Travel

VERA AMAR
Belgrade
Serbia
Interviewer: Ida Labudovic

Growing up
During the war
After the war

Growing up

My name is Vera Vajda; my married name is Amar. My father was Nikola Mikloša Vajda and my mother Miroslava, nee Torbić. I was born on June 22, 1923. I am the eldest of three children. My mother gave birth to my two brothers and I in the course of three years. My youngest brother, Vojislav, and I were both born in June and my middle brother, Ljubomir, was born in January.

The thing I remember about my mother’s side of the family is that they were very poor. She lost her parents during World War I; they were spoken of very infrequently at home. My father’s parents lived outside of Yugoslavia. They came two or three times for short visits to Yugoslavia; I did not know them well. My father was born in Zalaegerszeg, Hungary. When he graduated from secondary school, he went to Vienna to study. He completed what they called at the time a commercial two-year college. My paternal grandfather, Emil, was a court furrier. My paternal grandmother was named Judita. There were four children in the family: my father was the eldest; then Martin; a sister, Tereza; and the youngest, Lajos. They were religious and they celebrated all the holidays. I do not make a distinction about how religious they were, if they were among Jews in name alone or they lived like Jews. I was too little to have made such a distinction; today I know this well.

I remember when we went to the wedding of my father’s younger sister, Tereza, in Budapest. Although I was very young, I remember that wedding. It was in a synagogue, but I do not remember where the synagogue was. My mother sewed velvet suits with white shirts for my brothers. I had a red pleated dress with a lace collar and patent leather shoes. They were my first and most beautiful patent leather shoes. My mother had a dress that was pleated in a bell shape, in three rows, and patent leather shoes. Father wore a dress suit. I do not remember how we traveled there or how we returned. I only remember Aunt Tereza’s wedding, my patent leather shoes, my dress and my mother’s.

During the war

I was 17 when the war began. At the time, the question of family and their relationships were distant to me. Now, I think about this much more and only lately have I received additional information. My father’s family lived and were killed in Hungary, in Budapest. There is a museum named after my youngest uncle, Lajos Vajda Museum. I was very surprised to learn about this place, but I never managed to enter and see what was inside, especially if there are pictures.

Fifteen years ago, I went on a business trip to Szentendre with David Dinko, a member of the Academy of Science and worked with frescoes. We worked on a series called “The Beginning of Literacy” and filmed the origins of literacy using old icons. Szentendre is a small town with nine churches and yet not one priest was still there, except the one who gave us the key. I wanted to see where my grandmother was buried. We were in Szentendre for eight days and only later did I learn about Lajos Vajda’s museum. They took me to the Jewish cemetery on my last day there. The entire cemetery was dug up and the black marble monuments were laying one on top of the other. The names could not be read. It bothered me that it was like this, and that is a part of my subconscious that pulls me.

My father’s mother Judita died right before the war, and my father was killed in 1941 in Belgrade along with his brother Martin. His sister remained in Budapest, she married and I know her married name is Klein and that she had three children. The whole family died in the war. My Uncle Lajos, the youngest, was in a camp. At that time, my grandfather was captured and I do not know whether he died in a camp or outside. Uncle Lajos was released from the camp, contracted tuberculosis and died. I have no idea where he is buried.

What connects me very closely to my family, to my father and his family, is what my father formed within his family here in Belgrade; he brought tranquility and material prosperity. He was well-educated and made a good living. He was very tender with us children. Father worked a lot. He spent the mornings and the afternoons at work at “Tuner and Vagner,” a private company. He would come home to eat lunch, then return to work. That is what life was like in Belgrade before the war.

My father was a manager, a financial specialist, and he had a big salary. He first worked for “Bajloni,” then at “Tuner and Vagner” and finally for “Brace Zdravkovic,” a quarry. It is because of this last job that we moved to Pasino Hill. The office was at 7 Nebojsa Street. My father and mother met before my father began working in “Tuner and Vagner,” while he was still working in “Bajloni,” a Belgrade brewery. He was a boss, of what today is called the commercial department, where my mother worked as a clerk. There was great love and happiness between them. My father, although he came from a foreign country, found tranquility here, and my mother was very happy, because she had a wonderful life with my father. In three years, she gave birth to three children. Unfortunately, it all came to an end in 1941 and that began the tragedy that affected all Jewish families in Belgrade. As a child, I watched a whole column of Jews from different cities, Skopje and especially from Macedonia. At the time I did not think about it much.

My father and mother lived in a room, near London (a neighborhood in the center of Belgrade) in a building where the Bata store is today. I was born there. Later they moved temporarily into a building owned by Bajloni. We also lived on Solunska Street in a Jewish house where the Pardo family lived. The Pardos had two sons and a daughter but unfortunately they were all killed. We also lived at 3 Jovanov Street where the Kalef family lived. And finally we lived at 30 Cara Urosa in a building that no longer exists. Above us was the synagogue that unfortunately was destroyed by the Germans when they retreated. As a child, I always went to synagogue. I liked it, it was attractive and meaningful to me. Since I am from a mixed marriage, I had a dilemma about whether to take Serbian or Jewish religious classes. To this day, this is still a relevant question. My mother and father were very sensitive, and this meant that my father did not offend my mother nor my mother, my father. I went through school without taking any religious studies. However, the synagogue attracted me –  it was full of weddings, I went there and everything was lovely. Later, I saw that I was in a picture taken at a wedding of a relative of my husband, Isak Bata Amar.

In the Dorcol neighborhood, where I spent my youth, 90 percent of the population was Jewish. I went to the German-Serbian school with my brothers. Our housekeeper took us to school. We spent most of the day on Jovanova Street. Since I had two brothers, I grew up on roller-skates, scooters and bicycles. In Kalemegdan, where the zoo is today (it did not exist at the time), there were swings, merry-go-rounds with ropes attached. At the end of the rope there was rubber, where one was supposed to sit; we drove it with our feet until we were flying.

The entire atmosphere was Jewish –  when I think about it, I did not know one Serbian family that lived in the house where I lived or in the houses next to mine or across the street. They were all Jews. My husband’s aunt’s sister lived across the street. Even as a young man, my father would come to visit his relative who had three children. I think their last name was Demajo, but I know the children’s first names were: Marsel, Miksa and Mikica. They were my friends. Eighty percent of the children in my grade were Jewish. The people who lived around us were Jews, and this was entirely normal for us. The relations between the Serbs and the Jews were very close. The holidays were celebrated; everyone visited one another. My mother did not want to celebrate any holidays, because she did not want to offend my father. Everything concerning these holidays that I soaked up, experienced and that became an integral part of my life, I experienced outside of my house. I had a happy childhood with great comforts. When I look back on all this, it seems that all of us Jews lived like one big family in Dorcol.

I do not remember if there was a Jewish school in Belgrade, I think that there was not. Maybe there was a Jewish kindergarten, but since my mother stopped working as soon as she married, she was able to take care of the house and children. I went to the women’s gymnasium; that building still exists on Dusanova Street.

Going to synagogue was very exciting and nice for me. I went to look at the brides and to see how they looked, to listen and to attend the weddings because it made me happy. I was not aware of this then, I only know that something was always pulling me toward it and I was emotionally tied to it. I know that my mother did not want to let us go, but since we lived close to the synagogue on Cara Urosa Street she let us, because we were not in danger from traffic back then. There were no cars and only two tramways went by our house every two hours. My mother did not let us out because we lived in a garden apartment. There were three of us, and when you let one you must let them all. We went to Kalemegdan and I have a lot of pictures with our mother or housekeeper. That is how children lived back then; later they let us ride scooters. Even though I was a girl I drove with my brothers. But there was no traffic. Children did not have the same freedom that they do today. When I was a young girl, my father was quite strict. He always waited for me in the summer and winter at 8 p.m. If I were five minutes late, he would point to the clock. Relationships were different, not to speak of discipline in schools and discipline in studies, in bedtimes and wake-up times. We were never permitted to wake up and stay in bed. That was a strange thing, but that is how we were raised. The moment Father came in, we had to stand up. It seems to me that it was a sign of respect –  there was a relationship that is entirely different today.

I did not celebrate the holidays much, barely at all. Shabbat was a general holiday for us. I do not know how to explain it. Shabbat was not observed in our house, but it was felt in the whole neighborhood and probably that had an influence on my mother, since she certainly accepted something of the Jewish holidays, but not everything. The atmosphere was felt in the sense that life slowed down, the shops were closed, Father came home. But my father had to work on Saturday and even on Sundays. This is something that still bothers me today. I have the feeling that I lived between two religions. When I married my husband, he told me that on Shabbat his parents and sister closed the store and came home. His father smoked a lot and lit one after another, which I thought was very strange yet cute. In school I celebrated the Christian holidays. I remember Saint Sava, when I sang in the choir. There were also parties. I know that my father went to parties with my mother – not only in the Jewish center, which was located in the same place as it is today, but even more so to other places. She would sew a dress. My mother sewed at Regina Benvenisti’s, which was a well-known salon in Belgrade, and would go to the officer’s house for balls. They celebrated together. I did not have any connection to the community, and I do not remember which holidays they went to the community for.

Later, when we were older, we moved to Pasino Hill, where the atmosphere was entirely different. First of all, it was not as intimate. In general, the houses were privately owned and there were more Serbs than Jews. All of this influenced the formation of the psyche and the way of life and a different atmosphere. The Jewish families were different; we never heard that they hit their children. I do not remember that my mother or father hit us. Jews did not drink any alcohol. In our house no one drank, and this had its influence. Back then, there was a deeply felt respect not only of children for their parents, but between parents. I know that my father always talked endearingly to my mother. Her name was Miroslava, but he called her Mico. He always kissed her when he came home. Of course, he kissed us children, but he always kissed mother as well. Things were entirely different once we moved. We lived in a house where we lived with the landlord. We lived in the lower apartment, a larger apartment.

When our father was taken away and executed, we had to move from there. Then the troubles and relocation began. After a happy childhood, April 6, 1941, entirely ruined everything.

My father was unable to go to the seaside, but we went every summer to Sarajevo by train, from Sarajevo we took a short track train to Herceg-Novi, Igalo, Kumbor, the three of us children, Mother and, naturally, we brought our housekeeper along. My father could pay for all of this, but he was not able to leave his office to go on vacation with us. Now, when I think about this, it hurts me, because he invested a lot of energy and work into ensuring that his family was happy and satisfied, and unfortunately he was killed in his 40s. When we were adults, and when he would have been able to spend time with us, they killed him.

The last time I saw my father was November 14, 1941. After forced labor, he was imprisoned at Autokomand at Topovske Supe. Until November 13, actually November 14, my mother and I visited the camp. Every day, for more than a month, we brought him food and we waited for hours in line to give it to him. The Germans called out the names, and we had to say who we were looking for and who we were, and then they would call us. They called the prisoners to come to the yard, as the meetings were in the yard, and called those of us who were waiting in line to see our loved ones. The meetings were very hard, sad. I remember that I was very young and I still had not grown to my parents’ height. There was a great clamor. We were packed in like sardines. They turned on German music, which made the conversations more difficult. We were in the yard for 10 minutes. Of course, we entered when the whistle blew and left when it blew again. When that conversation was over, my mother departed on the left side of Topovske Supe and I on the right side, where the Number 10 tram runs today. My mother departed on the opposite side, cutting through gardens and meadows, so she would get home as soon as possible.

When I left the camp, which was surrounded by wires and many soldiers – to be more precise, armed guards –  I tried to see my father one more time, not knowing it would be the last time. I got close to the fence and caught a glimpse of my father, his face and his hat at the window. I always have that picture of him with that hat in my mind. He waved to me and at that minute I heard a guard warning me not to get so close to the fence. Naturally, I was not scared and I did not react to his threat. Then he shot at my feet. I continued and a little further away I stopped again and I tried to speak with my father, but I do not remember about what. I remember that I waved and told him that Mother and I would come tomorrow. Then the guard shot again, this time at my head, and the bullet passed by my left ear. When my father saw this, he screamed and begged me to move away. I left, and this was the last time I saw him.

That day, November 13, was a nice sunny day, even though it was cold. However, during the night there was a storm. It snowed and rained, a strong wind blew and hit against the shutters and the gate. The entire night we listened to the rattle of the different locks and the murmurs that always accompany big storms. In the morning, my mother made lunch and, since it was slippery outside, she dressed me in boots and on top of them my father’s old socks. She gave me two portions, which she wrapped in a lot of paper and rags so that the food would not get cold, and put it in a straw bag. I left. I registered and they took the list. They took the food from me, and 10 minutes later they returned the food to me. They told me that he had been taken to work in Germany; they did not even mention forced labor. That is actually how I learned that my father had been executed.

My brothers were with my mother. My brothers were younger than me. They moved out of the apartment and in general they hid around the neighborhood. Nedic’s people captured my brothers a few times, but each time there was at least one of their friends from primary school present and they let them go. The neighbors announced that the Gestapo was coming. This was on Pasino Hill with only a few houses, where it was risky for the Gestapo to enter. This is how they avoided execution three times. My brothers did not go to school; only after the war did they finish school. Both are engineers. My eldest brother has a son, a daughter-in-law and three girls. My younger brother has a daughter, a son and two grandchildren. His daughter does not have children. Fate would have it that they also survived. My mother lived deep into old age and died at the age of 90. My father, my uncle Martin, and his wife and two children were all killed.

As soon as I turned 18 I married a Serb, and I had a son, Slobodan. During those years we all played, we went to school and still carried dolls. I had my child and I was more than happy. I have two grandchildren from my elder son. I moved six times. Because I married a Serb, I was protected in some ways, but not 100 percent. They captured me three times on the street: once on Karadordeva Street, once on Knez Mihailova and once at Slavija. I succeeded in getting away from them by using my youth and skill. I do not know why I seemed suspicious but most likely because of my appearance. The whole situation in Belgrade was clear to everyone. They closed in on me on the corner of Knez Mihajlova and Kralja Petra. This was the first precinct; the police captured me and I did not have documents because I was young and I did not need to carry them. I lied to them and told them what was best for me. When they make a raid they arrest you and interrogate you. Once they captured me at the train station. I was there for only two or three hours and in the precinct much longer, five or six hours. I did not have a Jewish last name; I was already Vera Necic. I told them my address and they could check it; I always managed to run away. They let me go. I had a small child and in general only went out with the child occasionally. Nedic’s people captured me. I think it was not the German police. That is how I survived the war.

By 1945, I already was dating my second husband, Bata Amar. He asked me to marry him; I was already divorced. My ex-husband came to the community once to collect money for saving a Jew during the war. Sometimes things in life are fate. He ran into Aleksandar Aca Levi, who was a vice-president of the community; he knew my whole life story and told him never to come to the community again.

After the war

When the war was over I met my husband Isak Bata Amar, the drama secretary, at the National Theatre when I enrolled in the Drama Studio. At the time it was called Drama Studio, before the Academy. After a two-hour conversation, he asked me if I would like to marry him. Yes. He said that the fact that I had a son did not bother him but that if his parents were still alive he would not be able to marry a half-Jew, since I had a Serbian mother and a Jewish father. He told me that he was  from an Orthodox Jewish family and that he would not be able to marry me if his parents were still alive. Since he did not find any of his relatives when he returned from the war, we married on February 15, 1947. My husband never found anyone from his family. My husband was a lawyer but worked in the field of culture. I also worked in the cultural field: for the cultural committee, then in “Nolit” and then in television and newspaper.

I have a son from this marriage, who also works in the field of culture as a film director, and a granddaughter Sara, who studies in Israel. My life is entirely different. After four years of suffering, I was at 29 Strahinica Bana, the house of Avram Mevorah, a Jewish lawyer, when liberation finally came. When I met my husband I complained that I did not have money to pay for the year. He took the receipt and went to Avram Mevorah and told him that I was his future wife. He ripped up the receipt and I never paid the rent.

It was a nice life with Isak Amar. My son from my first marriage received the same treatment, if not better, than our other son. My son Slobodan received that name because he waited for freedom and Zoran because he was born at dawn. I lived a lovely and happy life. Isak, like my father, brought tranquility to our house. There was lots of love and understanding. He had something that charmed people – not only those in the family but all those around him. He was a functionary in the community and held several positions. One thing that I remember is the space below the synagogue, which is currently being renovated into a kosher kitchen. Mr. Reuben Rubenovic, who was president of the Jewish community of Belgrade at the time, handed me the key, and said: “Here is the key for two days; take whatever you need, however much you want.” I had a wonderful blue coat, a blue dress. I took shoes; before that I wore shoes without soles and had to fill them in with cardboard. When I went to work on the “Brcko Banovici” railway tracks for two months, in 1946, my husband sent me American canned food and a wonderful package that the Jews received. I will never forget the peanut butter and chocolate with raisins.

With Bata, I participated in the community. We sang in the Jewish choir, and twice I went with the choir to Israel. When I went to Israel now, after all these years, I did not recognize the place. In 1955, I went to Haifa for the first time by boat; we traveled three days via Greece. Jews we knew from Belgrade waited for us in Haifa.

Because of the life I spent with Bata Amar, I participated in all cultural events, parties and holidays in our community. My husband did not want to speak about his origins. He lived with his family before the war at 48 Dusanova Street. After the war, the owner of the building called us to give us photographs; everything else was taken. We also got back one brooch and pearls. The owner was able to save only the pictures; the Germans threw away the rest. The ring I wear was made from the brooch. My sons’ wives each received a ring with one of three stones from the brooch. That is all my husband was able to find. My brothers continued to live in Belgrade. One is connected to the community; the other is not. We are divided.

Now I am a full Jew; I became giur – as my mother wasn't a Jew –  in Israel. I wanted that. I was psychologically ready but not physically. I did not even get information about what to bring with me for that moment. I came to grips with this, that minute but instincts are very important. I brought with me everything that was needed. It was my luck that I was not alone. My granddaughter Sara was with me and helped me. I remember that when I entered the room in Ashkelon, which was filled with books, three rabbis sat there, the date was December 17. I do not know Ivrit but I know German, which is similar to Yiddish. So I arranged with one of the priests that my granddaughter and our rabbi, Isak Asiel, be present. When I went in, we greeted each other and they even asked Sara if she wanted to convert. Sara answered that she was not ready. The honesty of her answer impressed the rabbis, Isak and me. She was only 19 at the time, now things are different.

Three questions remain in my head. Why do I want to be a Jew? I answered that I always was a Jew. The second question was: Will I observe Shabbat? I answered yes. The third question was: Am I prepared to help people to the best of my ability? I said that I could not answer that, but that Isak could tell them. They were especially surprised when they asked me what Hebrew name I wanted and I immediately answered “Judita.” I wanted to have the same name as my grandmother. I knew so little about her and I never had the chance to feel her love – so I wanted to have her name. It is a very great thing to be a grandmother. I now have three grandchildren and I see how much they depend on my love and understanding.

When I say that I am a real Jew, I am. I became an Orthodox Jew. I keep kosher, I observe Shabbat and all the holidays and still learn a lot. I am happy about this, and I have peace of mind. I have balance. I go to synagogue on Friday night and Saturday and this is enough for me. I feel psychologically healthy and good.

Margit Schorr
Suceava
Romania
Date of interview: August 2006
Interviewer: Molnar Ildiko

Mrs Schorr is a small woman living alone in her flat with her two budgies. She is in a good physical condition, likes to go out and take walks in the nearby park. She loves the sunshine. She also likes cooking and baking; I was treated with “dulceata” (very sweet jelly jam) and with cookies during our sessions. Her relatives visit her regularly; they take good care of her. She lives a quiet, neat and bright life.

My family history
Growing up
During the War
After the War
Glossary:

My family history

My paternal grandfather’s surname was Ashkenazi, I don’t know his name or his date of birth, he came from the region of Odessa, fled one of the Russian pogroms. He settled down in Focşani and became a jeweler, where he owned a jewelry shop. Later on he moved to Suceava and owned the jewelry shop where my father would work as well. My grandparents were religious; everybody was religious at that time. He died before the First World War somewhere in the 1910s. My father did not really talk [about him].

My grandmother Ashkenazi Margit, whose maiden name and date of birth I don’t know, was a very quiet and reserved woman. I did not know either one of my grandparents but was named after my grandmother. My mother got to know her as her mother-in-law for a short while, my grandmother died in the 1920s. What I remember is that I used to have very thick hair and my mother always told me, that I inherited my grandmother’s hair, she had thick hair as well and always had to cut it because it was too heavy. I don’t have any other memories of her. A few years ago, I discovered my grandmother’s grave by chance; she is buried in the cemetery of Suceava. The guard there is a young man, I kept asking him and he searched until he found the grave, it’s not even in the back of the cemetery, for our cemetery … you can hardly walk through it, it is in such a terrible state… there is no one left to keep it, there are no more Jews.

My grandparents had three sons: my father, Karl Ashkenazi born 1873 in Focşani, after which they moved to Suceava. My father had two brothers whose names and dates of birth I don’t know, they both emigrated to America. After we came back from Transnistria, in 1945, one looked for us through the Red Cross, he sent us a photo and a food package because he had heard about our state of being, afterwards we lost contact. I don’t know anything about the other one; we never met. They lived there, we lived here in Suceava, and we never got in touch. That is all my father told me, very vague.

My father went to a normal school, or high school, I don’t know and learnt the handicraft of jeweler from my grandfather. He was an educated man, an autodidact, who read a lot. How many times did I wake up in the night – he had lost his first wife and son and was stressed about and couldn’t sleep at nighttime. Whenever I woke up in the night, I would find him reading. He had been through all the libraries in Suceava and read and read … He read in German for we spoke German at home.

My father’s first wife was a Jewish woman, her name was Berta Ungarisch, as I remember, and she was from Suceava. I don’t know how my father met his first wife, but it was a love match. They had a son, I don’t remember his name but [if he have been alive] he would have been my half-brother, he died of meningitis at the age of 12. Berta died soon afterwards of heart problems. My father did not really talk about these events. She was buried next to my grandmother in the cemetery of Suceava.

My mother’s maiden name was Jetty Rosa Kinsbruner, who was left all alone after her mother died so my uncle, Hans Kinsbruner, her brother who lived in Gura Humorului, intervened and arranged the meeting between my father and my mother. I think a shadchan [matchmaker] arranged their meeting.

My father was a widower; my mother was an old maid as they used to say at that time, she was 30 or 31 years old. I don’t know how long it took my father to remarry after the death of his first wife. They married around 1918, both being serious people who had been hit by fate. My parents had a religious wedding ceremony. If they had a written ketubah? I never saw it because we were deported and lost everything.

My maternal grandfather was Moişe Kinsbruner, I don’t know where he was born but it had to be somewhere in the 18402. My grandmother, Sosie Kinsbuner nee Rubel, was born in the 1850s but I don’t know where. My grandparents had seven children: Salo Kinsbruner, born in the 1870s, Hans Kinsbruner born in the 1870s, Liebe Kinsbruner born in the 1880s, Dora Kinsbruner born in the 1880s, Puike Kinsbruner born in the 1890s, my mother Rosa Kinsbruner born in 1887 in Şcheia-Suceava and Fany Kinsbruner born in the 1890s.

Grandparents Kinsbruner lived on the countryside, in different villages and here in Şcheia, very close to Suceava. My grandfather worked for a landowner and I think he brew ţuică [brandy] or some other drink for a living. At one point my grandfather refused to clink glasses with the landowner and the landowner fired him. I don’ know anything about that landowner, this story is the only thing I ever heard, that the landowner got mad because a jew wouldn’t clink glasses with a christian. So when my grandfather fell out with the landowner, my grandmother and the seven childred moved to Cernăuţi where they opened an inn run by my grandmother. Maybe my grandfather was still alive at that time, I don’t know.

Grandmother Sosie was a troubled woman who had to run the inn by herself, I don’t know if she had any help, she had seven children and when she came home tired after work, loaded with packages they would all wait hungry for her. And then she would stay: „One moment, one moment, set the table”  but she wouldn’t even start to cook. They would set the table and wait. They had enough food, they were wellfed, I don’t think they ever went hungry.

My grandfather was a very religious man yet I don’t know if he wore a mantle and a kippah, I never saw a photograph of him because religious Jews do not get their picture taken. I don’t know how many days a week he would fast. At the age of 50 something, he was so weakend through all that fasting that my grandmother ran to the rabbi and told him: „Rabbi, what can I do with my Moise? He will die. He is fasting …” So the rabbi sent him home and said : Go home and eat. You are responsible for your children.” He still died in the 1900s at the age of 50 something. I know that my mother used to reprimand me many time because I am not religious by saying: „ You are the granddaughter of Moise Kinsbruner who died of hunger because of all his fasting …”

My grandmother was religious as well, I know that she covered her head with a shawl or a wig. Grandmother Sosie died young in the 1918s, she was somewhere in her 60s. My mother was the sacrificed one. All her siblings were married and spread throughout the world so my mother took care of her dying mother. I don’t remember if they still owned the inn at that time or if they liquidated it when my grandmother got sick.

Salo Kinsbruner lived in Vienna. He married a Viennaise probably before World War I and was the first of the siblings to leave. I never met him. He died young because of war wounds and was buried alive, that is what I heard. Salo had two children, a son or a daugther and if they still live they should be in America. We never were in touch with Salo who lived in Vienna but his daughter, whom I think already died in America, visited us once.

The second brother was Hans Kinsbruner, he lived in Gura Humorului and I don’t know anything about his wife. They had a very sweet daughter, Dora.  She was deported in the same period as us. They came back from Transnistria and on their way home the borders closed and they got stuck in a place I don’t remember. The girl went out to gather wood for the winter, to keep warm and a beam fell on her and killed her on the spot. They went back to Gura Humorului without their girl where they had a shop with clothing material and linen. And slowly, as time passed, one after the other died. I visited them every summer, I used to spend my vacations in Gura Humorului. It is very beautiful there and there were many Jews, many of them religious, those people with sideburns. Hans wasn’t religious in his youth but after the death of his girl he turned into an ultra-religious person. He would sit and rock himself all day and his sisters would even make fun of him because he would shake and fast and keep the holidays too much.

My mother’s older sister lived in Czernovitz. Her name was Liebe Kinsbruner, married Scholl, we were deported together to Transnistria and even shared a room in Sharogod. She had a daughter named Rachel. After they came back from deportation, they moved to Israel. She died in Israel.

Another sister was called Dora Kinsbruner, married Stern. They lived in Rădăuţi where uncle Stern ran a fish shop, he sold fish. They had a son named Max Stern. My daughter-in-law was befriended with Max, they grew up together, they used to be neighbors in Rădăuţi. They emigrated during that period when most of the Jews left, around the years 1950-60 1. Max died in Israel, he left behind a son but I have no idea where he is.

Puike Kinsbruner lived in Czernovitz as well. I don’t know her real name, everybody used to call her Puike, she later married a Kahan. Her husband was an architect, they had two sons. One of them died in Suceava, his wife came to Suceava as well and remarried. His daughter is still alive though, she is somewhere, pciking strawberries I think, but he died. His older brother was an architect as well and died in America, he had a daughter. They used to live in Czernovitz but then his wife died and he went to America where his daughter already lived.

The other sister who lived in Czernovitz was Fany Kinsbruner, married Brill who was the youngest of the sisters. My uncle was a photographer, his name was Iacob Brill and they lived in Czernovitz. Iacob and Salo Brill were two brothers, both photographers, who started out working together but by the time I was a child they weren’t together anymore, both of them had an own studio in a different part of Czernovitz. I did not know Salo too well, he moved to the Russian Street, „Russische Strasse”, which I discovered when I was in Czernovitz with my sons last year. The studio of my uncle Iacob Brill was on the Water Street, „Wasser Gasse” it was called in German. Afterwards, when the Romanians came, the street was renamed Ferdinand Road, it was wellknown in town, I spent a lot of time there. My aunt Fany had no children of her own, she consider me to be her child. The studio was beautiful, at the entrance there was a show case advertising photo’s, then you entered into a large room with an interior stair case which led to the studio it self. I remember that the stair case was built out of wood and it was squeaky, and I, being little, descended and fell and rolled all the way down. Everybody was terribly scared but I was alright. My uncle would receive his clients downstairs and then he would take them upstairs to photograph them, downstairs was also the living space of my aunt and uncle. Iacob Brill was shot by the Romanians or the Germans, I forgot, and I don’t remember if it was an accident or if it happened on purpose. Fany was deported as well but she ended up at the other side of the Bug River, where the Germans were, and she died there in 1942-43. She died young, she wasn’t even 50 years old. When we were still deported, in Transnistria, we received a card written by her during her deportation. She said she was fine, that she had to clean the bathrooms in a German military hospital. We never heard anything from her again, she probably died of typhus or she was killed.

My mother’s siblings weren’t very religious, they would observe the holidays nicely but wouldn’t exaggerate. All the cousins and aunts kept very much in touch and during vacations they would come visit us in Suceava or we would „frequently” go to Czernovitz, once a month, once every two months. When I would visit aunt Tiny, I would take the bus Suceava – Czernovitz, and we would go to Czernovitz through Siret, it would take an hour and a half, maybe two hours.

Jewish life in Cernovitz was nearly identical to Jewish life in Suceava. They were a bit more pretentious, would go to cafe’s or to a restaurant maybe. They maybe were more elegant, their city was bigger. But otherwise it was the same. Holidays were the same and the rich market in Czernovitz, their market was very abundant. People from Czernovitz were more snobbish and at my aunt’s house …. You would eat, there was so much food you would get sick. I had a fat uncle, Kahan, he loved to eat and my aunt weighed more than 80 kilograms.

Last year I was in Czernovitz with my sons. One of Karl’s neighbors has a big shop in Czernovitz and he guided us around and lodged us at a hotel in the center of the city. We walked around and I tried to discover the places where I spent my childhood. If we would’ve stayed another day, I would’ve found more, now time was too short and too many had changed. We did not go to the street where my aunt lived, but I know where it is; we did see the National Theatre and the house where my other aunt used to live. It was very emiotional to see those places again, the places where I spent part of my childhood. Not many things had changed. I had forgotten many things and had to try hard to remember them. Czernovitz’ atmosphere has changed though. There are no more elegant people standing in front of the café’s and everybody speaks Russian. They don’t even want to speak Romanian or maybe they forgot. While we were walking along the National Theatre, we saw a beautiful house and some companies, we opened a door and entered a jewish center. There was a long table, set, and the old people and the younger ones were sitting and eating, they were celebrating the evening of Rosh HaShana. And when we entered and introduced ourselves as Jews and Romanian, they told us to sit down and served us dinner as well. It was hard to understand eachother because they don’t speak Romanian but luckily I know Yiddish. Next to me sat an old lady and we started to talk with each other – I told her that I had been deported to Sharogod, that I had spent their almost three years – „ Ah, Mrs., I am from Sharogod a well!”. And we remember common acquaintances and talked a long time, my son took a picture of us and I sent them a copy as well, I asked for their address. I would’ve liked to go there again, to talk again with that lady, to remember those years in Sharogod. I did not get the chance but it is an extraordinary thing, that while walking through Czernowitz you accidently find a Jewish Community on the evening of Rosh HaShana. Afterwards my son wanted to see the synagogue in Czernovitz, I didn’t know where it was and we didn’t speak their language, so we walked and walked for two or three hours, up a hill down a hill – Czernovitz is full of hills. When we finally found the synagogue it was closed, for it was Saturday. We took some pictures in front of the synagogue and that was that.

The family would gather there in Czernovitz. One of the cousins would play the piano and sing happy songs, the aunts would sing, only my mother would be the sad one. They would sing in German, that was the spoken language here, maybe even in Hebrew, I don’t remember. They were all kind of songs, not only traditional ones, but also happy ones, jazz. I remember that the three aunts Fany, Puike and Liebe and I don’t know how many cousins would meet and it would be such a merry gathering. Those from Czernovitz lived beautifully and joyfully. They lived beautifully and died horribly.

My mother, Jetty Roza Ashkenazi nee Kinsbruner, was born 1887 in Şcheia, which was next to Suceava. She went to elementary school and spoke Yiddish and German. My mother was very modest. I had a sister named Suzi Ashkenazi, born 1919 in Suceava, named after my grandmother Sosie and then I was born 1923, also in Suceava. My sister died of diphtheria in 1924; she was only four years old. She is buried here in Suceava. When my sister died, Fany – my mother’s sister from Czernovitz- came and took me with her so my parents could grieve. I stayed a whole year with Fany. When they took me back, I didn’t want to go to my mother, I didn’t recognize her.

Growing up

Karl Ashkenazi’s store was the name of my father’s jewelry store, named after him. It was in the middle of the center and behind the shop was our house. It was a rental house. The shop was little, you had to climb three stairs, enter the shop and in a corner would be his table, he sat and worked there all the time, with a loupe, he was almost blind at the end. He worked alone; he did not have any help. Also in the shop was a counter with all kind of jewels, it disappeared after we were deported. My father would import jewels and watches from Czernovitz and sell them. Behind his shop was our house, which consisted of two rooms and a kitchen. We had cold water, I think also during the night; if you wanted to take bath the water had to be heated, we had a round tub. We did have electric light and our heating system was an oven functioning on wood. We would buy wood in the autumn, a farmer would bring us a wagonload of wood, then we would hire someone to chop and arrange the wood; you would warm up so well at a fireplace!

When you exited the house at the back, you would enter into a large courtyard with wood chips on the ground; there was another shop in that house, a big grocery store and wine store, there were wine barrels and the merchandise was unloaded there, for example olives. It smelled of olives and I would walk around, looking for a little bit of grass, I missed the green. The courtyard was closed in by houses and in one of the house, which was a bit more behind the others, lived to sisters named Plesciug, probably Ukrainians, who owned a photography studio. They lived in a little, dark house. As a child I would enter everywhere, I would play in the courtyard and walk everywhere, I could be found in every house, everybody knew me and everybody played with me.

My mother would go to the market if she needed anything. Farmers from the countryside came to market and brought chicken. Suceava had good markets and all the stores where owned by Jews and my mother would buy from them. My father’s jewelry store was there as was his workshop. We always had a maid. My mother spent a lot of time with my father in the store; she would help him so she couldn’t get everything done in the house. That is why we always had a maid who would clean, help with the groceries and probably took care of me as well. Apparently, my parents could afford it because as far as I remember, we always had a maid.

I was well dressed as well, my mother knew how to sew and she made me some beautiful dresses. She made most of my dresses but every once in a while she would take me to a tailor for a coat or a dress. At that time most clothes were sown, not bought. You would by the fabrics in town and go to the tailor who would make it for you.

There were three or four cars in town during the inter-war period belonging to some rich people from Suceava; there were carriages as well.  Most of the carriages belonged to Jews and when you had to go to the train station, you would hire a carriage. I remember one of the owners, his name was Tedica, I think; he has died. They would come to pick you up from home, you would take seat in the carriage with your luggage and then you would go: trample, trample... go to the train station.

There were at least four or five synagogues in Suceava before the war [Editor’s note: by 1939 there were 12 functioning synagogues in Suceava], there were many rabbis and shochets [ritual butchers] in town. There was the Grand Synagogue to which my mother went and where she had her own place, then there was the Tailor’s Synagogue, I don’t remember the other ones. The Grand Synagogue was downtown, in the old part of the city when you come from the train station, which was where the Jewish quarters were. That synagogue does not exist anymore; it was demolished. The synagogue that still stands is the Gah synagogue. The shochet that I knew wasn’t next to the rabbi’s house, no it was further away, closer to the house where I was born and spent my childhood; there was a Jewish center there as well.

I knew rabbi Moscovici very well; I used to go to their house because his daughter Miriam was my friend. The rabbi’s house was on the road, when you entered Suceava from the direction of Iţcani. Their house was like all the other old houses in Suceava, little with only a ground level. I don’t remember how it looked from the inside, nowadays the house doesn’t exist anymore. I don’t remember if the rabbi’s wife was still alive at that time, I have no memories regarding her. Miriam I remember well though, we met at Hebrrew school. It is interesting because I have a photograph from that time but don’t remember a thing from my time at Hebrew school. I had a teacher, I learnt the alphabet and know how to read but how I learned …? Years after the war I met Miriam in Gura Humorului. She had married  a rabbi, I think rabbi Frankel. It was summertime and she had come to recover a bit. Poor Miriam, she was troubled, she said to me: „I can’t do it anymore…” because every year she gave birth to a child, it is a mitzvah for them to have many children. She wasn’t in Suceava anymore after the war, I don’t know if she still is alive, if she is in the country or in Israel, she was a bit younger than me … She had a brother and this brother would ride a bike and all the people, especially the more religious ones would say: „What does it mean that the rabbi’s son rides a bike through town? It means that he isn’t too rabinnical [meaning he doesn’t keep the Law’s commandments].”  Moscovici was wellknown in Suceava and he was respected by everyone, I don’t know though if he was orthodox.

