Return to Memoirs

CHAPTER 8

When we arrived in Frankfurt, my mother contacted our cousin Leibu Brody and he arranged a place for us to stay. They were debating whether we should register at a displaced persons camp in Salzheim, or move in to an apartment with two other single Jewish women refugees that he knew. There were pros and cons on each side. At the camp we would be registered as official DPs and that might make it easier to emigrate. However, if possible, it was more comfortable to live in a private apartment. Both the apartment and the DP camp were near Leibu, which was important, because we didn't know anyone else. It was important that we be near someone we knew, someone who could help us.

Finally Leibu and my mother decided that we should move into the apartment of Gizi [Gisela] and Magda, the two Hungarian refugees that Leibu knew. They were young women who had survived the concentration camps and had settled in Germany. They were supporting themselves by sewing and trading in food that they got from the DP camps. Eventually they also emigrated to America.

"Were you still with some people, or were you alone then?"

"No. By the time I got to Frankfurt, we separated because some people were going to Salzheim, some people were going to Bad Nauheim, some people were going to--. There were many camps In Germany, and they, most of the people had somebody they were coming to. Only the ones who didn't have were going to Frankfurt. It was the center, so I and some few people yet were going to Frankfurt.

In Frankfurt we got to the Jewish 'gemeinde'. I contacted Leibu and Mendel, and they came. Leibu arranged already with Magda and Gizi, first that I'm coming to them in their house, and that they should find me a room someplace to live. But first I had where to go already. Maybe I would have been better off if he would have taken me straight to a DP camp and give me a room. But he lived not far there too and he didn't live in a DP camp either. And I figured maybe I would be better off not to go to a DP camp but to live private, because there were a lot of people living private. It was nicer to live private than to live in a DP camp. DP camp was more camp life, you know. And he figured, Gizi and Magda, they make a living there, they're dressmakers, and that somehow I'll get involved with them. They'll get me some job, I'll work for them, and I'll get a room, a furnished room there. And not far, Salzheim was a good DP camp. If to go in a DP camp, Leibu wanted me to get in Salzheim, that I should be with Leibu, and Mendel is around there. Gizi, Magda was living in Nied, very close to the Salzheim camp, and so I should be with friends. So I got in with Magda and Gizi. She had a four room apartment, she had a cot. I got a cot there and I was cooking for them, and I was helping to clean, and I was helping to sew."

"People were able to make a living as a dressmaker? You had money?"

"Yes, in Germany, after the war- not for money really- they exchanged for food, for silver, crystal from the Germans- from the DP people for provisions. They had canned foods. They were 'handeling', and Gizi was very good at that. She's very capable, Gizi. A capable person. And I was very happy with them, with Magda and Gizi there. It was again like with young people, and a home, and nice people, and Gizi was very lively."

"How did they survive, where did they come from? [Again the same constant question]."

"They came from the concentration camp. They all survived the concentration camps. So Gizi had a sister Serenke [Serena], and Magda had a brother survived in Israel, and another brother what she didn't know at the time. So I stayed with them."

"They were originally from Hungary also."

"Yes."

"Now how did Serenke survive with two children? [She had two sons about ten and eleven years old. Her husband and two older sons were deported and never came back. She died recently in 1989]."

"She was in ghetto in Budapest."

"Leibu when he came to visit us, he was very friendly with Gizi and Magda too, Leibu. He had a few girl friends there, Leibu. He lived there by German people and he was young and he loved girls. There was no problem there, he could have them by the dozen. And he lived not far from us, also with another German couple. And he came to visit us and I said to him, 'You know Leibu, I think I would like to move out, be on my own more. I work here, I do things, but I would like more a job someplace to work, if it would be possible. I don't like to depend on these people. It's all right, it was fine for a temporary, but could he get me a job someplace?"

"When was this?"

"That was- I was probably a few months by Gizi. And he had connections at the Joint. Leibu was already also wearing an American army uniform, like Mendel. They were both- you know it meant a lot there, they had connections. And he was traveling to Paris a lot, official Joint business. He had good connections. It came very useful there. When I really needed the help, so he was there. He got me a job. He came down one day, he says, 'Suri, I have here a job tailor made for you, in a children's home where Judy can stay. It's actually for children for four weeks just, transitory, just for 'erholung' (recuperation) for children, and we'll get in Judy first there, and then I'll try to get you in there. So you got there first, for four weeks."

