hardest five months away from home. During the war my husband worked as a physician, replacing various physicians in different towns in Bulgaria, who had been mobilized. My husband's mobilization was civilian. Thus, we were moved to towns where a physician was needed. In every town we found accommodation until we received the next appointment for the next town. But we had to sleep in a hotel, until we found an apartment to rent. On seeing our yellow stars, the hotel managers and landlords in Gorna Oryahovitsa shut their doors in our face. They cursed at us and swore at us. But at last we found a place to spend the night. In the morning we found an apartment to rent; unfortunately the landlord turned out to be an anti-Semite and we had to leave soon. After the end of the war my husband met the hotel manager who refused to let us in the first night, because of our yellow stars. He was in prison, because he had committed many offences during the war and he was ready to fall down on his knees in front of my husband, who was an influential man then, to beg him to save him from prison. Didn't that man have any dignity?

Fortunately, after some time in Gorna Oryahovitsa I met a man by chance, who was also a mobilized Jew. He was a tobacco expert and we went to live in the house of his landlady, an old teacher. The house was on the outskirts of the town. Our landlords were nice people. I remember that we lived on the second floor of the house and to go up we had to climb some wooden stairs. We had only one mattress full of hay and when we turned from side to side, it would rustle noisily. We often went out walking along the road to Arbanasi, a nearby village with a monastery. I didn't go out of town at all, since once a couple of children hit me and threatened me. My landlady did the shopping. I wasn't allowed even to go to the town bath, because I was told that I wouldn't be able to wear my yellow star if I took my clothes off. During those five months I only went out during the evening walks.

In June 1942 we were moved to Strazhitsa [in central Bulgaria], where we lived much more calmly. There we were however harassed by three people, who had united against us - a criminal, who had escaped from a prison in London, the pharmacist and a priest, who rode a motor bicycle. They paid a lot of money to people who hunted partisans and they themselves did everything possible to turn them over to the authorities. When my husband would go to buy something from the chemist's for the clinic, they always confronted him and bothered him without any pretext. Maybe the fact that he was a Jew was enough for them. I advised him to keep silent, because they were just looking for a reason to beat him up.

We were still there when 9th September 1944 10 came around and we were allowed to take off our stars. On 8th September, we waited for the Russian army. On their arrival, they managed to convince the military police force to surrender without a fight. The whole village was at the square. They welcomed the soldiers with fruit and bread. My husband was even mayor of the town for 48 hours. He was a respectable person in Strazhitsa as a doctor who helped the underground antifascist movement between the years 1941-1944. After the antifascists took control he was asked to be the mayor of the town until the official elections could be organized.

During the war my brothers were sent to labor camps and my sisters remained at their homes without any means to earn money. My husband and I observed the Jewish traditions during the war, as far as it was possible during a war. The synagogue in Karnobat was turned into a cattle-shed then.

Post-war

After the war ended, we returned to Karnobat, where my husband worked as head of the district medical center until 1950. Meanwhile, our two sons were born - Marcel, in Plovdiv in 1945 and Michel, in Karnobat in 1948. After Marcel was born, I studied as an assistant pharmacist for two years and right after I graduated, I was appointed to work in the chemist's in Karnobat. In 1950 we moved to Sofia and bought the apartment where my sister lived. My husband started work in the Health Ministry as the director of the epidemic department. He liked his job very much. During the Doctors' Plot 11, all Jews in the ministry were fired, Salvator included. This was a very hard blow for him. He started work as a deputy editor-in- charge of the 'Zdraven Front' [Health Front] newspaper. Then he worked in the Social Health department of the ISQMD [Institute for Specialization and Qualification of Medical Doctors]. He became an associate professor in Hebrew studies in the Balkan Studies Institute at the Bulgarian Academy of Science and taught history of medicine. He has more than 500 publications. He created a consulting office for health workers, which still exists today.

In Sofia I started work in the Infectious and Parasitic Diseases Institute as a laboratory assistant, but I had to study more to be eligible for the position, so I studied two years for the necessary qualification. The work was very interesting. We worked in a research lab and ran tests on people from all parts of the country. I very much wanted to study for a university degree, but it was impossible. We already had two children whom I had to look after and we had to pay installments for the apartment, in which I still live today. I worked in the institute as a laboratory assistant until I retired in 1978. In the beginning we had to share the apartment with some other people. It was large, with three rooms, but we were too many people living in it and it wasn't big enough. A family with one child was living in one of the rooms and a woman with tuberculosis in the other. We, the five of us, including my mother, lived in one room and it was horrible! There was no place to put the beds and we slept on mattresses on the floor. We never felt at home. We lived that way for 13 years - finally, one of the families bought an apartment, the other moved out and we had the whole apartment to ourselves.

After the war ended, our friends were mostly Bulgarians. Although my husband was very busy, we still found some time for our friends. We often went out with Sasha and Vera Popovi. Sasha was a conductor with the Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra. We were also friends with Petko and Jana Drenikovi, who were also musicians, Dr. Konstantinov, Dr. Daskalov - brother of Jana Drenikova, who are also well-known musicians. The Jewish families with which we kept in touch were those of my bosses in the institute, with whom we gradually became friends. They were Dr. Azarya Polikarov and Dr. Roza Cohen - they were both microbiologists. I was also on close terms with my colleagues in the institute.

I mostly regret not moving to Israel. All my relatives and my whole family live there. My mother, who lived with us in Sofia until she died in 1974, also wanted very much to go there, but Salvator believed that his place was here and I couldn't convince him that we would live a better life there. I went there for the first time in 1958 with my younger son. We traveled by the ship 'Georgi Dimitrov' from Varna [the largest port town in Bulgaria]. There was not much fruit in Israel then. My relatives had asked me to bring them some walnuts, almonds, flat sausages. I traveled with four enormous suitcases. There were 120 people aboard the ship. When we arrived in Haifa, I was amazed; I had never expected to see so many people waiting. I was met by my husband's sister Sarika.

I traveled to a lot of towns in Israel then - Rehovot, Ramla, Tel Aviv, Yafo and others. I have traveled to Israel numerous times. When my husband's sisters were alive, I visited them. After that I stayed at the house of my brother Haim. I know Hebrew [Ivrit] well and I feel very comfortable there. I have traveled a lot with my husband; we have been almost everywhere in Europe, we also visited his sister Elizabeth in the USA. She had sent us an invitation and bought us airplane tickets. I often accompanied my husband at conferences on the history of medicine. We also went to Oswiencim [Auschwitz] in Poland, where all the relatives of my husband's mother died.

My children

We tried to educate our children in the spirit of the Jewish traditions. Neither I, nor my husband is religious, but we still chose to observe the traditions. I believe that Jewish traditions are a real treasure to everyone who respects them and observes them, without going to extremes. We celebrated all holidays. Salvator - or Daddy as we all called him, myself included - always read the prayers. We celebrated at home and didn't go to the synagogue. On Sabbath my mother lit the candles and later on I did. My mother cleaned the house on Thursday, cooked on Friday and Saturday was a day for rest. We didn't go to work then.

When the children were little, they loved Tu bi-Shevat very much. I made them purses with various fresh and dry fruits, in which they groped as if they were bottomless and their contents - priceless. Marcel ate everything right away, but Michel preserved his fruits and ate them gradually, until his brother asked him to share them 'like brothers'. Now I make such purses for my granddaughters, who are no longer little children, but are still very happy to receive them. After the death of my husband, Marcel read the prayers. When he was young, in 1975, he went to study in Yeshiva in Israel for six months, where he learned both Hebrew and many rituals. Our sons learned Ladino. At first Michel refused to speak Ladino, but then they both started speaking it. Unlike my childhood years when many people gathered during the holidays, Salvator and I always celebrated the holidays at home with the children.

After Salvator retired in 1974, he became chairman of the Spiritual Council in the synagogue. He started the process of its restoration. At the Ministry of Culture they told him that they would provide money for the restoration, only if the synagogue was turned into a concert hall. My husband objected and fought very hard to prevent this. In the end, he managed to preserve the original functions of the synagogue. While he held that position, he managed to attract many Jews to the synagogue. All the elderly Jewish men went to the services. He was the first to build a sukkah in its yard on Sukkot. He also used to prepare a short essay explaining the origins of each holiday. He knew the Bible in great detail. This tradition to write a brochure explaining the history of the holiday is still preserved today.

In 1978 my husband received the honorary title 'Honored Doctor' and in 1983 he received the title 'A People's Doctor'. Salvator died on 8th March 1986. He was an exceptional man - well read, wise, with a great sense of humor. He knew seven languages. His mother tongues were Ladino and German; he also spoke Hebrew, French and Russian very well. Now the restoration process is almost completely finished and if he could see it, he would be very happy and proud. We organized a religious funeral for him. There were many people present. First we gathered in the ritual hall, then we buried him in the Jewish cemetery in Sofia. We observed the main traditions - we covered the coffin with a special blanket and my older son Marcel said the prayer. In line with the ritual we served only salty food at the funeral and mastika. At least this is what I remember, because I wasn't myself that day.

Our older son, Marcel, was a very self-willed and silent child. He invested a lot of effort in everything he did and achieved what he set out to do. He read a lot. When he was reading for an exam, we did well not to bother him. My other son, Michel, was very mischievous. He had a lot of poor marks in the first grades, but later he found out what interested him. He also achieved a lot, but more easily than his brother. He took his exams without anyone noticing him studying. Their teachers still remember them. They graduated from School No. 1, which wasn't in the Jewish neighborhood, because there wasn't a Jewish school in Sofia. School No. 1 was a very good school then and was near our home.

As children they quarreled a lot, but now, as adults, they are very good friends and very close to each other. Marcel was so stubborn, that I remember how once he cried for three days because his father didn't allow him to study in a technical school, but wanted to send him to a language high school. Later he sat for an exam to go to study in Germany, he passed the exam and left without even telling us, because his father and I were somewhere abroad at that time. So Marcel graduated as an engineer in Germany. He worked for a while in the Institute for Computing Machinery and then in the Robotics Institute at the Bulgarian Academy of Science. In 1990 he left to work in Spain, in Madrid and he still lives there now. He is not married.

Our other son, Michel, earned a degree in physics, then in biology and now works in the Health Center. He is an associate professor, member of the World Health Organization and teaches medical physics in Sofia University. He has a nice family. He has a wife Sultana, who is not a Jew, and they have two daughters, Matilda and Leontina. We didn't object to the fact that our daughter-in-law wasn't a Jew. We saw that she was a good girl and they loved each other and have a wonderful family. Our daughter-in-law learned to observe the Jewish traditions together with us. Their older daughter, Matilda has been living in Israel for four years now, which makes me very happy and unfortunately a little worried because of the events taking place there now.

Although our family is small, it is a very moving moment when all the family gathers on Pesach - Marcel comes from Spain and Matilda from Israel. Since Marcel has no children of his own, he is very close to his brother's children and loves them like his own. They are also very attached to him. Both my sons have friends, some of whom are Jews and others who are not.

My only relatives in Bulgaria are the children of Miko (Haim) Israel, the cousin of my husband. He was a teacher of Russian. He has two sons, Berto and Sami. Berto in turn has two sons, Albi and Borko, while Sami has one son, Haim, and both live in the USA. Unfortunately we don't see each other very often, but we do get to meet sometimes during family holidays.

After 1989 life in Bulgaria became very insecure and hard for the young as well as very unfavorable for the retired people. I've never been very interested in politics. This was not true of my husband, however, who was a member of the Communist Party. Before the changes I could afford to travel, to go on holidays, but now it is impossible without the help of my sons and the Jewish organization. Life is very tragic for the old people, who don't receive support or help from anywhere. On the other hand, the events of 1989 [see 10th November 1989] 12 gave people the opportunity to be freer and more responsible. Now life in the Jewish community is thriving, while before we were denied of almost everything and we had to invest a lot of efforts and diplomacy in everything we wanted to achieve. Now we receive a lot of financial aid from Jewish organizations and foundations and we have the opportunity to pursue various activities in the Jewish Center, which has been brought back to life.

My present-day life

Nowadays the Jewish community in Bulgaria and especially in Sofia seems to me very united. Every time I go to the Bet Am 13, I feel warmth, which cannot be described with words. There is something interesting to do there every day and something to be learned. When I feel well, I always visit the groups teaching Hebrew, Ladino, the health club, 'Golden Age' club and others. In the summer we often go to excursions to different places in Bulgaria. I found many friends in the Jewish home and have a very good time there. My closest friends are Viska Kamhi, Reni Tadjer, Sarah Luna, Mati Asael, Mati Pilosof, but there are many others. Every day we have an organized lunch in the canteen. The food is prepared in the senior Jewish home in Sofia ['Home of the Parent']. The food is kosher and is transported to OJB Shalom 14 where we go to eat, paying just a small sum. At noon I go to the Jewish Center, where lunch is organized for the old people. The food there is delicious and I also get to meet my friends. I don't live far from the Jewish Center. There are some Jewish women living in the neighboring apartment blocks with whom I keep in touch.

I live relatively close to the Jewish home and when I feel well I go there. It is very pleasant, because while having lunch, I meet with my best friends. Various actors often come to visit us, especially those performing in a theater called '199', who staged performances for us a couple of times. Twice a week we gather in the mornings in the health club. We do some gymnastics and dance Jewish dances. Sometimes we also dance Bulgarian dances, but I'm no longer young and unfortunately I cannot dance for long. At the end of each month we celebrate the birthdays of all those who had one during the month. Everybody brings something for a treat and we have a very good time. In the evenings we often go to exhibitions or concerts. They also invite interesting people to hold lectures. We have had the chance to listen to Valeri Petrov [penname of Valeri Nissim Mevorah, one the most renowned contemporary poets of Bulgaria], Angel Vagenshtain 15, politicians, musicians, employees in the Israeli Embassy and others.

Glossary

Kurt Kotouc
Prague
Czech Republic
Interviewer: Pavla Neuner
Date of interview: October 2004

Kurt Kotouc lives in a small apartment in Prague, in a pleasant neighborhood close to the city centre. Mr Kotouc is a very elegant and friendly gentleman who comes across as being calm and well-read. We did the interview in a room where one wall was covered in books; the focus of many of the volumes was visual art.

Family background 
Growing up 
During the War
After the War
Glossary 

Family background

My grandfather's name on my father's side was Leopold Kotouc. He didn't come from a Jewish family. He made his living as a miner. He met my grandmother in Oslavany, which is a village not far from Brno - it was known for its coal mines and that's where he would commute to work. In those days, miners didn't belong to the proletariat the way they were later made out to be in socialist literature. In reality, he was employed and had a salary, so it's very probable that he was grandmother's equal partner. [He was up to the social level of his wife.] I mean, we are not talking about being rich or anything. I didn't know my grandfather at all; he died in Oslavany in the 1930s.

My grandmother on my father's side was named Johana Maria Kotoucova, born Hanslova in 1862 in Oslavany. Her father was Salamon Hansl. My grandmother was from a Jewish family but a non-religious Jewish family, and she herself was not religious. My grandmother was an ordinary woman. After the death of her husband, she moved to Brno with her daughter. I loved her, but my contact with her was minimal. I remember her as a withdrawn woman, with illnesses appropriate to her age. I think she didn't have any siblings.

My grandfather on my mother's side was named Alois Sensky. He was from Ivancice, which is a small town in Southern Moravia, where there used to be a Jewish settlement and where you can find a beautiful, romantic Jewish cemetery, which is also interesting because it isn't flat but spreads into a hill. Grandpa had a secondary school education. He lived in Mohelno with Grandma. At that time, it was a pretty big Czech village with about two thousand inhabitants. Grandpa had a shop with mixed goods; they sold groceries and sweets but also whips, shoes and hoses. I remember how once someone came, who needed shoes. Grandpa put this person's foot on a piece of paper and traced it to get the size. Then he brought the shoes back from Trebic, where he would travel to buy goods. There was an old, rickety bus that would go from Mohelno to Kralice, which was where the nearest railway was. When Grandpa would travel to get the goods he would take the rack wagon with him.