I don’t know how many Jews lived in Suceava before the war, but percentage wise it could have been half of the city’s population, maybe 40.000 – I’m not sure. A part of the Jews were the intellectuals, lawyers, medics etc. A big part consisted of the artisans and the merchants who were in the center of the city, they were the middle class, and then there were the poor of Suceava, who lived on Nesermete, that was the road which went down from the citadel, a downwards road and there they sat: coachmen, women plucking feathers, little artisans. My father was a jeweler; he was a craftsman in his profession and a merchant, having a shop in the center of Suceava. According to me there were three categories of people: the intellectuals, the merchants and the third category might have contained a few merchants and the poor.

I don’t know if there existed a form of help for these poor Jews, maybe the Hevra Kadisha, those who buried the poor, helped them. I know that money for the poor was collected into those money boxes, I saw them at Keren Kayemet LeIsrael [K.K.L.] but not at our home. I visited an exposition in Israel, which showed moneyboxes from all over the world.

My mother was religious, my father wasn’t. They made some sort of agreement when they married: “You keep your traditions as you want, I will do as I want.”  They got along very well. My father did not go to the synagogue on holidays but he knew all the Jewish laws and on his deathbed I heard him pray all of a sudden. He once had a disagreement with someone from the Community and from that moment on he did not go to the synagogue anymore. But, for example, if there was something of which he thought that it might be beneficial for me, for example the swinging of the kappara he would do it because it was for his child.

My mother went to the synagogue on the Holy days not on Saturdays when women don’t really go. I am not sure if she ever went to the ritual bath, maybe she went to the city one. I’ve heard that there used to be a mikveh when you entered Suceava from Iţcani. I don’t know if my mother ever went, maybe when she got married to my father. My father wasn’t the kind of person who would force her to go but maybe the community wanted her to go so they could give her the blessing. My mother used to fast, she bought matzos, kept kosher, I knew of all the holidays, she went to the shochter when something needed to be cut, she wouldn’t let a christian slaughter the animals, she did not mix dairy with meat products, but I don’t remember if she washed the dishes together or not. We had a mezuzah at the door but I don’t know anything more than that.

My mother kept the Shabbat. My father ate a lot, you know that all diabetics eat a lot. My mother prepared Jewish food and fried fish and all. We probably had Challah as well, it’s some sort of bread, but we didn’t make any special preparations. I don’t remember, I think it was in Israel, that somebody explained to me that the Shabbat is a holiday bigger than any other. It is the biggest celebration of the Jews. My mother did not cook “sholet” [a traditional Shabbat dish] but she told me that my grandmother would make it. She had a special dish made out of clay that had to be in the oven for a night, on coal, to keep warm and make the sholet. And last year, my grandson Herbert came and wanted to make sholet. He went to the market by himself because I told him: “Leave me alone, I don’t know how to make sholet” so I went to the market by himself and came back with carrots, beans … He turned my whole kitchen upside down. I told him: “You know what, go to your aunt – Karl’s wife – and make the sholet at her place.” But she doesn’t know how to prepare it either. So he made a mixture of sholet. He had heard about it in Israel, he wanted to make it here, that’s how the crazy idea came to his mind. He made sholet and that was the first time I ate it. He taught me how to cook it but I haven’t tried any new recipes since then. I simplified them because I diet.

My mother had special dishes for Passover in the loft. They would be taken down for Passover and then my mother and I went to a bakery where they made matzos and sometimes I helped. The matzos were put in some oval baskets and covered with a clean cloth and then you could take them home. Every corner of the house had to be cleaned … I liked the holiday atmosphere, you felt as if you were preparing for something. Passover was without bread but otherwise with the regular food: fried fish, meat, and Jewish food. My mother would cook Jewish food but not for all the seven [eight] days of Passover.

For Passover my parents would send me to friends so I could see how the Seder rituals had to be kept. Every year I visited a different family friend. For a while I went to our neighbor, he was a lawyer and his daughter died in Israel. Another time I went to other friends, I don’t remember but I went every year. I remember that matzos were stolen, younger children than me would do that and the boys would do the Manishtanah questions. I remember that you had to open the door so the prophet Elijah could enter. And in that moment when the door was opened the cat would strategically enter. We were so entertained … only small things, details, stay in your mind. And afterwards the Seder food, I remember everything you have to do then.

At Yom Kippur my mother and I went to the synagogue and my father would stay at the opened door to hear the Khol Nidre, he wouldn’t enter the synagogue. He did not fast for Yom Kippur, because he was sick, he had diabetes. I only remember him as a sick man. I don’t know if there are any exceptions in religion because of illness, I couldn’t say. I did not research those things; they are too personal.

At Purim I was afraid of the masks. I had a room all for myself in which I would hide, covering my head with pillows so I wouldn’t have to see the masks. For me Purim was a torture, I was terrified of the masks. And my parents would tell me about how Purim in Suceava was when they were young. People would hire carriages because the masked ones would go from one acquaintance to another and they would share sweets, sing and dance; they would tell me about Purim and the merriness on the streets but I did not live during those times. I lived in those times when the masks would go from house to house for treats. When I was little Purim was celebrated as they once did: the dressed up [masked] Jews would come home, my mother would bake, pastries with honey and nuts but for me it was horrible, I didn’t know where to hide. My mother baked very tasty things, they would buy fruits, and we had everything we needed. I don’t remember Hanukkah; I don’t think we ever lit the candles. Now I have the candles but I don’t think we did at that time.

My father was a very social man. Our home was always opened to friends, especially my father’s younger friends because he would say: “I am old, why shouldn’t I have young people around me?” They would come, gather round the table, talk politics and my mother would serve. We had an open, receiving house. My mother was of a closed nature, she wasn’t merry but she received everybody warmly.

My father loved nature very much and on Saturdays he would close the store and we would go into the wilderness where it was green and beautiful. We would take food with us, my father would walk in front of us carrying his walking stick on his shoulder, my mother would limp after him and than I would be the last and sometimes the first; those were our Saturdays and Sundays. In the evenings we would be home, the walks were short. When I was bigger, I would go to the beach of the river Suceava with my friends.

My parents never went away for vacations, they couldn’t close the store, they were tied to it. Every once in a while they would go to Gura Humorului and then they were happy. During the summer we would all meet there. My aunt from Gura Humorului had siblings all over the country and they would all meet there: the ones from Czernovitz, us from Suceava – our aunt had to deal with us all. All the relatives would sojourn in the country. They had a big house, my aunt’s mother lived upstairs and she owned the house, which had many rooms.

My teacher in primary school was Mrs. Buduhos who loved us all equally and who sent me a photograph of the third grade when I returned from Transnistria. I was a dreamy child, rather spoiled but not in the annoying kind of way, I was happy. I would sing all day long, felt sheltered, had dolls and played with them until I was 12, I had a thousand and one friends. Only ones I got a horrible beating, which I’ll never forget again. I did not like to wake up in the mornings. My mother dressed me while I slept, pulled me for I had to go to school. And I didn’t react. Afterwards she took me out of bed, put me on my feet and pushed me out of the door, because the school was next door. And when I heard the school bell ring I would run half asleep to school. And one day my father had enough. And he gave me a good beating, which I’ll never forget: “ Or you wake up properly or you get it!” And he gave me a good beating. That was the only time.

If you walked out of the house, passed through the courtyard, you arrived at some kind of roundabout; one way went to the high school to which I belonged and on the other side lived my two friends Ruth and Melany – who later on changed her name to Monica -, and that is where I spent my childhood. We were three girls who grew up in the same neighborhood, we went together to school, we went together to Transnistria, we were together all the time. Ruth died last year in Israel, in a moshav, I visited her a few times and Melany lived in Bucharest, she married a Christian. We kept in touch for while and afterwards we lost contact; she didn’t write, I didn’t write. We saw each other a few times, she was in Bucharest at the beginning afterwards I don’t know where she was, we didn’t even speak on the phone afterwards so I didn’t know anything about her. But last week [august 2006] a young woman came and introduced herself as Corina Hoancă and said: „ I am Monica’s daughter and I came to see the places where my mother grew up and I would like to hear some of your memories regarding her.” I showed her photos of her mother, the photo from school and I told her many things about Melany. I showed her the places where she used to live, where our high school was, I took her to the synagogue. During our childhood, the city looked completely different. Some of the old quarters stayed more or less the same but most have changed. I walked with Corina and I was hard for me to rebuild the places where her mother lived eventhough it was in my neighborhood, near to the high school. But the interesting part is that I told her to come to my place and tell me about her mother, about how she was doing. „ My mother died three or four months ago.” It felt as if she had hit me with something on my head because even though we hadn’t seen each other for a while, I always knew that Melany was in Bucharest.

„Lady Mary’s High School”  was the name of the high school I went too, I still have the basque with the initials of lady Mary. When I was 12-13 I became a “străjeriţă” 2, we had to wear the grey or blue uniform, I don’t remember, and a tie. And I would take part in the activities of the strejarie, I would march, sing, we never went to camp, all the activities took place here, I actually went only for four years to that high school. War came, I couldn’t go to school anymore, the strajeria was disolved, another regime took over. We were kicked out of school in 1939. Jews did not have the right to go to high school. I don’t know on what grounds [probably because of the numerus clausus in Romania]3 but I couldn’t go to school anymore so everybody had to try and find a way to complete their studies. Those of us who could afford it went to Czernovitz and studied there. I went there as well, lived with my aunt Tiny and went to some courses for a year. It was a private school run  two ladies,  probably retired teachers, who gathered a number of girls and taught them general culture and languages.

I didn’t feel any anti-Semitic manifestations before the war, just when the war started to draw closer.  In primary school there was a teacher who would say a few anti-Semitic things as well as two girls who didn’t want to have anything to do with us. But most of them behaved very nicely until the very last moment. There was a girl, she still lives in Suceava, who would take our arm, walk with us through the city, to show people how they had to behave. There were others who didn’t want to have anything to do with us. But they were only two or so. The rest behaved properly.

I never suffered any harm from my colleagues or my professor. Contrary, the mayor’s assistant from Suceava who was a cuzist 4 and was known as a Jew-eater, was a professor but I forgot his name. And when the Germans came to the city, he went from house to house to find rooms for the officers. And when he arrived at our house, of course my parents were frightened and looked at me, he came with a Romanian officer I think, and said: “We can’t put anyone here, there is a young girl living here …” and he left.

During the War

I wasn’t aware of the beginning of the war until it really broke out and the Polish fled to our regions, because Hitler had entered their country. Everybody went outside to serve them. They were dressed in furs; the rich had fled Poland by taking their own cars and crossing the borders. And everybody walked by to serve them with drinks and other things and I know that some of hem said: “You are Jews, we don’t take from Jews”. And then we said that there actually were coward Jews after all, that we shouldn’t serve them.

My father was a social democrat but in the end he abandoned politics just as he had abandoned his religiosity, something had displeased him and he stopped doing politics. I don’t remember if he ever discussed those things in front of me, I was too dreamy as a child. We did not have a radio. My parents would go somewhere else to catch up with the news. At that times they were broadcasting those programs with Hitler barking through the radio, with commentaries, typical war broadcasting. My father liked the newspapers, with politics, spoke with friends and discussed the news and he felt that a catastrophe was coming closer. They didn’t discuss possible solutions or what to do and how to react. Maybe not even my parents could anticipate the tragedy that was waiting for us.

Throughout all my childhood, I knew that my father was sick and his health slowly started to deteriorate, his kidneys started to play up. He died slowly, working until the very last moment. He was sitting, couldn’t breathe anymore and made a pair of wedding rings for this man who wasn’t a guard but a legionnaire of some kind, a man who had hanged many Jews in Bucharest, he was a Jew-eater. He was the husband-to-be of one of my school colleagues, who was a very nice girl, and he wanted a pair of rings so he could marry that girl. And my father, already dying, told him that he wasn’t able to do it. The guy hit the table with his walking stick and said: “Either you make me the rings or I can’t guarantee the outcome”. So my father made the rings, it was his last job. He made the rings, gave them, went to sleep and never woke up again. This happened in February 1941, my father was 68 years old.

After my father died, my mother continued to run the store as best as she could but she would only sell things. The workshop was closed down for my father had been the only one who worked there. Before our deportation, a couple of guys came and asked for a watch and a ring in order to ‘guard’ our house, they all left with something. We had crystals, silverware and we knew that it was in vain but we wanted our peace and gave them the things so they would leave us alone. This happened after the deportation had been announced. We were deported in October.

One day we were announced that we had to pack our bags and than they sent us in three shifts over the Bug, over the Dniester 5. It was very primitive back then, a drummer would walk on the streets and that is how all the news and commands were transmitted to the people. He would walk, beat his drum, gather people around him and say what he had to say. Maybe there even was a written statement, I don’t remember. Those were the days of utter chaos and I just don’t remember.

We were in the third transport, we had two or three days to prepare ourselves, I don’t remember exactly how many but it was too short. Those who left before us had been less lucky; I know that people told us that we, transport number three, were the lucky ones. I don’t remember what happened to those from the first two transports. None of them is still alive, maybe Mrs. Victor, an old teacher, still is. She was there and she remembers, but now she isn’t able to discuss those time, neither does she want to be reminded of them.

We didn’t know where we were going. Maybe others knew. But I was young, 18 years old, maybe for me it was also somehow a sort of adventure, but I didn’t know a thing. I know that my mother gathered what she could carry and when our time came, we hired a carriage with a friend, put our entire luggage in the carriage, sat on top of them and went to the train station. And in the train station the cattle trains were waiting, cattle wagons and in one of them were we and our fellow citizens; maybe some of them were in different wagons, I don’t know but they locked us up and we traveled towards the Dniester.

Romanian soldiers guarded us. They didn’t do anything to us, nobody beat us, and nobody pushed or shoved us. The worst thing was the humiliation. Here [at home] I lived a normal and civilized life, as you would, I was a merchant’s daughter, a jeweler’s daughter; there we were humiliated all the time. They put is in cattle wagons, they took us out of our homes and before we crossed the Dniester they would touch us and search for jewelry. They didn’t shoot or hurt anyone, at least I didn’t see it happening, the shootings and beatings followed later.

We sat down in the wagon and as I remember there was a toilet, our friends and other acquaintances were in the same wagon as us and everybody was mourning the things they left at home. But we traveled towards the unknown; we didn’t know where we were going. We arrived at Otaci, which is still on our side, on the Romanian side of the Dniester, and there they transferred us into boats so we could cross the Dniester and arrive in the Ukrainian part. On one side was Otaci and on the other side Moghilău 6. I think that there had been innundations in Moghilău because the houses were half-destroyed and that is were they lodged us, at a local woman’s house and I don’t know how long we stayed there.

Many young ones were caught and sent to the other side of the Bug, where my aunt died as well. I managed to escape and hired a carriage with some friends … And here all of a sudden my memories disappear, I don’t know anything anymore. All I know is that we crossed a field and arrived into a community named Murafa, a poor place with small houses and we entered a house where a widow and her little child lived. My mother and I stayed there for a while. Afterwards a friend, who was in Shargorod, sent a carriage to pick us up.

He found us a place to live in a Jewish house, in the Jewish quarter of Shargorod 7. „Hagiaica” master was a furrier and had two or three sons and a daugher who died of typhus. Two of the boys were soldiers and the boy with a disabillity was at home and we became friends. He could sing beautifuly and we became really good friends, I heard he died. My mother and I shared a big room, our masters behaved nice towards us. Afterwards all the refugees from Czernowitz came and lived with us in that room: my mother’s oldest sister Liebe Scholl, uncle Polak and cousin Rachel. They emigrated to Israel after they returned from the deportations. And than my aunt died in some home in Israel. My aunt and cousin slept on a table, my mother and I on a narrow bed of iron. Then typhus appeared. Rachel got typhus. My mother got typhus as well and I had to stay with her in one be. There was a hospital as well and my cousin Rachel was sent to it. Our doctors from Suceava, we had doctors, were there as well but I don’t know if they got paid for their services.

A family from Câmpulung Moldovenesc had to walk through our room as well, family Schiber. Five people lived in a small room and we stayed in the front room and they had to walk through our room all the time. A mother and her husband, daughter and son and the docter whom the Mrs. Schiber would marry after the war when she came back from Transnistria where her husband died.  She lived in Suceava and died last year. Mrs. Schiber’s son was quite the businessman abd brought them all kind of things into that room. He recently died in Israel, I mean he died in Viena and was transported back to Israel, I was in Israel at that time. Another family lived with Hagiaca in their kitchen. They had an old stove, inside of which was a pot of clay in which they cooked. The mother and the cousing cooked our food separatly. They were very retarded. They would tell us full of pride that they had curtains in front of the window. We had to admire their curtains because they were oh so proper. They were partely indeed proper and partly we had to admire them because it was in their interest, we were a connection to the rulers [romanian occupiers].

Our hosts were Jewish as well, they spoke Russian and Yiddish. I could communicate in Yiddish with them. They were somehow happy that we were there because we were able to talk to the Romanian soldiers, there were Romanians there, and they felt somewhat protected through our presence. They were happy that we were in their house or they just tolerated us because we were a connection to the Romanian occupiers. But we did not have any connections to the Romanian soldiers, we rarely saw them. They were under Romanian occupation and there was a, I do’t know how he was called, a prefect called deputy. He was a brutal man but he left us more or less alone because of certain reasons.

We survived and the interesting thing is that I was 18 years old and was rather well-built because I ate jacket potatoes all the time. They were so tasty, ah they tasted so good, we didn’t have anything else. We would cook them with their skin, bake them, put them in salt and eat them and the Hagiaica baked very good bread which we are. That region is a very rich regions with very good markets, all that you would want, they are Ukraine’s granary. Most of ours died by the time we arived and stayed in Shargorod.

The things we had taken with us we used to survive: pillow cases, I don’t know, all that we could carry we sold to the Ukrainians. Afterwards a cousin and her mother from Czernovitz came and stayed with us, the old woman was a seamstress and she would sew all the time. I don’t know who borrowed a sewing maching, one of those that turn around, and she would stay and sew and then sell the things. And after a year or maybe a year and a half, our family from Czernovitz found a trustworthy person and sent us some things… We survived because we were lucky enough to be placed into a house with an oven and we weren’t cold and kept selling the things we had taken from home and so the first winter passed and it was a nightmare, it was horrbile. And afterwards we just kept living.

There were Jewish labourcamps in Dorohoi and the Jews were taken out of the camps and sent to Transnistria [to Sharogod]. They arrived barefeet and full with lice, they brought typhus with them and they put them in an empty synagogue, it was winter, minus 20 degrees Celsius and the next morning one by one all the bodies were taken out and I saw that. I didn’t know what the people kept putting into those carriages and all of a sudden I realised that they had to be bodies…

Sharogod was a wretched town without toilets. You had to go outside, to a filthy pond, we had buckets and we would empty them into the pond. There was no water in the house but there were some primitive wells, just some holes in the ground, from which we would take the water. The locals taught me how to take water out of the well, to throw the bucket in and pull the water up, to carry it up the hill because we lived on a hill. Once during the winter it was icy and I carried two buckets of water and just when I had arrived on top of the hill, I fell and all the water fell on me. We carried the water and in time we made ourselves a sort of oven on which we could heat our food. A human gets used to things, he adapts to whatever comes on his path.

There was on the market [a currency used for business], we could buy things but I don’t remember if it was a special currency, Ruble or Lei. I was lucky that at my age of 18 years old, I did not completely realize the tragedy of our situation. It was very tragic indeed. To be taken out of your house, to be left with absolutely nothing, whoever wanted could exterminate you. In Sharogod the leaders were more tolerant. My daughter-in-law comes from Rădăuţi, she was born there but she was in a different place, Giurin I think.

We would go out of the house, walk around, befriend the Ukrainian youth, with would speak Yiddish with them, they were Ukrainian Jews. It was there that I learnt a handful of Russian. I couldn’t really learn that language. It is a difficult language. But we were friends and we would meet every evening and talk…

None of us from Bucovina were sent to work across the Bug. We had to pick tobacco leaves. They gathered us and than they took us to work where a lawyer from Suceava supervised us. There was a lot of youth and we would pick tobacco leaves. Mister deputy didn’t like something and we had to stay in line and in front of us he slapped the lawyer a few times. And we, youngsters, just watched. Afterwards I got sick of tobacco intoxication as a result of the leave picking and I was sick for a few days. I didn’t go often, maybe once or twice.

We stayed in Sharogod until May 1944. In May 1944 Sharogod was liberated, the Germans retreated, I watched them retreat, watched them how they ran as lunatics. We were surrounded by hills and I saw the partisans descent those hills. The Germans were still in town and the partisans were already descending. We hid somewhere in cellar under the ground and stayed there. We heard the Ukrainians pass by, they were the ones that left with the Germans because they felt guilty or where connected to the Germans and oh, the savages went with them. We heard them trample through the house; they didn’t find us so they left. We exited the cellar and the partisans came, we cheered for them because they were our salvation because if those Germans and Ukrainians had stayed for a few more ours they would have exterminated us. And afterwards, we hired a carriage and went home. We arrived in Czernovitz and stayed for a week or two with one of my aunts, after two weeks we left them as well and went home, again in a hired carriage with some friends.

After the War

We came back in May 1944, two years and seven months after the deportation but we did not find a single thing. We had locked the door when we left home but of course there was nothing left when we returned, they had emptied the house. I found a pile of papers, thrown outside, and in that pile I found my French study book, it was half torn. There had been a fire at our home. When we returned we didn’t stay in the same house, we lived with some friends.

I am not sure if my mother reopened the jewelry store but she wasn’t capable, she wasn’t a merchant. We did not keep the store after we came back.

I went back to school. Mrs. Lovi, a teacher, had opened a Jewish high school here in Suceava. I entered 10th grade and I skipped two grades because I had already done four years of high school and I wanted to write my final exams, I wanted to go to medical school. I don’t remember how many students and how many classes there were. One of Mrs. Lovi’s sisters was a judge, she taught Logic and Argumentation; then there was professor Rimmer, from Fălticeni, he taught mathematics. The others I don’t remember. I don’t even know where that school used to be. That’s the way that period of time went by and even though I don’t remember, it was very hard for me. Mathematics and Physics weren’t my cup of tea and so, when my husband came and proposed, I accepted very quickly so I could marry and did not have to become a doctor as I had wanted. That is how studying and schooling ended for me.

My husband’s name is Julius Martin Schorr, born 1906 in Suceava. His father was also from Suceva but his step-father named Schafer was the one who actually raised him because his biological father died in Iasi when Julius was six. His step-father was a respected man in Suceava, he was a lawyer. His mother was from Suceava as well, she and her sisters died of typhus on a table in Transnistria. She was a gorgeuos woman. My husband had two brothers: Schorr Siegfried who was an economist and died with his wife Gerda, also Jewish, in Struma 8. The other brother was Schorr Herbert, a doctor, who lived in France and died 1978 in Paris, he had a daughter named Nicole.

My husband lived with his parents and after his father [stepfather] died, he continued living with is mother. They had a house in the center of Suceava, it was opposite to the Court, on the other side of the road. They had a beautiful house with a big garden which don’t exist anymore. Apartment buildings have been built on that spot.

My husband was a handsome man, admired by the women from Suceava and because he was a bachelor until he was 38, I know he had a few girlfriends before he met me. He was a quiet, peaceful and serious man who professed the law. Before the war he had been a lawyer for a short time and after the war, when he came back, he was a civil servant.

My husband had been deported to Transnistria as well but we didn’t meet there. We met here, after we came back. I remember that he used to sit on a chair in some store and he would sell things. We were acquainted but he wasn’t part of my social circle, he was 17 years older than me. I was childish, had other friends, he was a man with life experience. We met at a wedding after our return and he decided that we should get married. He like me, I liked him, we both had been to Transnistria and that shared experience united us. He spoke with my mother and than we got married.

We married during spring 1945 in Suceava. We had a religious wedding but there wasn’t a ceremony because only my mother and me were left. I know that a rabbi appeared at our civil wedding but I don’t know if he was from Suceava or not. My husband wasn’t religious but he respected absolutely everything that had to be done, out of respect for my mother. We were married at home, we had a chuppah from the Community. As a widow my mother wasn’t allowed to stand under the chuppah. There were some acquaintances, not even friends, at the place where we lived but they could not have been more than six. He had nobody left so nobody came from his side. His mother and aunts had died, he was the only one who had returned from Transnistria. He was alone and as poor as I was. He had nobody left. I was poor, he was poor, we had absolutely nothing. But my mother made me a pink dress, I don’t know how she got the fabric, we borrowed the veil and that was it.

There is a big house in the center which belonged to one of my husband’s uncles, and he had room. After we married, we moved into that house and we stayed there until we moved to Câmpulung Moldovenesc. We got some furniture from the abandonned goods because many of those who had fled, died and didn’t return and they gave us a table and a chair, it was easier to collect than to buy furniture. My oldest son, Karl Berthold Schorr was born in 1945 and Siegfried, the younger one in 1949, both were born in Suceava. My husband started to work as a civil servant and I started to raise the boys, first one than both and that is how live went by.

We moved to the district’s capital Câmpulung Moldovenesc in 1952 9. As a civil servant my husband had been transferred and he took me, our boys and my mother with him. He went back, when he was transferred back to Suceava. I stayed six years in Câmpulung with the boys because I had fallen in love with the mountains and the forrests. My mother would take care of her grandsons, would take care of the house and I would climb the mountains. My mother only died in 1960 when we had already returned to Suceava. We all moved back to Suceava in 1957.

We lived in a deputy’s house in Câmpulung Moldovenesc, my husband somehow got the house and that’s where we lived. The house’s owners weren’t in Câmpulung Moldovenesc, I don’t know where they were. We lived on the first stock, another family lived on the ground floor and we had to pay rent and all those other things [bills and expenses]. There used to be many jews im Câmpulung Moldovenesc but all of them left or died … there is no one left. There used to be a synagogue as well. We had many friends and acquaintances there.

I had spoken German with my parents, I spoke German with my husband as well. He spoke a beautiful and pure German, I have many books that used to be his family’s. Now I have started to forget my German because I am surrounded only by Romanians. This used to be Austria and the older generation of Romanians all spoke German, the younger ones can’t.

My husband was a passionate hunter, he had a weapon and a permit, he had also an eagle which he kept for hunting and before the war he would often go hunting. During our marriage he hunted every weekend as long as he was still healthy enough and he would bring home hares, once a wild boar and all kind of fowls. I raised the children, he went hunting. When the boys grew up they accompanied him everywhere, they went hunting and fishing.  Every summer we would take a vacation and because we loved nature, we would go to Câmpulung, to Vatra Dornei, we would take long walks.

My husband was a civil servant at the prefect’s office, than at the Secretary of State and afterwards at the State’s Arbitration where he worked until his pension when he was 62 years old. He never had any problems regarding his nationality, on contrary, he was a respected man, regarded as a sort of activist. Under the communist regime we lived as everybody did. We didn’t have any problems because my husband was a social democrat and all the social democrats were automatically merged into the communist party. My husband was a communist and he entered me into the communist youth union [UTC]. They would have basic organisational meetings which I rarely attended because it did not interest me. If I went, I went for my husband so he could keep his chair.

I don’t know if the news of the formation of the Israeli state in 1948 preoccupied me. People started to mass-emigrate in the 1950s. One day I went into town and saw a mass of people in the center and there I heard, that those were the people that had gathered to leave, many people left at that time. I was very happy that we never spoke about leaving. My husband never though about leaving, he was also very ill. The truth is that a week or two before he died, he told me: “Just so you know, if both our boys will leave, we will leave as well”. But nobody wanted to leave. Until that moment we hadn’t even thought of it. My son Siegfried was the first who came home with this issue but only after my husband died.

My oldest son, Karl Berthold Schorr, was born 1945 in Suceava. He went to primary and high school here. He studied at the Faculty of Law in Iasi and worked for a while at the State’s Arbitration when my husband retired. When that institution was dissolved, he started working as an independent lawyer, which he still does. Karl is a hardworking man, just like his father was, when you have a job you fully dedicate yourself to it, he did so while he worked at the Arbitration but also at any other job; he knew that he to do it properly. His relationship with the Community is more of an emotional nature. He goes to the Community, they know him there but he doesn’t keep the holidays as strictly as you are supposed to. Neither do we. Karl never though about making Aliyah.

Karl’s wife is Jewish and originally from Rădăuţi, where her parents used to live. She spoke German at home. She worked as a mechanical engineer at the Cooperation here in Suceva. They did not have an arraged marriage. Karl had a group of friends through which he met his wife. We never said that his wife had to be Jewish. If he would’ve met a Christian girl and had insisted, we wouldn’t have stopped him and it wouldn’t have been a tragedy. But we also wished, as did he I think, that he would marry a Jewish girl. My sons never had these issues, maybe my grandchildren do. They were married in 1974, their civil marriage being in Suceava an their religious ceremony and the party took place in Rădăuţi. Robert, their oldest boy, was born after nine months in 1975 and is now in Bucharest and has a job at an advertisment company, at the subscription’s office of the newspaper Capitalul, he has an apartment in Bucharest as well. The other boy’s name is Edgar and he is in Suceava, he is two years younger than Robert. Both of them studied at the Faculty of Law.

My youngest son, Siegfried Schorr, was born 1949 in Suceava. He went to primary and high school here after which he studied at the Polightchnical Institute in Iasi, he is an engineer. He met his wife through some acquaintances, someone from Bacău was interested in our family and got in touch with us, we agreed and that is what they call an arranged shadah. They met in Iasi, liked each other and got engaged. For a while he would visit her every weekend. Siegfried’s wife, nee Herta Fischer, is Jewish, born in Roman in a family of religious Jews, her parents weren’t too overly religious but were good Jews who kept the holidays in good tradition. Their religious ceremony took place in Bacău, I think the rabbi was from there. Anyway, they had a religious ceremony with all the customary rituals, exactly how it should be. Herta is a good, hard-working girl, an engineer and worked, I think, at the hydrotechnical instalations, she studied mechanics. At the beginning Siegfried and his wife didn’t speak about leaving but after my husband’s death and when their friends and acquaintances started to leave en masse, they wanted to leave as well. It was also during that hard time when you had to stand in a queue for  peace of salami, life was hard so he decided to leave. All of a sudden. My husband died 1984, they left 1988. It was before the revolution, I don’t know if they had any difficulties obtaining their pasports because they lived in Bacău. My children lived in Rehovot, where they live now as well, just in a different house. At the beginning it was very difficult, it took them two years to find permanent jobs. After many interviews and courses, Herta obtained a job at the Ministry of Finances. Now it would be all perfect, if things were peaceful there.

They have two sons: Sasha-Luis and Herbert who was named after father’s brother from France. Sasha is wonderful, he is a golden boy. To study medicine at daytime and work at the airport during nighttime is not easy. Sasha’s wife studied together with him in Bucharest and is a medic as well, now she studies again so she can profess in Israel. Herbert studied law at a private university and is looking now for a lawyer’s office where he can work or do an internship. In the meantime he keeps having problems with the army. The drafted him, sent him home, drafted and sent him home again and now [situation with Libanon] I am convinced that they will draft him again, if it hasn’t already happened. Both of them had hard army careers, Herbert is a trained parachutist. He is the devil embodied, he jumps with the parachute, dives into the oceans, he goes wherever he finds danger. They integrated well and especially the young ones became 100% Israeli. Herbert has a girlfriend there, who originally came from Morocco. They have a melting pot of languages and nations there, it is a very interesting country which I love a lot. Maybe I am influenced by the fact that my children, grandchildren and friends are there although there aren’t too many left, one by one dies.

Siegfried and his family live a more Jewish life than we do here, especially since they are in Israel, they keep the holidays, there they don’t work on fridays and saturdays, my daughter-in-law lights the candles, they don’t eat bread for Passover and do the traditional Seder ceremony. They lit candles for Hanukkah and the younger one, Herberrt, would say the prayer during which you light the first candle. I was there for Purim and the boys were masked, the holiday when you eat fruit, my son bought a lot of fruits, I ate Hamantashen there, they do exactly everything because they live in a Jewish environment in Israel. Here they didn’t really have a place where they would see those things.

My children know things about Judaism from me, not from my husband. There was a rabbi at the bris of the boys. Both of them went to Talmud Tora for two or three years. Their teacher was the head of the Community for a while and he was very pro-active and gather the jewish youth: he taught Talmud Tora, there was a choir, there were more Jews back than, a lot more who could come to the Community. He was transferred to Bucharest afterwards and I think that he still works at the Federation nowadays, he became a representative there. The Talmud Tora kept losing children and at one point there were only two or three left.

I taught the boys all I know about Judaism. I don’t know if it is enough. Herberts knows more, he comes and teaches me now, he fasts and observes the holidays because they live in Israel. The children here, they know that they are Jewish. That is important as well, to know and to feel that you are Jewish …  if you keep traditiond or if you go to the synagogue is a lot less important. To feel that you are a Jew, to feel that the things that happen in Israel hurt you as well, to feel that it wounds you terribly when somebody denies the Holocaust. Sometimes I want to throw my television out of the window when a historian appears and says that everything is a lie, that things did not happen like that. I was marked by Transnistria, I can’t watch a movie with nazi camps in them. I can’t stand to hear them talk at their round tables about all those theories that the Jews want eternal sympathy… Those are the things that hurt me. And that is what it means to feel Jewish, my son feels Jewish just as I do. My grandchildren feel it a lot less, they are from a different generation. The young ones can’t understand or grasp those things…impossible. I told them a few things about the deportations. But they used to live with their grandmother, they were already big boys and their grandmother told them, anyway, they have always known and still know now that they are Jews.

Every summer my huband and I would go to Câmpulung, to Vatra Dornei for a vacation. We loved nature and would take long walks. I was for four weeks in Germany in 1986, I visited a friend in Munchen and I have been four times in Israel. I felt extraordinarily well in Israel, I felt home among all those Jews but it was just as nice to go home again. At first my husband was still alive, but he never was to Israel, he was sick all the time.

In 1976 I was there for the first time, I visited friends for six months and everytime I stayed three, four weeks at my friend Ruth in Jerusalem who isn’t alive anymore. I had another friend who was from Iasi and went to Israel, she taught at university in Jerusalem and I visited her every time for two or three weeks. She is mentally unstable and weak now that her husband died, she has none left to talk too. The second time I was in Israel was in 1989, after the revolution 10, actually during the revolution. Siegfried and Sasha came to pick me up, they arrived at th bored and they weren’t allowed to enter the country. The borders had closed, the revolution had started. So I arrived a few days before them in Israel and I have visited three more times since then. I visited all the beautiful places in Israel. I was at the Western Wall in the old city of Jerusalem, I was at the Dead Sea as well. The last time when I was in Israel my son took me to a place with a scale model of Israel. It is a beautiful peace of art, with little figurines and it represent all of Israel, the buildings from the country and the economical situation of the country. I was never afraid in Israel. I would walk in the evenings to my children, but now, unfortunately, the situation is different. But here, the last time, I am afraid. There are more and more thieves now who come and rob you.

I never thought about moving to Israel because I have children here. If both of them would have moved, I would have gone but I wouldn’t like to stay there too long. I am too old to learn new things, there comes a moment when you have to settle down and stay in your place, why should I pack and go? I feel very good here because I am with Jews, with my children and although my son offers me all what is best and beautiful there, I know I have to go home when my visum expires because eventhough I am there, I am here in my soul.

Siegfried used to write me loads and loads of letters. A few months ago, when I came back from Israel, I destroyed them all for there is no point in keeping them. Now that the world is modernising he keeps in touch with Karl via e-mail who prints them and gives them to me. And twice a month he calls me. And now that there are battles, misunderstandings, wars if I may say so, Siegfried calls me more often, he takes care of me.

My daughters-in-law are very nice to me, which I especially felt when I was sick and in the hospital in Fundeni, Bucharest. They are good girls. The young one, Herta, came from Israel and spoke to the professors and Edgar, my grandson, drove me to and from the hospital.

