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We had a hard time, because, after the war [World War II], all the sons and daughters who had gone to college abroad came back, except for my sister and another boy! A year went by, then two, and we couldn’t understand. My mother would say: ‘By God, even if she were at the end of the Earth, a smart girl like her would still give us some sort of sign!’ All the postmen in Bacau had learnt their lesson well: when sorting the mail in the morning, they had to pay particular attention to any letter addressed to my father! Then my mother went to a sister-in-law of hers, because it was her brother to whom we sent money. And she told her: ‘I’d like to find out what happened. Please write to Milu and ask him to investigate!’ Milu sent a letter to the Medical School. They answered, and so detailed, how she was taken, and everything! The school forwarded to my sister’s husband the letter in which we were inquiring about her fate. He gave us all the details. He told us his wife and a fellow-student from Iasi had been seized in front of the hospital two days after he had left. After the war ended, he looked for her everywhere! But he couldn’t find her. He accidentally came across someone who had been there – the Germans had also sent French people to the labor camps – and he was told the Nazis had used his wife as a physician, and then disposed of her. He spent seven years searching through cemeteries, hoping her name would come up somewhere. But this couldn’t have happened, because she had… she had been killed there [in Auschwitz].
Interview
Estera Sava