In the village, it worked that tradesmen served people for penny profits. Goods were sold on holidays and during the work week. The difference was that, during the holidays, the store was formally closed, but if someone really needed something, they would come to the back. I remember once we were sitting down to have Sunday lunch and suddenly we heard banging on the back door. Grandpa was irritated that someone was interrupting his lunch but he got up and gave them the goods they needed. There was a great deal of discipline in the family, Grandpa was a stern man but also an honest man.

Grandpa was an educated person and for many years he acted as the school alderman on the local town council where he was in charge of education. Twice he was even elected mayor of the village. People would come to Grandpa when they needed help with a request. When Grandpa wrote a letter, especially in German, it could be considered a graphic piece because he used handwritten runic lettering [gothic script of the German language] different from classic Latin script. It was an example of his elegant and cultured expression.

Grandpa had a brother named Jakub and I think a brother called Simon as well. This branch of the Sensky family also had a store with mixed goods; it was the second shop with mixed goods in Mohelno. Jakub took a non-Jewish woman for his wife and together they had many children and most of them married non-Jewish partners, so they were spared the Holocaust. Only Jakub's daughter Cili married a Jewish man. Together they had a son named Felix, who was deported to Terezin 1 and then to Auschwitz. By some kind of miracle Felix survived. Jakub died before the war even began.

Granddad died in Mohelno in 1934 and is buried in the Jewish cemetery in Ivancice.

My grandmother on my mother's side was named Josefina Senska [nee Steckerlova] and was born in Miroslav in 1875. Miroslav was a large village in the border region of Southern Moravia where the largest population was the German minority. [Editor's note: Prior to the creation of the Czechoslovak state (1918), Moravia was a province of Austria within the Austro-Hungarian double monarchy. The German population became a minority later, within Czechoslovakia; at the time Mr. Kotouc is describing they were an integral part of the German-Austrian majority.] The history of Miroslav dates back into the 13th century during which time a Jewish community settled near the original medieval settlement. So, one of the oldest settlements in this region is the Jewish one. In Miroslav there used to be a yeshivah and a synagogue. In 1938 the Germans took over Miroslav, just as they did the Sudetenland 2 and they chased out all the non-German inhabitants - the Jewish people being the first to go. From my childhood, I remember there was a Jewish street that led to the synagogue. Miroslav was close to the German border [in fact it is near the Austrian border] and is better known under the German name Misslitz.

Grandma came from the Steckerl family. Although she spoke Czech fluently, same as Grandpa, her mother tongue was German. My grandparents lived with the consciousness that a Jewish tradition existed but it was not accompanied by any rituals. They were religious and I think that they probably went to the synagogue for the high holidays. However, they didn't cook kosher food at home.

Grandma had a younger sister, Elsa, who was born in 1890. She was not married. She was transported to Terezin in 1942 and two years later she was killed in Auschwitz. In Terezin she acted as a nurse, so she had some sort of secondary school with a health practice orientation. Grandma also had a brother named Karel and I know that he was in the Austro-Hungarian [KuK] army 3 in World War I and that he was schooled as a butcher. Somehow, under circumstances that I'm not aware of, he escaped the Nazis through Austria and then to London.

My father was named Otto Kotouc and was born in Oslavany in 1895. Dad probably studied in secondary school. It is possible that he was a trained weaver because textiles were something he really knew a lot about. He was nineteen when World War I broke out in 1914, and so he entered the Austro- Hungarian army. I'm not exactly sure where he served but he got shot in the foot on the Italian front 4. He didn't talk about the war very much. After marrying my mother, they moved to Brno where dad engaged in textile trade. In Brno there were many textile factories producing a great deal of textile waste that could be further processed. My father would buy the leftovers and do just that. The leftovers were unwoven and processed differently, depending on what kind of textile it was. He wasn't particularly successful in his trade; I know at one time the company fell apart completely. I think he was trying to assert himself.

My mom's name was Stella Kotoucova, born Senska in Mohelno in 1902. Although she did not go to university, she was a very educated woman in her day. After elementary school she attended a secondary school for women, which was a German school in Brno, where she learned subjects ranging from maths and Czech to cooking. After marrying my dad, she stayed at home, but she helped him with the company.

My mom had four siblings: her brothers were Hugo, Bedrich and Hanus, her sister was named Greta. My aunt Greta was born in Mohelno in 1910. My aunt was known as a woman of great beauty and she had many suitors but she stayed single. One of my teachers was interested in her and so I had special status at school thanks to that. Aunt Greta had an offer for marriage from a rich furrier from Brno who was named Piowaty. He wanted her to marry him and he told her that he had already arranged everything, that together they would go to Canada and that there they would live beautifully. But my aunt couldn't abandon her mother and so she stayed and perished in [Lublin] concentration camp.

Hugo was born in Mohelno in 1896. He went to Miroslav for training; Grandpa probably wanted him to take his place. In Miroslav, Hugo fell in love with a certain young woman who came from a very wealthy family. He gave her gifts, bought her jewels and worshipped her. Unfortunately, he bought things that he didn't have the money for and he would borrow the money from the business where he was in training. And then he had no way of paying them back. He was afraid to admit it, so he shot himself. This all happened before World War I.

Bedrich was born in Mohelno in 1899 and went to university and became a construction engineer. He was sort of an adventurous type. When World War I started he was an officer in the Austro-Hungarian army. During the war he became ill with malaria and all his hair fell out and then he didn't have a single hair on his entire body. He always made jokes about it, he said it was the reason he was so socially successful because wherever he came everyone noticed him thanks to his bald head. As a construction engineer, he went to Slovakia after the war where he fell in love with a bigoted Catholic named Katka [diminutive of the Hungarian name Katalin]. Bedrich was so clever that even though Katka was of a strict upbringing he started to go out with her, which her family had no intention of supporting.

Katka was from Southern Slovakia, from the town of Modry Kamen, near the border with Hungary; she was from a wealthy country family. For them he was a nothing - just a poor engineer and a Jew on top of it. In the end, they married at the beginning of World War II. They had two children together and lived in Banska Bystrica. She remained Catholic and went to church regularly. My uncle wouldn't be baptized but it worked for them. When the deportations began in 1944, my uncle hid at his friends' in the mountains. After the communist take-over [February 1948] 5, the situation with her parents totally changed. They went from being rich farmers to kulaks 6, who had everything taken away. Bedrich died in 1967 and Katka died recently.

Hanus was born in 1910 in Mohelno. He finished textile industrial secondary school and became an expert on textile. His wife was a Sudeten German named Margareta; thanks to her he wasn't transported to Terezin before 1945. Together they had a son named Petr who was born in 1939. In 1948 they emigrated. Hanus was a fairly well-known textile expert and two British businessmen, who bought textile equipment in Bohemia and wanted to start up production in Rhodesia [today Zimbabwe], turned to him with the request to choose reliable equipment and mediate the sale. Then they told him that they would like to take him on board. My uncle was afraid that it wouldn't be possible because after the communist take-over no one could leave the country freely. They told my uncle: 'look here, they are interested in us because we are buying equipment and because they will have other orders with us.' In a flash he arranged passports and travel permits for Hanus, Margareta and my cousin to travel out of the country. Hanus and his family then moved to Rhodesia and my uncle became the manager of a textile company and later became independent. However, Rhodesia became the totalitarian state of Zimbabwe and they chased out the white people and took their land and property. In 1966 my uncle died and my aunt moved to London to be with her son, Petr. Petr already had a son there, whose name is Tomy and who is a professor in London today. Petr died a year ago [2003].

My father had a sister named Marie; she was born in 1890. During the 1930s my grandpa died and Grandma and my aunt Marie moved from Oslavany to Brno. They lived together and they both helped my father: he would always bring textile to a storage space and they would unweave it. I remember that the last storage space that he had was in a shack that was in the courtyard of a house on Bratislavska Street. I loved my aunt very much and she loved me; I was a spoiled good-looking child, like out of the movies. She was crazy about me and kept wanting to give me something and talk to me. She had some sort of a hormonal problem; she was overweight as a result. Probably because of it, she never married. So she didn't have her own family and as a result she was closer to my father. She was friends with my mom. Marie wasn't religious at all.

Growing up

My brother Hanus was born in 1924 in Brno. Before the war he studied at an industrial secondary school, but he finished his last two years after the war. My brother still managed to have a bar mitzvah that our relatives, the Steckerls, organized in Miroslav.

Brno was the second city after Prague. There were about three hundred thousand inhabitants. Almost a third of those were the German minority which was not noticeable up until 1938. I wasn't conscious of the Czech- German relations issue up until that time. As a child, the crazy German national consciousness took me by complete surprise; it came across in long white socks and leather pants among other things [Austro-German folk wear, later abused by the Nazis]. All in all, old Brno was an industrial city with many textile factories.

I'm not able to say how strong the Jewish community was in Brno. There were about three synagogues there. A Jewish life existed there but it was assimilated and on a non-religious basis. I never met a person there with side-locks and in caftans. I remember the cafe Esplanade, which was known to be a 'Jewish' cafe. Our family didn't partake in Jewish community life at all. As a child I didn't have any great consciousness of Judaism. That came in 1940 when restrictions were put into place. Up until that time, I can't say that I experienced any anti-Semitism. I didn't go to the synagogue regularly, only my parents did during the high holidays and mostly because of our relatives. We didn't uphold the holidays at home and we didn't cook kosher. Our parents didn't raise us in a Jewish way. My father was of Jewish origin on his mother's side but he wasn't religious at all; my mother was the same. My mom knew how to write Hebrew a little; she learned it during her childhood. If my parents upheld any traditions, it was out of respect for their parents. At home we celebrated Christmas: we had a Christmas tree, gifts and everything else that is part of it.

I think we lived in relative poverty. We lived in an old rental unit in a two-bedroom apartment with a kitchen, a hall and without a bathroom. There was a little garden and gazebo that we also rented. In the apartment, everything was very basic, primitive almost. I remember as a small child my mother bathed me in the kitchen in a basin. My brother and I shared one small room: we each had our own bed and my father's typewriter and desk was also in our room. My mother and father were next-door in the other small room. They had a bed, a night table, an old dresser and mom's vanity table. When we had guests, we received them in the kitchen. In the kitchen we cooked on a stove; we heated the apartment with coal or wood that we would bring up from the basement. We had cold running water and electricity. In the room we had wooden floors and in the kitchen there were wooden boards on the floor. The walls were also painted crudely. My parents were both from the countryside, they were new to the city and so they were adjusting to city life. It can't be said that we had a painting of value or any kind of art in the apartment.

Given to the large German minority in Brno it was very important to have a strong command of the German language. My parents not only spoke German well; they spoke it just as well as they spoke Czech. When my father was writing business letters, he wrote in Czech or in German, depending on what company he was dealing with. My parents had their office at home and when my father dictated a business letter to my mother, I could hear him switching easily between Czech and German. Given the nature of my father's business he had many friends and acquaintances. Relatives would also come for visits at our place. My parents never divided people into Jews and non- Jews.

I attended a Czech general school in Brno on Mendlovo Square. A significant part of the school was made up of the sons of the proletariat. School attendance was, of course, mandatory. The parents of Roma or circus performers got around the attendance law by sending their kids to school at the end of the school year, so that their child would receive a report card. Perhaps they were getting 5 [the worst grade] or they failed but on paper it was proof of attendance. [Editor's note: They were occasional performers visiting Brno and they had no constant residence. This is why their children were often left out from school.] I remember a grotesque scene where a circus performer came to school and he chased the teacher with a whip because the teacher didn't want to give his son a report card.

At school, there were very few Jews. We were an exception; we didn't have to go to the religious classes with everyone else. I remember in the fourth or fifth grade, there was a young and elegant Catholic religion teacher. Once he called me and asked me to come to his place for a visit. He lived in a Jesuit convent; it was a real experience for me because the Jesuits were a very wealthy order. Upon entering the convent I walked through halls with high carpets and then I knocked on the teacher's door. In the room there were beautiful glass windows, a bed and a small table; everything was very elegant. And then he said, 'Listen, don't you have any books in Hebrew at home?' I answered that I didn't know. He said that he would be very interested, that he would like to read one. I came home and told my mom and she said that we didn't have any books in Hebrew. I said that I needed them for the teacher, so then I guess my mom found the book that I later took to the teacher, at my grandma's place.

In 1941 I completed elementary school and was supposed to start gymnasium [secondary school] on Na Porici Street, but it wasn't possible anymore [because of the exclusion of Jews from schools in the Protectorate] 7. I started attending the co-educational Jewish gymnasium. There were only two in the whole country: in Brno and in Prague. The Germans allowed teaching to happen but on the report cards it read: this report card is not a valid public school report card. Before the war, the school didn't have enough Jewish teachers because the Jewish community was so emancipated and assimilated. When Jewish teachers and students were forced to leave all other schools, our secondary school experienced a short renaissance. The school was the last place where many Jewish pedagogues could teach, among them was sociologist Dr. Bruno Zwicker, previously an assistant at Masaryk University in Brno, Valtr Eisinger, previously a teacher at a secondary school in Kyjov and Orlov, Otto Ungar, Arnost Gerad and others. Everything was carried out under an atmosphere of nervousness and fear, so discipline and teaching slackened. In May 1941 the Nazis took control of the building and so teaching stopped. The Jewish Community tried to keep some improvised teaching going in Valeji Street for some time. At that time, I would go to Mrs. Stefi Fiserova to learn English.

In grade five, I went to the Tatra Mountains with my elementary school. In those days, trips like that were quite rare. We had a very active teacher who organized trips. His name was Novotny and he taught Czech language and thanks to him it became a favorite subject of mine. Otherwise, I usually spent my free time with friends. In the summer, we would swim in the Svratka and in the winter we would toboggan on Kravi Mountain. We would go to a park near my apartment, back then it was called Obilnak; it was a wild place, where bushes of all kinds grew. There were all sorts of different places to climb and secret places where we would play, shoot from sling- shots or horse around in different ways. All that only until 1940.

Over the holidays, what I liked best was going to visit my grandparents in Mohelno. There were two rivers - the Jihlavka and the Oslava that ran beside the village. The nature there is romantic and beautiful. My brother would visit our relatives in Miroslav more often than me; I didn't like Miroslav as much as Mohelno. In Miroslav, there was a strict order and I didn't have the freedom to just pick up and go run around the woods. In Mohelno there was beautiful nature and I liked it there very much. Near the house, there was a fairly big garden, where there were no garden-beds but only fruit trees. After Grandpa's death Grandma moved to another small house where she lived until her deportation.

From 1939, Brno's powerful German minority began to buzz with traditional German hats and Henlein 8 organizations. Suddenly, the way to school along the Spilberg hillside became dangerous. Teens from the Hitlerjugend 9 waited for us there and our only defense was humiliating: all we could do was run away. It wouldn't be more than an adventure, if we, Jewish children, could share these experiences with our non-Jewish friends - as a shared fate. But we had to give up our friendships and start new ones with other Jewish boys out of self-protection; we had to exchange friendships that came naturally for friendships that arose from being the condemned. I remember going to visit a friend. His mother opened the door a crack and said, 'He isn't home!' The same thing happened the next day. Later, some feeling inside told me that my friend was not home for me because I was a Jew. I came home and because I felt shame, I didn't even tell anyone about it.

Later, in the streets, I met my favorite teacher, who used to praise my brother Hanus and me for our good school performance. On his collar he wore the symbol of the Narodni sourucenstvi [Czech fascist organization, from 1939 - 1945 the only legal political party in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia.] and he said, 'I knew that it couldn't end differently with the Jews.' Another time a group of guys jumped me and they twisted my arm behind my back and one of them asked, 'do you know where you belong Jew?' By coincidence someone was passing by so I was let go. At home, my father warned me not to go there. I realized, with bitterness, that he couldn't help me.