My son Karl has a beautiful little cottage and garden in Mitoc Dragomir, district Suceava, we nicknamed it his ‚estate’. We would go often, many times during the summer but now they don’t have time anymore. My grandson Edgar is very busy and he doesn’t have the time to take me there. This summer I was there only once. We never go all together, everyone goes alone. My grandson and his friends, my son and daughter-in-law with their friends and sometimes they bring me along. We stay there for a few hours and than we go back home.

The demolishing that took place during Ceausescu’s rule didn’t affect me, to the contrary, every new building interested me. Nowadays, when I walk through Suceava, I try to remember how it used to be. If you are alive and see that a new quarter is being built, you forget how the old one looked. But there used to be small houses, the center was paved with riverstones, there were two or three cars in Suceava. It was a litlle provincial town, quiet, where we walked the main road up and down, girls separated from the boys. This was before Transnistria. Everything changed after Transnistria and then, under Ceausescu, all kind of apartment buildings were built.

When the regime changed in 1989, I felt relieved. I could talk agan about what I wanted, I did not have to watch out. We lived under pressure. You lived under the impression that you couldn’t breathe in peace and I waited for that big happiness, which still hasn’t come. I have to say that we achieved some progress: shops are full, there is a circle of people with a lot of money, the rich people, which doesn’t disturb me, it is well. I would have liked for things to be different but I don’t regret them. I never cared about politics, that’s why I have no idea what is going on. I watch tv, Antena 3, and listen to all those people talk about politics and parties but it enters one ear and leaves through the other. To be honest, it never interested me.

Every three months I get money from Germany, because I was deported; it isn’t a lot but it certainly helps me. I get one million and two hundred lei from the Romanian state and together with my pension, I manage just fine. I don’t have to ask my children for help. I’m not very pretentious. I don’t need fancy toiletry, the things that I have, my daughter-in-law sent them from Israel.

During the last years the number of members at the Community in Suceava was reduced to 80, most of them are not even Jewish. And all the time somebody dies. Before the revolution, during the holdiays, it was a struggle for the Community to find daily ten men for the minyan. Now they manage maybe once a week even during the holdiays. The old ones can’t anymore, the young ones have to work as they are not yet retired. My children don’t go as well.

I used to go to the Community every once in a while to be surrounded by Jews. During a meeting we decided to start a sort of group, a group for us women where we coul meet and discuss, we even chose a person who would be responsible for the club but nothing happened, there is no one left to those things with: Mrs Victor, Mrs. Feller, Mrs. Wister. So there are no activities. The community used to organise the Seder, it was rather pleasant. They would bring the food from the Jewish cantines in Dorohoi or Bacau. The president of the Community has been here for only two or three months, the one before him is old, 90 years. Sometimes rabbi Rosen and other deputies from the Federation would come and then some Jews would gather.

I light candles at the Jahrzeit of my husband and my parents, I actually received electrical candles from Israel. I will put them in a socket and keep them on for 24 hours, I don’t light real candles anymore. It was the tradition that at a Jahrzeit you would give cake and brandy to the Community but I never did and I don’t think anyone still does nowadays. Unfortunately, I can only rarely go to the cemetery, maybe twice or three times a year, because it is far away and very solitary. So I have to go with my son or whenever Siegfried visits we go together. I take the candles with me and light them at the graves of my parents and my daughter-in-law’s parents who are burried there as well and I light candles at the graves of all those who were close to me or my friends. I pray daily, I take the calendar and read in Romanian,  I don’t know something else, and I say our Hebrew prayers not the ritual ones in Yiddish and I pray to the One up there and tell him what I want. Every evening I say „Lord, take care of my children …” and I ennumerate them all so that he won’t forget their names.

As long as it is summer, I am like, how shall I put it, those flowers who vegetate during the winter, you don’t have to give them water, they fall, dry up but stay in a bulb and when springtime comes, they blossom again. That is how I am during the summer. I am human in the summer, I can go out in the evening,  gossip with my neighbors, walk around, take very long walks. When the autumn and the winter come with their rain, than the tragedy starts. I can’t stand it to stay in the house, I have to go out but I can’t; either it’s too cold or it’s too slippery or I don’t know what and that is the greastest punishment for me. It’s horrible to be locked up in your house all the time. During the remaining time, what can I say, I read a lot, I read extremely much especially in German and Romanian. Now I can’t read anymore, I can’t concentrate, my thoughts fly everywhere… and these eyes don’t help me anymore, I have cataracts and other things in them and I don’t read much anymore. Even the television started to annoy me during the last period but still, every evening I watch TV. During the day I am busy. Although I am alone, I have to go the market or cook or clean. Twice a year I hire a lady to help me clean for the rest I do everthing by myself. That is my schedule. I don’t have friends, except for the neighbors and the acquaintances who are Christian but nice, but I have no more real friends left.

Glossary:

Carol Margulies
Targu Mures
Romania
Interviewers: Julia Negrea and Ildiko Molnar
Date of interview: December 2003

Mr. Margulies is a thin, short man aged 84. He works in accounting at the office of the Jewish Community in Targu Mures. One can often spot him on the street, always in a hurry to get to the bank or public institutions in order to solve the problems of his community. He’s very interested in politics and everything that’s related to the issues dealt with by Jews all over the world. He reads the ‘Realitatea evreiasca’ [Jewish Reality] newspaper and various German-speaking magazines which he gets by mail. Because his wife was ill, this interview was conducted at the Targu Mures synagogue, before the Friday prayer.

My family history
Growing up
During the War
After the War
Glossary

My family history

My paternal grandfather was born in Sadagura [today Ukraine]. [Editor’s note: The small, insignificant market town of Sadagura, in the vicinity of Czernowitz, where the Ruzyner Tzaddik Israel Friedmann (1796-1850) settled in 1842 and established his ‘court’, became the center of Chasidism. From there, the tremendous influence of the Tzaddik spread to the depths of Russia, Ukraine, Bessarabia, Moldova and Eastern Galicia. Today it’s a quarter of the city of Czernowitz.] My grandfather’s name was Karl Margulies; his Jewish name was Chaim Nute. He died in the 1900s. As he had passed away before I was born, I was given his name. When I came to Romania, I got an identity card that read Carol instead of Karl. The police told me, ‘So what’s the big deal? This king’s name was Carol, too!’ [Editor’s note: reference to King Carol I 1 and King Carol II 2 of Romania]. I can’t remember the maiden name of my paternal grandmother or the year of her birth. I know she was born in Sadagura too, but I know nothing about her family. All my father told me about her was that she died at a very young age, around 1885-1890, and that she was a tall and very beautiful woman.

She and my grandfather had two children: a daughter, Regina Margulies, who was older, born in the 1880s, and my father, Arthur Margulies, born in 1885. They were both born in Sadagura. All I know about Regina is that she got married to a man whose name I can’t remember; after World War I, in 1919, and they left for America. They had a boy there. I don’t know his name. He was married and had children of his own, but we didn’t keep in touch. Right after we came back from the camp, Regina wrote to us, asking whether we needed anything. She used to send us nylon stockings: one piece in one letter and its pair in another. She died in 1948; her son died shortly after.

My paternal grandfather’s second wife, whose maiden name I don’t know, was also born in Sadagura. She was rather quiet and soft, like Jewish women used to be at the time. They didn’t have children together. This grandmother was almost a stranger to us. I remember that she only came to our place a few times, when passing through Czernowitz [today Ukraine].

My grandfather was in the cattle business: he bought cattle for export or consumption. They spoke Yiddish at home and observed the kashrut. My grandfather was very religious. After all, he lived in Sadagura, in a very strong Jewish environment, where everyone was very religious. He used to smoke a lot. Tobacco affected his bronchi and lungs and his end was slow and painful. He died around 1900. He was already very ill when he summoned my father, who was still in high school at the time: ‘See, this is what tobacco did to me. If you ever put a cigarette in your mouth, I’ll kill you!’ So my father never smoked.

Before the war, they used to say: ‘Czernowitz, near Sadagura.’ Sadagura was a larger town and belonged to Austria-Hungary. When my grandparents were alive, there were still many Jews there, but they left during World War I, so Sadagura disappeared as a town. It has never been reborn. Even today, only a few ordinary people live there. There’s a book on Sadagura, written by a Romanian author, I don’t know his name, entitled ‘A name from Sadagura.’ [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies refers to a play written by Vasile Alecsandri (1818-1890), ‘Iorgu de la Sadagura’ (Iorgu from Sadagura), premiered on 18th January 1844 at the National Theater in Iasi. Alecsandri was a Romanian poet, author, playwright, folklorist, politician, minister, and academician; he was the founder of the Romanian theater and dramatic literature, a remarkable personality of Moldova and then of Romania during the entire 19th century.] I went there more than once; it wasn’t far, you only had to cross the River Prut. My uncle, who had a candy and chocolate factory, used to take us riding on Sunday. We made trips to Sadagura, to remember how things used to be there.

At that time, all the children had to go to cheder from the age of four. So did my father and he could read Hebrew. He went to high school in Czernowitz and got a graduation certificate. When World War I began, my father wasn’t called up to the front. He remained at the post office. He wore the imperial outfit [the uniform]; he was an officer and was in charge of the Czernowitz post office. In 1915, when the Russians entered Romania, my father gathered all the papers, telegraph machines, and telephones, purchased horses and two large carts in which he loaded everything and carried the items deeper into the country, to Seletin [town in Bukovina, 228km south-west of Czernowitz], which the Russians hadn’t occupied yet [Editor’s note: This is highly likely to have happened in 1918, shortly before the annexation of Bessarabia to Romania 3]. For his deed, he was decreed by the Emperor of Austria-Hungary, King ‘Apostolosin Koning von Ungarum’. The order read, ‘Awarding, on 23rd March 1915, to Abraham Margulies from Czernowitz, post office and telegraph specialist, the Golden Cross for valor.’ He also received a nice ribbon that read ‘Franz Josef’.

Before World War II, my father was a high-ranking clerk in Czernowitz, Bukovina, which belonged to Romania at the time. He was responsible for the security of the news that entered the country. He used to check the newspapers like an agent of the Siguranta 4, like it was called back then. As he spoke several languages, he read various newspapers; when he came across an article that attacked the royal family, he simply blocked that newspaper from reaching the population. At that time, the country was under a royal dictatorship, and they [the authorities] didn’t want the people to find out that King Carol II had a girlfriend, Lupeasca, while Prince Michael 5 was still a child. [Editor’s note: The woman was Elena Magda Lupescu, daughter of a Christianized Jew. Carol met her in 1922. She was known under various names, including Lupeasca or Duduia – the latter was the one by which Carol used to address her.].

By the time the war began [World War I], my mother, whose maiden name was Antonia Engler, had finished school in a catholic monastery in Vienna [today Austria]. The Austrians didn’t trust the Czechs and Poles, as they wanted to have the country just for themselves [be independent], so they treated them as enemies, not as friends, especially after the war began. So they took those girls who had studied at the monastery and sent them to Czechoslovakia. This is how my mother got to Dulmen [Editor’s note: At that time, Czechoslovakia didn’t exist as a state, so the city mentioned was under Austrian-Hungarian authority.], where she worked with my father for a police station. My father was an officer and clerk in Czernowitz, but he got sent to several cities across the country; this is how he got to Dulmen, where he met my mother. After a while, my father was sent to another place, Seletin, but he kept in touch with my mother by mail.

When the war ended, my father returned to Czernowitz; and so did my mother. She didn’t go back to Vienna, because, once the Austrian-Hungarian Empire collapsed, the Czechs, Poles, and Baltic people founded their own independent states. The Romanians received a part of the territories, too. In those days, the Russians had their Revolution 6. My parents got married in 1920. I don’t know if they had a religious ceremony. They settled in Czernowitz, which belonged to Romania at the time.

My maternal grandfather’s name was Berl Engler. He was born in Sadagura. I don’t know the year of his birth, but I know he died in 1910. His first wife, whose maiden name was Schrager, died in 1893, was very young, and I know almost nothing about her. They had two daughters: Tiny Engler, born in 1889, and my mother, Antonia Engler, born in 1892. My maternal grandfather’s second wife was Polish. Her name was Malca; I don’t know her maiden name. They had two sons: Leo [Zuzu] Engler, who was born around 1894, graduated in Vienna and became a doctor, and Sigmund Engler, born six years after his brother, around 1900; I don’t know what school he went to. Our grandparents couldn’t get along any better. Malca was a very kind woman; we didn’t know that she was our step-grandmother and loved her very much.

My mother’s sister, Aunt Tiny, got deported with us and died in Transnistria, in Tivriv [today Tyvrov, Ukraine], in 1943. She was married to a man named Mendel Sandman, born in Sadagura, too. He owned a candy and chocolate factory that was called Sandia. He employed around 20 workers. Only some of them were Jewish. They had a boss who my father had brought from Austria. The goods they produced were sent across the entire country. My uncle had agents who traveled and sold his merchandise in all the cities. My uncle also owned about six carts and each had a pair of horses; those were very beautiful and well groomed animals. They shone like dolls. There were Jews who traveled through the villages and sold the merchandise. My uncle’s house was where his factory was. It was a large place, with spacious and beautiful rooms. It had a bathroom. It only had one floor, but had a courtyard, where the stables were located. They had a very good social position; he was the first [in Czernowitz] to have a car and chauffeur. Uncle Sandman and Aunt Tiny weren’t very religious, but they observed the major holidays. No one ate pork. They spoke Yiddish and German at home. My uncle died in 1940, before the Russians came [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies refers to the annexation of Bessarabia to the Soviet Union 7]. He was 50-52 years old. In fact, he was lucky he died; otherwise, he would have surely been deported to some place in Siberia.

Sandman was a people’s man. His house was large, so he accommodated several relatives; each family occupied two rooms. The women weren’t employed; they stayed at home and looked after the children, if they had any. Among the occupants were the Zimblers, the family of one of my uncle’s cousins, Tony Zimbler. He worked for a newspaper in Czernowitz, ‘Allgemeine Morgenblatt’ [General Morning Paper]. He sold copies in the street every morning at 6 or 7. There were a lot of newspapers in Czernowitz, Romanian, French, and German. They dealt with local events more than with politics. Everyone spoke German there. Well, there were the hutulii [People belonging to a Slavic population which inhabits the area of the Northern Carpathians] and the Ukrainians who didn’t speak it too well, but they would learn it, too. They had a daughter, Silvia. She’s still alive and lives in Israel. When they returned from Transnistria, Silvia and her parents left for Israel from Iasi. They stayed in Cyprus for a year or two, as they weren’t allowed to go to Israel right away.

The Hausemans lived at my uncle’s, too. The father was a distant relative from my mother’s side of the family. Hauseman means ‘man’s house.’ They had two daughters, but I don’t know their names. One of them got married. In the 1930s, some people from America came to Czernowitz looking for Jewish girls to marry. She married, had a girl named Ester and stayed home. Her husband later came back and took them to America before the war began. The other daughter worked as a lawyer for the sugar trust in Czernowitz. She had an affair with the manager or something like that. Only a few days before the war began, they left for Bucharest. The man was some big shot there and she continued to work, having a German name, Hauseman. When the Romanians returned to Czernowitz, at the beginning of the war, she came home a couple of times and brought us money, as we were in need.

She never got married. Her lover had a wife and child and his wife denounced her for being a Jew. They [the authorities in Bucharest] hadn’t known about that, because she had a German name. When they came to seize her from the hotel where she stayed, she committed suicide. When we left for the camp, we gave all our gold and jewelry to Mrs. Hauseman, who left for Bucharest. Our family also had some silverware, spoons and the like, which I took to Uncle Sandman’s factory and hid in a large attic. When we returned, we found them where I had hid them. But all that we had given to Mrs. Hauseman was lost. She had committed suicide in Bucharest, and the gentleman she was with claimed he hadn’t received anything from her and didn’t know anything. So the jewels were gone.

A cousin of theirs lived in my uncle’s house, too. Her name was Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger. Eisinger was her father’s name and Meerbaum was the name of her mother’s second husband. She was my cousin too; we were related through my great-grandfather, Abraham Schrager. Selma and her parents weren’t deported with us. They stayed home for an extra year. But they were eventually taken with the second wave, in 1942. They got to the Mihailovca camp, across the River Bug [today Mikhaylovka, in Transnistria 8]. Selma caught typhus and died on 16th December 1942, at the age of 18. After her death they discovered she had kept a diary, like Anne Frank. My cousin, Silvia, who lives in Israel, sent me an article published in an Israeli newspaper [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies doesn’t know the name of the newspaper; the author of the article is Gideon Kraft.], pointing out that the publishing of the diary was ‘due to Teacher Hersch Segal, who discovered her.’ [Editor’s note: The works published by Hersch Segal (1905, Strzeliska-Nowe, Galicia - 1982, Rehovot, Israel) include the diary of Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger, Blütenlese, Gedichte, Rehovot, 1976.].

It’s an article in German which claims that Selma was related to Paul Celan [Editor’s note: Paul Celan, born Antschel, in 1920, in Czernowitz. He committed suicide in 1970, throwing himself in the River Seine. An internationally renowned poet, he was considered for the Nobel Prize in 1966. He was supposed to share the prize with Nelly Sachs, but the vote was against him.] The article renders a fragment of Selma’s diary, written in German, ‘Spring. The trees are only now naked, and every bush is a sweet whisper, like the first announcement of the new joy, and swallows will return tomorrow, too.’ [Frühling. Die Bäume sind erst jetzt ganz kahl, und jeder Strauch ist wie ein weicher Schall, als erste Nachricht von dem neuen Glück, Und morgen kehren Schwalben auch zurück.]

Zuzu [Leo] Engler, my mother’s step-brother, was a doctor. He studied in Vienna. He left for Israel during the war [World War II]. Zuzu initially bought tickets aboard the Struma 9. When the time of the departure came, they told him the seats were already taken. But he didn’t wait for too long until he finally left on another ship. He took his wife, Saly, their son, and mother-in-law. He left his mother, Malca, behind. She was 60-65, had diabetes, and was in hospital, in Czernowitz, where she found her death. At first, Zuzu had a hard time in Israel. Then his brother, Sigmund, who lived in America, sent him money and he was thus able to buy an x-ray machine. He was specialized in stomach diseases and got to the point where patients had to schedule an appointment several weeks in advance.

Zuzu’s son got married against his parents’ will. He lived in Tel Aviv. Zuzu once went to the seaside with his wife. She was on the threshold of getting drowned, so Zuzu’s son jumped to her rescue. He was the one who drowned instead, while his mother was saved. This was God’s way of punishing Zuzu for everything he had done and for his pride. It was the worst punishment. Zuzu died a long time ago. His wife, Saly, died in 2001. I wasn’t on good terms with her. She didn’t behave appropriately. Before the war they wanted to take a trip to Paris and didn’t have enough money. So they went to Malca to get the rest. She gave them the money without asking the other children. When I went to Israel, in 1987, actually, that was the only time I went there, I was invited to eat at Saly’s. I found her upset. She had a beautiful, large house in Tel Aviv. She had kept all my uncle’s clothes for me, they were all like new.

The other brother, Sigmund Engler, was 18 when he left for America, in 1918, after World War I. He knew many people there. At first, he worked for a car wash owned by a friend of his. Then he obtained a loan and, after his friend died, took over the business. He developed it and made a living out of it. His girlfriend, a Jewish woman who had stayed behind, eventually joined him in America and they got married. After a while, my uncle’s wife, I don’t know her name, had an affair with an American man. When her husband found out, he told her to move in with her lover. She refused. She locked herself in a hotel room and killed herself. Sigmund remarried. He picked a beautiful American girl. They came to his native country together in 1926 or so, when I was about five. They had two sons. One of them took over the business; I don’t know anything about the other one. My uncle died a long time ago. His wife survived after him for quite a while, but she is dead now.

My mother, Antonia Engler [Jewish name: Taube], was born near Czernowitz, in 1892. Jewish girls didn’t have to go to cheder. She went to school at a catholic monastery in Vienna. She got her high school graduation certificate there. She was particularly good at French and could also speak and read German and Yiddish. After she got married, she stopped working. My father was a high-ranking clerk and was paid well enough. We could afford a maid. I was born in Czernowitz, in 1921. My brother, Hary, was born in 1924. At home, we spoke German with my father and French with my mother.

Growing up

My father was the first descendant of his family who lived in Czernowitz; he bought a house there in 1923. It wasn’t downtown, but wasn’t far from it either. We lived in that house until we were taken to the ghetto. It had three rooms and a fairly large garden with fruit trees. We bred chickens and, for Passover, we bred a lamb which we used to play with. The house didn’t have tap water. There was a man, a Jew, who used to bring us water. He was short and poor; he would carry a water vessel on his shoulder and deliver to each house. He would only take our money at the end of the month, to have it all at once.

We had a very big piano. It occupied more than half of the room. It was a ‘Kaps’ concert piano that my mother used to play. She had a cousin whose last name was Goldhaufen who had a girl, Heidi. Heidi was about two years younger than me, had been to piano school in Vienna, and gave me piano lessons. My brother didn’t like the piano, so he never took those lessons.

My parents were religious, observed the holidays and kept the kashrut. On Fridays we would go to the town’s Turkish bath; the place was mostly frequented by Jews. They lit a fire and the stones warmed up and became red. They poured water on them and the steam was so dense, that you couldn’t see anything when you entered. We would go there in the morning, to have enough time to hang around. My father used to go to the synagogue every Friday evening, while my mother pronounced a benshen, i.e. she said a prayer before the candles. On Saturdays, my mother occasionally did some work; we weren’t that devout after all. On Friday evenings we would eat various traditional dishes. I remember one of them. It was called pitze: it was made with eggs and was very spicy. But the dish that we ate most frequently was fish. In Czernowitz, the church’s estate had a large fish market; in addition, there were 15-20 places where one could buy fish. Every other house had its own pool with live carp inside. You just went there and said, ‘Give me a half’ and you got it. Everyone ate fish on Friday evenings and Saturdays. At Passover, the town didn’t have any bread. Most of the bakers were Jewish, and they wouldn’t bake bread on Pesach. So everyone ate matzah. They wrapped them in a piece of cloth and carried them from house to house, so that everyone could buy.

My father spoke Romanian, too. This was the language spoken at the post office. It went like this: from time to time, he had to sit for an exam; if he succeeded, he got promoted to a job that was higher and better paid. One day, just before such an exam, my father was wandering around the post office when he saw a rabbi enter. He went straight to him and asked, ‘Rebe, what are you here for? Can I help you?’ The rabbi told him what he wanted. My father assisted him, and then said, ‘Rebe, I would like to ask you something. Could you please wish me that I do well in my exam?’ The rabbi asked him, ‘Do you pray every day?’ He replied, ‘No.’ And so the rabbi said, ‘If you promise you will pray every day, you’ll succeed in your exam.’ At that time, every other or every third house in Czernowitz had a rabbi. So my father started to go to the rabbi’s house before getting to work to say his prayer. This way, although he didn’t speak Romanian perfectly, he was among those who scored the highest in the exam. From that point forward, he kept his promise and prayed every day.

There were many Jews in Czernowitz. Most of them were lawyers, physicians and tradesmen. 90 percent of the stores were owned by Jews. Those were nice stores and they sold all sorts of things: food, clothes, and shoes. They never had problems with the Christians.

There was a large Orthodox synagogue. It had a rabbi whose name was Mark. He was like a king. He had a large house where he accommodated his bocherim: this is how his disciples were called. He was well paid for that. On New Year, major holidays and Saturdays, people went there to pray. When there was no room in the synagogue for all the people, the town’s cinema would be rented. There was a chazzan who sang beautifully. They hired him for the holidays and all those who wanted to listen to him had to pay for their seat. In the 1940s, when the Germans came [in 1941], they murdered the rabbi and set the temple on fire; it burnt down with everything that was inside.

I started to go to school in Czernowitz. It was an ordinary, public school, with classes taught in Romanian. On the street where Grandmother Engler lived, ‘the Jewish street,’ there was a school where classes were taught in Hebrew. Most of the pupils were from Bessarabia 10 who already wanted to leave for Palestine and join the aliyah. My father paid a girl from that school to come to our place and give me lessons. She sometimes ate at our place; it was as if she was part of the family. I didn’t go to cheder or anything of the sort. There were many Jewish pupils at the ‘Mihai Eminescu’ School, where I studied. I didn’t have any problems and had many Christian friends. We got along extremely well; it was as if we were brothers. They used to come to the synagogue on Yom Kippur. They fasted like we did and stayed there like us. There were two separate benches for them in the synagogue. They spent the entire day there.

My father prepared me for the bar mitzvah. I had to say a short speech, a few words. I read it, and then sang the Hatikvah 11 and other similar songs [traditional]. A lot of people were present: relatives and acquaintances. My parents had to find extra help with the kitchen. There was eating and drinking and I got presents.

As a child, before I went to school, I spent most of my time in my uncle’s house. They didn’t have children and enjoyed having me around. Uncle Sandman would take us for a ride in his car and sometimes to the restaurant. There were many Jewish restaurants in Czernowitz to choose from. In the evening, we would go with our aunt [and Sandman] to eat; they were kosher. Friedman’s was particularly famous. They even had music. They didn’t serve meat, only vegetables and milk. They had red beet soup. They don’t eat red beet here [in Transylvania]. We used to, and I taught my wife how to cook it. There was another restaurant called La dracu [Hell’s] [Editor’s note: pun based on the Romanian expression ‘as far away as hell’]. It was really far away, but people still went there. They had various bands playing and you could hear their music from a distance. For a few lei, a carriage would take you there. In the evening, you could go to the cinema or theater. At midnight or 1am, you could still buy hot sausages from people who sold them in the street. They kept them in special carts.

Every week we used to go to the Jewish theater, which featured Sidy Thal. The first performance of a Jewish theater took place in Iasi, thanks to a Jew named Goldfaden. Czernowitz was the second town with a Jewish theater. We didn’t miss any play.

The town had streetcars that ran in all directions. When my father was on vacation and school was over, we would take a streetcar from downtown and go to the swimming pool. It was located on the River Prut. There was a loudspeaker that played music all day long. People bought passes for longer periods. There were booths where you could undress. We usually got there in the morning and left in the evening. We took food with us. This is where we used to spend our time in summer for a month, a month and a half, as long as the fine weather lasted. We also went on vacation to Vatra Dornei every year. We had relatives there and used to stay at a boarding house called ‘The German House’. We would also go to Vijenca [Wizenka in German, in the Wiznitz district], a small resort not far away from Czernowitz, in Bukovina. My mother took me and my brother there and we rented a room from a relative of our grandmother’s for a month. My father stayed home because he had to work, but he came to visit us sometimes. There was a champagne [mineral water] bath there; it sprung from underneath the rocks and was as white and foamy as champagne.

When the Russians came, in 1940, I had one more year to go until graduating from high school. So I had to finish the tenth grade under Russian occupation. In fact, the Russians didn’t give us a hard time. Things only got difficult when the Germans arrived. I was 18 at the time. Our system consisted of eight grades, while the Russian one had ten. In order to finish the final grade, I signed up for a school where they spoke Yiddish. We used the alphabet letters, not Russian ones. When the Russians came, my brother, Hary, who was three years younger than me, was in the ninth grade at the same high school where I studied. The town had many high schools, but there was only one where classes were taught in Romanian. Others used Ukrainian or Russian or other languages: any minority had its own school. Russians paid particular attention to education; everyone had to go to school. When I got to the final grade, I could also speak Ukrainian blended with Russian, but I spoke neither of them well. I managed quite well though, because I had had contacts with the ruteni [Ukrainian-speaking minority in Bukovina]: the girls whom my parents hired to help around the house belonged to this population. They would learn Yiddish from us. There was no graduation exam: simply finishing the final grade was all it took. The Russians were interested in having people working, not spending years in school.

Everyone had to learn to speak Russian. In the large, beautiful parks of Czernowitz, you could come across elderly people who sat on a bench with the ‘Izvestia’ newspaper in their hands, learning how to read and write in Russian. [Editor’s note: Izvestia (the name in Russian means ‘news’ and is short for ‘Izvestiya Sovetov Narodnykh Deputatov SSSR’) functioned as a long-running high-circulation daily newspaper in the Soviet Union. While Pravda served as the official mouthpiece of the Communist Party, Izvestia expressed the official views of the Soviet government as published by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.] The Russians had very few communist Jews. In fact, people were anything but Communists in Russia. During Stalin’s regime, people were sent to prison for no reason at all. We didn’t know that from official sources, but we knew. Along with the Russian army came a number of civilians who occupied the vacant houses in Czernowitz and settled there. One day, my mother met a Jewish woman at the marketplace. She knew she was Jewish because of her outfit. She didn’t speak Russian, only Yiddish. My mother asked her, ‘How are things in your country?’ She replied, ‘Things will be just fine; if not for us, then for our children; if not for our children, then for our children’s children. Things will be fine.’ This was all she said. She was afraid to add anything else. The following joke was born at that time: Some people who were visiting Russia noticed that most Russians had bruises on their face. ‘What happened to you?’ ‘I went to the dentist.’ ‘So? Teeth are inside the mouth, not on the outside.’ ‘It’s true, but, down here, we aren’t allowed to open our mouths.’

In 1938-1939 our problems began. In universities, the numerus clausus 12 had already been applied. [Editor’s note: restrictions established by the law passed in 1934] Some said, ‘Look, if these guys [the fascists] are coming, you won’t get a retirement pension or a salary anymore, because they’ll sack you.’ My father went to a hospital and bribed his way into getting a medical certificate that gave him the right to an early retirement. He wanted to make sure he would at least get his pension.

During the War

In 1940, when he found out the Russians were coming, my father took a carriage to the border and told the guards, ‘I want to go back to Romania’. But they didn’t let him pass, because a Circular General Order had been issued stating that Jews weren’t welcome in the country. Back in Czernowitz, my father was worried he would have problems because he was unemployed. So he asked my uncle for help; he hired him as a worker in his candy factory. He worked there until 1941, when they deported us. Before the Germans and Romanians arrived, I was doing my pre-military service. Then the trouble began. [Editor’s note: The following territories passed under the Romanian administration: the five counties of Bukovina (Campulung, Suceava, Radauti, Storojinet, and Czernowitz), Hotin County in Northern Bessarabia and, starting from October 1941, Dorohoi County (the entire territory of today’s Czernowitz region, plus the South of Hotin County. The ethnic minorities were reluctant towards this new situation, the Jews being affected the most.]

In July and August 1941, the Jews from the rural areas and towns were gathered in temporary camps. In September, they began to be deported to Transnistria. The Tighina Treaty of August 1941, which recognized the Romanian civilian administration of Tighina, stated that the Jews who would be sent there would be detained in concentration camps and used for labor. Between 1941 and 1943, almost 100,000 Jews were deported to Transnistria. [M. Barbulescu, D. Deletant, K. Hitchins, S. Papacostea, P. Teodor: ‘Istoria Romaniei’ – ‘The History of Romania’ – p.46.]

In 1941, we were in the Czernowitz ghetto and were forced to wear the yellow star 13. We weren’t allowed to go to the marketplace before 10 or 11am. I can’t remember exactly. Many Jews got beaten up in the middle of the street. They would seize us and make us sweep the streets. There was a period when we had to report for duty in the morning and were taken to clean houses.

One day, my father went out to buy food at a forbidden time. He put on his golden cross, assuming that the Germans would treat him better if they saw the German [Austrian-Hungarian] decoration. A German officer who passed by ripped it off and put it in his pocket. He yelled that a Jew wasn’t allowed to wear that cross. This lasted for two or three months. We spent less time than others, because we had a neighbor, a German woman, who wanted our house and had us kicked out. I don’t know if she got it.

One Friday morning, we woke up to find the town full of gendarmes. They announced that any Jew who would be found at home after two o’clock would be shot. We took some things, left our house and ended up at my uncle’s factory, crowding alongside many others. They started to gather up people to send them to Transnistria.

While we were in the ghetto, Uncle Zuzu, God forgive him, made a terrible mistake [towards us]. He found out which streets were to be evacuated and knew he could escape by moving to another street, so he went to stay with the Hausemans. He came to us and all he said was ‘We’re leaving.’ He didn’t say, ‘Why don’t you come with us?’ My mother was his sister, yet he didn’t tell us anything. My father told him, ‘I heard about people running away. But where can we go? Besides, it’s only a matter of time. Maybe we’ll find a way to manage when we get there.’ No one from the street where Zuzu had moved was deported. If we had stayed for one more day in the ghetto, we wouldn’t have had to leave, because public clerks were exempted from deportation.

Our mayor was a decent man. His name was Traian Popovici and he was Romanian. His best friends were Jewish and he did business with Jews. I even heard he was buried at the expense of the Jewish Community. He arranged for the public clerks not to be deported. But nothing could be done for those who had already left. That was our life’s misfortune. God knows what would have happened to us if we had stayed. We probably wouldn’t have starved for four years. [‘Traian Popovici passed away in Bucharest on 4th June 1946. Dr. Filderman (one of the people who knew best what Traian Popovici had done for the Jews during World War II), on paying him a ‘last tribute’, said, ‘Many were those who made secret efforts in order to help a single person; but few were those who had the courage to publicly rise to the defense of an entire community. A good Romanian, he’s also considered to be a ‘good Jew’ by the Jews, although the suffering was all he had in common with them. What was mortal within him has gone. What has remained is the immortal essence.’ He was declared immortal posthumously, on 2nd January 1969, when he was awarded the Righteous Among the Nations medal and a tree was planted on his behalf on the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations, on the Mount of Remembrance, in Jerusalem. It’s the highest reward that the State of Israel offers to those who saved Jews (fragment from ‘Oameni de omenie in vremuri de neomenie’ – ‘Decent People in Vicious Times’ – by Marius Mircu, Bucharest, Hasefer Publishing House, 1996, pp.78-79)

They came to our place and told us, ‘You have 40 minutes to leave the house. Nobody is allowed to take more luggage than they can carry!’ They confiscated everything we took with us anyway. I’m not talking about wedding rings and other pieces of jewelry: this goes without saying. But they took our papers, too, ‘You won’t need papers where you’re going!’ They took the school certificates, identification cards and didn’t give us any identification papers. They took us to the station. A day later, our entire family left for Bessarabia by train. We traveled in a cattle car, next to four other families. The soldiers made sure no one escaped.

The journey lasted for two days or so. We got off in Atache, where the border was. It may have been a commune, but all we could see was an endless open field. We waited in the field for four or five days. This happened in October 1941 and it was already cold outside. Every day a raft took Jews across the river [Prut], from Atache to Mohilev-Podolsk 14, in Transnistria, Ukraine. The officers made a horrible joke. They took a family [father, mother and a couple of children] and told them, ‘God saved you Jews from the Egyptians and helped you cross the sea. Well, maybe that miracle will happen again.’ They put those people in a sack and threw them into the water. The entire family drowned. The officer who ordered this was Romanian. But he didn’t show up the following day. They transferred him. While we waited, we heard a rumor saying that the public clerks didn’t have to go. People gathered money and sent a delegate to Bucharest, but to no avail. After four or five days spent in the open air in October 1941, they took us across the border to Mohilev.

The situation was desperate there. The houses were in ruins and the thousands of people who arrived had nowhere to stay. We ended up in an abandoned house. It had two floors. Downstairs was a barber’s shop where a hairdresser lived and worked. The Russians called him ‘Parikmacher’ [Yiddish-Russian word meaning ‘wig maker’]. The house had been hit by a bomb and the staircase that led to the upper floor was broken. We had to climb an improvised staircase. We slept on the floor.

Mohilev was overcrowded; we couldn’t stay there anymore. They didn’t give us any food. We had finished our supplies on the way. They had confiscated our money and given us in return German marks specially issued for Transnistria. It was the only currency that was permitted there. I don’t know how my parents did it, but, for a while, we bought food. There were a few peasants who had remained in the area; they sold things like potatoes and eggs. [Editor’s note: The German authorities pursued the introduction of a special currency, only to be used in the occupied territories; in Transnistria, this German mark was called ‘Reichskreditkassenschein’ (RKKS). The exchange rate of the ‘Transnistrian mark’ was 60 lei or 10 rubles for one unit. Dora Litani, ‘Transnistria’, pp.42-44.] The Jews in Mohilev had been killed; maybe two or three had survived. We stayed there for two months. As there were too many people, they started to take them to other places. We ended up in a village called Tropova [today Ukraine].

