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Almost every year we used to go for holidays with the family, usually to the so called Linia [a row of tourist-health resort towns located on the line Warsaw-Otwock]. We went to Otwock, Falenica, once to Swider, many times to Miedzeszyn, once to Jablonna [summer resort towns near Warsaw] and once to Kazimierz. We usually took a train to the Linia, but we took a ship to Kazimierz [on the Vistula River, from Warsaw]. And our things, because we used to bring everything, [we used to send] by a horse carriage. I remember we would load things up at 6am and the horse carriage would get to the destination by night.
We used to go for a month, sometimes two. Estusia would come with us, of course. Once she stayed behind on the train station, she didn’t manage to get on [the train], and it was a big fuss, was she going to come on the next train or not. She did. Some summers Kuba came with us, too. Once Dad did it so that Aunt Chawcia and Izaak came as well.
Kazimierz was really a lot of fun. A lot of people, we used to walk up the Mountain of Three Crosses, go to a castle, we went to Naleczow [40 km from Kazimierz], to Pulawy [about 20 km from Kazmierz]. I think Jewish writers used to go there, because Dad went to some meetings there.
In 1939 we went to a summer resource in Falenica, and Father even had a shop there, but without apprentices, I helped him there a little, but not much, I didn’t really feel like working. I was 13, there were girls, Kuba was with us. Kuba was very popular with girls, he was outgoing, dark [was handsome, had dark hair], I was jealous. There was the hosts’ daughter, a pretty girl, Ziutka. When we knew that the war was coming, boys and girls [used to say]: ‘Well, Ziutka, be careful, when the Germans come, you’ll be doomed. But before that, you’re for Kuba.
We used to go for a month, sometimes two. Estusia would come with us, of course. Once she stayed behind on the train station, she didn’t manage to get on [the train], and it was a big fuss, was she going to come on the next train or not. She did. Some summers Kuba came with us, too. Once Dad did it so that Aunt Chawcia and Izaak came as well.
Kazimierz was really a lot of fun. A lot of people, we used to walk up the Mountain of Three Crosses, go to a castle, we went to Naleczow [40 km from Kazimierz], to Pulawy [about 20 km from Kazmierz]. I think Jewish writers used to go there, because Dad went to some meetings there.
In 1939 we went to a summer resource in Falenica, and Father even had a shop there, but without apprentices, I helped him there a little, but not much, I didn’t really feel like working. I was 13, there were girls, Kuba was with us. Kuba was very popular with girls, he was outgoing, dark [was handsome, had dark hair], I was jealous. There was the hosts’ daughter, a pretty girl, Ziutka. When we knew that the war was coming, boys and girls [used to say]: ‘Well, Ziutka, be careful, when the Germans come, you’ll be doomed. But before that, you’re for Kuba.
Period
Location
Kazimierz
Poland
Interview
Izaak Wacek Kornblum
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