During the War

In Brno the rise of Nazism and the persecution of the Jews [see Anti-Jewish laws in the Protectorate of Bohemia-Moravia] 10 was quicker than in other regions. At the end of the 1940s the Gestapo barged into our apartment for the first time. Two men were throwing the contents out of the wardrobe into the middle of the room. My mom had to put some of the things, like clothing and sweaters into a suitcase and it was sealed. One of the men, who had a vulgar expression on his face said, 'Das wird alles fur die NSDAP gut sein! Wir sind nicht eure republikanische Polizei.' [German: This will all be good for the NSDAP. We are not your republican police.] The next day my dad had to go with the suitcases to the law faculty building which had been converted into the headquarters of Brno's Gestapo. We lived through two days of anxiety, but my dad came back that time, even with the things that had been confiscated. It was a stroke of luck: the Gestapo administrator had served on the front with my dad during World War I and so for this reason, he let my dad return home.

Soon afterwards, we had to leave our apartment on Falkensteiner Street. In 1941, we were forced to move into a three-room housing unit, near Koliste Park in Brno, with two other Jewish families. I can still see a colorful kaleidoscope of the inhabitants of the building, stuffed together into a small space, made even smaller by a bunch of useless objects that their owners were unable to part with. It was a grotesquely diverse group of people who kept tripping over one another in a Kafka-like environment, but they wanted to maintain their pride, at least to the outer world. This apartment was also taken over by the Gestapo in August of 1941. In panic, I threw the butter that my parents had gone to a lot of trouble to acquire, out the window. Our room was the furthest removed, so the voices of the commando traveled to us and then the scene from Falkensteiner Street repeated itself. During this raid, both my parents and also the Weinsteins, immigrants from Vienna, were brought to the Gestapo.

The Weinsteins returned from the interrogation later and were silent about what had happened. Our parents were put into jail: my father was sent to the Kounic Hall 11 and my mother was sent to the jail at Cejl. By strange coincidence, we had a chance to see my father for a few seconds a couple of times after that. It was permitted to bring clean laundry into the residence once a week. During one of these times, my brother saw my father in the window of the building. So then we would regularly try and walk by there at the same time of day and my father sometimes did look out of the glass window. However, after a short period of time, my parents were deported to concentration camps. In 1942, they were both murdered in Auschwitz; my mother was in Ravensbruck 12 before this.

At that time, my brother and I didn't know about the death of our parents. Basically, we stayed alone, I was twelve and my brother was seventeen. Of our relatives, only my father's mother and sister lived in Brno, but grandma was over eighty and my aunt was chronically ill. They were both quite powerless. In 1942 they were murdered in Treblinka and Rejowiec [Poland]. We received a permit to move to our family in Mohelno. I was looking forward to escaping the scary atmosphere of Brno but in Mohelno it was no better. We hardly went out on the streets: in the village, our fate was that much more uncommon and visible and the yellow star on our clothing that much more humiliating. We were included in the transport leaving from Trebic. In May 1942, a family friend, a farmer named Rudolf Mohelsky took myself, my grandma, my aunt, my brother and our 50 kg baggage by horse- drawn carriage to Trebic. It was a beautiful spring day. At the Trebic school they transformed the transport of people into camp numbers. In the train we were with Grandma Josefina and Aunt Greta together for the last time, because after our arrival in Terezin we were separated at the so- called sluice. [Sluice: from the German word Schleusse. That is what the place where the transports were received and checked out was called.] We didn't even know when they dragged them out further east. They were murdered in the concentration camps in Auschwitz and Lublin in 1942.

In Terezin I was placed in Sudeten barracks; my brother was elsewhere. We were not allowed to leave the barracks and walk freely in the streets until 6th July 1942. [The civilian population left Terezin at the beginning of July 1942 and then the whole city became a ghetto.] For me it was a very bad time because I didn't have anyone there, I didn't know anyone and I knew nothing about my parents, my brother, my grandma or my aunt. I remember when the barracks were opened I ran out of the gates with a whole mob of people and everyone was looking for their relatives.

Gradually, my brother worked in a number of locations. At one time, he worked in the disinfection squad where he used very dangerous gas; I think it was called Ventox. For some time he worked in a kitchen as a helper and so at least he could eat a little better.

The Jewish self government starting organizing life in the ghetto and I was lucky because I got into building L-417. It was in a Terezin school building where there were ten boys' 'heims' [homes in German]. Each home had its own room, its own caretaker, who we called 'madrich' [leader in Hebrew], its own number and its own name. I was in number one. The dozen boys, who were all around thirteen, who came together at number one created a specific social group that was different from the other units in the building. The reason for its specific character was the age difference. With the exception of home number five, we were the only ones who were coming of age. At the beginning of the occupation we were too grown up to be able to lock ourselves into the microcosm of children. Actually, all these events sped up the process of growing up, at least psychologically and spiritually. We witnessed our homes being uprooted and our parents' powerlessness. Marked with stars and transport numbers, in quarantine and in sluice, we saw the fall of conventions, the fragility and impermanence of human relationships, selflessness and selfishness, we listened to the heavy breathing of the dying and to the breathing of couples making love.

That is the state our madrich, Valtr Eisinger, got us in. He himself was also quite young: he was twenty-nine years old. He was a talented teacher who was just starting out. He was given the opportunity to test his abilities, live out his ideals about life and the world. He had so much to do to take care of himself and on top of it he wanted to help us. We loved his confidence and his certainty in that unpredictable ghetto world. Eisinger didn't question surviving but announced, 'after the war, I will try for a doctorate.' He was close to us, that is why we could and wanted to follow the example of our great teacher who spoke about the philosophy of Ghandi, translated poetry, played soccer, moved into the dorms with us, sang in the opera 'Prodana nevesta' [The Bartered Bride, opera by Czech composer Bedrich Smetana] and loved his wife Vera from Terezin. Awareness of our common fate and Eisinger's personality allowed us to create a social atmosphere that made no difference between an orphan and the son of a scientist.

We called our group 'Republika Skid.' The name came from Eisinger who told us about the Russian book 'Republika Skid' that he liked very much. [Boys literature, by Belych, Grigoriy Georgiyevich and Panteleev, Alexei Ivanovich, 1927.] We were all taken by this and we wanted to be Skids. In brief a Skid comes from the 'Skola Imeni Dostoyevskovo' [school called after Dostoyevsky], a school for the homeless kids in post-revolution St. Petersburg [orphanage]. A Skid was secret. Although a symbol of our home hung on our wall Eisinger told us to explain this title to strangers as 'Skola I. domov' [school in house number one]. We were therefore a republic and had our own leadership, which was established on a festive Friday night on 18th December 1942. We were each given duties and responsibilities that corresponded with our interests and abilities. The members of the group were elected to different functions and at one time I acted as the chairman. A notable characteristic of Skid was that it was a collective where each person found their place.

One of Eisinger's strongest characteristics was his sense of tolerance. He himself firmly believed in a new, socially just way of organizing the world, but he didn't require us to mechanically take on his beliefs. In contrast, he said at our age it would be too early for us to have a set opinion, first he thought it was important to experience and know many things. His opinion came across in his practice; the diverse lectures in our home were a good example. People with all sorts of opinions visited us. For Eisinger it was dangerous to organize this kind of upbringing in a concentration camp [ghetto], with a flag, a group hymn and even a magazine that we produced. Back then, we didn't understand that; for us it was an adventure and it gave us the illusion of freedom.

The magazine Vedem 13 was exclusively the domain of us, the boys. Professor Eisinger only wrote introductions and sometimes he contributed with a translation from Russian. On Friday night we would always sit around the table, or on the bunks and each person who had written something that week would read their contribution. The magazine was not publicized in any other way than during these Friday night session. For two whole years, we 'put out' our magazine each Friday thanks to the leadership of our editor, Petr Ginz. Petr was great for this work, he had all the right predispositions; he had brought them from home, from Prague. He was an extremely intelligent boy. He was a year older than us. He even had experience editing a magazine, I think from the time when he studied in Prague. He spent all his time working on the magazine, all week, day after day he worked on the latest issue. It was hard work, especially when he handwrote all the contributions that he had gotten in any way he possibly could. He would make a fuss and he would try to appeal to our consciences but sometimes he wrote the entire issue himself under different names to save the situation. I would try and get contributions from the boys and sometimes from the adults; here and there I wrote something and took care of organizational details. The magazine reflected many of the personalities in Terezin and house number one became a well-known place in the ghetto. That is why different, noted guests would come to us: people like Karel Polacek 14, Norbert Fryd, Hans Adler and different personalities like that, who would come lecture or come and chat about something with us. Petr was a really great guy. I can still see him sitting on his bunk with his legs under him, working away on something. Petr was dragged away to Auschwitz in September 1944 where he died in the gas chamber.

On a regular day at L-417, forty boys would go do different work around the ghetto. They were chosen from the homes where the oldest boys lived: homes one and five. I myself began going to work in 1943. It wasn't particularly hard work; usually we worked in the vegetable garden in the barricades around Terezin. At least we had a little bit of nature there. We were supervised by one Jewish gardener, a very sympathetic young man, who we called Manci; I think his real name was Manuel. Occasionally, we were allowed to steal a tomato or a kohlrabi. The special thing about the group who worked in the garden was that to go to work we had to walk through a few hundred meters on 'free land', if that is what you can call the streets of the Protectorate [of Bohemia and Moravia] 15.

The wake up call was at six or seven in the morning, then we washed under cold water, cleaned the living quarters, and divided the daily duties: that is cleaning the rooms, the halls, the WC and the courtyard. Then we had breakfast and roll call. All the members of the homes gathered on the steps and the leader of L-417, Otik Klein, outlined the daily plan. Then the teaching began that all the children in the building attended. The teaching happened in the individual homes, but because of lack of space it mostly occurred in the attic, where it was also less likely that we would be barged in on by the SS. Wherever we were taught, one boy was always on guard duty. Each class was prepared to immediately start doing something different, like cleaning, in case the SS came to check up on us.

Of the eight or ten teachers, only two or three were trained teachers. We didn't have any resources and often children of very different ages and from different educational backgrounds were put together in the same classes. None the less, the teachers tried to establish some kind of system and they would consult each other at teacher meetings. They taught for about three or four hours a day. To this day, I still remember math, history and geography. Hebrew was not 'mandatory.' The system wasn't only about the teaching, but also about the day to day living of the boys with the teachers and caretakers. I realized how effective it had been after coming back from the concentration camp: I found myself in a normal school and actually, I was not behind at all.

We would go to lunch with a mug where one had to wait in a line in front of the kitchen in the Hamburg barracks. Afterwards we reviewed the material we had learned in the morning but without the teachers. Real free time started in the late afternoon before supper, between four and six. Some of the kids had their parents or other relatives in Terezin and so they would go visit them during this time. After supper, the homes became separate worlds, where the children would entertain themselves differently, depending on their age and their caretakers' abilities. We, the older ones, would stay up later. We even got to see the famous Terezin attic performances: cabaret, theater recitals and concerts.

I also remember expeditions, where after dark we would go to steal coal. Once I almost paid for it dearly because I couldn't crawl back out of some basement. 'Lights out' was at ten but we chatted after that until even the hardiest fell asleep. Those were magical moments, when the lights were out and we spoke to each other from the bunks. Eisinger was a great storyteller, we could have listened to him talk for hours. It is important to explain that it was unusual for a caretaker to live in the home. The caretakers had their own room in L-417. Just the fact that Eisinger decided to really live like one of us says more about him than words can ever say.

My brother and I were in Terezin until October 1944, until a series of transports practically wiped out the ghetto. My brother was deported at the beginning of October and my deportation ensued a few days later. I think there were seven transports and they went quickly one after the other. We didn't know where we were going at all, first the train headed west to Dresden but there it turned east. It probably went in a zig zag fashion because in the freight car some prisoner from the transport before us wrote in pencil 'to Auschwitz.' In Auschwitz-Birkenau, where 1,500 of us came to, most people went directly from the train into the gas chambers. Back then we didn't know what it was all about, but somehow I knew that I should group myself with people who were stronger. When we came to the ramp in Auschwitz, the prison camp guards jumped into the trains that they called 'Kanada' and they started taking our baggage. There was a young guy among them and I refused to give him my things. And he asked me, 'Wie alt bist du?' [German: How old are you?]. I told him I was fifteen or sixteen. And he advised me, 'Musst sagen du bist achtzehn!' [German: You have to say that you are eighteen!]. When I stepped out on the ramp, no one asked me for my age, but I tried to stick to the group of prisoners who were physically stronger, who then went to the camp together.

When we entered the premise, the crematoriums were operating and the wind blew the smoke from the chimneys at us. We marched to our appointed building, which took a while because we had to go through the disinfection room where they shaved us and poured some kind of solution on us. As they led us, I saw Jirka Zappner behind the wires; he also used to be in home number one in Terezin. He waved at me when he saw me. Otherwise, I was in Birkenau by myself. When we came to our building at the camp we had our 'greeting' right away. There our kapo [the word kapo was probably introduced into Dachau by Italian workers in the 1930s. During WWII, in popular language, kapo became a generic term for all inmate (prisoner) functionaries.] 'greeted us' with the words: 'Damit ihr wisst, wo ihr seid. Ihr seid in Auschwitz! Bei uns stinken die Toten nicht!' and at the same time he pointed at the chimneys. [German: So that you know where you are, you are in Auschwitz! Here the dead don't stink!] He was a terrible person. For Auschwitz it was typical that the positions were filled by career criminals and after being in the camps for such a long time they deformed into sadistic beings. This creature beat a prisoner to death on the second day, under the guise that the prisoner had taken an extra portion of food. Some assistant kapos held the prisoner on a bench and he beat him with a cane, until he totally exhausted himself, he was heaving and his veins were popping out, as he gave the blows.

The days in Birkenau were indescribable. There wasn't anything to eat; it was so bad that people picked potato peels out of the mud. You couldn't sleep, because the wooden house was so full that you had to lie on your hip. People were crammed together on each level of the bunks. If we were not going to do some kind of work we were ever on guard. Drills and commands and constantly standing on guard in the harsh, cold weather were worse than the work in Birkenau.

Near the end of 1944, it became more common to pick prisoners for labor in Birkenau. The German industry was doing so badly that they needed slaves. In one of these rounds, some civilians came: they were engineers and representatives of German factories. We were told to stand guard and all the metal trade people were ordered to identify themselves. At that point I already knew that the only way to save myself was to get out any way that I could. But we also all knew that it was very dangerous to pretend that a person had a specific trade. If they found out it wasn't true, it cost you your life. But I had no other chance so I stepped out of the row and identified myself. The civilians accompanied by the SS walked through our row and asked each person who had stepped out to say what they were. I said that I was an electrician. One of the factory representatives looked at the other and said: 'isn't he a bit young?' The other one just waved his hand, and by miracle I got into one of the transports leaving Birkenau for work.

We were deported to the labor camp Niederorschel in Western Germany. [Niederorschel is in Thuringen province, today Eastern Germany.] The camp was near the city of Kassel and fell under the jurisdiction of the camp Buchenwald 16. It was a long journey. We were so crowded together in the cattle-cars that we could only stand. One prisoner made a nervous movement with his hand during the inspection. He was told to step out and was shot on the spot. There were a number of victims in the train, some people were not able to stand on their feet for entire hours, without water and without sanitation.