My mother had a large handmade tablecloth with flowers, beautifully sewed. She gave it to a peasant woman from the village to let us sleep at her place, as the winter was there already. We were lucky to find shelter, so to speak. The peasants there had absolutely nothing at all; they were as poor as church mice. All they got for working in a kolkhoz 15 was some wheat. This is all they ate. In order to get a shirt, they traded potatoes or any other food they had. The peasant in whose house we stayed didn’t have relatives. Her son-in-law had probably run away or had been seized, as the Ukrainians were very nasty. When the war began, they didn’t fire one single bullet at the Germans, because Hitler had promised that Ukraine would be an independent country. So they waited for the Germans.

When they finally arrived and started to send them to forced labor in Germany, their enthusiasm was over. They changed their mind, became partisans and started to fight against the Germans. [The Ukrainian population saw in the arrival of the German army the liberation from the domination of the Soviet Union. They welcomed it for several reasons. On the one hand, the Soviet collectivization of the 1930s had dissolved all privately-owned farms, depriving the peasants of their means of existence. On the other hand, in the 1930s, the Soviet authorities eliminated the intellectuals’ class and suppressed the activity of the Ukrainian catholic and orthodox churches. As a result of the Soviet terror, during the decisive battle of Kiev, in 1941, the German troops encountered minor resistance from the Ukrainian army. But the locals were soon to be disappointed by the occupants, who began molesting the Ukrainians.]

We spent the entire winter at that woman’s place. She shared a cow with three other families; she got to keep it every fourth month. The hazaika [woman] occupied half of the house and the cow the other half; this is how the houses were built. Poverty was extreme: they had to steal in order to stay alive. They didn’t have fire wood; they had nothing. That situation didn’t make them feel revolted; they had been born like that and thought that was how things should be. Our host even had a book by Lenin and she was persuaded things were going well. We all slept in the same bed, together with Aunt Tiny, my mother’s sister. When the winter was over, we went back to Mohilev. We didn’t ask for any permission. We looked for a place to stay, but I can’t remember where we found it. The Jewish community gave us a paper saying: ‘The Margulies family was deported, and is here, and are composed of the following members…’ It contained our last names, first names, and our ages; when I came back to the country, this paper allowed me to prove I had been a deportee.

We spent very little time in Mohilev, because there were too many people. We went to Skazinec [today Skazintsy, Ukraine]. The locals called it ‘Barracks’ because there were 10-15 large barracks; they put us in one of them. It was summer already. There was a stream two or three meters away; I had some water and caught typhus. Every day, the Community, which was based in Mohilev, sent a large pail of pea soup to Skazinec, where there lived one or two thousand people. It was made of peas for cattle. There were many small children whose parents were gone; nobody looked after them and they were as skinny as a rail. There were no toilets, only an open field full of dirt. Those poor children used to walk the field and pick peas from the dirt; it was a terrible sight.

While I was sick, I stayed with my mother. They took her to another room, lest she should get sick, too. There were about 50 rooms on one side and the other; they had no doors or windows. The sick stayed on one side, and the others on the opposite side. There were many people there. The doctors were the first to get sick and die. We had no medicines, but God had mercy on me. We stayed in Skazinec until fall, when we were moved to Tivriv. I was recovering from my illness, so I was able to cover the 100-kilometer distance on foot.

We walked during the day and slept in the open air at night. We were escorted by Ukrainians, who were worse than the Germans. Those who couldn’t walk were shot. At a certain point, we got to a commune where they [the Ukrainians] knew there were Germans. They left us waiting and went to the Germans to tell them they were delegates escorting Jews. Two Germans came to see us and we started talking to them. It was 1942 [Editor’s note: This may have happened later, in 1943.]. The Germans already knew the course of the war was beginning to change, but we had no idea. Anyway, they didn’t hurt us. They asked us where we were going and we told them about Tivriv. ‘Good, they’re waiting for you with a hot meal there. Walk in peace!’ We found a kolkhoz there. We spent the nights all crammed up in there. The Jews who had been there before had been killed by the Germans. We were taken to Tivriv in 1942. The end of 1943 caught us there. In fact, we stayed there until we heard the end of the war was near.

There were rumors. One day, two Russian tanks arrived. We were so glad! They went to every commune where they knew there were gendarmes, seized them and hung them by their feet. A group of Jews went to the Russians and pleaded for the release of the gendarmes, who hadn’t done us harm: we used to work for them, chopping wood and things like that. The Russians took them down and let them go. The following day, the Russian tanks disappeared and the Romanians were back. Do you know what they did? The [Romanian] gendarmes gathered everyone [the Jews], had them standing behind a house and fired the machine gun at them. Some died, some were injured, and some escaped. They didn’t go after the ones who had escaped. As we lived in a more isolated place, we had no idea of what was going on. We simply heard gun shots all of a sudden.

We had very little food: they gave us some corn flour and one or two potatoes. The gendarmes told us, ‘We’ll leave you alone as long as you don’t leave the premises. If you do, we’ll shoot you!’ One morning, my father announced, ‘I’m going to trade some clothes for food. It may get me killed, but, if I don’t, we’ll starve to death.’ He took the clothes and left. He never returned; he was shot dead. The Jewish Community helped me bury him in the former Jewish cemetery in Tivriv. There used to be Jews there, but they all died. They issued a death certificate. When we returned to Czernowitz, my mother hired lawyers and submitted this certificate to the post office; she got a pension.

We stayed in Tivriv until we found out the Germans were far away. We started to walk back home and got there in fall 1944. It took us several weeks. From time to time, a truck with Russian soldiers would stop and give us a ride for one or two kilometers. We spent the nights in cemeteries lest the Russian policemen should catch us and send us to God knows where in Siberia.

After the War

My mother, brother and I got home after four or five weeks. We found an empty house. The windows were broken and everything was gone. Our beautiful furniture, paintings, books, stamp collection, were all gone. We found some photos lying on the floor and the neighbors told us they were of the man who had lived there. I don’t know who he was. They told us that one day after our departure, our piano was loaded into a truck and sent to Bucharest. I know this for sure, because I asked them.

So we had nothing when we returned. My mother went to this cousin of hers, Goldhaufen, and she gave us some trifles. Some Christian neighbors came by and told her, ‘Madam, come to our place; we want to give you some things!’ Her cousin didn’t let her, ‘Don’t go anywhere! I’ll give you everything you need!’ But she didn’t; she only claimed she would. Others did give us this or that though. We placed a rudimentary wooden bed in the house, but we were used to sleeping on planks. A neighbor recognized us and gave us something to sleep on. From time to time, she bought us things from the marketplace. Everything was expensive. We paid in rubles, but, because of the war, money had devaluated. I went to my aunt [Goldhaufen], who was rather well-off, and she gave me some things to sell at the flea market. There wasn’t anything that couldn’t be sold. The Russians had money and they bought anything, whether they needed it or not. My aunt told me how much she expected to get for each item. I sold them for twice as much and made several hundreds of rubles every day.

The Goldhaufens hadn’t been deported because my aunt’s son-in-law, whose name was Balan, had German origins and worked for the National Bank. They weren’t known to be Jewish; they didn’t even go to the synagogue. Eventually, Balan was seized by the Russians [because he was German], and so he suddenly wanted to be a Jew. He could play several instruments. The Russians, who are fond of music, took him to weddings and other events. He had a harmonica, so he led a good life there. [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies doesn’t know where he stayed in Russia.]

We didn’t give up the Romanian citizenship. We knew that, if we came back to Romania, where my father had worked as a state clerk, my mother would get a better pension than in Russia, where she received 30 rubles a month; and a kilo of meat cost 32. That pension was a good thing though, because it kept the police away. ‘What do you do for a living?’ the policeman would ask. ‘I have a pension.’ ‘You do? All right then!’ We had to report to the police to be registered. My brother was registered as a pupil and my mother a pensioner. As for me, I didn’t register and got caught one day. They asked me all sorts of questions, but in the evening they let me go home and I never saw them again.

In Cousin Heidi’s house lived a man who was from Czernowitz. I believe he was in the business of getting people out of Russia. He had connections and could make arrangements. With his help, we were able to leave Czernowitz. We reported to the border and said we were Romanians. The three of us were assigned to Targu Mures. I still have the paper proving we were assigned in April 1946, after we crossed the border. They sent my cousin Heidi and her mother to Cluj. Her aunt, Berliner, who was traveling with them, was sent to Sibiu. Heidi found a job at the Opera as a pianist right away. She came to Targu Mures a couple of times in concert. She came to see us, but she was upset all the time, because they had lost everything. Her husband, Balan, came home to Cluj, got a position at the cinema, but died three months later, at a very young age. My cousin was left alone and there was little she could do. She could hardly survive with what she earned from the Opera. Her mother was still alive and cooked for various people. At times, she stayed with us, too. Heidi never remarried. She worked for the Opera until her retirement.

Heidi had a cousin whose name was Goldhaufen too; we barely knew him. His family didn’t observe the kashrut. One day, he came home and said, ‘Mother, as of today, I will no longer eat in your house. I’m leaving for Israel, no matter what. You don’t cook kosher!’ He left for Israel in 1943 or so, joined the army right away, became an officer and was among the first to enter Berlin [today Germany] with the Jewish and Russian troops. The Germans were screaming, ‘Oh, no, the Jews are coming, the Jews are coming!’ They were running away because they were afraid. I heard this story from Heidi. [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies can’t remember the immigration of Heidi’s cousin in full detail. That cousin couldn’t have possibly joined the Israeli army because Israel didn’t exist in 1943 as a state. So the Israeli army couldn’t have taken part in the liberation of Berlin.]

So we arrived in Targu Mures in 1946. They gave us a place to stay in the large house near the synagogue, which shelters the Health Insurance Company today [The County Department for Public Health, 19 Aurel Filimon Street]. We must have been 20-25 families: all Jewish, all from the area of Czernowitz. Each family got a room. We had a communal kitchen where we could cook. We lived there until they found me a job. My mother received a pension, but it wasn’t much. My mother’s brother, Zuzu Engler, who had been living in Israel for a long time, would help us by sending us all sorts of things. Then we got a little room in Bernady house, opposite from where we lived in the beginning. [Editor’s note: That house is actually called Teleki and is located in Bernady Square] We didn’t have anything, but the place was good. We had a room and closet. All three of us lived there at first. Then, it was just my mother and I.

When we got to Targu Mures, my brother Hary signed up for the ‘Papiu Ilarian’ High School. He finished his final grade: he completed two grades in one year [thanks to the Voitec Law 16] and wanted to pass his graduation exam, but my mother wouldn’t let him, because it was very difficult. He spent his nights studying in the light of a small gas lantern and it paid off: he was one of the best in his class. His natural sciences teacher, Mrs. Croitoru, a very strict woman whose husband was a lawyer and who knew us from Czernowitz, told my brother that he was the best pupil she had.

My brother finished high school, waited for a year and passed his graduation exam. Then he went to Bucharest, was admitted at the Polytechnic and became an electrical engineer. He graduated in 1954 or 1955. They wanted to send him to specialization courses in Russia, but he said, ‘That’s where I come from and never want to return to again!’ Those courses could have helped him get important positions, but he didn’t want to go. After he finished college, he was assigned to a power station in Doicesti, in Oltenia. It was at the end of the world. Misu Kraft Davidovici, a former fellow-student said he wanted to work there, too; they made him the manager of the power plant in Craiova. During Khrushchev’s 17 visit to Romania [in 1958], there was a power failure in Bucharest one evening. My brother was in charge and the Securitate 18 wanted to arrest him. But my brother couldn’t say what had gone wrong. Electricians went out into the field and discovered a stork that had built its nest on the power lines, which had caused a short circuit. My brother got away, but he made a decision, ‘I’m not staying here anymore; I’ve had enough. I’m going to Israel.’ Nevertheless, he stayed. He met a girl who finished college in Bucharest, too. Her name was Elena Zavate; she wasn’t Jewish. He married her. Meanwhile, Kraft got him out of Doicesti and moved him to Craiova, to his power plant, where he appointed him deputy technical manager.

He married Elena in Craiova. They received an apartment there. They had a son whom they named Arthur Margulies, after his grandfather. They lived in Craiova for a number of years. One time, when the plant’s technical manager went on vacation, my brother had to replace him. When the manager returned, the workers addressed the management, ‘Please don’t remove Mr. Margulies from this office; if you do, we’ll leave, too!’ There was nothing they could do; they couldn’t change him, so he remained there until he retired. Arthur became an electrical engineer, too. After he finished college, he married a girl from Craiova who had graduated from Medical School. Eventually, they moved to Bucharest. She worked in the research field as a physician and my nephew received a special position [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies doesn’t know where]. He had to stay alone in a locked room where no one could enter. When he wanted out, he kicked the door; the guard opened it, and then locked it again.

One time, when my mother went to visit them, she noticed their little girl, Alisa, couldn’t see right. They took her to a doctor, but they were told, ‘You’ll have to wait some more and see what happens; but you should know that this case is very difficult to treat in our country.’ At a certain point, my brother’s wife had some differences with her superiors, so Arthur decided that she should go to London for a week or two, on the grounds of her daughter’s eye condition; she went there on her own, while my nephew stayed home with Alisa and their second child, a little boy who had been born one month ago. She went to the Leeds hospital and spoke with the doctors about her daughter’s condition. They told her they could solve it. So my nephew took the girl to England. The operation was successful, but none of them returned to Romania. My nephew went to the Jewish Community over there and told them he was in trouble. They listened to him, filled up his refrigerator and treated him well. The little boy they left in Romania grew up here. Every time they tried to get him to England, the British Embassy refused to grant him the visa he needed to join his parents.

While he stayed in England, my nephew was granted the right to work. There was a company for which he would have liked to work, but, before he got there, a man came to him and made him an offer, ‘Look, I have a factory that makes very large burners for factories and we’re the only ones making them. I can’t pay you as much as my competitor is ready to give you, but, still, I would like you to come work for me. I can only give you this much now, but, in time, things will improve.’ Arthur had my brother sell everything they owned here: about three houses in Bucharest, and sent the money to England. Since they didn’t let him bring his son, who was already four, they decided to leave England. They applied for Canadian visas and got them. My nephew’s English employer told him, ‘You may be leaving England, but you’re not leaving my company! You’re going to Canada and you’ll start up a factory just like mine. I’ll give you a monthly salary and a share of the profit. I’ll also give you shares and so on and so forth.’

They settled in Toronto, where they bought a nine-room house; they were finally reunited with their son, who was already five or six years old. There was a law there that didn’t allow children under 14 to walk the streets unaccompanied, so my brother and his wife, who were already retirees, joined them in the 1990s. I think my brother recently got an apartment from the State, but only a one-room apartment. Their daughter, Alisa, signed up for college in England. They’re not religious, but they keep in touch with the Toronto community and attend their meetings. The community erected a monument in memory of the Holocaust, there in Toronto. I got a picture of it.

In the beginning, after we settled in Targu Mures, I got a temporary job picking berries. We had to go to Stanceni [88km from Targu Mures], where we lived in huts. We gathered the fruit in barrels together with some German women from Sibiu – they were very stout women. I spent three or four months there.

In school, at handicraft, I had learnt how to compact books. In Targu Mures, I met a man who was from Czernowitz. I hadn’t met him back home. We went to his place from time to time. He had a radio set and we listened to the news. I loved to listen to the news in the evening. He worked in a bookbinding shop and got me hired there. The place was located in Gyorgy Bernady Square. I spent little time there, because the workshop was taken over by the printing shop. As an employee of the printing shop, I still did bookbinding until I got transferred to billing. I had to centralize sales, receipts, everything. My work was done in an hour as I had a calculator. I didn’t spend too much time there either, as they transferred me to accounting. But, right after that, they made personnel cuts. I wasn’t fired, but they lowered my salary. I told the manager that I couldn’t go on with that kind of salary. I went to see Borshivetzki, the manager of ‘Cartea Rusa’ [‘The Russian Book’, the bookstores’ organization, today Sedcom Librarii Company], and asked him if he could hire me. This is how I got to their accounting department. The head of the department was a married lady named Luca. Her husband had remained in Sibiu. They had a daughter. I don’t know how she had ended up in Targu Mures. We became friends. She came by our place almost every evening: she became a friend of the family. We listened to the radio: we had an ‘Orion.’ She spoke German, so she could converse with my mother.

One day we received an order; an employee had to go to Sibiu to collect a typewriter that we had been assigned. My boss told me, ‘Go and bring the typewriter home!’ It was the first time I set foot in Sibiu. I went to see the Black Church [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies mistakes Brasov for Sibiu. There isn’t a Black Church in Sibiu.], I had a walk and, in the evening, I picked up the typewriter and headed for the station. But the train was so crowded, that I couldn’t get on. So I spent the night standing with the typewriter in my arms. I took the first train in the morning. I got home and went to bed. My boss sent someone to call me to work: ‘I’m not coming to work today! I haven’t slept all night!’ The following day she sent me a piece of paper informing me that I had been fired.

So I went to see an acquaintance who worked in finance and asked him whether he had a job for me. ‘Mister, there’s nothing for you here, but there’s this gentleman who has just arrived and is asking me if I could find him someone.’ His name was Zicherman and he worked in planning at Vinalcool [the enterprise for wine and alcohol processing]. He told me, ‘If you want to, you can come work for us. This guy is going to work for the Securitate, so the position is vacant.’ Vinalcool had several divisions; the spirits division was located near ‘Cocosul de aur’ [‘Golden Rooster’, famous restaurant in town, at 106 Kossuth Lajos Street]. The wines section was elsewhere. Shortly after I was hired, the company had a new manager. He was Jewish. His name was Rodan, but I suppose it had been Rosenstoch and he had changed it. After he consulted with the central management in Bucharest he called me to his office and informed me, ‘As of tomorrow, you’re the new head of work planning. What do you say? Do you want to?’ So they made me head of planning at Vinalcool. I spent almost 29 years there before I retired. It was a good employment. When I got hired by Vinalcool, we received a room in an apartment building on Gheorghe Doja Street.

I wasn’t a party member. There was another boy who came to work for the planning section and he wasn’t a party member either. We were the only employees in the section for a while. Then the secretary of the enterprise’s political organization was transferred to our section; they didn’t like him, I don’t know why. The manager asked me, ‘What should we do with him?’ I told him, ‘Mister Manager, there is a girl sitting at a desk; move her to another office and send the party secretary to ours.’ So he came. We got along very well. He didn’t try to persuade us to join the Party. I was among those who had come from Russia. People in my situation who had joined the Party were sacked. [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies refers to a policy conducted at the beginning of Ceausescu’s regime, which considered those who had come from Russia Russian spies.] I never got involved in politics. I was never in trouble at work because I wasn’t a party member. I didn’t attend the party meetings, but I had to go to rallies. Everybody had to be there – party members or not.

In my opinion, there was no communism in the past. You call that communism? What we had here wasn’t communism at all. There was widespread stealing and everyone knew it. Here’s a story I heard. A Russian man who had four children wrote to Stalin, ‘Comrade Stalin, I beg of you, give me a better job, so that we can get by; my wife isn’t employed, because we have four children and she has to look after them.’ Three months later or so an order came. The man was transferred to a guard’s position; the salary was even smaller than before. What could he do? Well, this is what he did: at night, when trucks would stop at the gate that he guarded, he would grab two or three pairs of shoes or anything else they carried. And his life took a turn for the better. This is how things went.

After we settled in Targu Mures, I sent letters to all the Jewish communities, looking for a Jewish wife. Two or three answered. There was this girl from Timisoara, an agronomic engineer, with whom I exchanged some letters. It didn’t last, because I would have had to move to Timisoara to be with her. Ceausescu 19 didn’t let agronomic engineers stay in their home town as they had to relocate wherever they were assigned. [Editor’s note: Mr. Margulies refers to Ceausescu’s regime, when college graduates were assigned to a specific location right after graduation and couldn’t change it if they wanted to.] She once sent me a letter, ‘Please, stop writing to me. I got the approval for leaving to Israel.’

Another girl was from Ploiesti. I went to her town. She was divorced. She was a nice girl who lived with her mother in a single room. They were poor. One week after I had got there, she got the approval for leaving for Israel, too. And there was another girl from Oradea, I think. She was a math teacher, a beautiful girl. I went there too. Her mother wasn’t Jewish, only her father, but I agreed to marry her anyway. I invited her to spend one month at our place. We went to Sangiorgiu. My mother wasn’t feeling well and couldn’t cook for us. We ate at the restaurant. In the end, she left; I met her again only once. Nothing happened. There was a girl who came from Suceava. I didn’t like her, but my mother did. That persuaded me that marriage isn’t according to one’s wish, but according to one’s fate.

My wife’s name is Raveca Besinei. I met her when I was working for the ‘Cartea Rusa’ bookstores’ organization, between 1948 and 1950. We were both in accounting, so we sat opposite each other at the same desk. She was born in 1922, in Targu Mures. She was a Christian and had graduated from high school. When the personnel cut stroke, she was sacked because she had owned a bookstore before the Russians [the communist regime] came. I used to go to her place from time to time and ask if she needed anything. After a while, she got another job at a company in charge of restaurants. It was located downtown, where the police station is. We got married much later. My mother got ill and bound to bed for two years. I had to cook, clean and go to work. It wasn’t far, a ten minute walk, so I could go home at least twice a day. There was no one who could help me; my mother didn’t put up with anyone. This is why I didn’t want to get married. Given my mother’s condition, I couldn’t just get married and tell my wife, ‘Take care of my mother now.’ But Raveca and I were friends during all this time. While my mother had nothing against my marrying a non-Jewish woman, I had. My mother died in 1979, at the age of 87 or so. She was buried in the Jewish cemetery of Targu Mures.

After my mother died, I went to Israel. Cousin Silvia sent me the money I needed to do that. I didn’t stay long and didn’t consider moving there permanently. The manager had pledged for me; he had trusted me and I didn’t want to get him in trouble by not coming back. I liked Israel. I spent eleven days there. Every day my cousin took me places. I saw the Negev Desert, where the most recent houses in Israel are located. We spent one night in Jerusalem and, in the morning, we went to the Dead Sea. I took a bath in it.

I got married in 1981. My mother wasn’t alive anymore. I was alone and everyone urged me: ‘Don’t be silly, take this girl, she’s nice and pretty.’ My brother insisted, too. So I married her eventually. I couldn’t live like that. My wife had a house that had belonged to her parents; on 12 Painii Street. It only had one room, kitchen, and pantry. We added the bathroom that we made large enough for a washing machine to fit in. We didn’t have children. I was lucky with my wife, I can’t complain about that. She was loyal to me and minded her own business. She worked hard. Now she’s no longer able to do much. I’m having a difficult time with her. She’s not lying in bed because she’s ill, but because she can’t walk. Before November came, she went to the cemetery. When she came back, our dog assaulted her and made her fall. She had to be operated. But her leg is shorter now; she can only walk using a walking frame. And she started to forget things.

I began working for the Community right after I retired, in 1992. My position doesn’t have a specific name – I’m in accounting, go to the bank and provide help where it’s needed. While I was employed, I observed all the major holidays. When Passover or Rosh Hashanah came, I just went to the manager and told him, ‘Sir, I have a holiday, so I’ll be going!’ I never had problems because of that. I went to the synagogue for holidays; when my mother was well, we cooked better dishes, to feel it was a holiday. After I got married, I also observed Christian holidays with my wife: Christmas and Easter. I didn’t forbid her to do that. One’s belief is one’s belief and it can do neither harm, nor good.

I couldn’t tell if the community life was more active after the revolution 20. We received some aid, but no compensation for the deportation, like Jews in other countries received. I remember that the government had us file a compensation claim 20-25 years ago. Things stopped there and we didn’t get any money. But the community is giving us aid, no complaints about that. The pension provides enough to survive. Of course, it’s easier for a couple who earns two pensions. We’re not picky. How can anyone be picky after experiencing the camp?

Glossary:

Nagyszülők

Édesapám nagyapját [apám mamájának az apját] úgy hívták, hogy dr. Schiller Zsigmond. 1847-ben született, és 1919 halt meg. Nyitrán jogi tanulmányokat kezdett, később a bécsi, a pesti egyetemen végezte, itt nyerte el a doktori fokozatot 1872-ben. 1873-tól mint ügyvéd működött, 1880-ig Budapesten, 1884-től Pozsonyban. Először ő foglalkozott a kisebbségek képviseletével. Amellett hírlapírással és növénytani dolgozatokkal foglalkozott. 1884-től a „Pester Lloyd” segédszerkesztője volt, 1906 óta pedig felelős szerkesztője A kiegyezést követően csakhamar Magyarország vezető politikai napilapja lett [Pester Lloyd: budapesti német napilap. A Pesti Lloyd-társulat alapította 1854-ben, eredeti célja a magyar kereskedelmi érdekek szolgálata volt. Naponta két kiadása jelent meg; társadalmi, gazdasági és kereskedelmi tartalmak mellett volt kulturális rovata is, közölt irodalmi és színikritikákat is. A kiegyezést követően csakhamar Magyarország vezető politikai napilapja lett. Első szerkesztője Weisz János volt, majd Rothfeld Sámuel szerkesztette. 1867-ben Falk Miksa vette át a szerkesztést, aki Deák Ferenc politikáját követte; az ő nevéhez fűződik a lap szellemi és anyagi föllendülése. Falk Miksa visszalépése után Singer Zsigmond, később pedig Vészi József volt a főszerkesztő. A lap 1945 áprilisában jelent meg utoljára. – A szerk.]. Költeményeket és beszédeket írt németül, magyarul. [Schiller Zsigmondról a Révai Nagylexikon is tartalmaz szócikket. Ebből megtudhatók a következők: Ógyallán (Komárom vm.) született, 1847-ben, Budapesten halt meg 1920-ban. Mint jogi doktor rövid ideig segédfogalmazó volt a belügyminisztériumban, 1872-től a „Pester Lloyd” munkatársa, közben Pozsonyban 1880–1884 hírlapíró, majd a „Pressburger Zeitung” főszerkesztője. 1903-ban a „Pester Lloyd” felelős szerkesztője lett. Számos politikai cikket, jogi értekezést és tárcát írt, továbbá egy nagyobb dolgozatot a kisebbségek képviseletéről („Budapesti Szemle”, 1873). Írt botanikai értekezéseket az „Oest. botanische Zeitschrift”-be (1863–1884), és voltak önálló botanikai munkái is. – A szerk.] A felesége 1854-ben született. Úgy hívták, hogy Stein Netti. Az apukája, Stein Salamon volt a nyitrai izraelita hitközség elnöke.

Schiller Zsigmondnak és a Stein Nettinek [hat gyereke volt, négy lánya, két fia Józsi a legidősebb, újságíró lett. Blanka férje Baumhorn Lipót volt, az egyik leghíresebb zsinagógaépítő [Baumhorn Lipót (Kisbér, 1860 – Budapest, 1932) a bécsi műegyetemen végezte építészeti tanulmányait. Első önálló műve az esztergomi zsinagóga (1888). Specialistája lett a zsinagógaépítésnek (ő építette az újvidéki, a temesvári, a szolnoki, Budapesten az Aréna úti zsinagógát, a a Pók utcait, a szegedit, a gyöngyösit. Átalakította és kibővítette az újpestit – összesen több mint 20 zsinagóga építése fűződik a nevéhez. Más művei: az állami felső leányiskola és a tőzsdepalota Temesvárott, a szeged-csongrádi takarékpénztár Szegeden stb. – A szerk.]. A harmadik lehetett az én nagymamám Paula [szül. 1879]. Akkor volt a Nelli, ő meghalt gyerekszülésben. Az ő kislányát a nagyszülei nevelték. Három gyereket neveltek: az apukámat, a testvérét, a Kató nénit és a Babust. Akkor volt a Frida. Frida néni ellentétben a többiekkel tovább akart tanulni és foglalkozást, úgyhogy tanítónői oklevelet szerzett. Budapest polgármesterének volt a titkárnője. A második férjével aztán kimentek Angliába. A hatodik volt Ottó. A Gyáriparosok Országos Szövetségén [(Magyar) Gyáriparosok Szövetsége (GYOSZ) – 1902-ben alakult. Alapítói Chorin Ferenc és Hatvany-Deutsch Sándor báró voltak. Célja a magyar gyáripar érdekeinek érvényesítése volt a vámpolitika és a külkereskedelem terén, valamint a gazdasági közvéleménynek mint az iparfejlesztés nélkülözhetetlen előfeltételének a megteremtése. Minden fontosabb gazdaságpolitikai törvényalkotási kérdéshez hozzászólt. – A szerk.] belül volt a Textilgyárosok Országos Szövetsége, Ottó annak volt a titkára. Jómódúak voltak. Mi, a nagyanyám és a szüleim voltunk a legszegényebbek. Az összes testvér bent lakott a belvárosban szép három-négyszobás lakásokban.

A dédnagymama sokáig élt, 1938-ban vagy 1939-ben halt meg. Józsival együtt lakott, mert Józsi nem nősült meg. Volt egy szép nagy lakásuk. Semennyire sem voltak ők zsidók. Őhozzá mi, unokák gyakran feljártunk.

A dédszülők [az apa apjának a szülei, azaz az apa nagyszülei] Künzker Salamon – talán elírás volt, hogy a Künzkerből Kinszki lett – és Fried Mina. Salamon 1828-ban született Kemencén [Hont vm.], harmincéves korában házasodott. A Kinszkiknek Ipolyság mellett volt földbirtokuk. Egy nagyon szép, régi barokk polgárházban laktak, olyanban, aminek van egy nagykapuja, és a nagykapu középen nyílik a kiskapu. Nagyon emlékszem rá, mert voltunk ott nyaralni. Semennyire sem tartották ott a zsidó szokásokat. Abszolút úgy éltek, mint a dzsentrik: lóháton, bricskával közlekedtek. Mikor visszacsatolták Magyarországhoz [Azaz: amikor a trianoni döntés következtében elcsatolt felvidéki területek egy része visszakerült Magyarországhoz – lásd: első bécsi döntés. – A szerk.], nyaraltunk náluk. Nagyon jóban voltak az unokatestvérek. Apám árva gyereknek számított, és ők mindig hívtak minket, ott nyaraltunk. Emlékszem, mikor legelőször mentünk, elmentünk vonattal Balassagyarmatig, és akkor egy homokfutót [bricskát] küldtek elénk. S mi azt nagyon élveztük.

A nagyapámnak, [Kinszki] Árminnak [szül. 1860-as évek] az egyik testvére, Józsi ott maradt gazdálkodni. Józsi bácsinak két fia volt: az egyik gazdálkodott a Kinszki-birtokon, a másik bérelt egy grófi birtokot Hévmagyaron [Hévmagyarád – Hont vm.-ben lévő, 1910-ben 300 lelkes kisközség volt. – A szerk.], az egy kis falu volt. Megvolt a grófi kastély – egy igazi szép kastély, kápolnával, minden – de az be volt zárva, és ők az ispán házában laktak, ami egy szép kúria volt, és nagyon modernül volt berendezve. Én életemben először láttam villany hűtőszekrényt, villanytűzhelyt. Volt szeszfőzdéjük, cséplőgépük, gőzekéjük. Nagyon jó földesúr volt, szerették őt a falusiak, mert törődött az iskolával meg a kultúrával. Volt egy fia, a Jancsi. Én nagyon szerelmes voltam a Jancsiba mint kislány, és mindig elképzeltem, hogy hozzámegyek feleségül. Volt egy kis lovam, a Juci, az ott nevelkedett náluk. Úgy volt, hogy a Jancsi átjön Magyarországra tanulni, és akkor majd nálunk lakik, és a bátyám, aki akkor már gimnazista volt, majd foglalkozik vele. Őket mind elvitték Auschwitzba Szlovákiából [lásd: deportálások Szlovákiából]. Mind meghaltak.

Ármin mint fiatalabb fiú, gondolom, járt kereskedelmi akadémiára [lásd: kereskedelmi iskolák]. Szerintem nem Budapesten tanult, csak feljött ide állásba, az Anker biztosítónál dolgozott [A bécsi székhelyű élet- és járadékbiztosítással foglalkozó részvénytársaságnak igazgatósága volt Budapesten. A céget a 19. század közepén alapították. – A szerk.]. A nagypapa művelt ember volt. Sportember is volt,  korcsolyázott, arra emlékszem, hogy volt korcsolyabérlete is. Ármin dolgozott a biztosítónál, a nagymama, Paula pedig otthon volt. Az Ilka utcában egy nagyon szép háromemeletes bérvillába költöztek, ezt a villát Baumhorn Lipót építette. Gondolom, egy emeletet vettek ki. Aztán jött a két gyerek, nagy korkülönbséggel. Apám, Imre 1901-ben született, a Kató néni, aki most is él még Párizsban és kilencvennégy éves, 1907-ben.

Anyukám családja egészen más, azt mondanám, hogy proli család  volt. A nagypapám és a nagymamám Grünberger Dávid [1861] és Brauner Hermina [1869]. Felvidékről valók voltak, de nem tudok róluk nagyon sokat. A nagypapa szabó volt, de később egy katonaiegyenruha-cégnél az volt a dolga, hogy egy nagy táskában levitte a szövetmintákat oda, ahol garnizon volt, és a tisztek csináltattak maguknak úgynevezett extra uniformist, tehát gyönyörű kimenő ruhát. Ők kiválasztották az anyagot, a fazont, ő mértéket vett róluk, és fölhozta Pestre, amikor összegyűjtött többet. Megcsinálták a ruhát, ő levitte, fölpróbálták, utánaigazította – azért kellett szabó –, és akkor levitte nekik a kész egyenruhát. Úgyhogy ő – azt mondta anyukám – két-három hetenként jött haza, mert mindig utazgatott valahol. Mindig kapott gyümölcsöt, egyszer bort is hozott haza, egy nagy hordóval.

Kilenc gyerekük volt – mindegyik gyerek Pesten született. A vidéken született két első meghalt rögtön a születése után, mert – ahogy mondta anyukám – a nagymamám nagyon fiatal lehetett, még fejletlen volt a méhe. És utána jött még kilenc. Hát védekezni olyan nagyon nem mertek ugye ellene. Mindig mondják, hogy hány gyerek lett volna, hogyha gyakrabban jön haza a nagypapa?! Állítólag a nagymama testvére, aki orvos volt, a tizenegyedik gyerek után megsajnálta őket, és valahogy a méhét egy kicsit elfordította, és akkor nem lett több.

Az anyukámék nagyon szegény környéken laktak, a Cserhát utcában. Anyukám mesélte, hogy a nagymama meg a nagypapa ennek ellenére azért elment, mondjuk, a Király Színházba megnézni egy operettet vagy valamit, és amikor a nagymama hazajött, elénekelte a gyerekeknek, amit a színházban hallott. De például volt olyan, hogy anyukám a tornaórán nem akart tornázni, mert nem volt rajta bugyi, és félt, hogyha bukfencezik, kilátszik a feneke, és aztán azért meg is buktatták. Hazament sírva, és a nagymama mégis varrt neki egy bugyit. Nem jutott arra idő, hogy a gyerekeknek varrjon, mert mindig voltak a pénzes munkái. Másoknak varrt. A gyerekek lyukas ruhái szinte sosem kerültek sorra.

A legidősebb gyerek a Sanyi volt, ő valami kereskedelmi iskolát végzett, és főkönyvelő lett. Két gyereke volt. Sanyit az egyik fiával együtt vitték el a németek egy teherautón valamikor 1944-ben; valami erdőben voltak, és azt mondta a fia, 17 éves volt, hogy itt meg lehetne szökni. Sanyi nem mert, a fia viszont leugrott, berohant az erdőbe, és beállt a partizánokhoz, tehát ő életben maradt. Sanyiról semmit sem tudunk. Volt a Frédi, aki orvos volt itt Zuglóban. A feleségét Ecksteinnek hívták. Nagyon gazdag emberek voltak kinn Zuglóban. Fuvarozási vállalata volt a szüleinek. Ő pedig teniszezni járt, fehér szoknyában, meg a Tátrába mentek télen síelni, és imádott bridzselni – ő volt a polgári elem ebben a családban. Frédi az első világháborúban mint orvos Isonzónál volt, és valaki rálőtt, és emiatt ő háborús sebesültnek számított. Ezért ő valami nagyon magas kitüntetésben részesült, és nagyon sokáig mentessége volt a zsidótörvények alól [lásd: zsidótörvények Magyarországon], és amikor már neki is bujkálnia kellett, akkor a felesége szeretője elbujtatta az egész családot. Ez így fel volt vállalva, hogy van szeretője.

Volt aztán a Lajos, ő pék volt. Lajos nagyon nagy magyar volt, csavart bajusza volt, minden. És azt mondta [a holokauszt alatt] – még itt van a fülemben –, „hogy most mostoha gyereke vagyok az édes hazámnak, de leszek én még édes gyereke az édes hazámnak”. Munkaszolgálatos volt, eltűnt, soha nem jött vissza.