"I was there by myself? I don't remember."

"Yes. You went in there for four weeks, in a home. You were very young. I was there all the time [after] then. It was just temporary [that I was alone there], a short time."

"I remember when you were there, I don't remember being alone."

"So, you got in there, and I come to visit you, and it was like heaven. You were in a room with children, and a 'madricha' (a matron), a woman who was helping out the 'madricha', and clean, and organized, with a director for the home, and a kitchen, a big kitchen. And the Joint supervised. It was a children's home, a very well run children's home. And I said to Leibu- at the time he didn't know, at the time he even didn't know that I would have a chance there. He just had to get you in a home. It's an 'erholungs' home, you are run down, it's going to be good for you. And he's going to look for me a job. And while I was coming to visit you, I said 'Leibu, I have a job. If you could get me a job here, I don't need anything better than this. I could live here, be with Judy. Any position I'll take.' He went to the director. The director was a German Jewish lawyer, a lady, an older lady. She was in the German Parliament before Hitler, so she was a big 'macher', a big shot. A very, very capable lady, and very nice person. Very domineering. She reminds me a little bit of Mrs. Joshua [my mother-in-law]. A general."

"Well Henry's aunt ran a children's home in Paris. She was Henry's mother's sister."

"She reminds me of Mrs. Joshua because she was very independent, very domineering, and very capable. And Leibu went to her, and he said to her, that here I am. I was left from the war, alone, and I need badly a job. Could she find something for me here, that I'm willing to do any job. She find me a job to be with a group, a 'madricha'. You didn't need a teacher's license, or papers. All you need, a willingness to work with the children. But I had some experience with a child. I had a child, and I was a mother. I was mature enough, and the job what we did with the children, it wasn't that we were teaching them. It wasn't a teaching [job], it wasn't a school. It was just take care of the children. Feed them, play with them, make sure that they comb their hair, they should look neat, and mostly keep them happy and play with them."

"These were children who had survived?"

"Survived. Most of them were in Russia, with families. They were coming back from Russia. Russian families survived. And they settled in Germany, in DP camps, and they were very run-down children, malnourished, deprived. And this home was especially for to give vacations like, for four weeks, for groups. And then they came back another four weeks after a while. They were coming back a few times, back and forth. It was at least two hundred children there in that home from all over. From all the leftovers, from Germany, wherever there's children leftover, or families, DPs, whoever there was, they were all coming there for free. And there were 'madrichas' there.

For the boys there were men 'madrichs', for the bigger ones. For the little ones there were lady 'madrichas' also, and for girls. It was like tailor made for me that job. I got a room in an attic. You were sleeping the four weeks down with the children in the big halls. They were like hospital rooms. It was an old age home before. And then when I got an attic room with two beds, you were sleeping with me. And all day you were in the group with the children, eating with them, and so was I. It was ideal. It was perfect. It was the first time in my life I had a job, that I earned money. I mean I was working all my life, but never a job, an office job or in a business. This was a job. I got paid yet a little bit, plus room and board."

"When did you start this job?"

"In the end of 1947, December. Bad Nauheim, a beautiful little town. A picture, a fairy tale town. It wasn't like industrial, or a town, it was just a resort place. Beautiful park, and woods around it, and springs, geysers, and a heart sanitarium, and this old age home. But it was just parks. It was a real picture town, and fresh air and beautiful. I don't think so I ever seen such a beautiful little place like that was. They had a hospital there."

"I remember you taking me there to have injections. I remember it was so painful. Liver shots." [My mother always had to carry me back from there because I couldn't walk after those shots.]

"You were getting liver shots. Was that important for you! I think that brought you to whatever that you didn't catch so many colds after that, because you needed iron, and B vitamin 12. But anyway, I got the job there and I had the best situation since the war. I was independent, I had food, I had board and room, and I felt useful. I liked what I'm doing. It was hard work. Thirty five children, full time. I always had thirty five children, and that's no picnic. It was hard work but I was good at it. The children liked me and I liked the children. I played house with them, and I was combing them, and dressing them, and talking with them, and having games with them, and playing ball with them, going for rides in the woods, for outings. [My mother often told me what a big difference it was taking care of the boys' groups versus the girls' groups, especially when I would complain after my three sons were born very close together. The girls liked to play house and other games, and were fairly easy to handle. The boys on the other hand, were wild, and were forever fighting and "breaking heads and feet".]