In Niederorschel there was an airplane factory, Junkers, where we worked riveting aircraft wings. The so-called 'Aussenkommando Niederorschel' had existed a few months before our arrival and about seven hundred prisoners from a number of countries worked there: Poland, Hungary, Romania, Holland, France. My co-worker was even from Riga, and there were also German anti- fascists there and some Russians. But about 80 percent of the people there were Jewish. I had a pneumatic hammer, which I used to put rivets through tin. A more experienced prisoner hammered the rivets from the other side using a hammer and an iron bar. The work was directed by German bosses. I can't say there was any close contact, but I was lucky to have a decent boss; his name was Andreas Schroter. He was an older, graying person. On Christmas he brought a piece of Christmas cake for two of us prisoners who he supervised.

Looking back, it can be said that Niederorschel was a hard camp, but back then, after Birkenau, I felt like I had been re-born there. Death was not so at hand: that a person would see the smoke from the crematoriums and would constantly be waiting to be called upon for selection and sent to be gassed. We lived in an old building that had been a textile factory from which we would walk down a long, narrow corridor lined with a wire. It was cold and there wasn't enough clothing for the prisoners. They didn't heat the factory. I found a paper bag from cement somewhere and crammed it under my prison clothing to warm myself up a bit. Each week, we received three cigarettes and about twice they poured a little beer into our mugs. Today, it seems laughable, but for those three cigarettes I always got a piece of bread from one German soldier. The SS guarded the factory exits and soldiers led us to and from work through the corridors. Inside, we were guarded by civilians, employees of Junkers, some of them were adamant Nazis.

In Buchenwald, German political prisoners acted as the kapos which was a contrast to Birkenau where these functions were performed by various criminals and horrible individuals. So in Buchenwald there was a certain mutual order that was maintained. The kapos supported the prisoners to work out things amongst themselves. They ensured a certain order of things. A source of news was our kapo Otto Herrmann and his two assistants. He was from Halle an der Saale and he had been deported to the ghetto right at the beginning of Hitler's reign. The German political prisoners managed to maintain a degree of self-esteem in relation to the SS officers and sometimes they even got away with quite a lot. In his 'office' Otto Hessman had hung up a map of Europe that had been published in some German newspaper. Even though the SS would go to him, he kept tabs of the front on his map.

Once I was going along the hall and he walked out and saw me. As a kapo he was not short of food. He asked me, 'Willst du Suppe?' [German: Would you like soup?] and in his hands he held a bowl full of soup. Of course I wanted it and I got it. He added, 'Musst nicht auswaschen!' [German: You don't need to wash it!] I thought that he was saying it as an act of kindness but there was a different reason. Later, I understood that he didn't want anyone to know that he gave his soup to someone, because the kapos had their bowls washed in the kitchen. I realized it at the moment when I brought him the washed bowl and he got angry at me.

We worked in the factory until the end of March 1945. Near the end, work was often interrupted because the German economy was not working anymore. Earlier, the wings had been transported elsewhere, where they put them together with other airplane parts, but because transport was not working, it was no longer possible. The wings started to pile up beside the factory and they started to send us to do other work, so our conditions worsened as a result. With the accompaniment of the SS, we started going into the forest for wood. We had to dig out tree roots from the frozen ground and we did other work in the woods for which there just wasn't enough labor force to do. We experienced a great deal of cold and hunger. When we were accompanied to work by some of the milder SS officers, we would look around, and when we saw a piece of beet that had been forgotten in the field, we dug it out from the ground and ate the frozen beet. I will never forget how once, when we were working in the forest, a middle aged woman came to us, a German woman. None of us knew her and she brought us a big pot of boiled potatoes. For me it was a big experience, not only because of the food alone, but because Mr. Schroter, with that piece of Christmas cake and decent behavior, and this woman restored my idea of the Germans. They convinced me that among the Germans there are good, non-violent people, because a person needed a lot of courage to do what they had done.

In March 1945, the western front came close to the camp; you could hear the rumbling and the gunfire. The leader of the camp tried to cover it up. Once, at roll call, he noticed that the rumbling was getting attention. He announced that they were blowing up rock in a quarry. At another roll call he said' 'Ihr denkt, wir haben den Krieg verloren. Aber da irrt ihr euch. Und wenn, dann werdet ihr das nicht erleben!' [German: You think that we have lost the war, but you are mistaken. Even if we do, you will not live to see it.] He almost managed it because following that, we were sent to the central camps in Buchenwald, on one of the notorious death marches. That was the second day in April 1945. We were unexpectedly called upon. Shortly before that, I had had leather shoes. They were completely beat up, they leaked and my feet were freezing in them. So I exchanged them for wooden clogs in the storage because at least those did not leak. That was my bad luck, because I had to do the whole march in wooden clogs. The march was long and cruel and I hardly survived it. My feet stopped serving me: the sole didn't bend on those wooden clogs, so I was limping from the last of my strength. I just pulled myself along and wasn't aware of what was happening around me. We marched at night and during the day and we would rest in old barns. It was because American planes were appearing in the sky more and more often and the danger of an airplane attack became more and more likely, and the SS were clearly afraid of that. Also, at night the civilian population couldn't observe us.

The march took seven or eight days. Whenever we stopped to rest in some old barn or building, I would take off the clogs and look at my battered feet. In this desperate situation, we would look at processed wheat stalks to see if there was one grain, so that we could at least swallow something. The German soldiers knew that the war had been lost and so they just walked in silence. We got to Buchenwald, where right the next day, we were liberated by the American army. Later I found out that the Americans circled the whole of Buchenwald, which was located on a hill, before they came up to the camp. For a short while, shooting could be heard, the Germans surrendered and suddenly we saw the first jeep with a crew of one driver, two soldiers and one woman.

After the War

I didn't get back to Czechoslovakia until June, when buses started arriving to pick up the prisoners. Although I was very much looking forward to seeing the place of my birth, Brno, at the same time I thought that I wouldn't find any of my family members alive. After my return, I found out that my brother was alive and I traveled to Mohelno, to my mother's birthplace, to rejoin him. My brother had gone from Auschwitz to the work camp Gleiwitz 17 in southern Poland. It was a camp where they repaired damaged wagons and had been under the jurisdiction of Auschwitz. He survived there until the end of the war. In Brno we got an apartment left behind by a Hitler supporter who had run away. My brother finished his studies that he had started before the war at the chemical industrial secondary school. We had to live modestly but we were young.

In 1948 my brother immigrated to Germany. Although I knew that he had been thinking about emigration, I had no idea when it would actually happen. Then I got a greeting card from Germany, from him. Hanus wanted to go out into the world and he wanted to get away from the place where we had experienced so much horror. The communist turn-over motivated him even more. At that time, I hadn't even thought of emigrating; my goal was to finish my secondary school education. Another reason why I didn't emigrate was that Valtr Eisinger had significantly influenced me in Terezin and so I didn't see the communist regime as a threat but more as a promise of something better. I had certain ideals and I really believed that the socialist regime would bring the solutions to the main problems people were facing.

When he first left Germany, Hanus was in a refugee camp. Then a Brazilian businessman came through, who bought and sold seeds, and my brother got an offer to work for his company. He got a permit to move to Brazil. Until all the permits were worked out, he worked as a waiter and did other odd jobs in Brazil. After a few years, he became independent, set up an office and began doing business with construction ceramics. He married and lives in Rio de Janeiro. Unfortunately, his wife died, but he has a large family: three sons and grandchildren. As an immigrant he couldn't come for a visit and so we saw each other again after a long forty years, once I received a permit to travel abroad.

In 1949, I completed Industrial Art School in Brno, and I did various jobs. First, I was at the Institute of Regional Planning where I helped with the graphic design of maps. I wrote articles about art exhibits and thanks to that I got work at the Brno House of Art where I had opportunities to meet artists and organize exhibits. From 1958, I worked in the Centre for Trade Art in Brno. In 1963, I re-located to Prague to work in the head office of the Centre for Trade Art. The last twenty years I've worked in the National Gallery in Prague preparing art catalogues and posters.

I married for the first time in 1951. My first wife had gone to the same secondary school. She wasn't Jewish and it didn't matter. At the beginning of the 1950s two sons were born, Jirka and Dan. When I moved to Prague, we divorced but I stayed in close contact with my family. My younger son, Dan, unfortunately died of cancer at the age of thirty-four. He was single. In the second half of the 1960s I married again, but the marriage only lasted until the beginning of the 1970s. My second wife worked as a journalist in CTK [Ceska Tiskova Kancelar, Czech press agency]. My older son, Jirka, lives in Brno, he completed university and at the current time he is an engineer and has an electronics company. He is single.

I became a member of the Communist Party [of Czechoslovakia] 18 right after returning from the concentration camp. Gradually, I began to lose trust in the regime and in the end I even thought of emigration, but I already had a family and it wasn't so easy. The trials of the 1950s [Slansky trial] 19 and their open anti-Semitism were shocking and sobering for me. One had to remain cautious because to openly distance oneself from the regime could cause a serious threat to one's existence. After the war, anti-Semitism was evident even in official politics. Concrete instances of anti-Semitism directed at me personally only came on a few occasions. During the trials I was working for the Brno House of Art. At that time I was at the army base, doing mandatory military service. After my return from the army, my friends told me that in the Brno House of Art there was some doorman or caretaker saying that I was a suspicious individual, perhaps an anti-state collaborator. He was a totally illiterate primitive and I'm convinced that his motivation was because I was Jewish. After the war, I didn't draw attention to the fact that I was Jewish, but I didn't deny it either. The Holocaust and the concentration camp awoke a consciousness about the Jewish fate in me. But I didn't think that this made me different from other people; being Jewish was simply a question of my fate.

About a hundred or a hundred and ten boys went through house number one in Terezin and of those about ten survived the Holocaust. Zdenek Taussig brought the magazine Vedem from Terezin to Prague; he was the only one from the entire 'Heim' who had stayed in Terezin the whole time. His father was a blacksmith in Terezin and he was the only one capable of re-shoeing a horse. Zdenek lived with him in the blacksmithery; they converted the coal storage room into a place to sleep. After returning to Prague, he passed the magazine on to my friend from house number one, Jirka Brady, who gave the material to me when he emigrated in 1948. Life went differently than we had dreamed.

The anti-Semitism that came after February prevented us from publishing our youthful literary attempts from Terezin. With the Prague Spring 20 of 1968, Zdenek Ornest and I were playing with the idea of putting together a book that would contain at least some fraction of the eight-hundred pages of the magazine. We were hesitant. With some detachment we had to choose the best prose and poems, of which all spoke to us in the intimate voices of our childhood friends. That is why we were glad to cooperate with Marie Rut Krizkova who is a literary historian. During the normalization period she was a dissident and Charter 77 21 spokeswoman. A publishing house accepted our book in 1971. A year later, we closed a deal and put together a publication of the Terezin Memorial and the Severoceske publishing house. The final draft of the book called 'Je moji vlasti hradba ghett?' [We Are Children Just the Same] was refused by Dr. Vaclav Kral, who in his strange judgment managed to connect the publishing of children's prose with the 'aggression of Israel against the Arab world.'

In 1968, we had the goal of turning our building in Terezin into a museum of the ghetto, but those in charge of normalization created a monstrous museum SNB [short for Statni narodni bezpecnost, police during communist regime] and revolutionary traditions of the Northern Czech lands. Oto Ornest, Zdenek's brother, tried to smuggle the book across the border but the whole matter ended up in court because they caught Oto at the border. I was incredibly afraid, because before they caught him, we had met on a number of occasions: I had given him manuscripts to be sent abroad and I had supported this project financially. When he later got in front of the court, he only said what he had to and he didn't give away me or any other participants. He was sentenced, the procurator said that sending literary contributions across the border was a threat to our society. Thanks to the care of Marie Rut Krizkova the manuscript was published in 1978 as a samizdat 22. The response to the first edition led to a second edition at the end of the 1980s; again it was written on a type-writer in a different format. It was shown like this in 1990 at the Frankfurt Book Fair.

I was expelled from the communist party after the Prague Spring. At that time, I was working at the National Gallery in Prague, where I worked in uncertainty because I wasn't a member of the Party. I was the director of the print section, which bothered one director who constantly emphasized that I shouldn't be allowed to continue in my function. In the end, I managed to hang in there, in part because the National Gallery was directed by Jiri Kotalik. Many people reproach him for cooperating with the regime because he remained diplomatic with party and state representatives. Otherwise, they wouldn't have kept him there but at the same time, he allowed the National Gallery to work with certain people who would otherwise have been politically unacceptable. That in itself is notable because at that time, it was difficult to employ someone who had been expelled or written off by the party to a position that was not manual labor.

I managed to stay in my job but I was constantly living in doubt. After I divorced for the second time, I shared an apartment with a man who was a traffic police officer. Once, early in the morning, his friends came to visit him and they were in uniform. I was lying in my room and I could see the movement of the uniforms through the frosted glass on my door and in my sleepiness, I was sure that they had come for me. But other people experienced much worse things. Because of my work at the National Gallery, I didn't have a great deal of free time. I liked to travel and I was one of the lucky people who because of various exhibits got to go abroad. I retired in 1987.

In 1989 there was so much happening in Europe that there was reason to believe that it would come here too, although in earlier years I didn't hope that I would live to see it. I was incredibly thrilled about November [see Velvet Revolution] 23, I even participated in the famous student march from Albertov [the march was stopped at Narodni Avenue with brutal police intervention]. Since then my life has changed completely, even though the change-over reached me at a time when I was an older person. When I was of an active age, I was lucky to be able to do work that I enjoyed. From this point of view, it was a beautiful time. However, the feeling that came with the return of a democratic regime meant a lot of things to me. After 1989, I visited America, Israel and Canada. I visited Israel as a delegate of the Terezin Initiative 24.

An exhibition about the literature of the prisoners was created as part of the Terezin Memorial, I contributed to it with Marie Krizkova. Recently, we prepared a traveling exhibit about the magazine Vedem. I also worked in the Terezin Initiative that was founded in 1990. The initiative publishes its own magazine and played a large role in the creation of the Terezin Memorial. The initiative has done and continues to do very good work and was a key player in the battle for compensation that I also received. Like many survivors, I didn't tell my children much about the concentration camps. This is because, a person who went through a concentration camp lived through the complete devastation of a human's character and that is an extremely humiliating experience. When the book 'Je moji vlasti hradba ghett?' came out in 1995 my son read it and found out many things that he knew nothing about before that.

Many people are disappointed with the post-November developments, but I am not. I'm a sceptic thanks to my lifetime experiences, and so I didn't paint some kind of a rosy future. Right at the beginning of the new regime, I didn't assume that things would develop the way people imagined that they would. The difficulties that we face today leave me indifferent. We live in freedom, we travel abroad, as we want to, we can read freely, talk and do everything that a person wants to do and I see that as a really important thing.

Glossary

Kurt Kotouč
Praha
Česká republika
Rozhovor pořídila: Pavla Neuner
Období vzniku rozhovoru: říjen 2004

Kurt Kotouč žije v malém pražském bytě v příjemné čtvrti nedaleko centra města. Pan Kotouč je velmi elegantní a přátelský pán, který působí klidným a sečtělým dojmem. Rozhovor jsme vedli v pokoji, jehož jednu stěnu tvoří knihovna, ve které lze nalézt mnoho svazků zaměřených na výtvarné umění.

Rodina
Dětství
Za války
V Terezíně
Transport do tábora
Po válce

Rodina

Dědeček z otcovy strany se jmenoval Leopold Kotouč. Ze židovské rodiny nepocházel. Živil se jako horník. Babičku poznal v Oslavanech, což je obec nedaleko Brna, která byla známa svými uranovými doly a kam dojížděl za prací. Tenkrát horník nebyl takový proletář, jak ho později vybarvila socialistická literatura, ve skutečnosti měl zaměstnání a plat, takže je dost možné, že byl babičce rovnocenným partnerem. Nelze ovšem hovořit o bohatství. Dědečka jsem vůbec neznal, zemřel v Oslavanech ve třicátých letech.