Aztán volt a Jenő [1877], az szabó volt. A felesége kereskedő volt, libafeldolgozó. Neki is volt az első világháborúban valami magas kitüntetése, úgyhogy egy ideig ő nemhogy munkaszolgálatos nem volt, hanem keretlegény volt. De aztán őt is elvitték, és eltűnt, nem jött vissza. Neki volt két gyereke, mind a kettőt meggyilkolták 1944-ben. Akkor lett az anyukám, Ilus [szül. 1899]. Anyukám pont a Jenő kétéves születésnapján született. A nagymama otthon szülte az összes gyereket, mert volt neki egy orvos bátyja, ő segített, és bepólyálták az anyukámat, s odatették Jenőke ölébe, aki egy kis sámlin ült, hogy itt van a születésnapi ajándékod. Jenő fölállt; nem kell - mondta.

Akkor a következő az Imre volt, ő is orvos volt. A második világháborúban nagyon hamar orosz fogságba került. Azt mondta, hogy nagyon rendesek voltak az oroszok. Hát egy orvost megbecsültek. Visszajött, és itt Zuglóban volt a körzeti rendelő igazgatója. Nálunk lakott, olyan volt, mint az én pótapukám. Megnősült még, s aztán nagyon-nagyon hirtelen meghalt 1953-ban.

Akkor volt az Erzsi, ő tisztviselő volt, egész életében egy zene-hangszerboltban volt vezető tisztviselő, egy értelmes, okos nő volt. Őt elvitték, és nem jött vissza. Akkor volt a Gyöngyi, az iker, de a születéskor az ikertestvére meghalt. Ő lámpaernyő-készítő volt. Krausz Zsigmond volt a férje, ő is meghalt [a holokausztban], de a Gyöngyi visszajött, aztán még egyszer férjhez ment, és nagyon hamar rákban meghalt. Lehet, hogy azért, mert rajta kísérleteztek mint ikren, amikor kint volt Németországban.

Az utolsó volt az Aranka, neki volt valami szakmája, talán kesztyűkészítő volt. Férjhez ment – egy ilyen kényszerházassága volt, mert már ő nagyon öregnek érezte magát, és gondolta, hogy hozzámegy ehhez a Pollákhoz. Mindig mondta, hogy nem szereti. Lett neki két gyereke, ma is élnek a rokonok valahol.

A nagyszüleim nem voltak annyira szegény emberek, csak sok volt a gyerek. De azért időnként elmentek Karlsbadba egy kicsit kúrálni magukat. Éppen kinn voltak Karlsbadban, és a nagypapa éppen biliárdozott, amikor jöttek be az újságosok ordítani, hogy kitört a háború [az első világháború]. És állítólag nagypapa ráborult a biliárdasztalra, és már meg is volt halva. A család legnagyobb gondja az volt, hogyan hozzák haza a holttestet, mert elkezdődött a katonák, a hadsereg szállítása, minden. Összefogtak és mégis hazahozták, hogy itt legyen eltemetve. Hermina nagymama hazajött, és itt volt a kilenc gyerek – ebből négy fiú kinn volt a fronton, később aztán vöröskatonák [lásd: Tanácsköztársaság] is lettek, de életben maradtak. Anyukám volt a családfönntartó, pont akkor végezte el a kereskedelmi iskolát. A férfiak mind a fronton voltak, tehát mindenütt nagy munkaerőhiány volt. Anyám nagyon jól tudott gyorsírni, és mindenféle helyeken dolgozott. Nagymamának volt egy varrógépe, és otthon vállalt varrást.

A nagymamámnál volt pénteken gyertyagyújtás – ma is megvannak a gyertyatartói nekem, és kiderült, hogy ezek úti gyertyatartók, ezeket vihette magával Karslbadba. A Bethlen Gábor téren volt egy zsinagóga, de ott fizetni kellett a helyért, a fiúk mentek péntekenként, a lányok nem, merthogy ennyinek nem tudtak fizetni, de a nagymama ment. Kóserség nem volt. Minden ünnepet megtartott a család. A nagymamám nagyon szeretett olvasni meg színházba járni. A nagymamám is nagy hazafi lett, és csak nagy magyar történelmi regényeket olvasott. És a regényekből, amiket elolvasott, azokból választott nevet a lányainak, fiainak.

A Bethlen Gábor tér amolyan családi fészek volt. Mindenki ugyanabban a házban lakott. Ott lakott a nagymama egy háromszobás lakásban az Imrével és Lajossal, a két nőtlen fiúval. Ott volt az Imrének az egyik szoba rendelő. Abban a házban lakott a Sanyi is, a mellette lévő lakásban, a fölötte lévő lakásban lakott az Erzsi, és ugyanannak a háznak a másik udvarában az Aranka. Tehát csak mi nem laktunk ott, meg a Gyöngyi és a Jenőék. És a nagymamánál összegyűltünk elég gyakran. Volt egy nagy asztal, emlékszem, sok ember ült körülötte. A nagymama nagyon nagy összefogó erő volt. 1943-ban halt meg.

Szülők

Az apukám eléggé kis vékony gyerek volt, és úgy gondolták, hogy ne járjon iskolába. Volt a Frida néni [anyja testvére], aki otthon tanította, és az apám az ő segítségével kettesével letette az elemi iskolából a vizsgákat, és kilencéves korában már elvégezte mind a négy elemit. Nagyon kis okos gyerek volt. És akkor a papa mondta, hogy tovább a gimnáziumba. Legjobb iskola a piaristák, tehát elvitte a piaristákhoz és beíratta. Boldogan hazajött a nagyapa a kis Imikével, akit imádott, leült, leborult az asztalra, és már meg is volt halva. Ilyen hirtelen volt a halála. Soha nem volt semmi baja. Ez 1910-ben volt. Olyan fiatal volt még a nagyapám, hogy nem volt nyugdíj. Gondolom, hogy a munkahelye egy ideig valamit adott az özvegyének, utána pedig odavették őt, hogy dolgozzon ebben a biztosítóban. Az Ilka utcát nem bírták fönntartani, és elmentek a nagyszülőkhöz [a Paula nagymama szüleihez] a Tüköry utcába. Ők bent laktak a szerkesztőség épületében, tehát ez szolgálati lakásszerű volt. Paulának soha nem lett többet önálló lakása. Panziókban, később pedig barátoknál egy kis szobában éldegélt. Apám meg a Kató néni minden hónapban adtak neki valami kis pénzt. A dédnagymama akkor, azt hiszem, a Jóskával [fia] élt már együtt egy kisebb lakásban.

Apám [Kinszki Imre] a piaristákhoz járt, ott is érettségizett tiszta kitűnőre. Voltak hárman unokatestvérek és barátok, és azon gondolkodtak, hogy írni kellene a „Huszadik Század”-ba [1900 és 1919 között megjelenő folyóirat, 1901-től a Társadalomtudományi Társaság folyóirata. 1906-tól főként a polgári radikálisok fóruma volt (ekkortól Jászi Oszkár szerkesztette), előtte azonban – Gratz Gusztáv, Kégl J. és Somló Bódog szerkesztősége idején – liberális és szocialista nézeteknek is helyt adott. – A szerk.]. Aztán elmentek a Jászihoz, kiderült, hogy apám már járt bent nála, és már oda is adta a cikkét. Ez nagyon jellemző volt rá.

Ottó [apai nagymama testvére] volt az, aki a család ügyeit intézte. Ő intézte el, hogy apám odakerült a textilgyárosokhoz, miután két évben egymás után nem vették vissza az orvosi egyetemre azért, mert zsidó volt [lásd: numerus clausus Magyarországon]. Át akart akkor menni biológiatanári szakra, de nem kapott engedélyt, és akkor odakerült irattárosnak a GYOSZ-ba. Nagy irattár volt az, aminek ő volt a vezetője, de inkább idegen nyelvű levelezést csinált. Szóval az én apám, aki több nyelven levelezett, filozófiai és irodalmi tanulmányokat írt, soha nem járhatott egyetemre.

Anyukám Gárdonyi Ilona. Grünbergerről van magyarosítva [lásd: névmagyarosítás], még lehet, hogy a nagypapa magyarosította. Anyukám 1899-ben született. Polgárit [lásd: polgári iskola] végzett, utána egyéves kereskedelmit [lásd: női kereskedelmi szaktanfolyamok], és tisztviselő volt, gyors-gépíró levelező.

Azt hiszem, a szüleim úgy ismerkedtek meg, hogy az anyukám oda került, ahol az apukám dolgozott, a GYOSZ-hoz, azon belül a Textilgyárosok Egyesületéhez. Apukámmal egy szobában voltak, anyukám keményen dolgozott, rengeteg túlórát, mindent vállalt. Apukám kezdett kis papírrepülőgépeket dobálni az anyám asztalára, és őt nagyon idegesítette, és rászólt, hogy kis hülye kölyök, de apám csak dobálta. Az egyik repülőgépen az volt, hogy szeretne vele találkozni. A Farkasréti temetőbe adott neki randevút – ez jellemző volt apámra. Apám abszolút gátlásos kis fiatalember, megérkeztek a temetőbe, apám leült egy padra, letette a kalapját maga mellé, nehogy anyám odaüljön. Akkor anyám leült a másik sarokba, s elkezdtek a tudományról beszélgetni. Apám otthon bejelentette, hogy el akarja venni Gárdonyi Ilonát, amire állati nagy botrány lett, hogy egy művelt, öt nyelven beszélő fiú miért akar elvenni egy olyan csóri lányt. Az apám családja mintha több generációval előbb asszimilálódott volna, egészen más légkörben, másképp éltek, mint anyámék. Apám beleszületett egy olyan családba, ahol természetes volt, hogy beszéltek németül meg angolul meg franciául, anyám meg egész életében nem tudott még németül sem megtanulni. S mindig szemrehányást tett az anyukájának, akinek még majdnem hogy anyanyelve volt a német, de annyira akartak asszimilálódni, hogy eszébe nem jutott megtanítani őt németül.

Összeült a családi tanács, és megbeszélték, hogy az a megoldás, hogy el kell küldeni a munkahelyről anyámat. Úgyhogy Ottó bácsi behívta, és mondta, hogy nagyon meg vannak elégedve a munkájával, de sajnos létszámleépítés van. Anyám rögtön tudta, hogy miről van szó, azt mondja, aláírom, hogy nem akarok hozzámenni az Imréhez feleségül, van nekem elég bajom. Nagyon dühös volt, ezt a jó állását nagyon szerette. Persze rögtön el tudott helyezkedni máshol, de apám csak nem kopott le. Már másnap ott várta, ment utána. Anyám nem volt szerelmes, de apám kitartó volt, anyám húgai meg ott ugráltak a nyakában, hogy zsidó családban addig, míg a legidősebb lány nem ment férjhez, nem mehetnek ők sem. Hát azt mondja, hozzámegy. Aztán nagyon-nagyon megszerette anyukám. Nem is lehetett apámat nem szeretni. Annyira drága, melegszívű, kedves, szerény ember volt.

Nem hiszem, hogy szempont lett volna apámnál, hogy zsidó nőt vegyen el, de így alakult. De nem is volt egyházi esküvő. 1925-ben esküdtek. Gyönyörű volt az esküvő. Valami jelmeztárból kölcsönöztek jelmezeket, apám zsakettben volt, anyámon gyönyörű mirtusz, minden, és fölvették filmre. Gyerekkoromban az egyik fő attrakció az volt, hogy egy kis filmvetítővel néztük anyuék esküvőjét. Fogalmam sincs róla, hogy hol volt az esküvő, de a filmen azt látni, hogy egy nyitott kocsival mennek végig a Rákóczi úton. Egy fénykép is készült róluk.

Anyukám bátyjai nagyon kedvesek voltak. A két bátyja összefogott, és ők vettek bútort nekik. Akkor nagyon nehéz volt lakást találni. Zuglóba költöztek, mert ott egy szép kétszobás lakást lehetett kivenni annyiért, amennyiért Pesten egy kis ólat lehetett volna. Amikor összeházasodtak, anyám az Uránia Filmszínházban dolgozott mint a Lakner bácsi – akinek gyerekszínháza volt – titkárnője [Lakner Artúr, azaz Lakner bácsi Gyermekszínháza – gyermekszínészekből álló társulat – 1926 és 1943 között működött. – A szerk.]. Akkor az Urániában tartottak nagy irodalmi előadásokat. Anyámat mindenki ismerte, mert anyám nagyon jól gyorsírt, írók diktálták neki a műveiket, anyám otthon legépelte. Amíg a bátyám meg nem született, megtartotta ezt az állást. Később is mindig gépelt otthon. Jöttek hozzá az írók, diktáltak, vagy ő ment el valahova. Megkapta a saját gépét a Lakner bácsitól. Sokáig jóban voltunk vele. Engem és a bátyámat is akartak gyerekszínésznek, de apám azt mondta, nem hagyok a gyerekekből majmot csinálni.

A bátyám, Gábor 1926-ban született. Apukám nem akarta, hogy körülmetéljék [lásd: körülmetélés], de a két nagybátyám nagyon fölháborodott ezen. Apám aláírta, meg tanúkkal aláíratta, hogy az az ő akarata ellenére történik. Aztán egyszer, amikor alaposabban megnéztem, minden aláírás az apámé volt. Ő írta alá sokféleképpen, ennyire bántotta, hogy körülmetélték a fiát. Apám szerint ez barbár szokás volt. Ő annyira az angol hagyományokat tisztelte, ő angol úriemberként szeretett volna élni. Én apám szájából ezt a szót, hogy zsidó, nem hallottam, se mint vallásról, se mint emberről, valakiről, bárkiről.

Apám végig a GYOSZ-ban, a Textilgyárosok Egyesületében dolgozott, amíg a zsidótörvények [lásd: zsidótörvények Magyarországon] következtében föl nem mondtak neki vagy nem nyugdíjazták.  Textilszakember lett, tudósítója volt a „Textil Zeitung”-nak. 500 forint [azaz: pengő] volt a fizetése, amiből nagyon szépen éltünk volna, ha nem adott volna belőle vagy 200-at a nagymamámnak. Aztán amikor a nagybátyám [Imre nevű anyai nagybácsi] Pécsre ment orvosira, neki is küldtek minden hónapban 100 pengőt albérletre meg mindenre.

Apám munka után fényképezett. Állítólag a bátyám születése előtt anyukám vett neki egy kis gépet, addig eszébe nem jutott. Akkor a gyereket kezdte fényképezni, de nagyon gyenge minőségűek lettek a fotók. Nem nyugodott bele, és elhatározta, hogy megtanulja, hogy ő maga előhívja. Minden ott volt neki a fürdőszobaablakban. Kitalált egy gépet, úgy hívták, hogy Kinszekta, amivel természettudományi nagyítóval mikroszkopikus felvételeket tudott csinálni. Ez a kisszobában, a cselédszobában – nem volt cseléd – volt. Akkor valamikor délután hazajött, este pedig elment a Centrálba – mert megmaradtak ezek az irodalmi kapcsolatai. Nagyon sokan jöttek hozzánk, nagyon szerettek hozzánk jönni a barátai. Nálunk nagy társadalmi élet volt. Anyukám irtózatosan finom süteményeket csinált, meg a semmiből is tudott finom szendvicseket csinálni.

Amikor megszülettem [1934], egy emelettel lejjebb költöztek a szüleim, hogy legyen három szoba. A sarokszoba gyerekszoba volt, ott volt a kiságyam meg a bátyámnak a sezlonja, kis íróasztal, mindenféle színes bútor. Aztán volt a hálószoba, két ágy meg két szekrény, két éjjeliszekrény. És akkor volt az ebédlő, annak volt egy kiugrója, ott volt apu íróasztala, még a legénykori szép faragott íróasztal. Volt egy nagy akvárium – halmániákus is volt apu, a Rákos-patakból maga fogta ki a halakat, meg gőténk is volt. És volt bent egy könyvszekrény és egy biedermeier ülőgarnitúra, amit Frida néniéktől kaptak nászajándékba: egy nagy kerek asztal hat székkel. És akkor volt egy előszoba.

A házban a gangon volt az élet. Háromemeletes ház volt, az egyik oldala nyitott, és egész nap besütött a nap a folyosóra. Mikor kicsik voltunk, ott tanultunk járni, ott pancsikoltunk, ott írtuk a leckét, és a ház gyerekei ott rajcsúroztak az udvaron. Nagy játékok voltak. A házban csak mi voltunk zsidók, de nem volt ott semmi probléma.

Cselédünk nem volt. Mikor nagyon pici voltam, még volt valami Teri néni. Arra is emlékszem, hogy volt egy varrógép, és egyszer egy hónapban jött egy néni, aki mindent megfoltozott. Például apukámnak minden inge olyan volt, hogy a hátából kivettek egy darabot, és csináltak rá új gallért. Ágynemű, minden; ő mindig jött. A Kinszki nagymamám csodálatosan kötött. A bugyimtól kezdve mindent a nagymamám kötött, horgolt. Horgolt bugyim volt, zoknim, nagykabát, korcsolyázáshoz holmik, mackónadrág meg pulóver, kesztyűk, mindent a nagymama kötött.

Anyukám minden nap ment vásárolni, főzött. A Bosnyák téri piacra járt. De volt, aki hozta  például a tejet vagy a túrót házhoz. Minden reggel ott volt a tej meg a zsömle az ajtóban mindenkinek. Anyukám nagyon jól tudott sütni. Mikor még nem voltak anyagi gondok, legalább ötfélét csinált egyszerre: volt a női szeszély [baracklekváros, tojáshabos sütemény], a pischinger [tortaféle, ostyalapok között mogyorós csokoládékrémmel], az isler, az estike és még valami ötödik. Mi ott sürgölődtünk, segítettünk neki a bátyámmal. Volt egy nagy doboz, abba voltak berakva ezek a sütemények, és volt az előszobában két egyforma fehér szekrény. Az egyik polcos volt, a másik akasztós. A polcos szekrényben voltak a tartalékedények – mert nem volt ebédlőkredenc –, és volt abban egy fogas, és oda volt ez a doboz felakasztva, és abban volt a sütemény. Mindig volt. Apukám imádta. A másik, amit nagyon tudott anyukám, hogy amikor jöttek a barátok, gyönyörű hidegtálakat csinált semmiből. Valami sonkaféle volt, azt ő így fölcsavarta; aztán icipici zöld paradicsom, ezek így föl voltak állítva körbe mint a kis ágyúk. Akkor kemény tojás, fasírt, és ezek gyönyörűen föl voltak tálalva. És volt nagyon sokszor tea. Anyukám, amikor eljött a munkahelyéről, a kollégáitól ajándékba kapott egy valódi Rosenthal teáskészletet – gyönyörű volt, nagyon kecses és nagyon szép [A német Rosenthal cég, melyet a 19. század végén (1879) alapított a névadó Philip Rosenthal, főleg barokk és rokokó ornamentikával díszített porcelánárut készített, majd az 1920-as évektől felhasználtak art deco motívumokat is. – A szerk.] – és egy ezüst dobozban kanalakat. Volt egy merőkanál és 12 ezüstkanál. Mindig, ha vendégek voltak, akkor a dobozból kivettük, mert hétköznap nem használtuk.

Apám pacifista volt. Hozzánk a lakásba nem jöhetett be játékpuska, íj, még játék katona sem. Kisvasút volt, állatok, állatkert. Apám csinált nekünk társasjátékokat, állatosat meg őslénytanosat. Ő találta ki a játékszabályokat, ő csinálta meg a figurákat hozzá. Nagyon ügyesen tudott hajtogatni. Egész városunk volt, hidakat, házakat, épületeket, kupolát, mindent tudott papírból hajtogatni és kifestette nekünk.

Én tanultam zongorázni. Anyukám elhatározta, hogy részletre és váltóra vesz egy használt zongorát, és járt hozzám egy zongoratanárnő. Aztán egyszer csak kiderült, hogy miért kell engem zongorázni tanítani. Az orvos nagybátyámnak volt egy szeretője [ez  Frédi nevű anyai nagybátyja], egy óvónő és zongoratanárnő. Azt mondta, hogy amennyiben én tanulok zongorázni, ő fizeti az órákat. Ez volt a módja annak, hogy a szeretőjének fölháborodás nélkül pénzt adjon. Akarta, hogy óvodába is menjek, de az ellen fellázadtam – azt is persze azért, hogy így is adhasson pénzt. De zongorázni zongoráztam, egészen, amíg nem jött a zsidó dolog.

A bátyámmal korcsolyáztunk, úsztunk a jéghideg vízben. A bátyám dolga volt mindenre megtanítani engem. Bedobott a medence közepére, én kikapálóztam, megint bedobott, és akkor lassacskán így megtanultam úszni. Ugyanez volt a korcsolyával. Bevitt középre, otthagyott, én bőgtem, ott álltam egy darabig, kicsámpáztam, megint bevitt. Egy óra múlva már vidáman kikorcsolyáztam. Kemény telek voltak, itt a Columbus utca sarkán volt egy jégpálya.

Mindig Nógrádverőcén nyaraltunk. Volt ott egy tanítócsalád, Szilágyiék, akiknek a kertjében volt egy kis faház, és azt az én szüleim 500 pengőért egy egész szezonra kivették. Amikor vége lett az iskolának, oda lementünk. Jött egy stráfkocsi, arra rápakoltak kosarakba ágyneműt, mindent levittünk, és lenn voltunk egészen addig, míg nem kezdődött a tanítás. Apámnak volt szabadsága – három hét biztos volt –, és lejött. Amikor nem volt, akkor jött minden nap vonattal. És amikor én már nagyobb kislány voltam, minden nap kimentem a vonathoz eléje. Nógrádverőcén óriási kirándulások voltak, föl a hegyekbe kisvasúttal. Nagyon sokáig jártunk oda. Már egy évvel azután, hogy megszülettem, van rólam fénykép ott lenn. És egészen addig, ameddig már a nagyon nehéz, háborús idők nem jöttek.

Az Angol utcába jártunk elemibe. Gábor mindig tiszta kitűnő tanuló volt. Nálunk  jól kellett tanulni. Szégyen volt valamit nem a legjobban csinálni. Nálunk mindenki előtt állandóan valami könyv volt, mindenki valamit tanult, írt. Apám és a bátyám nagy matematikusok voltak, mindig matematikai feladaton dugták össze a fejüket. Mikor mentem iskolába, a tanító néni mondta, „te is tanulj olyan jól, mint a bátyád”. Mikor én iskolába kerültem, én már görög katolikus voltam. Öt éves voltam [azaz: 1939-ben], amikor görög katolikusok lettünk [Görög katolikusok – bizánci rítusú, keleti katolikus egyházak, melyek szertartásaikat megtartva kiváltak az ortodox (görögkeleti) egyházakból, és egyesültek Rómával. Nincsenek dogmatikai ellentéteik a római katolikus egyházzal, csak bizonyos hittételek hangsúlya körül van eltérés. Elismerik a pápai primátust, de egyházfegyelmi kérdésekben megőrizték saját régi hagyományaikat, például nős férfiakat is pappá szentelnek (de püspök nem lehet házas ember). Az első világháború előtt több mint 2 millió görög katolikus élt Magyarországon (elsősorban az ország keleti megyéiben, Kárpátalján és Erdélyben). 1934 óta nevük „bizánci szertartású katolikus”, mert csak a görög anyanyelvűek végzik a liturgiákat görögül, egyébként minden nép a saját nyelvét használja. – A szerk.]. Nem volt zsidó identitásom semmi. A bátyám ment húsvétkor locsolkodni, meg hozzánk is jöttek. A bátyám ministráns volt [Ministránsok – a katolikus egyházban oltárszolgák, rendesen világi fiúk, akik a miséző papnak az oltárnál segédkeznek (a hívek helyett felelnek, a misekönyvet az egyik oldalról a másikra viszik, a bort és vizet az oltárra helyezik és öntenek belőlük, a mise alatt csengetnek stb.). – A szerk.]. A hitoktatója imádta a bátyámat, azt mondta, hogy a bátyám egy szent. Mert annyira jó gyerek volt. A karácsony nagyon rendesen meg volt tartva, a húsvét is. Kötelező volt templomba járni, minden vasárnap ott kellett lenni a misén; volt templomlátogatási igazolvány, le kellett pecsételtetni.

Volt egy Tóth Celli nevű kislány az elemiben, akivel jóban voltam, a papájának volt egy kocsmája. Amikor másodikosok vagy harmadikosok voltunk, volt valamilyen osztályműsor, és magyar táncokat táncoltunk magyar ruhában. Nekem nem volt, mert az apukámat már B-listázták, és szegények voltunk. És ez a drága Celli, mert ő beteg volt, odaadta nekem a magyar ruháját, hogy én abban táncoljak. Én annyira bőgtem, mert megalázónak éreztem, hogy nekem a Tóth Celli ruhájában kell táncolni. S a bátyám lefényképezett. Akkor jött az első áldozás, ők katolikusok voltak, én görög katolikus, minálunk egy héttel később volt. És akkor megint a Tóth Cellinek a ruhájában voltam. Na ez már betett nekem, és le vagyok fényképezve, hogy így bőgök, hogy ne fényképezz le, mert ez a Tóth Celli ruhája. Amikor bejött a zsidótörvény, és föl kellett tenni a csillagot, a legjobb barátnőm a Pápai Irénke szóba sem állt velem, rám sem nézett. És a Tóth Celli odajött és megpuszilt engem. Amikor már sárga csillagot kellett hordani [1944. március 31-én rendelték el], már nem is volt tanítás. Az az év nagyon gyorsan befejeződött. A zsidótörvény következtében nem járhattam gimnáziumba. Jött a gond, hogy velem mi legyen. Volt egy nagyon helyes hölgy, aki szegény volt, és járt a bátyámhoz, és angolra tanította. És akkor engem is kezdett tanítani németre.

Apukám családja egy abszolút liberális, asszimilálódott család volt, ahol semmiféle zsidó vallási tevékenység nem folyt. Én az apukám családjánál soha nem láttam se gyertyagyújtást, semmit. Az anyukám családjában valamennyi volt. Ha oda az ember pénteken elment, látta, hogy a nagymama és a fiúk mennek a templomba. Mivel mi ki akartunk vándorolni Új-Zélandba, apukám úgy gondolta, hogy akkor már ne cipeljük magunkkal ezt a zsidóságot, hiszen úgysem volt érdekes neki a vallás. Volt egy kolléganője, aki görög katolikus volt, akivel beszélgetett, nagyon szimpatikus lett, hogy itt a papok nősülhetnek, meg gyerekeik vannak, meg szegények, ez egy ilyen emberi vallásnak tűnt neki. Pontosan emlékszem a keresztelőmre, nagyon meg voltam hatva, mert nagyon tetszett a pap, a térdére ültetett, és mondta nekem a Miatyánkot [Miatyánk (Pater noster) – a keresztények legszentebb imája; a keresztény hagyományok szerint maga Jézus tanította meg rá az apostolokat. – A szerk.]. A bátyám nagyon vallásos lett. Nagyon jó tanuló volt, nagyon szenvedett attól, hogy megkülönböztették – a sárga csillag, amit nem lehetett levenni. Anyagilag már nagyon rosszul álltunk, apukám már B-listán volt, egy szobát fűtöttünk, és a bátyám ott imádkozott mindig a jéghideg szobában. Anyukám mondta mindig, hogy őrült ez a gyerek, apukám annyira szépen, toleranciával azt mondta: hagyd békén, neki kell valami, ahova menekül. Én a bátyámat mindenben követtem. Nem vettek föl már 1944-ben iskolába, én akkor kezdtem volna a gimnáziumot. A bátyám azt mondta, semmi baj, neki megvannak a tankönyvei, és elkezdünk tanulni. Mint az iskolában, szépen tanított mindenre, amit egy elsős gimnazistának tudni kell.

Anyukám irtózatosan ragaszkodott a családjához. Szinte minden nap bementünk a nagymamához. Ezért nem is volt baj, hogy apu nem jött haza, mert mi sem voltunk otthon. Anyukával elmentünk a bátyámért a gimnázium elé. Bementünk a nagymamához, ott valamit ebédeltünk, estefelé pedig hazasétáltunk. Anyukám takarékoskodott, tehát soha nem volt villamos; mindig gyalog. Közben megálltunk a Ligetben – egyedül a Ligetben volt hinta meg csúszda; Zuglóban nem voltak játszóterek. Anyukám tudott egyedül beszélgetni a nagymamával, a szájáról olvasott, és hangosan beszélt hozzá, mert akkor már szinte teljesen süket volt. Én játszottam, rajzoltam, később főleg olvastam. Imre nagybátyám, az orvos, nagyon szeretett, otthon volt, amíg el nem vitték munkaszolgálatra, ő mesélt nekem.

Gyerekkoromban mindig arra aludtam el, hogy apukám hallgatta a Hitlert. Akkor be kellett a zsidóknak adni a rádiót [lásd: zsidótörvények Magyarországon]. Nekünk volt egy kis néprádiónk, azt beadtuk, meg volt egy nagyon komoly [Az 1939/40-ben elindult ún. néprádió-akció során fejlesztett ki négy nagy európai elektronikai cég, a Telefunken, a Standard, a Philips és a magyar Orion Villamossági Rt. egy olcsó rádiókészülék-típust, a néprádiót. – A szerk.]. Kató néni férje a Tungsram fejlesztőmérnöke volt, és ő állított össze nekünk egy egészen különleges készüléket, ami a hálószobában az egyik szekrény mögött volt. Azt apukám mindig este későn elhúzta, ki a rádiót, és akkor hallottam a BBC szignálját. Apám nagy angolbarát volt. Mindig ebben hitt, hogy majd jön a Churchill.

A háború alatt

A háború alatt az anyukámmal a gettóban voltunk. Azóta se mentem el az Akácfa utcába abba a házba, ahol a gettó volt, se abba, ahonnan elvittek minket, a Király utcából. Mikor megyek, ott a sarkon megállok, ez az a ház – bemenni az udvarba, ahol álltunk ott, ahol szétválasztottak; ordítottak a nyilasok, hogy öt percet adnak, s hallottuk fönt a lövöldözést, mert biztos volt, aki elbújt, és azt ott helyben lelőtték. Nem tudok oda elmenni. 

Főleg a rabság, bezártság miatt küzdöttem az első időkben, a gettó előtt, a Gobbi Hildának a papája, a Gobbi bácsi volt a parancsnok abban a házban, ahová minket vittek. Nagyon szerettek engem, és akkor mindig mondtam neki, hogy én már annyira utálom ezt a kijárási tilalmat. Engem kinevezett futárnak, kaptam egy karszalagot és volt rajta egy zöld kereszt, és akkor a csillagot levehettem. Mindig küldött engem valamivel, ami azt jelentette, hogy akkor is, mikor a zsidók nem mehettek ki, én mászkáltam. Gabi bácsi azt mondta, ha bombázás van, álljak be egy kapu alá. Nem volt könnyű, mert zárva tartották a kapukat. Amikor apukám munkaszolgálatos volt, és mindig próbáltunk neki csokit vagy valami más finomságot venni, de amikor kijárás volt, akkor egy pillanat alatt elfogyott, mire odaértem, már nem tudtam neki venni semmit. És akkor egyszer amikor csak én mehettem ki, gondoltam, hogy most van az a pillanat, mikor bemegyek és mondom, kérek tíz deka csokit. Rám nézett az eladó, és azt mondta: „Kislány, nem vagy te zsidó?” És én, mint a nyúl, pénzt, mindent otthagytam, az életemért futottam. Nem tudtam, hogy most nem hívja-e egy pillanat múlva a nyilasokat vagy…?

Az apai nagymamám [Paula nagymama] is a gettóban volt, de máshol, és ő ott meg is halt. Mikor odamentünk, ahol volt, mondták, hogy meghalt. Apukám nagyon ragaszkodott az édesanyjához, és a fejébe vette, hogy megkeressük. És elmentünk abba az üzlethelyiségbe, mert már megtelt a zsidó fürdő udvara, s ebbe az üzlethelyiségbe rakták a holtakat; mint a fahasábok föl voltak ott szépen stócolva. Nagyon-nagyon hideg tél volt, és majdnem hogy meztelenre le voltak vetkőztetve – hát a ruha aranyat ért. Elkezdtük lerakni a halottakat, hogy megkeressük a nagymamát. De így, hogy ő megfogta a vállát, én a lábát, és így meg voltak fagyva, mint a fahasábok. Bennem nem volt borzalom, mert olyan kemények voltak és olyan merevek, mintha deszkákat rakott volna az ember. És hosszú ideig  rakosgattuk, s aztán föladtuk. Nem találtuk meg, persze nem is lett eltemetve.

Az apám munkaszolgálatos volt Déván és Celldömölkön. Aztán volt itt Pesten, valamilyen malomban is. Ő a kis vékony ember cipelte a zsákokat, de ott is volt lapjuk. Csináltak olvasókört. Ezek mind fehér karszalagosok voltak [azaz zsidó származásúak, de keresztény vallásúak]. 1943-ban már a bátyámat is mindig beosztották. Levente nem lehetett, és a tűzoltósághoz volt beosztva. Ha bemondta a rádió, hogy légi veszély, akkor a bátyám rögtön biciklire ült, és ment a tűzoltósághoz.

Én apámon soha nem láttam sárga csillagot. Ő mivel áttért volt, fehér karszalagot viselt, semmi különbség. A bátyámra pontosan emlékszem, hogy ott térdelt a templomban sárga csillaggal. Anyukáémra, az enyémre is emlékszem, nekem kordbársonyból volt, mert amit anyám a rongyoszsákban talált sárga színűt, abból csinálta.

A gettóban volt a háznak egy pincéje, és ott lent voltunk, mert akkor már folyton bombáztak [1944 végén]. Egyszer csak a mellettünk lévő épületet eltalálták, és átszakadt a vízvezeték. Zúdult be a víz a pincébe. Óriási pánik lett, rohantunk föl, jött be a víz. Ez még december volt. És akkor fönt voltunk a lakásban, az ablakok már be voltak mindenütt deszkázva. Valami fény beszivárgott részben a deszkák résein, nagy szoba volt, körülbelül harmincan voltunk benne. Körben a falon hatalmas üveges szekrényben rengeteg könyv volt. Több se kellett nekem, én egész nap olvastam. Így eltelt az idő. Hát az ennivaló az annyi volt, hogy kapott a szoba egy kenyeret. Anyukám aztán, amikor meghallotta, hogy csönd van [vagyis abbamaradt a bombázás], rögtön kiment, az orosz katonáktól kapott valami kenyeret meg csokoládét.

Kijöttünk a gettóból, és mondtam anyámnak, hogy menjünk vissza a Liszt Ferenc térre, ahol a vatikáni védett házban voltunk és ahonnan bementünk a gettóba [lásd: menlevél]. Mert ott maradt minden bútorunk, ágyneműnk, edényünk. Visszamentünk, és megtudtuk, hogy egy akna érte ezt a szobát, ahol voltunk a gettóban és akik ott maradtak tovább, mint mi, mindenki meghalt. Mikor anyukám ezt megtudta, ettől kezdve én felnőttesítve lettem. Mondta, Juditkám, mindig azt csinálom, amit te mondasz. Juditkám, milyen pártba lépjek be? Hát szociáldemokrata. Akkor anyukám belépett a pártba. Hamarosan azt mondta anyukám, „jaj, Juditkám, mit csináljak, lépjek át a kommunista pártba?”. „Ne lépj át”, mondom, „mert a két párt majd úgyis egyesül, hallottam” [lásd: Magyar Dolgozók Pártja (MDP)]. Nem lépett át, de  visszaminősítették tagjelöltnek. Evvel nagyon jól járt, mert kevesebb munkát vártak tőle. 1956 után nem lépett vissza a pártba, de összejártak a régi elvtársakkal.

A gettóban nem tudtunk semmit Auschwitzról meg a munkaszolgálatról. Az eszünkbe nem jutott, hogy nem él apukám. Mentünk ki mindig a Keleti pályaudvarra, és mindenkit, aki leszállt, megkérdeztünk. Egyszer csak édesanyám talált egy embert, aki abban a században volt, emlékezett is apámra, s akkor mondta, hogy őket valahol lecsatolták, aztán a vonat elment Németország felé. És valahol leszálltak, és gyalog mentek Sachsenhausen felé – ez az erőltetett menet. A szállásuk egy német tanyán volt az istállóban a szalmán, és neki [annak az embernek tehát, aki visszajött] annyira sebes volt a lába, hogy ő nem bírt továbbmenni, s úgy határozott, hogy kockáztat: befúrja magát a szalmába. Sikerült neki, nem találták meg. Ő nem tud többet a többiek sorsáról. Soha többet senkit nem találtunk, csak ezt az egy embert. Tehát nyilvánvaló, hogy Sachsenhausen és e között a tanya között valahol mindenkit lelőttek. De mi abszolút úgy fogtuk föl, hogy ennyit tudunk róla, majd ő is jön. A bátyámról sem jött sokáig semmi hír, aztán talált anyukám egy fiút, aki a bátyámmal együtt dolgozott több helyen is a munkaszolgálat alatt. És ő mondta, hogy mikor megérkeztek Buchenwaldba télen, a vagonból kiterelték őket, és megkérdezték, hogy kinek milyen végzettsége van. És a bátyám mondta, hogy diák. Akiknek nem volt szakmájuk, azokat levetkőztették, s hideg vízzel addig locsolták, míg meg nem fagytak. Anyámban, azt hiszem, hogy akkor megpattanhatott valami. Apámat mindig várta haza, soha nem volt hajlandó holttá nyilváníttatni, pedig kapott volna özvegyi nyugdíjat, én árvaságit. De halála pillanatáig várta haza apámat. A bátyámat nem várhatta, mert azért ezt el kellett hinni, miért mondta volna különben a fiú.

Imádtam apukámat. Valami olyan kapcsolat volt köztünk, hogy mindig érzem, hogy fogja a kezemet. Anyukámnál ez nem volt, és az nagyon mókás volt, hogy inkább tőlem kért tanácsot mindenben. Megszokta, hogy apukám intézi az ilyen dolgokat, ő tudja a politikát meg minden. Rövid ideig, amikor a nagybátyám megjött 1946-ban a fogságból, ő egy kicsit átvette az apaszerepet. Megnősült, de törődött velünk, anyagilag is. És mikor ő meghalt [1953-ban], akkor majdnem belehaltam. Nem tudtam enni, hogy most őt is elveszítettem. Nagyon okos, intelligens ember volt, lehetett vele beszélgetni, olyan jó érzés volt. Az nagyon megviselt.

A Liszt Ferenc téren laktunk. Zuglóból [a régi lakásból] ami megmaradt, bevittük oda. Egy kézikocsin behúztuk azt a néhány bútort, nem sokkal a felszabadulás után. A lakásban három szoba volt, mindegyik szobában más család lakott – de az eredeti tulajdonos nem jött vissza. Aztán az egyik szobából a család visszament a saját lakásába, lett két szobánk, és akkor anyukám szerzett a harmadik családnak a földszinten egy lakást, és így lényegében a lakás a miénk lett. Anyukám egészen a haláláig [1983-ig] ott lakott a Liszt Ferenc téren. 1946-ban visszajött a nagybátyám orosz fogságból, és neki kellett két szoba, az egyikben lakott, a másik a rendelője volt. Meg visszajött a Gyöngyi, ő is nálunk volt. Aztán visszajött a Kató néni, apám húga, ő is nálunk lakott. Mindenki vagy elpusztult, vagy kivándorolt, tehát mi olyan légüres térben voltunk. Anyukám a testvéreibe meg abba az egy nagynénimbe kapaszkodott tíz körömmel. Anyukám mindenfélét csinált. Az egész házba járt takarítani, hullát mosni, mindent elvállalt. Később a nagybátyám megnősült, a Gyöngyi férjhez ment, és mi ketten voltunk a lakásban. Ki volt adva az IBUSZ-nak mindig az egyik szoba, hogy egy kis plusz pénz bejöjjön. A háború után anyukám a Divatáru Nagykereskedelmi Vállalatnál volt mint gyors- és gépíró és levelező, aztán volt a Nemzeti Banknál, volt a Tükernél (tüzelőanyag kereskedelemi vállalat). 

1945. április volt, egyszer csak anyám rám néz, azt mondja, te, nem kéne neked iskolában lenned? A legközelebbi iskola a Mária Terézia Leánygimnázium volt; a nagymama testvérei közül többen ide jártak. Ez elegáns iskola volt Pesten, az Andrássy úton. Bementünk, végignéztek rajtunk, hát szörnyen néztünk ki, és rögtön mondták, hogy régen megkezdődött a tanítás, nincs felvétel. Na, anyám kinyitotta a száját, azt mondta: „Jó, mi így nézünk ki, gettó és a többi, de ez az apja!” És kirakta a piaristáktól apám bizonyítványait. Fölvettek. Mondták, hogy csak magántanuló lehetek, de bejárhatok, és majd magánvizsgát kell tennem. Hát én attól kezdve bejártam rendesen. Talán két kettesem [Ez az osztályzat a mai „jó”-nak, azaz 4-es érdemjegynek felel meg. – A szerk.] volt, a többit mind jelesre letettem, az első évet. Utána már mindig kitűnő voltam. Nem volt egy könnyű dolog, mert ez bizony egy nagyon elegáns környék volt, az Andrássy út, a lányok legnagyobb része nagyon jómódú volt. Én nem voltam benne ebben a társaságban, mert én nem bírtam velük lépést tartani. Én mindenhez értettem, amihez ezek az úri kisasszonyok nem. Tudtam főzni nagyon hamar; mindenre anyám tanított meg, mert muszáj volt. Nagyon utáltak az iskolában, én ezt vállaltam. Én sehova sem tartoztam. Volt zsidó cserkészcsapat, oda nem tartoztam, mert görög katolikus voltam. 1945 után még kötelező volt a hittan [A kötelező iskolai hitoktatást 1949 szeptemberében törölte el az Elnöki Tanács 1949: 5. sz. törvényerejű rendelete. – A szerk.], de mivel görög katolikus én voltam egyedül az iskolában, a tisztelendő lakására mentem hittanra, aki a bátyámnak volt a lelkésze. Engem érdekelt is a vallástörténet, szertartástan, meg hogy hogy volt ez az egyházszakadás [1054-ben történt az egyházszakadás, amely a keleti, görög (bizánci) szertartású kereszténységet majdnem teljes egészében elszakította a nyugati Rómától. – A szerk.]. Egészen addig jártam, ameddig nyiladozott az eszem, és megkérdeztem tőle, hogy miért nem mentette meg a bátyámat. Tudtam, hogy vidéki ember a tisztelendő, mondtam neki, hogy elvitette volna magával, és azt mondta volna, hogy Erdélyből jött menekült, az unokaöcsém. Senki a papnak a szavát nem vonta volna kétségbe. És azt mondta, hogy Istennek mártírokra van szüksége. Mondtam neki, hogy ronda képmutató, miért nem azt mondja, hogy gyáva voltam, kislányom. Azt elfogadtam volna. Jött a fordulat éve [lásd: kommunista hatalomátvétel Magyarországon], nem volt már akkor kötelező, soha többet nem mentem hittanra. Templomba eljártam anyukámmal. Ott volt egy nagyon kedves néni, a sekrestyés [A sekrestye a templomban a szentély melletti kisebb-nagyobb helyiség, ahol a miséhez szükséges ruhákat és eszközöket tartják. Itt ölti föl a pap a miseruhát. – A szerk.] néni. Annyira magányosak lettünk, mindenki körülünk eltűnt, a lakásunk, a holmiink, a testvérek, a nagyszülők. Anyánk keresett valamit, és az a szentendrei néni, amikor a templom után bementünk, mert ott mentünk el mellettük, megkínált bennünket mindenfélével, Húsvétkor kaptunk kis szentelt sonkát, süteményt. Olyan volt, mint egy rokonunk. Vasárnap nem volt hova mennünk – régebben mindig mentünk a nagymamához, de mindenki eltűnt –, és átmentünk hozzájuk, nagyon szerettük őket.

A háború után

14 éves koromban lehetett választani, hogy reál vagy humán tagozatra menjek-e. Anyám az égvilágon mindent rám bízott. Még az írását is szégyellte, és mindig azt mondta, ha valamit alá kellett írni, hogy „írd alá, Juditkám, te sokkal jobban tudod az én írásomat”. Humánra mentem, de ez csak egy évig ment, mert aztán jött az iskolák államosítása, és minden osztály egyforma volt. Sok gyerek disszidált, eltűntek. Furcsa, félelemteli légkör volt, hogy nem mertük megkérdezni. Negyedikben még hatvanan voltunk, és tizenhatan érettségiztünk. Ez volt az utolsó 8 évfolyamos gimnáziumi osztály.

Megalakult a Magyar Ifjúság Népi Szövetsége, a MINSZ, és azon belül a Diákszövetség [(MINSZ) – 1948-ban alakult mint az ifjúsági szervezeteket összefogó csúcsszervezet. Feladata az MDP befolyásának növelése az ifjúság körében és a termelés segítése (pl. munkaversenyek szervezésével). 1950-ben, a DISZ megalakulásával megszűnt. – A szerk.]. Én abba rögtön beléptem, iskolavezetőségi tag lettem. Iskolai önkormányzatot alakítottunk. Volt egyenruhánk, szürke blúz, öv, övcsat – rajta Kossuth-címer, fáklya, semmi vörös csillag, nem volt kommunista egyáltalán –, és egy sötétkék nyakkendő. Nekem ezáltal meg volt oldva a ruházkodásom, ilyenben jártunk öten vagy hatan az osztályban. Értelmiségi gyerekek voltunk, de nyomorultak, a legtöbbnek a papája elpusztult. Hárman – az osztálytanács – bemehettünk a konferenciára is, és beleszóltunk az osztályzásba. Nagyon undok diktatórikus dolgot csináltunk, leosztályoztuk az osztálytársainkat: aki nem tetszett nekünk, az rossz jegyet kapott. Én oktatási felelős lettem, de később már kerületi szinten. A saját nagyképűségem révén 14-15 évesen jártam én szemináriumra.

1948-ban mentünk falujárásra [Az MDP vidéki agitációjának egyik formája volt; a kommunista párt gyenge szereplése az 1945. évi választásokon, amikor is nyilvánvaló lett, hogy még az újonnan földhöz juttatott gazdák többsége is a kommunista párt ellen szavazott, 1946-ban arra indította a pártvezetést, hogy megszervezze a falujárási mozgalmat. A cél helyi pártszervezetek létrehozása vagy megerősítése volt, és a kommunistaellenes hangulat és előítéletek eloszlatása. A falujárásban többnyire nagyvárosi munkások és egyetemi hallgatók vettek részt önkéntesen vagy igazodási óhajból/kényszerből. 1953 körül a mozgalom elenyészett. – A szerk.]. Utólag tudtam meg, hogy Olaszliszka volt a végcél, ahol ellenálltak az iskola államosításának. Elérkeztünk ebbe a faluba, és ott műsort adtunk. Házakhoz voltunk kiadva, hogy ott alszunk, ott étkezünk, minden, és nekünk agitálni kellett, hogy szavazzanak a népfrontra. Utólag megtudtam, hogy ezt a falut már agyonkínozták, egy csomó férfit elvittek, minden. El nem lehet képzelni azt a hangulatot. Ültünk az asztalnál, én mondhattam akármit, ezek nem szólaltak meg. Gondolták, ha nem mondanak semmit, abból nincs baj. Mi nem tudtuk ezt. Mi csak eszközei voltunk a politikának. Mi azt hittük, hogy még mindig népfront van, és már régen a kommunista párt irányított.

A Jókai téren volt ez a párthelyiség, oda szerettem menni, mert ott szerettek engem. Pici gyerekkoromtól könnyen tanultam, szerettem szavalni. És ez egy ilyen kis közösség lett. Valószínűleg sok zsidó lehetett ott, akik keresték a helyüket. Volt mindig kis  összejövetel, mindenki hozott süteményt vagy szendvicseket, volt teázás és műsor. Két fellépő volt. Én szavaltam, [a fiú] meg táncolt.

A háború után nem merült fel senkiben, aki megmaradt, hogy elmenjünk innen. Az egész családja anyukámnak arra ment, hogy minél jobban asszimilálódjunk. Soha nem láttam semelyik lakásban pajeszt meg táleszt, az én anyukámnak eszébe nem jutott gyertyát gyújtani, meg hogy péntek van. A bátyám, mikor görög katolikus vallású volt, pénteken  böjtölt, tehát nem lehetett húst főzni. Meg hogy mise előtt nem lehet enni-inni [Mise előtt lehetett enni, de ha valaki áldozni is akart, akkor a délelőtti mise előtt éjféltől böjtölnie kellett, legfeljebb tiszta vizet ihatott. – A szerk.]. Agyonvert volna, ha látja, hogy egy korty vizet iszom, mert ő komolyan vette.  Én olyan vallásos voltam. Egészen addig, míg a hitoktató azt nem mondta, hogy a bátyám… Abban a pillanatban, mintha elvágták volna, jött a mozgalom. A mozgalom sokáig tartott, egyetemista koromig. De soha nem léptem be a kommunista pártba. Ha lett volna szociáldemokrata párt, abba talán belépek. Nagyon sokszor be akartak léptetni, és mindig elmagyaráztam, hogy én ezt a pártfegyelmet nem bírom elviselni. Énnekem kell, hogy megmondhassam a véleményemet. És különben is, ezekkel a nyilasokkal nem vagyok egy pártban.

Az igazgatónőnk, miután az iskolát államosították,  kemény bolsevik volt. Azt mondta nekem, hogy te mész a Lenin Intézetbe. Mondtam, hogy én nem megyek, én művészettörténész akartam lenni. Azt mondta, a Rákosi-ösztöndíjat garantálom neked. Az akkor, amikor anyukámnak 500 forint volt a fizetése, 2000 forintot jelentett volna havonta. Mondtam, hogy nem, ilyen makacsul. Jelentkeztem, művészettörténetből felvételiztem, és a felvételi bizottság vezetője látta, hogy értelmes vagyok, bármit kérdezett, szakirodalmat, ismertem mindent, a legfrissebb dolgokat. Akkor azt mondta, egy művészettörténésznek nyelveket is kell tudni. Mondom latin, német, angol, francia, orosz, elég öt nyelv? Adott minden nyelvből egy szöveget, hogy én azt fordítsam le. Úgy látszik, hogy a latin sikerülhetett a legjobban, mert azt mondta, hogy latin szakra fölvesz [Az 1950-es évek elején a feszített beiskolázási törekvések eredményeképpen irreálisan magas felvételi arányszámokat szabtak meg. A teljesítendő (tervszámokban meghatározott) számok nem feleltek meg sem a valós igényeknek, sem pedig a valós jelentkezési arányoknak. A rendszer ebben az esetben a jelentkezőket mechanikusan más területre irányította, nagyon sokan létszámfelettiség, illetve más területen jelentkező létszámhiány miatt teljesen más szakra nyertek felvételt, mint ahová eredetileg jelentkeztek. (Ladányi Andor: Felsőoktatási politika 1949–1958. Budapest, 1986, Kossuth, 42. old.) – A szerk.]. Mondom, én oda nem megyek. Hát aztán kapok egy papírt, hogy fölvettek angol szakra. Akkor összetalálkoztam egy nagyon okos emberrel, aki azt mondta, menjek én csak angol szakra, jobban járok. A művészettörténetben annyira ki van szabva Magyarországon, hogy kinek mi a területe, hogy maximum a bizományiban lehetnék becsüs. Ha pedig az angolt elvégzem, akkor előttem a világ, az mindenütt jó, még művészettörténész is lehetek. És én akkor ezt a tanácsot megfogadtam.

Az angol szak egy nagy teremből állt, ami a könyvtárterem volt, és még egy szobából. Az órák mind ott voltak a könyvtárban. Négy tanár volt az angol tanszék, nyolcan vagy kilencen voltunk diákok. Jött az első óra, beszélgettünk, kiderült, hogy itt senki az égvilágon nem akart angol szakra jönni. Vallástörténésztől elkezdve mindenfélére volt itt jelentkező. Vitás is volt egyáltalán, hogy indul-e angol szak, nem is lehetett jelentkezni rá. Ez volt az első év, amikor senki nem érettségizett angolból. A legelső óránk angol nyelvű volt. Bejött a tanár, s elkezdett angolul mesélni. És mi úgy néztük. S azt mondta, miért nem jegyzitek? Én egyedül tudtam annyit angolul, hogy megmondjam: azért tanár úr, mert nem tudunk angolul. Jaj, azt mondja, rossz helyre jöttem be, és már ment is ki. Szaladtam utána, mondom, nem, mi vagyunk az angol. Úgy van, hogy én ez akartam lenni, az az, az amaz. Hát őt ez nem érdekli, tanuljunk meg angolul. Volt ott néhány hülye lány, akik elrohantak a tanulmányi osztályra, hogy ők munkásszármazásúak, és hogy ez van. És behívták ezt a Herveit, és kötelezték, hogy fél évig magyarul kell tartani az óráit. Erre aztán elszabadult a pokol. Úgy bánt velünk, mint az állatokkal. Hatan maradtunk rögtön már az első év végére. Aztán egyszer csak közölték velünk, hogy magyar szakosok lettünk.

Kaptam szociális segélyt, és aztán, mert kitűnő voltam, tanulmányi ösztöndíjat, Úgyhogy körülbelül ugyanannyi volt az ösztöndíjam, mint anyuka fizetése, a szakkönyvekért például csak 25 százalékot  kellett fizetni, menzát is sokkal olcsóbban kaptunk. Én bizony vasárnap is bementem egy lábassal, és hazavittem. És nekünk anyuval ebédünk-vacsoránk megvolt belőle. Minden nyáron elmentem oda, ahol anyukám dolgozott, egész nyárra keresni egy kis pénzt, mert nyáron nem volt ösztöndíj. Nyaralás soha nem volt. Anyukámmal nagy turisták voltunk, és turistaházba mentünk fillérekért közös szobába [azaz más, idegen kirándulókkal közös szobába]. Azért jártunk az Operába, hangversenyre, a legolcsóbb helyre, de jártunk; könyveket is vettünk, erre azért anyám adott mindig.

A férjemmel együtt jártunk egyetemre. Egyidősek vagyunk, 1934-ben született ő is. S. Cs-nek hívják. Schilling volt. Celldömölki sváb család. A papa kisnyilas volt, aztán párttag lett, ez így szokott lenni. Cs. négy évig járt Kőszegen a bencésekhez, és amikor államosították az iskolát, négy évet Celldömölkön gimnáziumba. Okos fiú volt, elküldték a Lenin Intézetbe [1952 tavaszán az ELTE Egyetemi Orosz Intézete átalakult Lenin Intézetté. Feladata: „Magas színvonalú marxista-leninista képzettséggel rendelkező és az orosz nyelvet jól ismerő egyetemi előadók, ideológiai munkaterületen dolgozó funkcionáriusok képzése. 1956-ban szűnt meg. – A szerk.]. Egy évet járt oda, de nagyon utálta. Volt neki egy nagybátyja, és amikor ő nagyon panaszkodott otthon, akkor az anyukája elment hozzá, hogy segítsen rajta. Egy telefonjába került, Cs.-t betette a bölcsészkarra. Másodévtől már a bölcsészkarra járt, magyar szakos volt.

Aztán jött ez a nyár, és mondták, hogy lehet dolgozni a KISZ Központban [Magyar Kommunista Ifjúsági Szövetség 1957-től létezett; elődje a DISZ, a Dolgozó Ifjúság Szövetsége volt. A DISZ az MDP vezetése alatt álló, a 14–25 éves fiatalokat tömörítő ifjúsági tömegszervezet volt, a MINSZ által tömörített ifjúsági rétegszervezetek egybeolvasztásával jött létre 1950-ben. Lapja a „Szabad Ifjúság” volt. – A szerk.], mert szerveznek egy KISZ vezetőképző tábort, és akkor megkapom az ösztöndíjat. Az én dolgom  volt, hogy megfogalmazzam azt a levelet, amivel meghívjuk az illetőket, meg kiborítékozzam. Többek között S. Cs. is rajta volt, akit én nem ismertem. Ez augusztus 20-án indult, és volt valami nagy bál a Közgazdasági Egyetemen, és ott a Buch Pali nevű tanársegéddel nagyon jót táncoltam egész este. Másnap volt az új emberekkel ismerkedési est, és ott odamentem a Bóka László professzor úrhoz [Bóka László (1910–1964): a 20. századi magyar irodalom kutatója (könyvei jelentek meg József Attiláról és Ady Endréről), író, kritikus. Közoktatásügyi államtitkár (1947–1950), majd az ELTE egyetemi tanára. Verseskötetei és regényei is megjelentek. – A szerk.], akit az apám jól ismert, beszélgetni, és odajött valami fiú is, ez volt a későbbi férjem. Aztán később volt tánc, és valami ősemberszerű muki fölkért. S akkor odaszóltam Cs.-nek, hogy ha ez a muki fölkér, akkor mindig kérjen le, és akkor lekért. Az első mondat – soha nem felejtem el – az volt, hogy „ugye, a Buch Pali zsidó?” Mondom, én nem tudom, de én az vagyok. Ez volt az első mondat. Mert én ezt elhatároztam a háború után rögtön, hogy megmondom, ha valaki megkérdezi, mert én azt nem akarom, hogy aztán valami nyilas legyen. Nem dicsekszem vele, de megmondom. Ezt az egész zsidóság dolgot majdnemhogy szégyelltem, ez az áldozatok szégyene, szörnyű. Szégyelltem. Ha lehet, akkor nem tagadom meg, de ha lehet, én görög katolikus vagyok – amikor kellett –, amikor már nem kellett, akkor MINSZ-tag vagyok. Cs. nem szólt semmit. Nagyon lázadt a saját celldömölki valósága ellen. Talán nem is a nyilasság ellen, hanem ez ellen a kispolgári lét ellen. Egy könyv nem volt náluk. A falon háziáldás meg ez a családi ágy nagy párnával. Később mindig mondta nekem, hogy neki majd lesz kocsija, meg felöltözünk a Váci utcából, és akkor elmegyünk, megmutatjuk magunkat Celldömölkön.

Cs. nagyon kitartó volt, mindig jött, beszélgettünk meg sétáltunk. Mikor vége lett ennek a tábornak, akkor én olyan szerelmes voltam, hogy. Kezdődött az egyetem, és ő csak jött, jött. Anyukámmal első pillanattól  kezdve nagyon nem értették meg egymást. Ő kollégista volt, ezért mindig odajött hozzánk. Anyukám felügyelt – a kályha mellett üldögéltünk, beszélgettünk, és anyuka nem nagyon ment ki. Anyám egyszer azt mondja Cs.-nak, hogy ha ennyire szereti, miért nem kéri meg a kezét? Azt mondja Cs., megkérem a kezét.

Cs. pár hónapig tanított, aztán felvették a Magvetőbe. 1956-ban elvitték katonának vidékre, engem meg le akartak rakni egy másik vidéki városba. Elrohantunk a Bókai professzorhoz, és ő elintézte, hogy engem is ugyanoda helyezzenek, Szerencsre. Lementem, és bementem ott az oktatási osztályra. Óh, örömmel várjuk, le lehet tenni az esküt, s akkor Cs.-nek betudjuk a katonaságot. Azt mondta: Cs.-nek Szerencsen a gimnáziumban van egy magyartanári állás, látjuk, hogy az elvtársnő oroszt is tanult, Szerencs külterületén, Bekecsen van egy orosztanári állás, és a szerencsi gimnáziumban taníthat németet. Ott kint, azt mondja, van egy pedagóguslakás, és odaköltözünk. Kimentem oda, hogy megnézzem a lakást, és jelentkezzem az iskolaigazgatónál. Azt mondja, ne vicceljen, mi az, hogy magát kinevezik? Hát innen, Bekecsről ment a nem tudom, kinek a lánya, az jövőre fog végezni orosz szakon, az övé ez az állás. Hát jó, akkor addig csináljam. Mondom, és a lakás? Hát abban benne lakik a nyugdíjas tanítónő, hát mi azt innen nem rakhatjuk ki, az idevalósi. Erre fogtam magam, fölutaztam Pestre, s írtam nekik egy levelet, hogy mivel semmit, amit ígértek nem tartottak be – tehát nincs tanári lakás, nincs megoldva az étkezés, nincs megoldva a közlekedés –, én ezt az állást nem fogadom el. És megírtam Cs.-nek is. Cs.-től egy szemrehányó levél jött, hogy leszerelek és hova megyek. A kollégiumból már kitettek, nincs állásom. Kató néni, aki a könyvkiadónál dolgozott, azt mondta, hogy ő most hallotta, hogy a könyvesboltokban angol nyelvtanfolyamot fognak indítani a dolgozók számára, keresnek angol tanárt, ő engem oda behoz. Elmagyarázták, hogy az út az, hogy el kell mennem egy munkaközvetítőhöz, és azok közvetíthetnek engem ki munkára. Bementem, és kiközvetítettek. Kiderült, hogy még szervezés alatt áll az angol nyelvtanfolyam, addig hát menni kell egy olyan könyvesboltba, ahol vannak idegen nyelvű könyvek. Ez volt az Egyetemi Könyvesbolt. Én voltam a legfiatalabb és a legmagasabb képesítésű, két diplomával, de én voltam a kisjancsi, minden szar munkát velem csináltattak meg.

Cs. közben megjött, és rögtön elment harcolni a Széna térre. Én is mentem mindenhová, ott voltam a Rádiónál, a parlamentnél, mindenütt [lásd: 1956-os forradalom]. Úgy éreztem, hogy ez az én forradalmam, ott kell lennem. Úgy nézett ki október 3-án [azaz: november 3-án], hogy most már nyugalom és béke van, és letették a fegyvert a csapatok. Mire ébredünk másnap reggel? Óriási ágyúdörgés, a rádióban bemondják, hogy csapataink harcban állnak. Anyu tudta, hogy férfi ne menjen ki az utcára, mert vagy elmegy harcolni, vagy elviszik az oroszok [Utalás a háború utáni helyzetre. Lásd: málenkij robot]. Anyukám ment ki kenyérért, sorban állt, nem engedett ki minket egyáltalán az utcára. Amikor egy kicsit elcsitultak a dolgok, akkor kimentünk, hogy megnézzük, mi van. Na és akkor Cs. azt mondta, hogy hazamegy Celldömölkre, megnézi, hogy mi van. Akkor már folyt a disszidálás, és én azt gondoltam, hogy az életben nem látom. Volt két nagynénje Amerikában, akik 1945-ben disszidáltak. Eltelt egy hónap, semmi hírem nem volt róla, és egyszer csak beállít, hogy ő nem tudott elmenni miattam. És én akkor is mondtam neki, hogy nézd, én nem akarok elmenni, itt van anyukám, ő sem akar, de menj nyugodtan.  De nem, mert csak együtt megyünk.

Megengedték, hogy egy kicsit ott legyen a kollégiumban, de egy idő után már el kellett hagynia a kollégiumot, és se állása, semmi. A Bókai professzor utánanyúlt – a Tudományos Akadémián akkor kezdték csinálni azt a nagylexikont, és lehetett címszavakat szerkeszteni. Ez egy ilyen félig mechanikus munka volt, de fizettek érte. És hát valami lakás kell. A Bóka professzor szólt az anyósának, aki az Egyetem téren egy nagy házban lakott, és ott a velük szemben levő lakásban volt egy albérleti szoba kiadó. Jótállást vállaltak, és Cs. megkapta a szobát. De ki volt kötve, hogy ide nő nem teheti be a lábát. Na most, akkor mi legyen? Sétálgattunk az Engels téren, ott van az V. kerületi tanács, és azt mondja Cs., hogy házasodjunk össze, az lenne a legjobb, akkor nem mondhatnák, hogy a feleség nem jöhet ide. Mondom, jó. Azt mondja, menjünk be, kérdezzük meg, mikor lehet legközelebb. Mondták, hogy pénteken. Előjegyeztettük hát magunkat péntekre. Az anyakönyvvezetőnél a Cs. tanúja Bóka professzor volt, az én tanúm pedig a házból egy néprajzkutató. Ők voltak és anyuka, senki más. És utána a Bóka – neki ugye volt akadémiai kocsija – fölvitt a Várba, hogy ünnepeljünk. A Tárnok Cukrászdában rendelt nekünk két dobostortát meg egy konyakot. Délelőtt volt az esküvő tizenegykor, és Cs.-nek már 12-re kellett menni dolgozni. A Bóka szerzett neki egy állást egy nevelőintézet kollégiumában a Sas-hegyen, ő ott volt a nevelőtanár.

Az albérleti szobánknak a következő volt a berendezése. Volt benne sodrony négy lábon, amin volt egy matrac. Cs.-nek volt egy paplana, párnája, anyukámtól később kaptam huzatokat. Amikor terhes lettem, anyukám azt akarta, hogy költözzünk oda. Azt mondta Cs., hogy ő odajön, ha leválasztják a lakást. Mondta anyukám, hogy ő ezt egyedül nem tudja végigcsinálni, valaki legyen ott, mert ő nem tud annyi mesterrel bánni. Cs. hallani se akart róla.

A főbérlő néni tüdőbajos volt, mi rettegtünk, hogy megfertőződik a gyerek. Poloskás volt a lakás, hiába védekeztünk, mindenhova bemásztak. Cs. nagyon nyomott volt ettől, és akkor az Ortutaynak [Ortutay Gyula (1910–1978), néprajztudós, egyetemi tanár (ELTE). Tudományos munkássága mellett számos politikai funkciója is volt (1948/49 – a Kisgazdapárt társelnöke, 1945–47: a Rádió elnöke, 1947–1950: vallás- és közoktatásügyi miniszter, 1957–1964: a Hazafias Népfront titkára, majd alelnöke (1964–1978), az Elnöki Tanács tagja (1958–1978). – A szerk.] szerkesztette egy könyvét. Elmesélte neki ezt a kétségbeejtő helyzetet. Azt mondja, ó, majd én segítek rajtatok. A VIII. kerületi tanácselnök most kért tőlem vizsgahalasztást, megmondom neki, hogy nem adok halasztást, csak ha ad egy lakást. Akkor kaptunk egy szükséglakást, tetőtér volt az udvar felé. El nem tudod képzelni azt a boldogságot, hogy lett egy önálló lakásunk. Konyha nem volt, csak fürdőszoba, WC. Egy ablak volt rajta, a gyerekhez jutott; neki lett elválasztva függönnyel egy külön kis gyerekszoba. A házfelügyelő nagyon ügyes volt, az egész kis előteret bepolcozta, mert akkor már nagyon sok könyvünk volt; Cs. könyvkiadónál volt, és kapta a példányokat, meg az íróktól is kapott. Volt egy cserépkályha, de az reggelre mindig kihűlt, a mellékhelyiségek pedig irtózatosan hidegek voltak. Folyton beázott, a gyerek kapott egy krónikus középfülgyulladást, mert nedves és gombás volt a lakás. Szóval nem volt egy egyszerű élet, de mégis a saját lakásunk volt. 1970-ig laktunk ott. Cs. el volt foglalva, éjszaka járt haza.  Hazajött, a gyerek aludt, nem is tudom, hogy tudta-e, hogy van apja. Abszolút egyedül neveltem föl. Mikor elköltöztünk a szükséglakásba, Cs. otthon dolgozott, de idegesítette a gyerek. Úgyhogy én a gyereket mindig elvittem. Budapest összes múzeumait végigjártuk.

Eszter mindent tudott a családról, a háborúról, de nem neveltem egyáltalán zsidónak, sőt meg is van keresztelve, mert az anyósomék követelték ezt. Cs. nem vallásos, utálja a papokat. De a következőt mondták az anyósék, és erre én mit mondjak?! „És ha még egyszer ilyen rendszer lesz, a lelkedre veszed, hogy a gyereknek emiatt baja legyen?”

Miután megszületett a gyerek, angol nyelvű gyereksétáltatást vállaltam. Őt toltam a kocsiban, és két gyerek jött velem, és azokat angolra tanítottam minden nap. Nem akartam bölcsődébe adni. Elvittem anyukához, ott adtam angolórákat. A gyerek állt a járókában, játszott. Akkor gondoltam, hogy óvodába menjen, megpróbálok állást szerezni. Nem volt egyszerű dolog. Írtam egy kérvényt, hogy vállalok mindent, úttörővezetést, napközit, bármit, eddig hol voltam, mit csináltam, hol végeztem, és azt beadtam minden kerületbe. Semmi. Aztán jött egy telefon, hogy a VIII. kerületben kéne valakit helyettesíteni. Odakerültem, magyart és történelmet tanítottam – anyukám közben vigyázott a gyerekre –, egy fél évig voltam ott. Utána mentem, ahova kellett, egy hétre, két hétre, végigtanítottam a VIII. kerületet. A VIII. kerületben rendkívül hírhedt iskolák voltak, a tanárok ittak, nem tanítottak, bejöttek, végigverték a gyerekeket, szóval elképesztő helyek voltak. Szerencsétlen cigánygyerekek, akiknek a szülei börtönben voltak, látszott, hogy mindig csak bántják őket. S ők megérezték, hogy én emberileg bánok velük.

A lányom kitalálta, hogy ő spanyolt akar tanulni, olyan nyelvet, amit nem tud senki, és elment a Szinyeibe, és elintézte magának, hogy fölvegyék. Zseniális emberek közé került. Nagyon jó volt magyarból, történelemből, spanyolból egészen kiváló. Azt találták ki a tanárai, hogy mivel spanyol szakra akkor csak kettőt vettek föl, diplomaták gyerekeit, nem is érdemes ezt megpróbálni, hanem menjen magyar–pedagógia szakra. Végig kitűnő volt mindig. Első év után egy táborban megismerkedett a férjével, a Péterrel, aki matematikus, akkor ő negyedéves volt. Nem zsidó. Eszter húsz éves volt, amikor összeházasodtak. Az esküvőn senki más nem volt, csak a két tanú. Akkor ott laktak anyukámnál, kaptak egy szobát, szépen berendezkedtek. Ott született Pannika  1980-ban. Eszter nem hagyott ki évet az egyetemen, levizsgázott, addig vigyázott rá a nagymama. 1985-ben elváltak. Eszter nem ment újra férjhez; amikor elváltak, ő is egy fiúhoz ment, akivel együtt lakott, egy nem zsidóhoz.

35 évi házasság után elváltam. Cs. párttag volt, nagyon jóban voltak Aczéllal [Aczél György (1917–1991) – politikus, az MSZMP KB (1956–1989) és az MSZMP Politikai Bizottságának (1970–1988) tagja volt. Az 1960-as évek közepétől 1985-ig a magyar kulturális élet legfőbb irányítója volt. – A szerk.] és Pozsgayval [Pozsgay Imre (1933) – politikus, vezetője volt az MSZMP KB Sajtóosztályának, 1976–1982 között művelődési, ill. kulturális miniszter, tagja volt az MSZMP Központi Bizottságának, a Hazafias Népfront főtitkára volt. 1989-ben az Ellenzéki Kerekasztal tárgyalásain ő vezette az MSZMP tárgyalóküldöttségét. – A szerk.]. Mindig tanácsot kértek tőle irodalomban, képzőművészetben. De mi benne voltunk ebben az ellenállós társaságban is, mindenkit ismertünk, minden ilyen kiadványunk megvolt. Mi hoztuk be a felforgató irodalmat. Cs. mindig azt gondolta, hogy minket lehallgatnak. És amikor telefonáltunk, mindig azt mondta, na most ezt a  lehallgatónak mondom.

Nekem van két unokatestvérem, az egyik Párizsban él, a másik Londonban, és nagyon jóban voltunk, mikor kint voltunk Angliában, meglátogattuk őket, és ők is egy darabig jöttek hozzánk, de egyszer csak elmaradtak. Megkérdeztem a másik unokatestvéremtől, hogy miért nem jönnek soha, és azt mondja, megmondom őszintén, hogy Cs.-ről az a vélemény, hogy ő egy beépített ember. Erre azt mondja, a te biboldó rokonaid! [A biboldó pejoratív szó a zsidóra.] Abban a pillanatban úgy éreztem, hogy én 35 évig egy idegen emberrel éltem együtt. Hogy mondhat ilyet?! Én azt hittem, hogy ez egy intelligens, művelt, liberális, jólelkű, érzékeny ember! Kivel élek én együtt!? Egy részeg, nyilas kocsissal!? Elképesztő érzés volt, de úgy gondoltam, az lesz a legegyszerűbb, ha nem szólok. Elmúlt két hét, hogy én nem szóltam hozzá, eléje tettem a kávéját, a kajáját, kimostam, minden, de nem szóltam egy szót sem. Nem vette észre. Gondoltam, hogy hátha észhez tér. Aztán elköltöztem tőle, először a lányommal laktunk együtt, aztán neki sikerült egy külön lakást találni. Azóta élek egyedül. A férjemmel a válás óta nem találkoztam. A lányom és az unokám tartották vele a kapcsolatot, tőlük tudtam meg, hogy meghalt. A közös életünk minden apró darabját és komoly értékét is az az idegen nő kapta, akivel ez utolsó időkben együtt élt.