Babička z otcovy strany se jmenovala Johana Maria Kotoučová, rozená Hanslová v roce 1862 v Oslavanech. Její otec byl Salamon Hansl. Babička pocházela sice ze židovské, ale nepobožné rodiny a sama pobožná nebyla. Babička byla obyčejná žena. Po smrti manžela se s dcerou přistěhovala do Brna. Měl jsem ji rád, ale můj kontakt s ní už byl minimální. Pamatuji si ji jako nemluvnou, do sebe uzavřenou, přiměřeně věku nemocnou paní. Myslím, že babička žádné sourozence neměla.

Dědeček z matčiny strany se jmenoval Alois Senský. Pocházel z Ivančic, což je městečko na jižní Moravě, kde bývala židovská obec a kde lze nalézt krásný romantický židovský hřbitov, který je zajímavý tím, že neleží v rovině, ale rozprostírá se do kopce. Děda měl středoškolské vzdělání. Bydleli s babičkou v Mohelnu, což tenkrát byla poměrně velká česká vesnice asi s dvěma tisícovkami obyvatel. Dědeček tu měl svůj kvelb se smíšeným zbožím, kde se prodávaly potraviny a cukroví, ale i biče, boty a hadice. Pamatuji si, jak někdo přišel, že potřebuje boty, a dědeček mu položil nohu na papír a obkreslil mu ji kvůli velikosti. Pak mu ty boty přivezl z Třebíče, kam jezdil nakupovat zboží. Z Mohelna jezdil starý rozhrkaný autobus do Kralic, kde byla nejbližší dráha. Když dědeček jezdil pro zboží, bral si žebřiňák. Na vesnici to fungovalo tak, že obchodník lidem sloužil za halířové zisky. O svátcích se prodávalo stejně jako o všední den. Rozdíl byl jen v tom, že se svátek sice formálně ctil a krám byl zavřený, ale když někdo něco nutně potřeboval, tak přišel zadem. Pamatuju si, jak jsme seděli zrovna u nedělního oběda a najednou se ozvalo bouchání na dveře a dědeček byl rozmrzelý, že ho někdo ruší u oběda, ale vstal a šel prodat potřebné zboží. V rodině panovala kázeň, děda byl přísný, ale poctivý pán.

Dědeček byl vzdělaný člověk a také celá léta dělal školského konšela v místní obecní radě, kde měl na starosti vzdělávání. Ve dvou obdobích byl dokonce zvolen starostou obce. Tenkrát se žáci v odborné škole učili psát krasopisem, kurentem, což je písmo odlišné od latinky. Dává mnoho možností kaligrafického provedení. Za dědou lidé z Mohelna chodili, když třeba potřebovali pomoc s nějakou žádostí. A dopis, zvlášť německý, který dědeček napsal kurentem, lze označit za grafické dílo. Byla to ukázka elegantního a kulturního projevu.

Dědeček měl bratra Jakuba a myslím, že ještě bratra Simona. Tato větev Senských provozovala druhý obchod se smíšeným zbožím, který v Mohelnu byl. Jakub si vzal za manželku nežidovku a měli spolu hodně dětí, z nichž většina se provdala nebo oženila s nežidovskými partnery, takže holocaustu ušli.  Pouze Jakubova dcera Cili si vybrala manžela židovského. Měli spolu syna Felixe, který byl deportován do Terezína a pak do Osvětimi. Zázrakem to všechno přežil. Jakub zemřel ještě před válkou.

Dědeček zemřel už v roce 1934 a je pohřben na židovském hřbitově v Ivančicích.

Babička z matčiny strany se jmenovala Josefina Senská a narodila se v Miroslavi v roce 1875. Miroslav byla velká  obec v pohraničí na jižní Moravě, kde převládala německá menšina. Historie Miroslavi sahá až do 13. století, kdy se tam u původního středověkého osídlení usadila židovská komunita, takže jedno z nejstarších osídlení tohoto kraje je židovské. V Miroslavi bývala ješiva i synagoga. V roce 1938 Miroslav zabrali Němci, stejně jako Sudety, a vyhnali všechno neněmecké obyvatelstvo, na prvním místě Židy. Ale z dětství si pamatuji,  že tam byla celá židovská ulice, kterou přišlo k synagoze. Miroslav ležela v německém pohraničí a je známější pod německým názvem Misslitz.

Babička pocházela z rodiny Steckerlů. Mluvila sice plynně česky, stejně jako děda, ale jejím rodným jazykem byla němčina.  Prarodiče žili ve vědomí existující židovské tradice, která ale nebyla doprovázena žádnými rituály. Byli věřící a myslím si, že asi chodili na velké svátky do synagogy. Košer se ale u nich nevařilo.

Babička měla mladší sestru Elsu, která se narodila v roce 1890. Nebyla provdaná. Přišla transportem v roce 1942 do Terezína a o dva roky později byla zavražděna v Osvětimi. Elsa se v Terezíně uplatnila jako zdravotní sestra, takže měla asi nějakou střední zdravotní školu. Pak měla babička ještě bratra Karla, o kterém vím, že byl v první světové válce v rakousko-uherské armádě a že byl vyučený řezník. Za okolností, jež neznám,  se mu podařilo  před nacisty utéct do Vídně a následně pak do Londýna.

Můj tatínek se jmenoval Otto Kotouč, narodil se v roce 1895 v Oslavanech. Tatínek pravděpodobně vystudoval střední školu. Je také možné, že se vyučil tkalcem, protože textilu skutečně skvěle rozuměl.  Bylo mu devatenáct let, když v roce 1914 vypukla první světová válka, takže nastoupil do rakousko-uherské armády.  Nevím, kde přesně sloužil, ale byl střelen do nohy na italské frontě. O válce příliš nemluvil. Po sňatku s maminkou se přestěhovali do Brna, kde otec obchodoval s textilem. V Brně bylo hodně textilních továren produkujících mnoho ještě zpracovatelného textilního odpadu. Můj otec tento odpad vykupoval a dále zpracovával. Textilní zbytky se rozplétaly a dále zpracovávaly podle druhu textilu. Příliš úspěšný ve svém obchodování otec nebyl, protože vím, že jednu dobu byla firma úplně zrušená. Domnívám se, že se spíš jen pokoušel uplatnit.

Maminka se jmenovala  Stella Kotoučová, rozená Senská, v Mohelnu 1902. Vysokou školu sice neměla, ale na svou dobu to byla vzdělaná žena. Maminka po obecné škole navštěvovala ještě střední dívčí školu, což byla německá škola v Brně, kde se vyučovaly předměty od matematiky a češtiny, až po vaření. Po sňatku s tátou zůstala maminka v domácnosti, ale pomáhala tatínkovi s firmou.

Maminka měla čtyři sourozence, bratry Huga, Bedřicha a Hanuše a sestru Gretu. Teta Greta byla rozená v roce 1907 v Mohelnu.  Teta byla vyhlášenou krasavicí, které se dvořilo mnoho mužů, ona ale zůstala svobodná. Ucházel se o ní i jeden můj učitel, takže jsem měl díky tomu ve škole protekci. Teta Greta měla i nabídku od jednoho bohatého brněnského kožešníka, jmenoval se Piowaty. Chtěl, aby se za něho provdala, říkal jí, že už má všechno zařízené, že spolu odjedou do Kanady a budou se mít krásně. Teta ale nemohla opustit svou matku, a tak zůstala a zahynula.

Hugo se narodil v Mohelnu v roce 1896. Byl v Miroslavi v učení, dědeček měl zřejmě v úmyslu udělat z něj svého nástupce. V Miroslavi se ale Hugo zamiloval do jakési slečny, která pocházela z velmi bohaté rodiny. Dával jí dárky, kupoval šperky a obletoval ji. Bohužel kupoval věci, na které neměl peníze a na které si tudíž půjčil z pokladny podniku, kde byl v učení. Pak je nemohl vrátit. Bál se k tomu přiznat a tak se zastřelil. Stalo se to ještě před první světovou válkou.

Bedřich se narodil v Mohelnu v roce 1899, vystudoval vysokou školu a stal se z něj stavební inženýr. On sám byl trochu dobrodruh. Když začala první světová válka, byl v rakousko-uherské armádě důstojníkem. Ve válce onemocněl malárií a vypadaly mu pak všechny vlasy a neměl na těle jediný chlup. Vždycky na toto téma vtipkoval, říkal, že to byl důvod jeho společenského úspěchu, protože když někam přišel, všichni si všimli jeho zcela holé hlavy. Jako stavební inženýr se po první světové válce dostal na Slovensko, kde se zamiloval do bigotní katoličky Katky. Bedřich byl ale tak šikovný, že  ačkoliv byla Katka řeholnice, navázal s ní známost, což její rodina ale nemínila podporovat. Katka pocházela z jižního Slovenska z města Modrý Kamen při hranicích s Maďarskem, z bohaté selské rodiny. Kromě toho Bedřich byl Žid a pro ně nula.  Nakonec se vzali někdy začátkem druhé světové války. Měli spolu dvě děti a žili v Banské Bystrici. Ona zůstala katoličkou a chodila do kostela, strýc se pokřtít nenechal, ale fungovalo jim to. Když v roce 1944 začaly deportace, tak se strýc nějakou dobu schovával u známých v horách.  Po válce jsem za ním asi třikrát přijel na návštěvu. Po komunistickém převratu  se situace s jejími rodiči najednou zcela obrátila a z bohatých sedláků se stali kulaci, kterým všechno vzali. Bedřich zemřel v roce 1967, Katka nedávno.

Hanuš se narodil v roce 1910 v Mohelnu. Vychodil textilní průmyslovku a stal se z něj odborník na textil. Za ženu si vzal sudetskou Němku jménem Margareta, díky které byl transportován do Terezína až v roce 1945. Měli spolu syna Petra, který se narodil v roce 1939. V roce 1948 emigrovali. Hanuš byl poměrně vyhlášený textilní odborník a nějací dva britští podnikatelé, kteří v Čechách nakupovali textilní stroje s úmyslem zahájit výrobu v tehdejší Rhodesii, se na něj obrátili se žádostí, aby jim vybral spolehlivé zařízení a koupi zorganizoval. Pak mu řekli, že by ho do toho podniku chtěli vzít také. Strýc se obával, že by to nebylo možné, protože po komunistickém převratu nemohl nikdo svobodně odjet. A oni tehdy řekli strýcovi - podívejte se, na nás mají  zájem, protože tady nakupujeme strojní zařízení a protože od nás budou mít další zakázky. A bleskově zařídili Hanušovi, Margaretě i mému bratranci pasy a povolení vycestovat. Hanuš s rodinou pak tedy odjel do Rhodesie a strýc se tam stal vedoucím textilní továrny a snad se později i osamostatnil. Pak se však z Rhodesie stal totalitní stát Zimbabwe,  kde vyháněli bělochy a zabírali jim půdu a majetek. V roce 1967 strýc zemřel a teta se po několika letech přestěhovala za synem do Londýna. Petr už měl svého syna jménem Tomy, který je dnes v Londýně profesorem. Petr zemřel před rokem. 

Tatínek měl sestru Marii, narodila se v roce 1890. Někdy ve třicátých letech zemřel dědeček a babička se s tetou Marií přestěhovaly z Oslavan do Brna. Žili spolu a obě pomáhaly otci, který vždy do nějakého skladu přivezl z továrny textilní odstřižky a ony je rozplétaly. Vzpomínám si, že poslední sklad měl v boudě, která stála ve dvoře domu v Bratislavské ulici.  Tetu jsem měl velmi rád a ona milovala mě, byl jsem takový rozmazlený hezounek, filmově hezké dítě. Ona se nade mnou rozplývala a pořád mi chtěla něco dávat a povídat si se mnou. Měla nějaké problémy s hormony, což se projevovalo její otylostí. Asi kvůli tomu se nikdy neprovdala. Vlastní rodinu tedy neměla a tím spíš přilnula k mému otci.  S mojí maminkou byli kamarádky. Marie nebyla vůbec pobožná.

Dětství

Můj bratr Hanuš  se narodil v roce 1924 v Brně. Před válkou začal studovat střední průmyslovou školu,  ale poslední dva roky mohl dostudovat až po válce.  Bratr měl ještě bar-micvah, kterou pořádali příbuzní Steckerlové v Miroslavi.

Brno bylo druhé hlavní město, hned po Praze. Žilo zde kolem 300 tisíc obyvatel. Skoro třetinu obyvatel Brna tvořila německá menšina, což ale nebylo do roku 1938 znát. Česko-německou problematiku jsme do té doby nevnímali. Pro mě jako malého chlapce to šílené německé národní uvědomění, které se mimo jiné projevovalo bílými podkolenkami a krátkými koženými kalhotami, přišlo jako blesk z čistého nebe.  Celkově vzato bylo staré Brno průmyslovým městem plné textilních továren.

Nedokážu říci, jak silná byla v Brně židovská komunita. V Brně byli asi tři synagogy. Židovský život tam existoval, ale spíš na asimilované nenáboženské úrovni. Nikdy jsem tam nepotkal osoby s pejzy a v kaftanech. Pamatuji si na kavárnu Esplanade, která byla známa jako židovská. Naše rodina se židovského komunitního života vůbec nezúčastňovala.  Jako dítě jsem o židovství neměl žádné velké povědomí. To přišlo až po roce 1940, kdy nastala doba omezení a restrikcí. Až do této doby nemůžu říct, že bych někdy zažil nějaké projevy antisemitismu. Do synagogy jsme pravidelně nechodili, jen rodiče občas na velké svátky a spíš kvůli příbuzným. Svátky jsme doma nedrželi a ani košer kuchyni. Rodiče nás židovsky nevychovávali. Tatínek byl židovského původu po své mamince, ale vůbec nebyl pobožný, stejně jako maminka. Maminka ale ještě uměla trochu psát hebrejsky, jak se tomu v dětství naučila. Jestliže rodiče dodržovali nějaké zvyky, bylo to z úcty k rodičům. Doma jsme slavili Vánoce, měli jsme stromeček i dárky pod ním a všechno, co k tomu patřilo.

Myslím, že jsme žili v poměrné chudobě. Bydleli jsme ve starém činžáku v podnájmu ve dvoupokojovém bytě s kuchyní a předsíní, bez koupelny. K domu patřila malá zahrádka s altánkem, kterou jsme měli v pronájmu. V bytě bylo všechno  jen základní až primitivní. Pamatuji si, jak mě maminka jako malé dítě ještě koupala v kuchyni v neckách. V jednom maličkatém pokoji jsme byli s bratrem a v druhém žila matka s otcem. Měli tam postel, noční stolky a starodávné skříně a maminčin toaletní stolek. My jsme s bratrem měli každý svou postel, u nás taky byl otcův psací a pracovní stůl. Když přišla nějaká návštěva, odbývalo se to v kuchyni.  V kuchyni se vařilo na kamnech, topilo se uhlím nebo dřevem, což se nosilo ze sklepa. Měli jsme tekoucí studenou vodu a elektřinu. V pokojích byly na zemi parkety a v kuchyni dřevěná prkna. Stěny byly zdobně vymalované. Rodiče pocházeli oba z venkova, byly ve městě nováčci a tak se nějak přizpůsobovali městskému životu, takže nelze hovořit o tom, že bychom doma měli nějaký hodnotný obraz či jiný druh umění.

Vzhledem k brněnské početné německé menšině bylo důležité dobře ovládat němčinu. A moji rodiče uměli německy nejenom dobře, ale stejně perfektně jako česky.  Když otec vedl obchodní korespondenci, psal česky nebo německy podle toho, o jakou se jednalo firmu. Rodiče měli kancelář doma a když otec mamince diktoval obchodní dopis, slyšel jsem, jako střídavě a bezděčně přecházeli z češtiny do němčiny a zase zpět. Otec měl vzhledem ke svému obchodování poměrně dost přátel a známých. Na návštěvu k nám jezdili a chodili také příbuzní. Moji rodiče nedělali v lidech nikdy rozdíly mezi Židy a nežidy.

Chodil jsem do české obecné školy v Brně na Mendlově náměstí. Škola byla z podstatné části zaplněna syny brněnského proletariátu. Školní docházka byla samozřejmě povinná. Rodiče cikánů nebo cirkusáků zákon obcházeli tím, že své ratolesti poslali do školy až koncem školního roku, aby dítě dostalo vysvědčení. Třebaže měli pětky nebo propadli, byl to před úřady doklad o školní docházce. Pamatuji si groteskní scény, když přišel nějaký cirkusák a honil učitele s bičem, protože nechtěl dát synovi vysvědčení. Ve škole bylo Židů jen minimálně. Byli jsme výjimky, protožejsme s ostatními nechodili do hodin náboženství. Vzpomínám si, že ve 4. nebo 5. třídě tam učil náboženství mladý a elegantní katecheta. Jednou si mě zavolal a požádal mně, abych k němu přišel na návštěvu. Bydlel v jezuitském klášteře, pro mne to byl obrovský zážitek, protože jezuité byli bohatý řád. Po vstupu do kláštera jsem procházel chodbou s nádherným vysokým kobercem a pak jsem zaklepal na učitelovi dveře.  V místnosti byla krásná vitrína, postel a stoleček, všechno velmi elegantní.  A on mi pak říká - poslechni, nemáte doma nějaké staré hebrejské knihy? Já jsem odpověděl, že nevím. On řekl, že by ho to moc zajímalo, že by si rád nějakou přečetl. Přišel jsem domů a vyprávěl jsem to mamince a ona říkala, že žádné hebrejské knihy doma nemáme.  A já jsem jí říkal, že bych jí ale pro pana učitele potřeboval, tak maminka pak, asi u babičky, sehnala knížečku, kterou jsem pak panu katechetovi donesl.

Za války

V roce 1941 jsem dokončil obecnou školu a měl jsem postoupit na gymnázium Na Poříčí, avšak to už nebylo možné. Začal jsem tedy navštěvovat koedukované Spolkové židovské reálné gymnázium. V celé republice byly jen dvě, v Praze a Brně.  Němci sice povolili výuku, nicméně škola vydávala vysvědčení, na kterém bylo uvedeno:  Toto vysvědčení nemá platnost vysvědčení veřejných škol. Před válkou škola neměla ani dost židovských kantorů pro výuku, protože židovská komunita už byla emancipovaná a asimilovaná. Když ale školy musely opustit nejen žáci, ale i kantoři, zažilo naše židovské gymnázium na krátký čas renesanci. Škola se stala posledním působištěm řady židovských pedagogů, kteří jinde už nesměli vyučovat, mezi nimi byli sociolog PhDr. Bruno Zwicker, předtím asistent na filozofické fakultě brněnské Masarykovy univerzity, Valtr Eisinger, původně profesor na gymnáziích v Kyjově a Orlově, Otto Ungar, Arnošt Gerad a jiní. Všechno už ale probíhalo ve velké nervozitě a obavách, takže i naše kázeň a snaha učit se polevila. V květnu 1941 nacisté gymnáziu zabavili jeho budovu, takže vyučování definitivně skončilo. Židovská náboženská obec se nějakou dobu pokoušela organizovat jakési improvizované vyučování v ulici V aleji, kde obec sídlila. V té době jsem ještě chodil na angličtinu k paní Štefi Fišerové.

V páté třídě jsem byl s obecnou školou na zájezdě v Tatrách. Tenkrát byly takovéto školní výlety poměrně vzácné. Měli jsme ale podnikavého pana učitele, který výlety organizoval. Jmenoval se Novotný a vyučoval český jazyk, který jsem si díky němu oblíbil. Jinak jsem volný čas trávil typicky s kamarády. V létě jsme se koupali ve Svratce, v zimě jsme sáňkovali na Kraví hoře. Chodili jsme do parku blízko našeho bytu, tenkrát se mu říkalo Obilňák, bylo to divoké místo zarostlé bezovými a jinými keři. Stály tam různé prolejzačky a tajemná místa, kde jsme si hráli, stříleli z praku nebo dělali jiné lumpárny. To všechno ale jen do roku 1940.

O prázdninách jsem nejraději jezdil k prarodičům do Mohelna. Vedle obce protékají dvě řeky, Jihlavka a Oslava. Příroda je tam romantická a krásná. Bratr navštívil častěji než já i příbuzné v Miroslavi, kde mně se ale tolik nelíbilo. Panoval tam totiž přísný řád a já neměl takovou volnost, abych se třeba mohl sebrat a utíkat do lesa. V Mohelně byla krásná příroda a měl jsem to tam moc rád. U domu byla poměrně velká zahrada, kde nebyly žádné záhonky, ale jen ovocné stromy. Po dědově smrti se babička přestěhovala do jiného malého domu, kde pak žila až do své deportace.

Od roku 1939 se Brno se svou mocnou německou menšinou začalo hemžit dirndly a stoupenci henleinovských organizací. Cesta do školy podél špilberského svahu se náhle stala nebezpečnou, číhali tam výrostci z Hitlerjugend, jimž jsme se nesměli bránit jinak než ponižujícím útěkem. Nebylo by to víc než dobrodružství, kdybychom my, židovské děti, mohly sdílet tyto události s nežidovskými přáteli jako společný osud.  Museli jsme se však vzdát svých kamarádů a uzavírat nová, jakási sebezáchovná přátelství s židovskými chlapci, zaměnit přirozené vztahy za sblížení vyvržených. Pamatuji si také, jak jsem šel navštívit kamaráda. Úzkou štěrbinou pootevřela dveře jeho matka: „Není doma!“ Totéž se opakovalo další den, později mi teprve jakýsi vnitřní pocit prozradil, že můj přítel není doma pro mne, protože jsem Žid. Vrátil jsem se domů a ze studu se s tím nikomu ani nesvěřil.  Jindy jsem na ulici potkal svého oblíbeného učitele, který kdysi chválil mého bratra Hanuše i mne za dobrý prospěch. Na klopě měl odznak Národního souručenství a říkal: „Já jsem věděl, že to s Židama nemůže jinak dopadnout...“  Jindy mne na mohelské stepi zaskočila skupina výrostků. Zkroutili mi ruku za záda a jeden se zeptal: „Víš, kam patříš Žide?“ Kdosi šel náhodou kolem, a tak jsem byl propuštěn. Doma mne otec varoval, abych tam už nechodil. S hořkostí jsem si uvědomil, že mi nemůže pomoci. 

V Brně byl vzestup nacismu a pronásledování Židů prudší, než v některých jiných oblastech. Na sklonku roku 1940 vtrhlo do našeho bytu poprvé Gestapo. Dva muži vyhazovali obsah skříní doprostřed pokoje. Některé věci, prádlo, svetry, musela matka skládat do kufrů, které byly nakonec zapečetěny. Muž vulgární tváře prohlašoval: „ Das wird alles fur die NSDAP gut sein! Wir sind nicht eure republikanische Polizei!“ [To všechno se bude NSDAP hodit! My nejsme vaše republiková policie!] Otec musel druhý den jít i s kufry do budovy právnické fakulty, proměněné v sídlo brněnského gestapa. Prožili jsme dva dny úzkosti, ale otec se tentokrát ještě vrátil, dokonce i se zabavenými věcmi. Přála mu náhoda, vyšetřující úředník gestapa s ním kdysi byl na frontě první světové války a propustil ho proto zpět domů. Zanedlouho poté jsme museli opustit náš byt na Falkensteinerově ulici. V roce 1941 jsme byli donuceni sestěhovat se s dvěma jinými židovskými rodinami do společného třípokojového bytu velkého činžovního domu u brněnského parku Koliště. Před očima se mi vybavuje pestrý kaleidoskop obyvatel bytu, stísněných v malém prostoru, zmenšeném ještě všelijakými neužitečnými předměty, s nimiž se jejich majitelé nechtěli rozloučit. Byla to společnost groteskně nesourodá, lidé o sebe zakopávali ve ztemnělém, kafkovském prostředí, chtěli si však zachovat jakousi důstojnost, alespoň ve vnějších konvencích. I tento byt přepadli v srpnu roku 1941 gestapáci. V panice jsem vyhodil z okna na ulici máslo, kdesi s námahou rodiči opatřené. Patřil nám nejzazší pokoj, zprvu k nám doléhaly jen hlasy toho komanda, pak se opakoval výjev, který jsem znal už z Falkensteinerovy ulice. Při této razii byli oba moji rodiče a také Weinsteinovi, emigranti z Vídně, předvoláni na Gestapo. Weinsteinovi se později z výslechu vrátili a mlčeli o tom, co prožili. Naše rodiče však uvěznili – otce v Kounicových kolejích a matku v trestnici na Cejlu. Podivuhodnou náhodou jsme otce ještě několikrát na zlomek chvíle uviděli. Do kolejí bylo povoleno přinášet jednou týdně čisté prádlo. Přitom bratr jednou otce zahlédl za oknem vězeňské budovy. Pokusili jsme se pak pravidelně v tutéž denní dobu chodit kolem Kounicových kolejí a otec opravdu někdy opatrně vyhlédl za okenním sklem. Po krátkém čase byli však rodiče deportováni do koncentračních táborů. V roce 1942 byli oba zavražděni v Osvětimi, když matka předtím byla ještě vězněna v Ravensbrücku.

O smrti svých rodičů jsme ale s bratrem v té době nevěděli. Zůstali jsme prakticky sami, mně bylo dvanáct a bratrovi sedmnáct. V Brně už z našich příbuzných žila jen otcova maminka a sestra, avšak babičce bylo přes osmdesát let a teta byla chronicky nemocná. Byly obě zcela bezmocné a v roce 1942 byly zavražděny v Treblince a Rejowieci [Polsko]. Dostali jsme povolení odstěhovat se k rodině do Mohelna. Těšil jsem se na únik z hrozivého brněnského prostředí, ale v Mohelnu nebylo lépe. Skoro jsme nevycházeli na ulici – na vesnici byl náš osud ve své ojedinělosti ještě přízračnější, žlutá hvězda na oděvu potupnější. Byli jsme zařazeni do transportu odcházejícího z Třebíče. Přítel naší rodiny, sedlák Rudolf Mohelský, odvezl v květnu 1942 koňským potahem babičku, tetu, bratra a mne i s našimi padesátikilovými zavazadly do Třebíče. Byl krásný jarní den. V třebíčské škole, shromaždišti transportů, nás proměnili v lágrová čísla. Ve vlaku jsme byli s babičkou Josefinou a tetou Gretou naposledy spolu, protože po příjezdu do Terezína jsme od nich byli v tzv. šlojzce odděleni. [šlojzka: z německého Schleusse – stavidlo. Tak se říkalo místu, kde se přijímaly a odkud se odbavovaly transporty] Ani jsme tehdy nevěděli, kdy přesně je odvlekli dál na východ.  Šli do Treblinky a Majdanku, kde byly zavražděny.

V Terezíně

V Terezíně jsem byl umístěn do Sudetských kasáren, bratr byl jinde. Vycházení z kasáren a pohyb v ulicích ghetta byl povolen až od 6. července 1942. [Civilní obyvatelstvo Terezín opustilo až počátkem července 1942 a celé město se tak stalo koncentračním táborem] To byla pro mne velmi špatná doba, protože jsem tam nikoho neměl a neznal a nevěděl jsem vůbec nic o rodičích, bratrovi ani o babičce a tetě. Vzpomínám si, že když se ta kasárna otevřela, vyběhl jsem s celým davem z brány, každý hledal, kde má své příbuzné.

Bratr pracoval postupně na několika místech.  Jednu dobu dělal v dezinfekční skupině, která používala velmi nebezpečný plyn, myslím že se jmenoval Ventox. Po jistou dobu pracoval v kuchyni jako pomocník, takže se mohl alespoň trochu lépe najíst.

Když život v ghettu začala organizovat židovská samospráva, měl jsem štěstí, protože jsem se dostal do L-417. Byla to budova někdejší terezínské školy, kde bylo deset tzv. heimů – chlapeckých domovů. Každý domov měl svou místnost, své vychovatele, kterým jsme říkali madrichim [hebrejsky vedoucí], své číslo a své jméno. Já jsem byl v „jedničce“. Těch několik desítek chlapců kolem třinácti let, kteří se na „jedničce“ sešli, vytvořilo specifické společenství, odlišné od ostatních domovů v budově. Rozhodující pro tuto odlišnost byl věkový rozdíl. S výjimkou domova pět jsme byli jediní, kdož dosáhli kritického času dospívání. Na počátku okupace jsme již byli příliš odrostlí, než abychom se mohli uzavřít do dětského mikrosvěta. Naopak, všechny tyto události urychlily proces dospívání, alespoň po stránce duševní.  Byli jsme svědky vyvrácení našich domovů, bezmoci svých rodičů. Označeni hvězdami a transportními čísly, v karanténách a šlojzkách, spatřili jsme pád konvencí, vroucnost i křehkost a pomíjivost lidských vztahů, nezištnost i obnažené sobectví, naslouchali chrapotu lidí umírajících i dechu dvojic, které se fyzicky milovaly.

Takové nás zastihl náš madrich Valtr Eisinger, sám ještě velmi mladý, devětadvacetiletý. Byl to talentovaný začínající kantor, jemuž nebylo umožněno ověřit své schopnosti, vytříbit své představy o životě a světě a jenž, maje tolik co dělat ještě sám se sebou, chtěl nyní navíc pomoci nám. Milovali jsme v něm jeho zanícenou odvahu, jeho jistotu v tom vratkém lágrovém světě, kde Eisinger nekladl otázku přežití, ale prohlašoval: „Po válce se pokusím o doktorát!“ Byl nám blízký, protože jsme se mu mohli a chtěli někdy později v životě podobat, tomuto svému prima profesorovi, jenž vyprávěl o filozofii Mahátmá Gándhího, překládal básně, hrál fotbal, nastěhoval se na kavalec mezi nás, zpíval v Prodané nevěstě, měl nesmírně rád svou terezínskou ženu Věru.  Vědomí společného osudu a osobnost Eisingera nám umožnily vytvořit společenství, zahrnující právě tak odchovance sirotčinců jako třeba syna vědce.

Naše společenství v domově jedna jsme nazvali  „republika Škid“. Bylo to podle Eisingera, který nám vyprávěl o ruské knize „Republika Škid“, kterou měl moc rád. Všechny nás tím zaujal a chtěli jsme být škidovci. Škid je vlastně zkratka z ruského škola imeni Dostojevskeho, školy pro bezprizorné v porevolučním Petrohradě. Škid byl tajný. Na stěně našeho domova sice visel náš znak, kde byl vyryt název Škid, ale Eisinger nás poučil, abychom cizím lidem tento název vysvětlovali jako zkratku „Škola I.domov“. Byli jsme tedy republika a měli jsme vlastní samosprávu, která byla ustavena na slavnostním pátečním večeru 18. prosince 1942. Každý z nás měl podle svých schopností a zájmů něco na starosti. Členové samosprávy byli voleni, i já jsem jednu dobu působil jako její předseda. Pro Škid bylo příznačné, že to byl kolektiv, ve kterém si každý našel svoje místo. Nejpůsobivějším rysem Eisingerovy povahy byl jeho smysl pro toleranci. On sám pevně věřil v nové, sociálně spravedlivé uspořádání světa, ale nežádal, abychom mechanicky přejímali jeho přesvědčení. Tvrdil naopak, že by bylo předčasné, kdybychom si chtěli ve svých letech vytvořit vlastní názor, nejdříve je třeba hodně vědět a znát. To se projevovalo i v praxi, například pokud jde o přednáškovou činnost u nás na domově. Docházeli k nám lidé s nejrůznějšími názory. Pro Eisingera bylo jistě velmi nebezpečné organizovat takovou výchovu v koncentračním táboře, a ještě k tomu s vlajkou, hymnou a časopisem, který jsme „vydávali“. My jsme to tenkrát tak nechápali, pro nás to bylo dobrodružství, dávalo nám to iluzi volnosti.