A mai napig sem tudok semmit a zsidó vallásból. Anyukám sem tudott héberül olvasni, csak az imákat néha hallottam, de nem nagyon tudom. Zsinagógában csak úgy voltam, hogy hangversenyen. Nekem nem jutott eszembe, hogy mint templomba bemenjek, de ha kaptam tiszteletjegyet, akkor elmentem. Mikor voltunk Prágában, bementem a régi zsinagógába, de múzeumként. Nem nagyon használtunk otthon zsidó kifejezéseket. Nálunk Babits volt az isten, az első vers, amit kívülről megtanultam, az Babitsnak az „Édes az otthon” című verse. És amit először hallottam zenét, az Bartók feldolgozású népdalok voltak: apukám ezeket szerette. Tehát zsidó dallam – én ezt felnőtt koromban hallottam. Apukámnak, ha belegondolok, nem hiszem, hogy bármi konkrét istenhite lett volna. És én ezt magamban is érzem, el tudok gyönyörködni egy virágban, egy kavicsban. Például abban hiszek, hogy addig él valaki, míg valaki szeretettel gondol rá, tehát addig nem érzem halottnak.

Van néhány étel, amit, azt hiszem, igen tradicionálisan csinál az anyám is. Azt is gondolom, hogy azért nálunk csak valamennyire kóser háztartás volt. Anyám a háború után is rettentően figyelt néhány dologra, mit mivel igen vagy nem lehet együtt vagy egy lábasban főzni [lásd: étkezési törvények]. Volt egy babfőzelék, amit gyűlöltem, szép nagy babok és fahéj volt benne. Annyira utáltam, mert olyan jó lett volna, ha jó hagymás, fokhagymás lett volna, de nem, ilyen édeskés volt. És amikor a férjem egyszer vett nekem egy zsidó szakácskönyvet, azt mondta, hogy miért nősültem be én a nemzetközi társaságba? Sólet, imádta ezeket a kajákat, és vett egy zsidó szakácskönyvet, abból tanultam meg egy csomót.

Egész gyerekkoromban a zsidósághoz csak negatív élmények kapcsolódtak. Zuglóban nem nagyon laknak zsidók. Ha végiggondolom, itt nekem nem volt egyetlen egy osztálytársam se, akire úgy gondolok, nem volt ez nyilvánvaló.

Én magyar zsidónak határoznám meg magam. A zsidóságom a polgári hagyomány. Az, hogy természetes dolog, ha semmi pénze sincs az embernek, a könyv, hogy én úgy nőttem föl, hogy mindig mindenki tanult otthon. A műveltség, a zene, a kottaismeret; a tolerancia, ez emberek iránti érdeklődés. Most megint öt embert készítek elő színművészetire, eszembe nem jut arra gondolni, hogy ez is egy zsidó. Én örülök, hogy zsidó vagyok, mindennek örülök, amin átmentem, kivéve azt, hogy őt, apámat megölték, de nem bánom, hogy voltam a gettóban. Annyira át tudom érezni másoknak a szenvedését, nemcsak zsidókét, mindenkiét.

Magyarnak érzem magamat határozottan. Nagyon sokszor föltették a tanítványaim nekem a kérdést, hogy miért maradtam itt 1956-ban. Mondtam nekik, lehet, hogy furcsa, de engem a nyelv és az irodalom tart itt. Nem bírnék egy olyan országban élni, ahol nekem azok a verssorok, azok a szavak senkinek nem jelentenek semmit. Én annyira soha nem fogok egy másik nyelvet megtanulni, hogy ez ugyanazt jelentse.

Jártam Izraelben a lányommal és az unokámmal, ő nagyon kívánkozott oda. Voltunk kibucban is, és a Panni, mikor meglátta, hogy a gyerekeket kerekes kis járókában tologatják, és van köztük vörös hajú, fehér bőrű, fekete, azt mondta, hogy ő idejön, és ezt akarja csinálni. Mi az Eszterrel eléggé magánosok vagyunk. Éreztem, hogy én például valószínű, hogy egy ilyen kibucban nem tudnék élni.

A népszámlálásnál, tavaly februárban és nem mondtam, hogy zsidó lenne a vallásom. Tőlem senki ne kérdezzen semmi ilyesmit! Mert pont erről van szó, hogy én egy olyan országban akarok élni, ahol nem kell erről nyilvánosan vallomást tenni. Miért kellene? Én a demokrácia részének érzem azt, hogy vagy válaszolok, vagy nem, az is az én jogom. Mivel én nem fizetek egyházi adót, nem járok templomba se. Hát mitől vagyok én zsidó? Attól, hogy a zsidótörvények szerint annak számítok? Akkor elfogadom. De egyébként ez egy más dolog, ez egy lelki, érzelmi dolog. Én azt gyűlölöm, hogy nekem erről nyilvánosan vallani kelljen, és szerintem rengetegen vannak így. Szóval én azt mondtam, semmi. Görög katolikus meg annyira nem vagyok, azóta, amióta ez az incidens történt [a hitoktatóval] – utána még mentünk, de már a templomba nem. Nekem onnan nagyon kellemes élményeim vannak, én szerettem abban a kis templomban lenni, szerettem a bizalmas kis légkörét, a szép ősi dallamokat, ezt a bizánci hangulatát a dolognak. Én sokszor gondolkodom ezen, hogyha meg kéne magamat határozni, akkor biztos, hogy a görög katolikus kimaradna belőle, csak az maradna, hogy szimpátia. A katolikus vallásnál sokkal szimpatikusabb a görög katolikus.

A dualizmus kora a teljes asszimiláció kora volt. Kinek jutott eszébe az Akadémián azt mondani a Goldziher Ignácra [Goldziher Ignác (1850–1921) a modern iszlámkutatás megalapozója, a muszlim vallás-, jog- és filozófiatörténet, folklór, az arab nyelvtudomány egyik legjelentősebb kutatója volt. – A szerk.] vagy a Stein Aurélra [Stein Aurél (1862–1943) régész, orientalista, utazó, az MTA külső tagja, a calcuttai egyetem tanára, a lahorei Oriental College igazgatója. – A szerk.] vagy a nem tudom, kire, hogy zsidó? Ezek voltak a legnagyobbak – az én dédpapám is, aki először foglalkozott a kisebbségiek ügyeivel tudományosan, mint jogász. Vagy a Schiller Bódog, az unokaöcsém, aki régész volt és aranygyűrűvel végzett.

Ferenc Pap
Cluj Napoca
Romania
Interviewer: Ildiko Molnar

The family of my great-grandfather on my father’s side came from Germany; they must have been very young when they moved to what was at that time, Hungary. Eliezer Kohn, my great-grandfather, was born in Dunafoldvar in 1837. He became a Chief Rabbi there. In 1875, when my grandfather was born – he was the youngest child – the family was still living in Dunafoldvar. My great-grandfather was appointed in Bekescsaba after that, where he soon became a Chief Rabbi again. [This happened] at the time of the so-called Congress, when the denominations came into being: orthodox, neolog and statusquo [conservative]. My great-grandfather became a neolog; he was probably more liberal. He also wrote sermons. I still have one of his sermons, printed in 1881. I think that he wrote out his sermon himself in Hungarian and printed it, probably in Bekescsaba. It is not very long; I only remember that he strongly praises Francis Joseph. Great-grandfather died in 1907. I have no idea about his wife, but she was Jewish, that’s for sure.

My great-grandfather had eleven children; my grandfather was the youngest of all. One of his brothers was called Artur; he was a doctor somewhere in Transdanubia. And I think that he had another brother, called Guido, who was also a doctor. Unfortunately I know very little about his brothers and sisters.
My grandfather on my father’s side, Illes Pap, wasn’t religious at all. He needed no father, no religion, nothing. As a teenager he was sick and tired of the environment at home and he went to Budapest, and from that time on he was completely non-religious. He graduated from high school there, and then he also finished university in Budapest. He majored in languages: Hungarian and German, but he studied something at the Faculty of Philosophy too. The family believes that he gained two doctorates: one in linguistics and one in philosophy. Later he was a teacher of linguistics and literature, until the end. As a student in Budapest, he became a member of a literary group called the Kisfaludy Compan. He dealt with the works of Arany Janos [one of the most famous romantic poets in Hungarian literature], and with Lessing from German literature. He wrote a book on this.  Besides this there was an old series, sort of like “Everyman’s Library”, which was probably much cheaper, and my grandfather’s book about Ferenc Rakoczi [Prince of Transylvania, leader of the insurrection in 1703-1711] was published as part of this series.
Anti-Semitism in Hungary grew very strong at the end of the 19th century. At that time there was a radical party leader and Member of Parliament. Due to the disadvantages which were incurred [because of the Jewish name, Grandfather] Magyarized his name. It became Pap [preacher], because the neighbours always called them “the preacher-boys”, because my great-grandfather was a Rabbi. [Besides] everybody who was called Kohn or Kohen or something similar is [of] kohanite [origin]. The name Pap could have come from here as well. He magyarized his name sometime at the very end of the 19th century, and all his brothers and sisters followed him and “Papized”. There were eleven brothers and sisters, and he, the youngest, Magyarized his name, and then all of his brothers and sisters became Pap, too.
He met my grandmother Paula at the end of the last century [the 19th], probably in Vienna or Budapest, and I think they were distantly related, too. My grandmother’s father was a distillery owner in Vienna. I know of one of my grandmother's sisters; she was called Olga, and she lived all her life in Vienna. Her husband was a factory owner, a rich man. They also had children.
My grandparents got married sometime at the beginning of the [20th] century. My grandmother learned Hungarian and she also wrote in Hungarian a great deal. Auntie Ibolya was born in 1904, as a first child. She was already born as Pap. At the end of the century there was a well-known linguist called Zsigmond Simonyi. It was said that my grandfather would be his assistant, but university work was poorly paid and high-school work paid a little bit better, thereupon my grandfather went to Kassa [today: Kosice, Slovakia] as a teacher. My father was born there in Kassa, two years after his sister. Three or four years after that, they moved to Szolnok. There was an educational centre in Szolnok called the Commercial School; and my grandfather became headmaster there. And then the events of 1918-1919 intervened: the end of World War I and the so-called Soviet revolution [the Hungarian Soviet Republic]. It was interesting that within this chaos both my grandmother and grandfather took sides. My grandfather was a so-called radical bourgeois and it was said that my grandmother was communist. After a short time they came to Budapest. In Budapest my grandmother was a member of the so-called Council of the Hundred – which was a kind of a parliament – and became the head of some kind of reformatory school. Then in March, of 1919, I think, this movement came to an end. When the whole thing collapsed they went illegally to her wealthy sister in Vienna. My grandfather sent from there all kinds of CV's and self-recommendations, and the Jewish high school of Temesvar [today: Timisoara, Romania] accepted his application. That’s how they got to Temesvar in 1920 or 1921.
In Temesvar they lived in a tenement dwelling somewhere downtown. My grandfather taught Hungarian and German at the Jewish high school. There’s a little story related to this. My grandfather was a passionate smoker. Many times there was a cigar hanging out of his mouth even when he entered a class. Besides this, he had moustache too. They drew him like this, with the cigar. Well, he was a huge man and his students nicknamed him “The oldster”. A few of his ex-students are still living in Kolozsvar. He was a well-built, physically robust man, and my father reminisced many times, fairly shuddering, but also with humour, that he once ate for breakfast an omelette made of twelve eggs. My grandmother stayed at home and took care of the three children. On her own initiative, she lived out her intellectual inclinations. She wrote plays. One of her plays was performed inTemesvar. My grandmother died in 1929.
My grandfather’s second wife was called Hilda. She was much younger than my grandfather was. I don’t know where they met, but they got married sometime in the 1930s. She already had a grown-up boy at that time, I don’t know whether he’s still living or not, but at that time the boy went to Vienna. I think he was called Karlsten Erst. His second wife died in 1942; I didn’t know her.
My father had two sisters; he was the middle child. The eldest was Ibolya. She learned to play the piano and she taught the piano. Later, after the war – in my childhood – I remember that she was a cashier in some kind of ready-to-wear boutique or clothes shop. She got married in 1940 to a teacher from the Jewish high school in Temesvar, called Hauben, who came from Bucovina, from Cernovitz. He was appointed there in Temesvar, and he taught Latin. This uncle of mine knew some thirteen languages. They moved to Israel in 1962. My aunt didn’t work anymore there, and my uncle commuted to the university in Tel-Aviv from Netanya, where they lived. He taught there Latin and Old French. Meanwhile he went on some study-tours as well. They didn’t have children.
The youngest auntie was called Klari. She had three husbands; the last one was called Mihaly Suranyi. At first she lived in Brasov (Brasso) then in Bucharest. She was an official all her life. After retiring, in the middle of the 1960s she moved with her husband here to Kolozsvar, quite close to where we lived at that time. Her husband was a Gentile. I think he died in 1973, in the same year as my mother did. He was of mixed origin, a Hungarian-Romanian, but [in the family he was “the biggest Hungarian and Jew”]. They didn’t have children. My aunt died in 1994. They are both buried here in Kolozsvar.
My father had a rather eventful youth, because he (and his two sisters as well) went to Vienna with his parents in 1919. At that time, after World War I, there was a program that sent many of the children of the so-called defeated countries – and Hungary was a defeated country – abroad to “be fed up.” That’s how my father and my younger aunt got to London for a year. They attended school there. In the same period my elder aunt, Ibolya, went to one of her aunts on the mother’s side in Czechoslovakia, by the same right, and stayed there a while. This period lasted about a year, sometime around 1920. Then they all came back to Temesvar. My grandfather was a teacher already and they continued their studies there, in the Jewish high school. My grandfather was very strict, like some teachers are. He was especially strict with his own son. He taught him, and even more, he was also his form-master at one time. My father told me many times that he always had to be perfectly prepared, otherwise it meant big trouble.
The Jewish [aspect] at high-school was probably the fact that the whole high-school – the teaching staff and the pupils as well – were Hungarian-speaking middle-class Jewish people whose mother tongue was Hungarian, and to whom religiousness didn’t really matter. Probably they were obliged to go to synagogue on weekends. All of my father's classmates were Jews as well. Later on, over the course of decades, the company of friends dispersed. Very few of them remained in Temesvar. Some of them went abroad: to Hungary or to Anglo-Saxon territory. My father went to Kolozsvar. The Jewish high school was functioning until about the time of World War II. I think that in the ‘40s there was only a Jewish elementary school inTemesvar.
My father must have graduated high school in 1924, I think, and then the auntie from Vienna undertook his education. My father would have liked to be a doctor, but there wasn’t enough money for that, so he finished a one-year course in Vienna: the shortened, one-year course of an academy of commerce. That academy still exists; it is called the World Trade Academy.
[Then the father got to Temesvar, because he got a job there. He also met Ferenc’s mother there]
My great-grandfather on my mother’s side, Markus Rosenthal, started out as a leather manufacturer in Temesvar. Later, as a mature man, he had a leather shop in one of Temesvar’s neighborhoods. They had five children; the youngest was my grandmother, Gizella. She had two sisters and two brothers. The eldest boy was Zsigmond, the next one was a girl, Cecilia. Another boy, Jozsef, became a chemist in Papa. And another called auntie Rozsi, I think, her youngest elder sister. She got married to a manufacturer in Budapest.
Ferenc Klein, my grandfather, was a shop assistant in my great-grandfather’s shop and that’s how he got together with my grandmother, Gizella. My grandfather didn’t become an owner because he was too young. At that time my grandmother didn’t work, of course. My grandfather was there in my great-grandfather’s shop; he was in the store till the end of his life (he had a very short life). He died very young, of cancer, around 1909. My mother was born in 1909. I think she was a few months old when her father died.
My grandmother and my mother lived in Budapest until the middle of the ‘20s. In Budapest my grandmother worked for a long time in the factory [that belonged to auntie Rozsi’s husband]. In the meantime my mother learned choreography at a well-known ballerina’s school, Olga Szentpal’s school, and from there she went to Wurzburg, Germany, where she graduated. They went back to Temesvar only after that. My grandmother had a separate flat; she was an official. I think that in the first few years my mother opened a [dance-] school in Lugos and then in Temesvar.
Somehow or other, at the end of the 1920s she met my father, and they got married in 1930. They only had a civil wedding [they were not married by a Rabbi]. At that time my father was transferred from his post in Temesvar to Bucharest, and they lived there for a while. From there they went to Kolozsvar, before my birth, sometime between 1931 and 1934. My mother had a school of choreography here, the so-called school of rhythmic dance and art gymnastics. My father was known in Kolozsvar– and he also introduced himself – as the husband of Vera Pap. This means that my mother, with her posters, was more well-known, at least by name, than my father.
My father was appointed again to Bucharest; I was born there in 1935. From there we went to Temesvar, where my younger brother was born. In 1938 we moved to Kolozsvar indefinitely. There was a Franco-Romanian insurance company and my father came to Kolozsvar as its manager. Then in 1940, when there was the change of power, they offered to send him to a position in the same company in Romanian territory, in Torda [today: Turda, Romania], but he didn’t want to go. He was devoted to Kolozsvar.  After a short time, from 1938, the three anti-Jewish laws were introduced in Hungary.
They ousted the Jews step by step; they began with the artists and then they extended it to the others and brought other coercive measures. In 1940 or 1941 they dissolved the insurance company, and my father lost his job. My mother wasn’t even in an official post. After 1938, when they moved back to Kolozsvar, she didn’t have her dance-school any more. There was something that stated that Jews couldn’t have official posts, and then my father had a good friend, an old man who undertook to run the company in his name. Then this had to end too. Then my father dealt with selling books, and he wandered all over Transylvania with books. He told us for fun once, that when he came home, he went to a major railway station where he had book-business with the stationmaster. He introduced himself and the stationmaster told him that he would buy books from a man with such a nice name. He also stood him a treat, but he didn’t know that he was a Jew. This happened in the 1940s.
The persecution of Jews in Temesvar – as a town in southern Transylvania [which belonged already to Romania by that time] – was less than over the border, in northern Transylvania, which belonged to Hungary at that time. The persecution of Jews between 1939 and 1944 meant that from time to time, the able-bodied men were called in to labour service. For example, the husband of one of my mother’s cousins was in Karanszebes [today: Caransebes, Romania] in forced labour service, where they had to dig some ditches. We, just like the other members of the family, lived in Hungary, here in Kolozsvar. Kolozsvar [belonged to] Hungary between September 1940 and 1944.
In the summer of 1943 they took my father into the forced labour service. From that time on my mother looked after us; she invented a product, a masterpiece of fine workmanship. She had been preoccupied with industrial arts even as a child and she was in a terrible dilemma at that time: to choose to deal with industrial arts or to be a dancer. In the 1940's she took up her old knowledge of industrial arts and she made beach-bags. This was when plastic, the imitation of textile and leather, was brought to Hungary, and she made beach-bags and sold them in secret. And there was another thing; we let out one room to a lady who moved there with her daughters, and that’s how we obtained the bare necessaries.
[The day before the opening of the ghetto in Kolozsvar, Ferenc’s family got the opportunity to run away.]
On the 3rd of May 1944 a Romanian peasant from Tordaszentmihaly raised the price for a family – the Stossers – whom he wanted to evacuate to Romania.  And so they were taken away – they were deported – and none of them came back. They found the price the man asked too high. My mother used to visit these Stossers, their ex-neighbours, and that’s how it was revealed to us what they wanted to do. The Romanian man came to us very angrily and told us that if these people didn’t want to save their necks he would help us flee us for nothing. It looks as if that man knew more than we did. That is how it happened that he took us for nothing. We lived in Zapolya Street at that time. We started from there. We hid in an attic until it got dark, then late night, we met this man at a given place and he took us over the border. There was my mother, my younger brother and I, and a woman from the neighbourhood who found out somehow what we were up to and pleaded to come along. The woman’s husband was in forced labor service as well; he didn’t come back but died there. They had no children.
I remember that we went through the forest a lot and it was very tiring. We went by horse and cart until the end of the Gyorgyfalvi road where we met this man and from that time on he took us on a very remote road. This whole thing made us more mature than we should have been at this age (I was just nine years old and my brother was just six). We remember quite a lot of details. For example we remember very well that before the end of the Gyorgyfalvi road they took us into a watchman’s house in order to use up some time. The landlady was the sister of the man who took us over the border. At one point she told us: “Children, hide under the bed quickly, because the wolves are coming!” in fact there was some sort of patrol, some kind of control by the gendarmerie. After they noted that everything was okay and they didn’t find us, we could come out. The lady gave us each a soup plate of “krumplipaprikas” [stewed potato with sour cream, seasoned with red pepper] with the words: “Eat, just eat, children; this may be your last supper…” To the left, at the end of the Monostor [today: Manastur] neighbourhood there is the Gorbo valley; somewhere there we got across [into Romania]. So it was not at the usual crossing-place, at the Felekteto [today: Feleacu], where they tightened control and caught many people fleeing, but we went somewhere else. This man knew the area. He took us over the border and left us before Tordaszentmihaly. Once we got there we entered a Romanian peasant house, completely at random. The man there probably guessed what it all was about. My mother asked him to take us to Torda. In Torda she had an acquaintance, we stayed there about seven or eight days then we went to Temesvar by train.
In Temesvar my mother was actually at home, but for us children, it was the first time we had been there. My mother knew very well where to go and what to do. We went to the house where our relatives lived: my grandmother and her sister Cecilia with her family. We hid there. It was quite a big house; controls by the authorities were completely incidental or did not exist, so we didn’t have to fear them. However, sometime in July 1944, some self-seeking person denounced us. That’s how we found ourselves at the Temesvar police department for about three days. The way we got out of there, was that a friend of ours bribed the chief constable. 
On the 23rd of August 1944 was the royal shift of loyalties. The king had Antonescu and a considerable part of his government arrested and taken away.  The Romanian government then went over to the Soviets’ side. From that time on the military operations continued on the side of the Allies – American, English, French and Russian – against the Germans. Of course this change didn’t happen in a flash, especially in the provinces. The change consisted of the fact that at the very beginning of September, the so-called red troops came to Temesvar. Then we – just like many other people – despaired and started to seek refuge in a nearby village. On the way we met these troops and they told us to go back to the town because Hitler was “kaputt” [finished].
The liberation of Kolozsvar was on the 11th of October 1944, which means that the united Romanian and Russian troops defeated the Germans. I think that after a week my parents already came home to Kolozsvar. We were enrolled at school in Temesvar: my brother at a Jewish elementary school’s 1st grade and I in the 4th, and we finished school there. In the summer of 1945 we went back to Kolozsvar too. In those times there were enough houses. There were 17,000 Jews in Kolozsvar before the deportation and these people’s houses all became free in 1944. We children went to the all-ready house [the house had already been prepared]. Then I became a child again. I know that our parents had the opportunity to choose and they chose the flat – it was in a street towards the railway station – which though relatively quiet, wasn’t far from downtown.
At first my father was an official of a newly created Jewish organization which ran under communist guiding-principles. It was called the Democratic Union of Jews. For a while, my mother was the secretary of a retraining centre for Jews. At that time this wasn’t a governmental organization, the Jewish community of Bucharest [was the organizer of these centres, because] it wanted to give jobs to those who had lost their prospects. There were similar movements in every Central Eastern European state: to retrain for physical work those Jews who came back from the deportations and couldn’t continue the work they had done before. This organization’s name was abbreviated to O.R.T. It had many sections related to physical work: locksmith, turner, joiner, and things like that, and my mother was the secretary of this school for a while. In 1945 or 1946 they both got into their respective professions; my father became an official, a bookkeeper in a factory in Kolozsvar, then he got a position somewhere else. My mother became the teacher of the ballet class at the Pioneer Centre in Kolozsvar. The abdication or deposal of the king was at the end of 1947. During 1948 the communist government increasingly seized everything, step by step. The nationalization was concurrent with this. In ’48 my mother got into the Ballet High school of Kolozsvar where she was a teacher and a deputy-headmaster. At the same time, sometime in 1949 she got into the newly-made so-called Cluj Conservatoire. At that time it was mainly a Hungarian institution, actually, it was Hungarian and mixed. She taught the discipline called the basics of moving on stage. Then she remained here, also in the new united conservatoire, even after her retirement in 1965.
[In 1959, when the Hungarian Bolyai University was amalgamated with the Romanian Babes University, and today’s Babes-Bolyai University came into being, something similar also happened at the conservatoire]
I attended the Jewish high school in Kolozsvar from 1945 through 1948, until the so-called education reform, when it was closed down. There were a number of Jewish youth associations, not in the school, but outside of it, though many pupils took part in them. There was probably a sports organization too, but it was mainly education of Jewish consciousness. Some of these associations were more radical, so they were Zionist. They said the only way out, was for everybody to emigrate. Others adjusted themselves to the circumstances and said to themselves that this was an opportunity to create some sort of Jewish life in Romania. I wasn’t a member of any of them. In 1948, when they closed down all the denominational schools, the Jewish school among them, I took an entrance examination and went to the school from which I later graduated. This was called Classical High School. At that time there were only about six such outstanding school of this type in Romania: one in Kolozsvar, Temesvar, and Nagyvarad, two in Bucharest and one more somewhere else. This was the only type of school where they taught Latin and Greek.
My classmates knew that I was a Jew, but they didn’t care at all, at least they didn’t show it. But an interesting thing happened: In the first year, in 1945-1946 I attended a Romanian school. There were many people, at least two, who thought that it was a very temporary condition [referring  to the Jews]. During the breaks they passed their time by gathering around me and beating me up, as much as they could. Three years later, after 1948, one of them was my classmate in the Classical School and at that time he was the meekest lamb in the world, so his attitude underwent a complete change.
When I finished high-school I enrolled myself at Babes University, to the Faculty of History. I finished in 1956. After that I waited for a few months because the principal told me that I would get a job at the History Institution, but it didn’t work out. I did all kinds of jobs for seven years. My first post was at a daily paper of that period, called Igazsag [the truth]. I translated the Ager Press’s (Romanian news agency in Bucharest) incoming news for the foreign affairs column. This lasted about one and a half months at the end of 1956. There was no possibility of confirming me in my post. Andras Kovacs was the general editor at that time, and he later went to the Hét [the week]. At the beginning of 1957 I dealt with Romanian-Hungarian translations. Then came the time when I was a pioneer instructor. I was a so-called chief pioneer instructor, which was a paid job at that time. I didn’t have to teach them but just to take charge of their activities in all fields. After that, for one or one-and-a-half months again, I stood in for a teacher of History, and I taught in Hungarian. Then my first real post came. In the spring of 1957 I became a proof-reader at the Kolozsvar press, and at the end of summer I got to the Korunk [our times].  I was a technical editor there for about three years. There were redundancies everywhere; that’s how I got out of there. After that, for almost three years again, I worked in the Kolozsvar University Library. From December 1963, I worked in the Museum of History of Kolozsvar, at first as a museologist then as a chief museologist, then as a chief research worker. I completed my Phd in March 1981.
I devoted a lot of time to my thesis work. I also translated hundreds of articles. Mainly in the ‘50s and ‘60s the Hungarian scholars from Transylvania didn’t really speak Romanian properly. And I was the only one who had Hungarian as his mother tongue and attended a Romanian university. I translated from Hungarian to Romanian for almost everybody who dealt with history, art history, folklore and philology. Besides the thesis work [for the doctorate] I devoted much time to the editing of the “Acta Musei Napocensis”, the annual publication of the Museum of History of Cluj. [Ferenc sub-edited the annuals of 1984-1988 as an editorial secretary. The name of the museum today is The Transylvanian National Museum of History, in Romanian: Muzeul National de Istorie a Transilvaniei.] Besides this, I translated more than 20 books and excerpts too. At the present time I’m working on a very interesting manuscript from the 17th century.
I joined the life of the Jewish community later. In 1984 the president of the community at that time, Miklos Kertesz, who was a lawyer, (in his youth he was a good friend of my father), asked me to participate as a museologist in the preparation of Romania’s first Holocaust exhibition. As proposed by the president of the religious community we organized the exposition with Mark Egon Lowith [a Jewish painter from Kolozsvar, still-living at that time] and with an architect called Daniel Lidianu; I, as a museologist, Lowith, as the art designer of the whole thing, and the architect, who was also a member of the organizers. The preparation consisted of the acquisition and placing of the materials. In some places we definitely had to obtain and to arrange artificial materials which were the nearest to the original. 
For example we got so-called "Heftling" prisoner clothing from the Hungarian Opera and we dressed up a puppet in these clothes. There were pictures on the wall, which had to be arranged according to certain rules and there were many other objects in the exhibition. For example there was the so-called “Ilse Koch soap” as well. This Ilse Koch was the wife of one of the leaders of the Auschwitz camp. She told her husband: “Why should we lose this precious material? We have to make soap from the dead Jews’ bones.” They made many soap of this kind, and there was a household soap, which we exhibited. There were also many certifying documents made by the Americans, referring to which people were in this and that camp, and which were liberated here and there. There was enough material for a room. In the synagogue on Horea Street, to the right of the Torah, there’s a little room, and we created this exhibition there. I’ve been a member of the religious community since 1984; for me, this is just as natural as the fact that I’m a Hungarian too. But I go there mostly to pay the member’s subscription. The best way we can put it is that I’m a Hungarian Jew, there is no more to it.
I met my wife through a colleague of mine – from the University Library – who she was friends with. Neither she, nor my parents-in-law had any objections to me because of my Jewishness. We had only a civil wedding. We got married in 1972. We didn’t think about whether we should raise our child as a Hungarian or as a Jew. It was all the same to me. The child confirmed; she became a Reformed [Protestant]. But nothing really depends on this.  We don’t observe Jewish holidays at all, just Easter and Christmas.

Dezso Deutsch
Budapest
Hungary
Interviewer: Dora Sardi and Eszter Andor

My family background
Growing up
School years
During the war
Post-war

My family background

My paternal grandparents were born in Hungary around the 1850s. My grandfather’s name was David Deutsch. I do not know my grandmother’s name;  I never met  her. She died young, in childbirth. Grandfather David died in 1936 at home, in Bakonytamasi, where he . He had been living there all along. One of my father’s grandfathers fought in Kossuth’s army [in the 1848 Hungarian War of Independence]. That Which means that, beside having a strong Jewish identity, he believed and considered himself a Hungarian.

I do not have real living memories of my father’s brothers and sisters. It is because I did not visited them very often. I know about one of his sisters of his, who . This sister helped her father run their store. She wagsot married, and her son and daughters who managed to survive the war, tnow hey all live abroad. My father had a brother, too, who moved to Ujpest and had a shoe store. He did not survive the Holocaust, either. Many of my relatives live abroad.

My mother’s parents lived in Tet, near Gyor. Tet was quite a big village. There was a  rabbi;, who lived there, there was everything a Jewish community needed. T, there was an Orthodox and a Neolog branch, too. There was a shochet, as well. The proper religious Jews devoted their lives completely to their being Jewish, to business and to the family.

Grandfather’s name was Bernat Sauer, grandmother’s Lina. She must have been born in the 1860s. My grandparents had a store which was then called the haberdasher’s. They traded with all kinds of clothing and sold fabrics too. The store was on the Main Street, near the Main Square, in the city. It was named the Sauer Haberdashery. They had a big family house. I do not know how many rooms exactly, but four is for sure. They needed it too as the family was a big one. And the store was in the same building only it opened onto the street.

They [my grandparents] occupied themselves with two things: business and synagogue. They had their own seats in the synagogue. Grandfather had some kind of position in the Jewish community, I am not sure what it was exactly but he was a member of some committee and  probably even  the president of that board. Grandfather would go to synagogue twice a day. He prayed with the prayer shawl and leined [the reading of the Torah] tefilin [phylacteries]. Almost like an Orthodox of the strictest kind. He wore ordinary dark gray suits [not a caftan]. He had  little payot, which he tucked behind his ears. He did not have a beard but his head was always covered – he wore a hat even when at home. Grandmother naturally wore a wig and in the house she wore a kerchief on her head. Grandmother partly ran the house, partly worked in the store. But as a matter of course, there was a house maid as well.

It was mostly at summertime that we would visit them, but not too much of that either. I was not too enthusiastic about the [maternal] grandparents and was not very keen on visiting them anyhow. We, the young generation had a little more modern way of  life and thinking, in the school too, and we were raised without being compelled to wear caps, and I had a moderate hairstyle too. I was about 13 or 14 and had a hairstyle when I went to visit my grandparents and the first thing they did was to have my hair cut saying that one could not appear before the rabbi like that. And there they would see to it that we wore something [hat or kipa] on our heads all the time.

My mother had five brothers and sisters, two of them my mother’s elders. There was Kari  [Karoly], then Aunt Riza, Aunt Sari, Naci, Uncle Dezso and my mother. My mother as well as the other children received the same [strictly Jewish] education. We were really and truly religious yet everyone of us spoke Hungarian but of course we all had an excellent command of Yiddish as well, and sometimes we switched over to that language.

The young ones worked for the [family] business for a while, then each went on their way. Some  moved  to Paks, others to other places. Some opened a store of their own. Each had some kind of a store but none of them dealt with foods. Sari had a leather goods store. All of them got married. Aunt Sari had two children, both of them girls, Aunt Lisa had two as well, one of them, Shmule lives in Israel: he emigrated as a young lad in 1939 and took part in the wars of  liberation too. He established a family in Israel. Dezso had three children – two girls and one boy, the latter died during the war.  He [Uncle Dezso] also had some kind of a store. Uncle Naci became director to a store that belonged to a big mining company, he sold [mining] tools and accessories. I do not know where it was: he became a little estranged from the family. He too had a family, wife and children as well. Karoly had married already before the war and they all died, they were all taken to Auschwitz along with the grandparents. Karoly alone came back home and here he remarried, established a new family then went to Israel and died.

My father’s name was Mor Deutsch. He was born in 1882 in Bakonytamasi  but of course he did not live there. My mother, Iren Sauer, was born in Tet in 1887. My father actually completed his elementary studies only, then, I think, he went to Vienna where he worked and learnt the language. First he married a very religious woman from Papa. It was an arranged marriage. Unfortunately she died in childbirth, but the child, Zoltan, survived. My father remarried, there was a young lady recommended to him – as was the custom of those days – and he married her. The little boy was less then a year old when he came into the custody of my mother. To me Zoltan was as if he had been my own brother and as far as I remember I only came to know later that he was not full kin to us. Later he came to live in Celldomolk where he opened a small store which in time grew bigger and bigger.

Growing up

[In Celldomolk] the majority of the Jews settled in the core of the town but not in separation. There was no ghetto, but the Jews lived close to each other, not in one single street, but in a few streets within one neighborhood. Our next door neighbor on the right was Christian as well as the one on the left side. But we had a good relationship. The Jews mostly made friends with Jews but we maintained good connections with the others as well, partly on account of the business. In Celldomolk there was an Orthodox and a Neolog community. The two communities were not on good terms with each other at all. They spectacularly neglected each other. The two schools fought and eventually the Orthodox community took over the school where pupils from Neolog families could come as well, however there were Neolog families who sent their children to some other school. Nevertheless, friendly private connections did exist between Orthodox and Neolog people.

Our store was in the center of Celldomolk, and I think it was the best store in Celldomolk. It offered everything except for food, that is, fabrics, haberdashery, shoes. It belonged mostly to the family as we were four of us brothers and two sisters and my mother was an excellent business woman. She also worked there part time but there were employees too. Generally eight or nine people were employed, mostly Jews.

In the store there was everything on stock: carpets, fabrics, silk. The store was in a one-storey house but it was a long building. It consisted of several departments. There was the textile department, the department of accessories, then shoe department. Later, after having finished school, I became the director of the shoe department. My father bought the goods mostly in Budapest, but there were wholesalers in Papa, or in Szombathely. Partly he himself traveled, and later we also went up to Budapest to get stuff, partly the big firms had their agents who toured the country with the collection and one could order from them.