Časopis Vedem byl výlučně záležitostí nás chlapců. Profesor Eisinger psal jen úvodníky, občas přispěl nějakým překladem z ruštiny. Vždycky v pátek večer jsme se sesedli kolem stolu anebo se rozmístili po kavalcích, prostě jak to šlo, a každý, kdo něco v tom týdnu napsal, předstoupil a přečetl svůj příspěvek. Časopis se nikdy nezveřejňoval jinak než při pravidelném pátečním předčítání. Po celé dva roky „vycházel“ každý pátek časopis Vedem zásluhou našeho redaktora, Petra Ginze. Petr se pro tuto práci skvěle hodil, měl pro ni všechny předpoklady, které si přinesl už z domova z Prahy. Petr byl nesmírně chytrý chlapec, byl o rok starší než my, měl dokonce zkušenosti s redigováním časopisu, myslím ještě z doby, kdy v Praze studoval. Časopisu věnoval všechen svůj čas, celý týden, den po dni, pracoval na novém čísle. Byla to dřina, zvláště když jsme pak spolu ručně  přepisovali veškeré příspěvky, které vymáhal, jak se dalo. Hartusil, obracel se ke svědomí škidovců, někdy popsal celé číslo sám pod různými jmény, jen aby zachránil situaci. Já jsem mezi kluky a občas i dospělými sháněl příspěvky, sem tam jsem sám něco napsal a staral se o takové organizační věci kolem. V časopise se obráží i život mnoha terezínských osobností, protože „jednička“ se v ghettu brzy stala dost známým místem. Proto tam pak občas chodili mnozí velmi pozoruhodní hosté jako byl Karel Poláček, Norbert Frýd, Hans Adler a jiné takové osobnosti, které nám přednášely nebo o něčem vyprávěly. Petr byl báječný kluk. Vidím ho dodnes, jak sedí na svém kavalci s nohama pod sebou a věčně něco kutí. Petr byl odvlečen v září 1944 do Osvětimi, kde zahynul v plynové komoře.

Běžný den na L-417 vypadal tak, že denně odcházelo asi čtyřicet chlapců na různé práce v ghettu. Byli vybráni z obou nejstarších domovů, z jedničky a z pětky. Sám jsem chodil do práce od roku 1943. Nebyla nijak těžká, většinou jsme byli zaměstnáni na zelinářské zahradě v tzv. šancích – opevňovacím valu kolem Terezína. Měli jsme tam alespoň kousek přírody. Dohlížel na nás jen židovský zahradník, velmi sympatický mladík, kterému jsme říkali Manci, ve skutečnosti se myslím jmenoval Manuel. Občas jsme si mohli ukrást nějaké rajče nebo kedlubnu. Zahradní parta byla ojedinělá i tím, že do práce musela pochodovat pár set metrů po „svobodné zemi“, dá-li se tak nazvat protektorátní silnice. V šest či sedm hodin ráno byl budíček, pak mytí pod pramínkem studené vody, úklid kavalců, rozdělení celodenních služeb - dozoru a úklidu v místnostech i chodbách, WC, na dvoře. Poté následovala snídaně a nástup. Všechny domovy nastoupily na schodiště a vedoucí L-417 Otík Klein přednesl něco na způsob denního rozkazu. Potom začalo vyučování, kterého se zúčastňovaly všechny děti z budovy. Z nedostatku místa probíhalo i na jednotlivých domovech, ale hlavně na půdě, kde nehrozilo takové nebezpečí vpádu SS. Kdekoliv se vyučovalo, měl vždy některý chlapec strážní službu. Každá třída uměla v případě kontroly esesáků ihned předstírat nějakou činnost, třeba úklid.

Z osmi nebo deseti učitelů byli jen dva nebo tři profesionálními pedagogy. Nebyly žádné školní pomůcky a do tříd bylo často třeba sdružovat děti trochu rozdílného věku a velmi různé předchozí průpravy. Učitelé přesto o určitý systém usilovali, vzájemně se radili na tzv. pedagogických radách. Vyučovalo se asi tři až čtyři hodiny denně. Ještě dnes si pamatuji na matematiku, dějepis a zeměpis. „Nepovinná“ byla hebrejština. Systém byl vytvářen nejen vyučováním, ale celodenním soužitím chlapců s učiteli a vychovateli. Jeho účinnost jsem si uvědomil po návratu z koncentráku, když jsem se zase ocitl v normální škole. Skutečně jsem vlastně nebyl vůbec pozadu.

Po výpravě s esšálkem na oběd, který bylo potřeba si vystát ve frontě před kuchyní v Hamburských kasárnách, následovalo ještě opakování probrané látky, to už ovšem bez účasti učitelů. Opravdové volno nastalo v pozdním odpoledni před večeří, zhruba mezi čtvrtou a šestou hodinou. Řada dětí měla v Terezíně ještě rodiče nebo nějaké příbuzné, a tak je v té době běžela navštívit do různých kasáren. Po večeři se domovy staly víceméně uzavřenými světy, v nichž se děti před spaním bavily podle svého věku a schopností vychovatele. My starší jsme „ponocovali“. Zhlédli jsme i ta proslulá terezínská půdní  představení - kabarety, divadla, recitace, koncerty. Také si pamatuji na výpravy, kde jsme po setmění chodili krást uhlí, jednou jsem na to málem doplatil, protože jsem nemohl vylézt zpátky z jakéhosi sklepa. Na kavalcích se pak po večerce, vyhlašované ve 22 hodin, ještě dlouho povídalo, až nakonec i poslední vytrvalci usnuli únavou. Byly to kouzelné chvíle, když se už zhaslo, povídali jsme si z kavalce na kavalec. Eisinger byl skvělý vypravěč, byli bychom ho poslouchali celé hodiny. Je potřeba vysvětlit, že to nebylo obvyklé, aby vychovatel bydlel přímo na domově. Vychovatelé měli v L-417 svou zvláštní místnosti. Už sám fakt, že se Eisinger rozhodl žít skutečně jako jeden z nás, říká o něm víc než všechna slova.

Transport do tábora

V Terezíně jsme byli s bratrem až do října 1944, až do série transportů, kterými bylo ghetto skoro vylidněno. Bratr byl deportován už začátkem října a já několik dnů po něm. Těch transportů bylo myslím sedm a šli rychle po sobě. Vůbec jsme  ale nevěděli, kam jedeme, vlak nejdříve směřoval na západ do Drážďan, ale tam se obrátil na východ. Zřejmě jezdil kyvadlově, protože ve vagonu nějaký vězeň z předchozího transportu napsal tužkou nápis – NACH AUSCHWITZ [do Osvětimi]. V Osvětimi Birkenau, kam nás přijelo asi 1500, šla většina lidí hned od vlaku do plynových komor. Tehdy jsme nikdo nevěděli, oč tam jde, ale nějak jsem tušil, že se mám hlásit k lidem, kteří jsou statnější. Když jsme totiž přijeli na osvětimskou rampu, naskákali do vagonu příslušníci vězeňského komanda, kterému říkali Kanada, a odebírali nám zavazadla. Byl mezi nimi i mladík, kterému jsem odmítal dát svoje věci. A on se mne zeptal: „Wie alt bis du?“ Řekl jsem mu, že je mi patnáct nebo šestnáct. A on mi poradil: „Musst sagen du bis achtzen!“ Když jsme pak vystoupili na rampu, nikdo se mě na věk sice neptal, ale snažil jsem se  držet se skupiny fyzicky zdatnějších vězňů, kteří pak šli společně do tábora. Když jsme vstoupili do lágru, krematoria již pracovala a vítr k nám srážel dým z komína. Pochodovali jsme do nám určeného lágru, což nějakou dobu trvalo, protože jsme museli projít dezinfekční místností, kde nás holili a potírali nějakým roztokem. Když nás vedli, viděl jsem za dráty Jirku Zappnera, který býval také z „jedničky“. Mávnul na mě, když mě spatřil, jinak jsem byl v Birkenau sám. Když jsme potom došli k barákům našeho tábora, měli jsme hned apel. Tam nás kápo „uvítal“ slovy: „Damit   ihr wisst, wo ihr seid. Ihr seid in Auschwitz! Bei uns stinken die Toten nicht!“ [Abyste věděli, kde jste. Jste v Osvětimi! U nás mrtví nesmrdí!] a ukazoval přitom na komín krematoria. Byl to hrozný člověk. Pro Osvětim bylo typické, že tam funkce zastávali často řemeslní zločinci, navíc dlouhým pobytem v lágru deformovaní do sadistické podoby. Tahle stvůra ubila hned druhý den jednoho vězně pod záminkou, že si údajně vzal o porci jídla víc. Nějací kápovi pomocníci drželi toho vězně na lavici a on do něj mlátil holí, až se při tom sám úplně vysílil, supěl a nabíhali mu žíly, jak zasazoval rány. Dny v Birkenau jsou nepopsatelné. Nebylo co jíst, lidi na tom byli tak špatně, že sbírali z bláta slupky od brambor. Nedalo se spát, protože dřevěný barák byl tak přeplněn, že jsme museli ležet na boku. Na pryčnách kavalců leželo vedle sebe vždy několik lidí, na každém patře kavalce. Pokud se nešlo na nějakou práci, měli jsme neustále apel. Nástupy, nácviky smekání čepice a věčné stání v pozoru v syrově studeném počasí byly v Birkenau horší než práce.

Koncem roku 1944 se v Birkenau častěji začali vybírat  vězni na práci. Německý průmysl na tom byl tak špatně, že potřeboval otroky. K jednomu takovému výběru přijelo několik civilistů, byli to inženýři a zástupci německých továren. Dostali jsme rozkaz k nástupu a měli se hlásit všichni kovodělníci. To už jsem věděl, že jediná možnost, jak se lze zachránit, je dostat se na cokoliv pryč. Všichni jsme ale také věděli, že je velice nebezpečné předstírat, že je člověk určitý konkrétní řemeslník. Když se na to přišlo, stálo to člověka život. Ale žádná jiná šance nebyla a tak jsem s několika jinými vystoupil z řady a hlásil se. A ti civilisté za doprovodu esesáka obcházeli naši řadu vystoupivších a každého se ptali, čím je. Já jsem řekl, že jsem elektrikář. Jeden zástupce fabriky se podíval na druhého  a řekl: „Ist er nicht zu jung?“ [Není příliš mladý?]. A ten druhý nad tím mávl rukou a já se dostal vlastně zázrakem do jednoho z transportů, které šly z Birkenau na práci.                                                                            

Byl jsem deportován do pracovního tábora Niederorschel v západním Německu. Tábor se nacházel blízko města Kasselu a spadal pod správu koncentračního tábora Buchenwald. Byla to dlouhá cesta. V dobytčáku jsme byli namačkáni tak, že jsme mohli jen stát. Jednoho vězně, který při kontrole vagonu udělal jakýsi nervózní pohyb rukou, nechali hned vystoupit a na místě ho zastřelili. Obětí ale bylo ve vlaku víc, někteří lidé nedokázali vydržet stát celé hodiny na nohou, bez vody a  hygienického zařízení.

V Niederorschel byla letecká továrna Junkers, v níž jsme pracovali hlavně na nýtování křídel. Tzv. Aussenkommando Niederorschel existovalo už několik měsíců před naším příchodem, pracovalo tam kolem 700 vězňů z mnoha zemí, Polska, Maďarska, Rumunska, Holandska, Francie. Můj spolupracovník byl dokonce z Rigy a také tam byli němečtí antifašisté a několik Rusů. Židů tam ale bylo 80%. Měl jsem pneumatické kladivo a přirážel jím nýty do prohlubní plechu. A z druhé strany nýty přitloukal řemeslně zkušenější vězeň pomocí železné tyče a kladiva. Práci řídili němečtí mistři. O nějakém bližším kontaktu s nimi se mluvit nedá, ale měl jsem štěstí na slušného mistra, jmenoval se Andreas Schröter. Byl to starší prošedivělý člověk. O Vánocích přinesl nám dvěma vězňům, kteří jsme mu byli přímo podřízeni, v aktovce každému kousek vánočky.

S odstupem času lze říct, že Niederorschel byl těžký tábor, ale tehdy, po Birkenau, jsem si tam připadal jako znovuzrozený. Smrt tam nebyla tak po ruce, aby ji člověk viděl v dýmu krematoria a aby čekal, kdy ho při selekci pošlou do plynu. Bydleli jsme v budově zrušené staré tkalcovny, ze které se do továrny chodilo dlouhým úzkým koridorem obehnaným drátem. Byla zima a my měli nedostatečné vězeňské hadry. V továrně se netopilo. Našel jsem si někde papírový pytel od cementu a cpal si kusy papíru pod vězeňský mundůr, aby mě trochu hřály. Každý týden jsme tam dostávali tři cigarety a asi dvakrát nám do esšálků nalili každému trochu piva. Dnes se to zdá směšné, ale za ty tři cigarety jsem vždycky dostal od jednoho německého vojáka kus chleba. Příslušníci SS hlídali vchody kolem fabriky, vojáci nás také vodili koridorem do práce a z práce. Uvnitř vykonávalo dozor několik civilistů, zaměstnanců Junkers – někteří z nich byli zběsilí nacisté.

V Buchenwaldu vykonávali funkci kápů němečtí političtí vězni, na rozdíl od Birkenau, kde to dělali různí zločinci a odporná individua. V Buchenwaldu tak panoval mezi vězni určitý vzájemný pořádek. To, co si mohli vězni mezi sebou uspořádat, tak kápa s německou důkladností podporovali a střežili jakýsi řád věcí. Zdrojem určitého zpravodajství byl náš kápo Otto Herrmann a jeho dva pomocníci. Pocházel z Halle an der Saale a do lágru byl deportován hned začátkem Hitlerovy éry. Němečtí političtí vězni si zachovali vůči esesákům určité sebevědomí a někdy si vůči nim hodně dovolovali. Otto Herrmann měl ve své „kanceláři“ na stěně připevněnou mapu Evropy, která byla nahodile zveřejněna v jedněch německých novinách.  A i když k němu chodili esesáci, sledoval na mapě pohyb fronty. Jednou jsem šel po chodbě a on zrovna vyšel a uviděl mě. Jako kápo neměl nouzi o jídlo. Zeptal se mě: „Willst du Suppe?“ a v ruce držel misku plnou polévky. Samozřejmě jsem chtěl a dostal jsem ji. Ještě mi řekl: „Musst nicht Auswaschen!“ Myslel jsem, že mi to říká jako výraz laskavosti, ale mělo to jiný důvod.  Dodatečně jsem pochopil, že nechtěl, aby někdo věděl, že svou polévku někomu dal, protože pro kápa misky umývali v kuchyni. Došlo mi to ale až ve chvíli, kdy jsem mu misku přinesl umytou zpátky a on se zlobil.

V továrně jsme pracovali do konce března 1945. V té poslední době se ale práce na křídlech dost přerušovala, protože německé hospodářství už nefungovalo. Dříve se hotová křídla přepravovala jinam, kde se montovala s ostatními částmi letadla a to už díky nefungující dopravě nebylo možné. Křídla se začala hromadit na prostranství vedle továrny a nás začali posílat na jinou práci, čímž se naše poměry zhoršily. Začali jsme za esesáckého doprovodu chodit do lesa na dřevo. Ze zmrzlé země jsme vykopávali kořeny stromů a prováděli jsme různé lesní práce, na které už ale nebyly síly. Zažívali jsme hodně hladu a zimy. Když nás do práce vedli někteří mírnější esesmani, tak jsme se dívali kolem sebe a když byl v poli zapomenutý kus řepy, dolovali jsme ji ze země a tu zmrzlou řepu jsme jedli. Nikdy nezapomenu, jak k nám jednou  při práci v lese přišla žena středního věku, Němka, nikdo z nás ji neznal, a přinesla nám veliký hrnec plný brambor vařených na loupačku. Byl to pro mne  zážitek, nejenom kvůli jídlu samotnému, ale proto, že mistr Schröter tím kouskem buchty a slušným chováním a tato paní v mých vzpomínkách rehabilitovali Němce. Přesvědčili mě, že i mezi Němci jsou lidé slušní a nebojácní, protože k takovým činům bylo potřeba hodně odvahy.

V březnu 1945 se k táboru přiblížila západní fronta, bylo slyšet občasné dunění a dělostřelbu. Vedoucí tábora se to snažil zaretušovat. Jednou, když na apelu pozoroval, jak dunění vzbuzuje pozornost, tak prohlásil, že jde o lom, ve kterém se právě střílí kámen. Na jednom z dalších apelů nám řekl: „Ihr denkt, wir haben den Krieg verloren. Aber da irrt euch. Und wenn, dann werdet ihr das nicht erleben!“ [Vy si myslíte, že jsme prohráli válku. Ale to se mýlíte. A i kdyby, tak vy se toho nedožijete.] Skoro se mu to podařilo splnit, protože vzápětí nás jedním z pověstných pochodů smrti poslali do centrálního tábora v Buchenwaldu. To bylo druhý den dubna 1945. Dostali jsme nečekaně příkaz k nástupu. Ještě krátce před tím jsem měl kožené boty. Byly úplně rozbité, teklo do nich a mrzly mi v nich nohy. Tak jsem je ve skladu vyměnil za dřeváky, protože ty alespoň nepropouštěly zespoda vodu. To byla moje smůla, protože jsem musel ten pochod absolvovat ve dřevácích. Pochod byl dlouhý a zlý a já jsem ho sotva přežil. Nohy mi přestaly sloužit, v těch dřevácích se neohýbala podrážka, takže jsem se jen belhal z posledních sil. Vlekl jsem se a ani jsem už nevnímal, co se děje. Pochodovalo se v noci a ve dne se odpočívalo v nějakých stodolách. Bylo to proto, že se stále častěji na obloze objevovali američtí letci a pořád hrozilo nebezpečí náletu, z čehož měli esesáci viditelný strach. V noci nás také nemohlo pozorovat civilní obyvatelstvo. Pochod trval sedm či osm dní. Vždycky, když jsme odpočívali v nějaké stodole nebo starém baráku, sundal jsem si dřeváky a prohlížel si odřené nohy. V té zoufalé situaci jsme třeba na vymláceném obilí ve stodolách hledali nějaká zbylá zrníčka, abychom alespoň něco polknuli. Němečtí vojáci už viděli, že je válka prohraná, takže pak už jen zamlkle šlapali. Tak jsme se dostali do Buchenwaldu, kde nás hned druhý den, 11.dubna 1945, osvobodila americká armáda. Později jsme zjistili, že Američané Buchenwald, který stál na pahorku, obešli a teprve, když to celé území okolo obklíčili, tak vyjeli nahoru k táboru. Krátce byla slyšet střelba kolem dokola. Němci se vzdali a najednou jsem viděl první jeep s posádkou, která se skládala z řidiče, dvou vojáků a jedné ženy.

Po válce

Do Československa jsem se vrátil až v červnu, když pro české vězně začaly přijíždět autobusy. Sice jsem se nesmírně těšil, až znovu uvidím své rodné Brno, nicméně myslel jsem si, že již nenajdu nikoho z rodiny živého. Po návratu jsem  zjistil, že je bratr naživu a odjel jsem za ním do Mohelna, do matčiny rodné vesnice. Bratr šel z Osvětimi do pracovního tábora Gleiwitz v jižním Polsku. Byl to tábor, kde se opravovaly poškozené vagóny, správně náležel k Osvětimi. Tam se dožil konce války.  V Brně jsme po jednom uprchlém hitlerovci dostali byt. Bratr dokončil studium, které začal před válkou na chemické průmyslovce. Museli jsme žít skromně, ale byli jsme mladí.

Bratr v létě roku 1948 emigroval do Německa. Věděl jsem sice, že se obecně myšlenkou na emigraci zabývá, ale že a kdy se to stane, jsem netušil. Pak jsem od něj dostal pozdrav z Německa. Hanuš toužil jít do světa a chtěl pryč z místa, kde jsme prožili takové hrůzy. Komunistický převrat ho v tom ještě podpořil. Mě v té době emigrovat ani nenapadlo, mým cílem bylo získat maturitu a ukončit si středoškolské vzdělání. Druhým mým důvodem, proč neemigrovat, byl fakt, že jsem byl v Terezíně velmi ovlivněn Valtrem Eisingerem, takže pro mě se komunistický převrat nejevil jako hrozba, ale spíš jako příslib. Měl jsem určité ideály a skutečně jsem věřil, že socialistický režim přinese vyřešení hlavních lidských problémů.

V Německu byl Hanuš nejdříve v uprchlickém táboře. Jednou tam přijel jakýsi brazilský podnikatel zabývající se nákupem a prodejem semen a bratr dostal nabídku v jeho firmě pracovat. Získal povolení se vystěhovat do Brazílie. Než byla vyřízena veškerá povolení, pracoval v Brazílii nejdříve jako číšník a podobně. Po několika letech se osamostatnil a zařídil si kancelář na zprostředkování dodávek stavební keramiky. Oženil se a žije v Riu de Janeiru. Manželka mu již bohužel zemřela, ale má velkou rodinu, tři syny a vnoučata. Jako emigrant nemohl přijet na návštěvu, a tak jsme se viděli až po dlouhých čtyřiceti letech poté, když jsem dostal povolení k výjezdu. 

V roce 1949 jsem dokončil Vyšší školu uměleckého průmyslu v Brně  a vystřídal jsem různá zaměstnání. Nejdříve jsem byl v Zemském plánovacím ústavu, kde jsem pomáhal s grafickým zpracováním map. Psal jsem články o výtvarných výstavách a  na základě toho jsem pak dostal práci v brněnském Domě umění ve Svazu výtvarníků, kde jsem měl příležitost seznámit se s mnoha výtvarníky a také s organizací výstav. Od roku 1958 jsem pracoval v Ústředí uměleckých řemesel v Brně. A v roce 1963 jsem přešel na ředitelství tohoto podniku do Prahy. Posledních dvacet let jsem pracoval v Národní galerii v Praze, zejména na přípravě výstavních katalogů a plakátů.

Poprvé jsem se oženil v roce 1951. Moje první žena vychodila stejnou střední školu. Nebyla Židovka a ani mi na tom nezáleželo. Na začátku padesátých let se nám narodili dva synové, Jirka a Dan. Když jsem se odstěhoval do Prahy, rozvedli jsme se, ale zůstal jsem s rodinou v blízkém kontaktu.  Mladší syn Dan bohužel již zemřel na rakovinu ve svých čtyřiatřiceti letech. Byl svobodný. V druhé polovině šedesátých let jsem se ženil znovu, ale manželství vydrželo jen do začátku sedmdesátých let. Moje druhá žena pracovala jako novinářka  v ČTK. Starší syn Jirka  žije v Brně, vystudoval vysokou školu, je inženýr a v současné době má  firmu na projekci elektronických zařízení. Je svobodný.

Členem KSČ jsem se stal hned po návratu z koncentráku. Postupně jsem ztrácel důvěru v režim a nakonec jsem i občas přemýšlel o emigraci, ale to už jsem měl rodinu a nebylo to tak snadné. Procesy v padesátých letech a jejich otevřený antisemitismus pro mne znamenaly šok a vystřízlivění. Člověk ale musel zachovávat určitou opatrnost, protože demonstrativně se distancovat od režimu znamenalo existenční pohromu.  Antisemitismus po válce se projevoval i v oficiální politice. Konkrétní projevy antisemitismu vůči mé osobě ale byly jen ojedinělé. V době procesů jsem pracoval v Domě umění v Brně a byl jsem tehdy v základní vojenské službě, kterou jsem si po dokončení studií musel odkroutit. Po návratu z vojny jsem se od přátel dověděl, že v Domě umění tam o mě nějaký vrátný nebo domovník vykládal, že jsem podezřelá osoba a možná nějaký protistátní spiklenec. On byl naprosto negramotný primitiv a jsem přesvědčen, že jeho motivací bylo moje židovství. Já jsem se po válce sice k židovství nehlásil, ale ani jsem svůj původ netajil. Holocaust a koncentrační tábor mě probudil k vědomí o židovské osudovosti. Kvůli tomu jsem si ale nikdy nemyslel, že bych se nějak lišil od jiných lidí, svoje židovství jsem vnímal jako záležitost osudu.

„Jedničkou“ v Terezíně  prošlo asi sto nebo stodeset chlapců, z nichž holocaust přežilo jen asi deset. Časopisy Vedem přivezl z Terezína do Prahy Zdeněk Taussig, který jako jediný z celého heimu zůstal po celou dobu v Terezíně. Jeho otec totiž pracoval v Terezíně jako kovář a jako jediný dovedl okovat koně. Zdeněk s ním bydlel v kovárně, kde si ze skladiště na uhlí udělali místnost na spaní. Po návratu do Prahy časopisy předal mému kamarádovi z „jedničky“ Jirkovi Bradymu, který materiály předal mně před svou emigrací v roce 1948. Život šel jinak, než jsme snili. Poúnorový antisemitismus bránil zveřejnění našich mladých literárních pokusů z Terezína. S příchodem jara 1968 jsme již se Zdeňkem Ornestem pomýšleli na knihu, jež by obsáhla alespoň zlomek osmisetstránkového časopisu. Váhali jsme nad touto prací. Bylo třeba s určitým nadhledem vybírat nejlepší z mnoha próz a básní, které všechny k nám promlouvaly důvěrným hlasem našich dětských přátel. S radostí jsme proto přijali spolupráci Marie Rút Křížkové, která je literární historička. V období normalizace byla disidentkou a mluvčí Charty 77. Redakce naší knihy se ujala v roce 1971. O rok později s námi uzavřely smlouvu o vydání publikace Památník Terezín a Severočeské nakladatelství. Připravený rukopis knihy s názvem Je mojí vlastí hradba z ghett? však zamítl jeho recenzent dr. Václav Král, DrSc., který ve svém kuriózním posudku mj. dokázal spojit otázku vydání terezínských dětských próz a veršů s tzv. „agresí Izraele proti arabským národům“. V roce 1968 vznikl záměr proměnit naši terezínskou budovu v muzeum ghetta, ale normalizátoři tam namísto toho vybudovali monstrózní Muzeum SNB a revolučních tradic Severočeského kraje. S Otou Ornestem, bratrem Zdenka, jsme se pokusili knihu propašovat za hranice, ale skončilo to u soudu, protože Otu chytli. Měl jsem hrozný strach, protože než ho zatkli, tak jsme se několikrát předtím sešli a já jsem mu předával rukopisy k odeslání do zahraničí a snažil jsem se podpořit tento záměr i finančně. Když se později dostal před soud, řekl jen to, co musel, a nevyzradil ani mě ani jiné účastníky. Byl odsouzen, prokurátor hodnotil zasílání literárních příspěvků do zahraničí jako společensky nebezpečnou činnost. Péčí Marie Rút Křížkové byl rukopis vydán v roce 1978 jako samizdat. Ohlas tohoto vydání byl koncem osmdesátých let podnětem „reedice“, zase jen strojopisné, ale v jiné úpravě a formátu. V této podobě byl strojopis také představen v roce 1990 na frankfurtském knižním veletrhu.

Ze strany mě vyloučili po Pražském jaru. Tou dobou už jsem pracoval v Národní galerii v Praze, kde jsem díky tomu, že jsem nebyl členem strany, žil ve stavu určitého ohrožení. Byl jsem vedoucím tiskového oddělení, což vadilo jednomu náměstkovi ředitele, který neustále zdůrazňoval, že nesmím být ponechán ve své funkci. Nakonec jsem se tam udržel, i proto, že Národní galerii řídil Jiří Kotalík.  Mnozí mu vytýkají, že spolupracoval s režimem, protože on jaksi zachovával takovou diplomatickou servilnost vůči různým stranickým a vládním představitelům, jinak by se na tom místě neudržel, ale zároveň v Národní galerii umožnil pracovat některým lidem, kteří byli jinde politicky nepřijatelní. To samo o sobě bylo vcelku pozoruhodné, protože bylo velmi těžké přijmout vyloučeného nebo vyškrtnutého člena strany na místo, které nebylo vysloveně manuální. Já jsem si svoje místo udržel, žil jsem ale v neustálých obavách. Když jsem se rozvedl podruhé, děli jsem se o bytovou jednotku s mužem, který byl dopravní policista. Jednou za ním brzy ráno přišli kamarádi v policejních uniformách a já jsem v tom svém pokoji ležel a přes matné sklo jsem viděl pohyb uniforem a byl jsem si v té rozespalosti zcela jistý,  že si jdou pro mě. Ale jiní lidé zažili daleko horší věci. V souvislosti s mou prací v Národní galerii jsem neměl příliš volného času. Rád jsem cestoval a byl jsem jedním ze šťastných lidí, kteří se díky pořádání výstav přece jenom dostali do zahraničí. Do penze jsem odešel v roce 1987.

V roce 1989 se  všude v Evropě kolem děly takové věci, že bylo důvodné doufat, že to konečně přeskočí i k nám, avšak v těch dřívějších letech jsem naprosto nedoufal, že se toho dožiju. Z Listopadu jsem byl strašně nadšený, účastnil jsem se dokonce proslulého studentského průvodu z Albertova.  Od té doby se můj život úplně změnil, ačkoliv mne převrat zastihl v době, kdy už jsem byl starší člověk. Když jsem byl v aktivním věku, měl jsem to štěstí, že jsem mohl dělat práci, která mne bavila. Z tohoto hlediska to byla krásná doba. Avšak pocit návratu demokratického režimu pro mne znamenal mnoho. Po roce 1989 jsem byl v Americe, Izraeli a Kanadě. Izrael jsem navštívil jako delegát Terezínské iniciativy.

V Památníku Terezín vznikla expozice o vězeňské literatuře, na které jsem se podílel s Marií Křížkovou. Nedávno jsme tam společně připravili putovní výstavu o časopisu Vedem. Pracoval jsem také v Terezínské iniciativě, která vznikla v roce 1990. Iniciativa vydává svůj časopis a má velkou zásluhu na vzniku židovského památníku v Terezíně. Iniciativa odváděla a odvádí skvělou práci, rovněž se rozhodujícím způsobem zúčastnila zápasu o odškodnění, které jsem obdržel i já. Svým dětem jsem o koncentračním táboře příliš nevyprávěl, stejně jako většina ostatních přeživších. Tento fakt lze vysvětlit tím, že ten, kdo prošel koncentrákem, vlastně prožil naprostou devastaci osobnosti člověka, což je nesmírně ponižující skutečnost. Když pak byla vydána v roce 1995 kniha Je mojí vlastí hradba z ghett?, můj syn si ji přečetl a dověděl se o mně věci, které předtím vůbec neznal.

Mnoho lidí je z polistopadového vývoje zklamaných, ale já nikoliv. Jsem díky svým životním zkušenostem skeptik, takže jsem si nemaloval žádnou růžovou budoucnost.  Už od začátku nového režimu jsem předpokládal, že se věci nebudou vyvíjet tak nádherně, jak si to lidé představovali. A těžkosti, kterým v současnosti čelíme, mě nechávají lhostejným. Žijeme svobodně, jezdíme do zahraničí dle vlastní libovůle, můžeme svobodně číst, mluvit, a podnikat vše, co člověk chce, a to vnímám jako strašně důležitou věc.