My parents worked very hard. A holiday was out of the question for them and we were there to help them. There was nothing like going on holidays like people do today, only at times of religious celebrations would they close the store. The family never had their lunch together except for religious festivals. No such thing as lunchtime existed at work: we would go and get our meals one after another in the flat at the rear end of the house. Evening dinners were more like family gatherings because by that time the store was already closed. In those days business was very important for Jewish families. When opening hours were regulated by law, the store was open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. But in the wintertime, when Sabbath was over,  my father would go and open the store even on Saturdays. That’s when the new week came in early and he would go and open the store at around 5 for an extra hour or so. There was a steady system of credits. We had lots of customers who worked for monthly salaries and came regularly to us and were indebted to us and many would purchase goods on credit. There were some who would pay only a part of their debts, and accounts had to be kept for them. At the same time we ourselves purchased goods on credit. This was a widely accepted custom.

My mother did not have to struggle too much with household chores as she herself worked in the store. She would not go out shopping too often. At the time of weekly fairs we had so many customers, it would have been impossible for my mother to go to the market.  It was always the housemaid who went [to market]. She was the one who cooked, she knew what to buy. But she went to kosher places only – she was not allowed to go anyplace else. But our customers often brought us presents, like fruits or vegetables. It was an absolute necessity for us to have a housemaid who was capable enough and would keep an eye on everything because most of the time my mother was busy with the store. And that stood for my grandparents too. Because  my grandmother was also busy with the store. Women had their very important, decisive role in the business. The housemaid was a real family member for us. She would help with everything, she learnt how to keep kosher and was verily like a grandmother. She lived with us – there was a place fixed for her next to the kitchen but she never ate with us – she had her meals in the kitchen. 

My mother also had a beautiful wig. Every day someone came to comb it. They put the wig on for her and so she was ready to start the day. Ladies wore only long sleeves even in summer and the tops were long too, as well as their skirts, but they looked very attractive all the time. My mother’s deepest concern was to raise us in the manner that we become good Jews, but she accepted that times were changing and she considered, for example, that maybe it was not so very necessary for us, boys to wear caps all the time, though it is also true that  in spite of our conduct  which was a bit closer to modern ways, we still remained very much Orthodox. We did not really digress from religion, just handled certain things in a different way. In fact the Jewry of the time had two main concerns: the great fair and the religious holidays. Those were the events we were always preparing for. Of course we young people frequented cafes, we were allowed to go to the dancing school when I was 18-19-20 years old. I and my brothers and sisters were absolutely Orthodox, but not that old fashioned. Well, my mother was not so happy about it, but what could she do? A typical reaction of hers was when I received my call up to the army, in her first shock she asked:  “yeah, but what about your meals?”

My parents were not particularly educated, and we did not have too much money, so we did not buy too many books. They would rather read books on Jewish matters if  they read books at all.  
We subscribed to the paper Egyenloseg [Equality] and to the Pesti Naplo [Pest Diary] which was the best paper of its time, a daily. Then there was the Miriam [prayer book for women], which was in Hungarian. My mother, however, read Hebrew beautifully too, only she did not understand what she was reading, so she would rather read the ladies’ prayer book in Hungarian.

During the first world war my father served  in the Italian front from 1917 to 1918. He came back when the war was over. He received a decoration  and I remember that he brought his pistol home, which he kept hidden somewhere. And at home he was a Jew and a Hungarian at the same time. And as being a member of the Alliance of Front Warriors decorated with an award of war merit,  he was convinced he would never suffer any harm from the Hungarians,  then see what happened.

Where I was born that was a smaller house and the store was in a separate building. Then later we had a pretty big house with a big yard and the store in the front and the family lived in the rear tract. We had four rooms which we needed too because I had two sisters and three brothers. My eldest brother was Zoltan. He, just like everyone of us, worked in the store, then in 1937 or 38 he became self-employed and moved to Dobrogkoz. That’s where he married and he went on working there. He had one child. He always observed his religion very strictly. Then there was Jeno. He was born in 1911. He too started working in the store and never left. Then he got married and two children were born to them. The elder must have been about three and a half when he was deported to Auschwitz, the other one less then six months old. Jeno was drafted into forced labor and died a few weeks before the end of the war in Mauthausen. Nandor was with him all along. The next brother is Nandor. He too worked in the family store, got married, was deported and his wife and little daughter perished. He alone came back from Mauthausen. Then I came in 1918, then my sister, Rozsi who was born in 1921. That time it was the custom that children had to help in the store. But she finished her studies too. She was a beautiful, intelligent girl. Unfortunately in 1943 she got married. My father strongly objected. not because of the boy but he said “You have four brothers and if one of them is unable to attend the wedding ceremony, you should not get married.” But she did and that was her bad luck. She too was deported and when her hairs were shaved the doctor noticed that she was pregnant and immediately she was sent to the gas, though she had been selected for work because she was strong and healthy, she could have survived the camp. My youngest sister, Margit,  was born in 1928. She was 12 when I left, a beautiful one, still in school. She was 16 when she was deported. She was also killed.

School years

I went to the Jewish elementary school which was a school of six grades. It was run by the Orthodox community. Here everybody was Jewish and as far as I remember there were Orthodox students wearing payot, but that was the only difference between them and us, we were all equally religious. We did not wear payot. Everybody spoke Hungarian, but the schoolteacher spoke Jewish [Yiddish] occasionally. We understood both.

When I finished elementary school I wanted to go to middle school. At first my mother strongly objected and said I did not need it and why should I go to a totally secular school. Eventually I went to the middle school in Celldomolk which was said to be a very good school. My mother consented to it on condition that I was not going to do any writing on Saturdays. The director was a decent man so it was I alone in the whole school who got the permission to be exempted from  writing. [On Sundays]. I would not even bring my schoolbag to school  – everything I needed I packed on Fridays, I left them in my desk and on Saturdays I would just be sitting and listening all day. In the school there were some Jews, they were Neolog, not religious. I had Christian classmates, but neither from them nor from the part of the teachers ever came anything [anti-Semitic remarks] because there was this director, a very strict and firm person but very nice and honest at the same time. My favorite subjects were arithmetic and geometric. I was the best student in my class. I also liked German, because I knew Yiddish so I was good at it too. I did not have to attend religious education. When the class started I would just go home, when it ended, I walked  back. During my school years I played football, I was member of a team. Later we played these games, mostly table tennis, and teams were set up by Catholic, Lutheran and Jewish societies.

From my first grade on I attended another school too, where I studied Jewish subjects. It was not a proper yeshiva, it was a kind of pre-yeshiva. It was run by the Orthodox community and we were about the ten of us students there. We studied Humesh [the five books of  Moses], Rashi [commentaries to the Talmud written by Rashi], Gemore  [Gemara, part of the Talmud which interprets and explains the Mishna which preceded it], as well as Tosefot [critical and analytical glossaries attached to the Mishna and the Gemara]. The classes had their special choreography. There  was a copy of the Talmud and we would read out from it, then the bocher [yeshiva student] explained it, then we discussed it  and gave the explanation of the different stories and we were supposed to understand the different points of view of the sages. We translated everything into Yiddish. Then sometimes we discussed the same thing in Hungarian. The discussion was in Hungarian. There was no homework but a so-called review or report on Sundays. It was conducted by the rabbi and he asked questions on the subjects we had covered  the previous week  It was not a proper exam but rather a discussion of the material we had studied the previous week. He would ask questions and he would add his own explanation to the given question. I liked going to this place but it was quite stressful because I would come home from school, have my lunch and by two o’clock I had to be there. I generally studied until six and I had to do my homework in the evening [for the middle school.]

Friday evenings and festival nights in general were decisive in the life of the family. [On Fridays] we would go to the synagogue with my brothers and sisters. Women would stay at home because they prepared the dinner with the help of the housemaid, of course, who was naturally a Gentile. She would serve the Friday meal and she would fetch the Saturday dish from the baker’s. [After worship] there came the Friday dinner. According to the tradition  my father blessed the boys one after the other, every week, which was such an uplifting feeling. [For dinner] we often had  stuffed fish, also soup and chicken stew. After dinner there was zmirot [psalms], singing. Then on Saturday mornings we would go to the synagogue. Then we would have lunch. 

Of course all Jewish tradition was strictly observed in the family. I have a very vivid memory of an event. One Saturday morning I was out in the yard when someone knocked on the door and one of our regular customers stood in the door with her sobbing daughter. As it turned out the daughter was to have her wedding the next day and her shoes which they had bought in our store were too small for her. So the mother said, “Please, Mr Dezso, I know that this is a holiday for you, but please, do me a favor and let me exchange these shoes. I am not even going in, you just hand it out”. Well, I did not have the heart to refuse her, I went in and brought a pair one size bigger which meant I did not have to touch money at all or anything, and just when I was handing over the shoes my father came. He saw me coming out of the store with a parcel in my hand, on a Saturday, and the lady started to explain that she was responsible, she was the one who asked me to do it and the like. My father did not say a word, he just simply went into the house. But when the customers were gone, he started to shout at the top of his voice. He actually hollered and declared that as long as he lived and the store belonged to him, nobody in that house would ever be allowed to work on Saturdays. In short he was always aware of what was the most important thing at a given moment: business, synagogue, family.

All holidays were strictly observed. The store was closed, we celebrated the holiday and went to worship. The most distinguished holiday was Pesach because that is one of our most important holidays starting with the Seder night. On Seder night we went to the synagogue, then we held the Seder which could go on until as late as half past eleven. There was a rich Seder plate, with  naturally charoses [a mixture of ground nuts, apple, wine and cinnamon] on it, along with bitter herbs and eggs and there was salty water on the table. It was my father who held the Seder, he explained everything. I, as the youngest boy read the Haggadah out. Everything [all utensils] were kept apart for Seder. In this period nothing was used from what we used normally, everything had been carried up to the attic. On the day before there was the process of doing hometz [the removal of all leavened products from the house] which lasted for one day. I did not take part in that, it was done by my mother and the maid. Whenever we were given any new clothing as children, it came for Pesach.

Then there was Succoth. Outside the entrance to the house we had a kind of fenced arbor. In the summertime one could sit there then in the afternoon my father and his friends played cards there. Then at the time of the Succoth it was very easy to prepare the tent, and everyone would eat there during the holidays. We had of course lulav [palm tree branch], and etrog [a kind of lime fruit]  in the house and we would be sitting out under the tent and read the Kohelet [Ecclesiastes; one of the five scrolls] and other things. My father would explain things and we also told what we were taught about those things at school. At Chanukah candles were lit in the synagogue, every day, as it came, one after the other. My mother would light them at home too and she told the blessing on it each evening, along with the girls. We, children would play, played with the spinning top. At Purim it sometimes happened that some kind of a role-play was staged in the school. They would animate the story of Esther, they would put on costumes, learned the roles and perform  the play. We would prepare presents, some cookies. Everyone would bake some, send it to their friends and close acquaintances and of course would get a lot in turn. There were some students with us who lived in the countryside but wanted to go to some Jewish school and so they came to live in Celldomolk and “eat days” [i.e. they would go and have their lunch with different Jewish families each day]. My mother regularly received such students then at each holiday we would be given huge parcels from the parents of these children.

During the war

I finished the middle school in 1938. Then I started to work in the store. At first [my duty was] selling goods, keeping the place tidy, then later on I did the purchase along with my father. We had a separate shoe department which was not a common thing those days and I became assigned to direct that department. My father would never stay behind the counter. There was a strict counter-system those days. My father would stay in the customers’ area while I stood behind the counter. I worked in the store until 1940.

In the middle of 1940 I received my call up letter from the army. I registered as a regular soldier and did not know that that could be the beginning of something. We were taken to Koszeg where after two sessions of training we were rounded up and told that we weren’t trustworthy enough to defend the country so we would serve as laborers. An indeed this was the first forced labor division, so we became the first Jewish forced laborers. We worked in Koszeg for a while, then at road constructions, trenching and unloading train carriages. There was also some agricultural work. It was all quite hard but we were all young and strong. From time to time we were allowed to send a postcard home but were not given any leave. From places all over the country Jews who were liable to military service had been directed to Koszeg, so two divisions were set up. We were told that we were expected to follow absolute discipline and the slightest breach of discipline would be sanctioned. There came 1942, the two years almost passed [the duration of compulsory military service] when in the summer of that year we were instructed to write a postcard home and say that we wanted them to send us all the necessary clothing for march as well as for cold weather because we were not entitled to be given any clothing any more. They packed us into a train and that was when a very typical scene occurred. The trains that carried the soldiers of the Hungarian Army to the front were finely decorated with flowers. When we arrived at the railway station a train beautifully prepared like that was standing there. When our commander caught sight of it, he ordered that all flowers should immediately be removed because we were only Jews and not Hungarians defending their country.

We traveled almost one week by that train. Food was not distributed too often and when we stopped we were already on the territory of Ukraine. Then came the march on foot. We were informed that we were going to cover more than 1,000 km in cavalry march – which meant 30 km per day and there would not be any rest only after having walked 15 km – so we’d better throw away all luggage that was not absolutely necessary, like canned food, and so on. The march lasted for more than a month and not once did we sleep under a roof. During the march we were given food too, I won’t say that it was sufficient and delicious but some kind of catering it surely was. And the weather was not that bad, as it was the summer period. Then we arrived at the river Don where we got accommodated in nasty tents and the trench digging and tank trap setting started. It was an absolutely senseless work to do and in the meanwhile fall, then the merciless wintertime and the frontline was approaching. Until fall we had been having a relatively nice commander who had no ill intentions. But when it dawned on him that the front was rapidly approaching and it would be impossible to defend ourselves, he asked for a leave and never came back. He was replaced by another one who was ruthless and a sadist and we were falling like flies.

I got hit in November and to my great luck I was taken to a hospital where the Hungarian soldiers got treatment, but the Jews were just thrown into the basement without beds or anything. The doctor would come down once a day but did nothing  -- Jews were not supposed to get medicament or bandage. We were given some kind of food and when I was already recovering I started to help those around me. One day the First Lieutenant Surgeon came downstairs to visit and he was accompanied by a girl. After the doctor had left she hurried up to me and asked “Mr. Deutsch, don’t you recognize me? I used to be a regular customer of your store in Cell[domolk], see these shoes, I bought them in your store. I am not in the position to help but I will try to keep an eye on you.” Days were passing and all of a sudden she comes and whispers in my ears that the next day everyone capable of walking would be sent back to the front, because the hospital was too crowded and I’d better figure out something. So the next day the First Lieutenant duly came and told us that we should be on our way. I told him I had just been written to my unit and asked for my clothes that I left behind when I was taken to the hospital and if I were to get back right now, I would just outright miss my baggage, and it was minus 30 degrees Celsius there and I was sure to freeze to death right away. He was a decent guy so he took me off the list and said that I should go by the next transport. And a few days later he even managed to organize me as a help-all in the basement, along with another guy. We had to bring the food, carry out the dead, look after  everybody and the like. So I got access to the kitchen where I was sometimes given an extra portion and that way I could share my regular portion with the other people downstairs.

That was going on like that for a while and one morning we woke up to realize that the hospital was empty. Food and all equipment lying around, the whole building deserted. While the Russians attacked, the Hungarians fled and no one cared about us, we were just left behind. For a few days we did not really know what had happened, then the Russians came and told that we were prisoners of war. For a short period of time we stayed on, then we were transported to camps. We went by train as far as the Eastern borders of Russia. It was already summertime by the time we arrived at our destination, the summer of 1943. Here I stayed for five years. Our job was the felling of trees. It was extremely cold, the rule was that we went to work only when the  temperature was above minus 40 degrees Celsius. If it fell under 40 degrees we would be given a day off. Boarding was all right and all those who reached these camps  starting off from the road construction in Hungary, all of us survived. Here one did not have to die any more.

Post-war

In 1947 those who were not fit for work because of their health were sent home – regardless of their being Jewish or German or Italian or Hungarian – we were all put together, but in the barracks people were separated according to their nationalities. The Jews however were not accommodated separately, we lived where the Hungarians lived. I’ll never forgive them for treating us the same way [as the non-Jewish Hungarians] and that we were not sent home earlier. In 1947 we were given a postcard so we had the chance to write back home ( it was the first time after five years that I was allowed to write home) that we were alive and well. And as I did not know whom to write and of course one had heard many things of what happened to the Jews, I wrote the postcard and addressed it to the Mayor’s office in Celldomolk. My brother got my card and knew that he could expect me home. Then in the spring of 1948 we too were released and sent home –  that year there was a big release campaign .

I went to Celldomolk straight away as I got home from captivity. My brother had already been home for almost three years, he got married and had a child too. I went home – in our house there lived my brother, his wife and their six-month-old little daughter. My brother told me what happened to whom. It was horrible. I helped my brother in the store but that time stores already started to become nationalized so I was given a job in Szombathely in a textile emporium where I dealt with the distribution of products. This store fulfilled the demands of  the whole Vas county. I got promoted to a relatively high position. I joined the party but then those days that was kind of natural, although I never became a very busy party member.

Of course one had to work on Saturdays too but I always remembered that it was a holiday. And I went to the synagogue on the high holidays. I took a day off  so that I could attend the service. It was quite obvious to everybody but I would never talk about it in particular. It was maybe the day before Yom Kippur when the secretary of the party comes up to me and asks whether I am taking a day off in order to go to the synagogue. I told him that it was so. So he says “you’d better not go, it is not really appreciated.” So I answered that at Yom Kippur there is a ceremony when we remember our deceased. During the war my grandparents, two brothers, two sisters, my parents and cousins got killed. He stopped bothering me, I think he got the message. I attended the synagogue anyhow, not much for prayers but I was seeking connection with my fellow Jews. There was a common room above the prayer hall –  the synagogue itself was too big for us – where we played cards and chatted, I went there quite frequently. I kept connection with the Jews all along.

It was in Szekesfehervar during a business trip that I got acquainted with Klari, my wife, who lived with her father. Her mum had been killed in Auschwitz, but she and her father had come home. Her father Andor had an upholstery while Klari worked as a shop assistant. When we decided to get married I applied to be transferred to Szekesfehervar. By that time I was already the second person at  the company, but Klari would not leave her father on his own and no place else could we have such a nice and spacious home as in Szekesfehervar. So I got transferred to a local textile center as a  distributor and  purchaser.

We had a civil wedding, but afterwards we went to the Szekesfehervar rabbinate, accompanied by a very few people only, and the rabbi also married us. In the mid-fifties this was not a common thing to do but to us it meant a lot. We regularly attended the synagogue and we were active members of the Jewish community. The Jewish community had about 30 members. That time it was not trendy to be Jewish and there were lots of mixed marriages. At the time of holidays we were always present in the prayer house – there was no proper synagogue functioning here either – and we would organize meetings as well. 

In 1956 nothing extraordinary happened in Szekesfehervar. A few people demonstrated, but nothing could be felt of what was going on in Budapest and in some other places in the country. In 1956 I was already married and had a job. We had my wife’s dad to look after so I was not in the position of thinking about emigrating to Israel. But when there were the wars in Israel I was deeply concerned. Of course I was not in the position to help, but I kept my fingers crossed for Israel. It was very comforting for me to know that Jews were able to protect themselves against others, that they had arms and they were able to fight and win. It was good to know after all that had happened in the second world war. It is not just that it gives you the feeling of security that a there is a Jewish state. I also appreciate that country very much and I would be really happy if there were real peace over there. Although I was not able to emigrate because whenever we were about to go and visit my relatives, my wife fell ill. We decided several times to go, but in the end we never went. It was only after her death that I managed to get there in 1998. It is a fascinating country.
Since we moved to Budapest I went more often to the synagogue. At first I attended the synagogue in Dohany street then the one at the Rabbinical Seminary. Since my wife died I am in the synagogue each Friday and I pray. I spend my afternoons at the Shalom Club where we play cards with my friends. I keep connections nearly exclusively with Jews. I have my doctor in the Jewish hospital. It’s among them that I feel secure.

I, Inna Ilyinichna Rajskaya, was born in Leningrad in 1933. My paternal great-grandmother and great-grandfather – the parents of my paternal grandmother  - were from Belorussia. Great-grandfather Elkona Borishansky ran his own business -- he dealt with drapery and was a fabric merchant. His wife, my great-grandmother, was a housewife -- I don’t know her name. I do know that the family lived in Minsk and that in addition to their house in Zakharievskaya St. there, they had a big estate  in the Rodoshkovichy region.

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Husband and children

Recent years

My family background

Their daughter, my father’s mother, was called Feiga-Tsipa Elkonovna Shif, nee Borishanskaya. She was born in 1867 in Minsk. She had many sisters and brothers, but I don’t know their names. After the [1917] Revolution some of them emigrated to the United States, but unfortunately the family lost contact with them. I myself never knew my grandmother; she died when my father was 14.  My grandmother’s family was quite wealthy: after all, great-grandfather was a merchant. Everyone was remarkably kind; they brought up not only their own children, but supported other, poor families. I remember hearing about one family that they supported greatly - the Mazel family. All the children in my grandmother’s family, especially the girls, had their schooling at home: their parents hired tutors who came to the house. One of those teachers was my grandfather Iosif.

Iosif Ilyich Shif was born in 1870, but where – I don’t know. He lived his entire life in Minsk. I know little about his family, just that they were not very prosperous but tried nonetheless to educate their children. In 1890 Grandpa completed his education in pedagogy and became a teacher in a Jewish school in Minsk. He taught young children both in his own family and in other families, among them the Borishanskie children.  And so it happened that my grandmother, Feiga-Tsipa Elkonovna Borishanskaya, and Grandpa Iosif fell in love and later got married.

Grandpa wrote a book in Hebrew titled “Mesikhta dereh erezh”, a science fiction treatise about commerce. It was published in Minsk in 1912. We have this book at home. My father told me that the apartment they lived in was a large one. It was situated in the center of Minsk, and every child in the family had his own room. It was a house with all conveniences. Besides that place in Zaharievskaya, they had a big estate near Minsk with a vast orchard. They had their own horses. In addition, they had housekeeping servants, cooks, nurses, teachers, and governesses in the family.

After the Revolution the family, like others, was stripped of all their properties, and  the apartment in Zakharievskaya was confiscated. They had to buy a small house in Minsk not far from the Opera theater.
It was a modest one-story building, but it was always scrupulously clean; my aunt maintained it rigorously. There were gorgeous plates and dishes and very beautiful silver spoons. Our family still has, for example,  family heirlooms such as silver spoons with the inscription “A spoonful of happiness” written on them  in Yiddish. These  were presented by my grandfather to a niece as a wedding present. When I got married, my aunt (she was alive at that time) gave them to me, and now I handed them down to my daughter.

The family was numerous and very hospitable; relatives and friends were always staying with them. My Grandpa Iosif’s   elder brother,  a rabbi lived with my grandfather’s family. He was a very religious man, and thanks to him even after the Revolution Jewish traditions were followed in the house. I remember that when we visited Grandpa, I often used to see his brother reading Jewish religious literature. They always told me that one must not interrupt his studies. Everybody in the family treated Grandpa very kindly and with great respect and tried to behave in such a way that he would not scold them.  There was a wonderful atmosphere in the family; they were able to treat each other with great kindness and affection. Even when one of the children was naughty, Grandpa stopped him not with a peremptory shout, but in ironical way. I remember very well how my Dad used to tell us: “Be quiet, grandpa is praying!”

My father, Ilya Iosifovich Shif, was born in 1904 in Minsk. From 1911 until the Revolution [1917] he studied in a Jewish school in Minsk. From 1920 till 1926 he worked in Minsk as a worker.  In 1926 he moved to his elder brother’s [Elkona’s] in Leningrad, where he worked as a metalworker at the Metal plant and later was an accountant at the same plant. That’s where he met my mother.

My mother, Anastasia Nicolaevna Shif (nee Kuznetz) was born in 1902 in St. Petersburg. She didn’t know her own family, other people brought her up, and I know nothing about her parents. Unfortunately, I don’t know anything about how my parents met or about their wedding.  At first they didn’t have anywhere  to live and rented a tiny room. But after two years  a room in the flat where my father’s brother [Elkona] was living become vacant, and my parents took it. That is where I was born in 1933. We lived together in the same flat with my uncle’s family until the war broke out in 1941. The family was a religious one and followed all the traditions. We observed Rosh-Hashana, Pesakh, Hanukkah and other holidays. My father’s cousin (who also lived in Leningrad) was a frequent guest in our house, and we always ate well. But I don’t think we followed the laws of kashrut, and neither my parents nor uncle attended synagogue.

During the war

During the war my father went to the front as a private. He served on the Leningrad front. Their unit was surrounded, and for several months they  tried to break through this encirclement. Father told me about brutal fighting, especially with the Finns, during which our badly uniformed, poorly armed forces sustained great losses. Father got along very well with his fellow soldiers and officers. Though he was just a private in a reconnaissance unit, he was a rifleman. He got wounded and was sent  to the rear – to a hospital in Sverdlovsk. When he was released from hospital he came back to Leningrad and somehow  got a pass so that my mother and I could also return from Chkalovskaya region (where we had be evacuated). So in June 1944 Mom and I got back to Leningrad. After the war my dad worked as a director of a “Lentextiltorg” shop.

After the war,  army buddies of my father who visited Leningrad stayed at our flat. I remember that very well. The flat in which we lived was a big communal one that had six rooms. Our flatmates were my uncle and aunt and two other Jewish families. One of these families also had its roots in Belorussia, but I don’t know anything about the other family. In addition, there was one more family – a Russian one, a very intellectual couple who had suffered in  1937. All these flatmates got on very well,  regardless of their nationality.

My father came from a big family. Everybody spoke Yiddish and Russian in his family, and  the elder brothers and sisters also had a good command of German and French. All the children were close. I had close relations with my relatives.  We visited my aunts and uncles who lived in Minsk very often, and they visited us in Leningrad, too. My parents had close relations with father’s cousins, too. One of them, father’s cousin Elkona Borishansky, lived in Moscow but visited us very often and stayed at our flat for a long time. 

My father’s sister  Sore-Elka was born in 1888, and after her mother’s death [1919] she took the place of a mother for the younger children. She studied in Germany like her brother Elkona, and he and she visited Minsk on vacation.  Sore-Elka got married to a certain Ura. She died in 1943.

My father’s sister  Eli-Sheva was born in 1895 and lived with her father and elder sister in Minsk. In the war they were all put in a ghetto and died in 1943.

My father’s elder brother Elkona Shif was born in 1890. He moved to Leningrad after the Revolution. He was a highly educated person and studied in Berlin until 1917. He  worked as an economist in Moscow and for a few years before the war was a bank executive in Leningrad. He had great authority and even after he fell ill with Parkinson’s Disease,  the bank used him as a consultant and sent employees to his home to ask his opinion. During the war he  was evacuated to Sverdlovsk. His wife, Bella Solomonovna Shif, a doctor, was drafted into the army and later transferred to a hospital to Sverdlovsk. Uncle Elkona died in 1953.

When Uncle Elkona got sick, not only my mother, but I, too, had to nurse him, as he was totally bedridden. He taught me a lot about my Jewish identity. He told me family stories, and from these I learned a lot about my grandmother, about my aunts, and about their children. He say so directly, but I now realize that he made clear nonetheless  that everything that was  happening in our country was unrighteous. I took care of him and talked to him a lot, and I am obliged to him for the awareness  that I am a Jew.

Another of father’s brothers was called Max. He was born in 1893 in Minsk, graduated from a commercial school, and worked as a division head at the Ministry of Commerce in Belorussia. At the beginning of the war he was involved in the evacuation of the documents of the People's Commissariat, so he sent a car for his family in order to evacuate them from Minsk. But his father and sisters remained in Minsk. He learned of that only after a month, when Minsk was already occupied by the Germans. Max survived the war and died in 1946. In 1941 learned that his children, Yasha and Fanya , had escaped from the ghetto.

Fanya was a prisoner in the Minsk ghetto from 1941-1942. Her grandfather, two aunts and her mother were shot before her very eyes. She and her mother’s older sister tried to escape. The Germans fired at them. But Fanya managed to get to Rodoshkovichy, near Minsk, where her family used to rent a summer cottage, and from there went on to join a group of partisans,  where she met her future husband, Yasha Axelrod.  She and her family now live in Chicago.

Cousin Yasha Shif was born in Minsk in 1923 and finished school in 1941. When the war started, he was caught in the Minsk ghetto. Later he managed to escape and join the partisans. He was wounded in 1944. After the liberation of Minsk, Yasha went back there and entered law school, which is where he met his future wife, Roza. They had a daughter named Rita. He worked as an attorney in a legal advice office near Minsk, but now he and his family live in New York.

It was a miracle that our cousins survived the war. I maintain very close relations with them to this day, even though we are spread all over the world: they live in America, so we haven’t seen each other for many years and communicate only by means of mail and phone conversations.

Growing up

I was born in Leningrad and was reared for the most part at home. I don’t have any brothers or sisters. From the age of five I attended a German kindergarten not far from our house. There two sisters – both former teachers – taught us to read and write, and they also taught us German; my uncle [Elkona] insisted on that, as he had a perfect command of German and wanted me to know it, too. In 1941 I was sent into evacuation with children of the employees of the Mariinsky theatre. These children were leaving for evacuation, and I was taken with them through family connections. During the evacuation I was at first in an orphanage near Kostroma, then the orphanage was moved to Kostroma itself. In September of 1941 Mom arrived; she took me and we together to the  Novotroitzk settlement in the Urals, where her distant relative Abram Alexandrovich Dobrovinsky, was a site manager of the building of the Orsko-Halilovsky metallurgical works.

After the war

When Mom and I came back from the evacuation, we found our room already occupied by other people, but since Father had fought in the war and was a disabled veteran, these people left and we got our room back. To tell the truth, there was practically no furniture in our room; apparently everything was burned during the blockade. Only a very few things that had belonged to our family remained, and these were only the things that had been taken and kept for us by a neighbor. After the war my father was in very poor health, and he soon had a heart attack. He wasn’t able to work the way he did before the war. Still, our family was exceptionally united, Father and Mother had a lot of friends who visited our house very often -  for the most part these were Jewish families or mixed families in which the husband or wife was Russian.

Later, I started to study from the fifth grade. I liked history, chemistry and geography very much; probably because I had great respect for  the teachers I had for these subjects. I particularly remember my history teacher, Raisa Solomonovna Ermanok - she was an outstanding teacher, a small, nice woman, who  after the war treated all the children in the class with great kindness and interest. I didn’t feel any discomfort at school because of my Jewish parentage; clearly we had good teachers and a good student body, too.

As soon as I graduated from school in 1951 I applied to the University to study in the chemistry department. Even though I had good grades, they didn’t accept my application, and one of the senior women who sat in the selection committee quietly explained to me that it would be better for me not to apply to this department. It was clearly because of the climate of mounting public anti-Semitism. This was the first slap in my face. Why it was the first slap? Because I felt for the first time in my life that I was a social outcast because of my nationality! Then I applied  to the Pedagogical Institute, but this time to another, department – geography, not chemistry – and I was accepted.  I graduated in 1955.

After graduation I married Albert Grigorievich Rajsky. Albert was a friend of the husband of my girl-friend Tsilya Ravich; he and  her husband had studied at the “Dzerzhinka” higher naval academy and served in the North. My husband is Russian, born in 1932 in Uglich, into the family of a clerk. His father was killed at front during the Great Patriotic War [World War II]. His mother had brought up my future husband and his elder brother alone. Both of them were naval academy graduates. 

When I began to look for a job, I again had serious problems. This was because outwardly I didn’t look typically Jewish, and everything went on in the right way until I showed them my passport [which said I was Jewish].

Husband and children

In 1961 my husband was demobilized from the Navy because of me, or, rather, of because of my nationality. They gave him no hope of being promoted to a higher  rank because his wife was Jewish. So he had to leave the Navy and started to work as a ordinary engineer in Leningrad.

At that time I worked in a Leningrad middle school, first as a teacher, then as a head of the curriculum department and later as the director. At present I am retired. It was only thanks to a schoolmate - she was my very close friend, and I communicate with her to this day – that I got my job. My friend had also graduated from the Pedagogical institute and worked at a school. In the middle of the school year her school had a vacancy for a geography teacher. The director of that school was a Jew named Safray, and thanks to him I got the job. He appealed to Gorono [the city’s public education  department] and said that he felt I was the right person the post. Gorono assigned me to the job, so I got fixed up, but with great difficulties. It was the second slap in the face I experienced. I also experienced a very unpleasant situation when they were confirming my appointment as school director. This took place  in the district party committee, and when the head of Gorono read out my biography, everyone woke up to the fact that I was a Jew. But they nevertheless confirmed my appointment.

Unfortunately, I have a very bad command of Yiddish, and I only understand it a little. I regret that I don’t know Yiddish, that I can neither write nor speak it. My father knew spoken Yiddish but didn’t know how to write. Why do I regret this? It is better to know than not to know, isn’t it? Lenin said in his time: «As many languages you know, as many times you are a man». That is, I could understand the culture and world outlook of my native people through the language. Now I only realize that I am Jewish, but I don’t know how to say it in Yiddish.

My daughter Elena was born in 1961. She graduated from the school in Leningrad, then from the Financial economics institute. I have two granddaughters, Anastasia, born in 1989, and Alexandra, born in 1991. My daughter’s husband is Jewish on his mother’s side; his father is Russian. Nevertheless both I and my daughter continue to feel, to realize, that we are Jews. We tell a lot about Jewish culture to our little girls: to my granddaughters. Besides, my husband – their grandpa - takes an active interest it, too: he reads books on Israeli history, on Judaism. Anastasia knows quite a bit about Jewish culture and about Israel. She knows about all our relatives, with whom we correspond or communicate by telephone, knows where they all live.

Recent years

Why didn’t we ever go to Israel? It was connected with my husband’s work:  first because of his military service, second because for 26 years he worked at the famous “Rubin” enterprise, which is now well-known all over the world because of the tragic events with “Kursk” [the nuclear submarine that exploded and sank]. He had so-called “zero access” classification [that means he had an access to very secret documentation], so we never even considered such a trip --  we realized that they would ever have allowed us to leave.

Throughout my life, I’ve had friends of different nationalities. I have several friends with whom I’ve been close from my youth. I was on friendly terms with a girl named Naimi Yakerson, who lived in our house, and who now lives with her family in Israel. My second close girl-friend, of whom I have already mentioned, was Tsilya Ravich, we are close friends to this day. We spend a lot of time together, and visit places or go to the country when we had a chance. I have one more girl-friend, Lyalya Simkina, who moved to Poland. We often see each other, Lyalya Simkina has even visited me, and I’m the first person that Musya Yakerson visits when she comes from Israel.

Most of my friends are Jews. But now, unfortunately, we are dispersed over the world. Our closest friends, the  Khanins,  now live in New York, though they visited us not long ago - in May. We always traveled a lot and tried to show to our daughter many places in Russia. We traveled often to Belorussia, where my cousins lived  before the emigrated to the United States [after the 1917 Revolution].
After the Revolution, my parents were afraid to keep in touch with the relatives who had emigrated to America. Only  my father’s cousin Elkona Borishansky, who lived in Moscow, maintained contact with them, but after his death those relations ceased somehow. Now I maintain close contact with my cousins – Jakov Shif and Fanya Axelrod, who live in New York and Chicago; and also with my nieces. We often communicate by telephone and write letters. They try to help us a little in some way. Certainly, all the recent changes in life in Russia are pleasant to a certain extent, because now there is no anti-Semitism – to be sure, I mean the state attitude toward Jews, not anti-Semitism in private life.

When Putin was in New York and met with Americans in our Russian Consulate, there were Jews present. And generally speaking, the attitude towards Jews now has become better. Unfortunately, however, anti-Semitism can be often felt on the everyday level. My son-in-law often have problems because he has a very Jewish appearance, and more than once drunk members of NRE [Russian National Unity is the neo-Nazi youth organization in Russia] taunted him, and even threatened him  – it is very unpleasant. Certainly, I would like Russia to join the European world and not to create something special, something Russian, which is what many people are still trying to do here.

[Inna Ilyinichna is an intellectual woman of 68. She remembers many details of the life of her paternal ancestors well and is very proud of her relatives. She often  emphasizes the  harmony in which they lived. When she tells about their lives, one can feel that she suffers for her relatives who have perished in a ghetto. Inna Ilyinichna considers it her duty  to recount the  intellectual beauty and strength of mind of her relatives to those, who investigate the  life of Jews before and after the Holocaust. She wants to keep alive for future generatio the memory of the grandeur of her kinsfolk.]