You were thriving. You had food, not very- we still didn't have the very nourishing food. I mean it was too much cereal, too much starches, not enough protein, not enough fruit. It wasn't real balanced, but considering, it was food. There wasn't a situation that you should have balanced. You should have what to eat. You should have food to get in. It was starch, whatever it was, it was food. And I wasn't even so much aware of it should be more protein or more 'doos' (this or that).

"As long as you had food you were happy."

"I was happy. That I had balanced food as a child that was normal, because at home everything was- but there, if we had food- nobody had a balanced diet in Germany after the war. There was no meat, there was no fruit, there were no bananas. There was just whatever, especially in the home, we got from the Joint. There was cereals we got, cocoa I remember, margarine we got, potatoes we got, beans some we got. Sometimes we got a little meat, canned meat, you know. Oh, we had canned meat, for Shabbos, and milk powder we had. So we weren't hungry, already.

I started to work there. The director from Germany, she valued my, she like my work. The children liked me. I made friends with the other 'madrichim' there. They all respected me. I made very good friends with the cook, not because I wanted to 'shmychel' them (butter them up), because they're the cook. In those years, was very good to be good with cooks. Everybody was always- in camps, in DP camps, the cook was a very valuable asset to be friends with. But they were a young couple, a Hungarian [couple], and I was Hungarian. And they had no children, they couldn't have children. And they loved- when you got there, before I [did], they, when you came, they came in the dining room, and they seen you, and they went over straight to the 'madricha', and they said, 'Who is this child?'

'I think she comes from Germany, from Frankfurt.'

She said, [the cook], 'My God, she looks like one of us. I bet she speaks, she understands Hungarian.' And they came over, they started to talk to you Hungarian. And you didn't speak well Hungarian, but you understand, and you shook your head, and a few words you- when they started to talk you answered some few words here and there. So they seen you're Hungarian. So they said, 'This child is our type, it shows.' And they had a camera and they made you a picture right away.

I even remember the dress you had on because, Gitu had a skirt, and I made from that skirt- a woven brown, woven material. It was a flare skirt and I just took that dress. It was a very flare skirt, very flare. I made two shoulders, I cut down two shoulders, and the neck was a wide neck, and I gathered that neck. And I crocheted around a nice pink thing around the neck. And I made an opening in the back, and a big bow, a pink bow, and little buttons, and I made baby doll sleeves. A short dress, and I embroidered pink polka dots around the dress and on the sleeves. And the dress, everybody thought that I bought it in a salon. It was short and flare, and you were a little doll. White shoes, white socks, and a pink ribbon I put on your hair. That's how I brought you in the children's home. And I put on, I remember, then I got a little white apron. I put on a little loose apron with a yoke, and that was also flared, and white lace around it. You looked like a doll, like a picture from a doll. And your hair, you looked very beautiful.

And they made a picture. I remember because they gave me that picture, in that dress, and I had it. I must have that picture someplace yet. And they took you right away, they took to you right away. They brought you special food up there, and they took you in their room, and the 'madricha' put you at the head of her table, next to her sitting.

"Was I younger than the other children?"

"You were prettier than the other children. You were a beautiful child. And you were like a doll. You had something. You were like a little doll. You weren't just a little girl, you were a little doll. And I came there, and so I got in already. I came to visit you a few times, and I knew the cook already, so Leibu had a very easy job to get me the job there. He got me in. I was established, I was there, I was very happy there.

I stayed there till 1949. The children started- the parents started to emigrate. It was always less and less children. There was less and less need for the home. And the children kept on repeating, back and forth, the same children. They came like home. They loved to come there. But I seen one thing, that this is going to end, that my job is going to end. Something has to be again happening. I didn't feel like to go back very much to Gizi and Magda, and to Serenke, because too much tension, friction. I have to start to think of something.

I started to get about. I took all my papers out. I was registered, the minute I came to Germany, in a DP camp in Salzheim. I started to work on my papers, try to organize my papers. And I spoke to the director of the home. I said my situation, 'I have a problem, I have to get out someplace. The home is, the way it looks, it's going to be dissolved. I have to get someplace. Can you help me in any way?' I knew she has connections in Bad Nauheim and she has connections in the Ministerium. She has connections all over. If anyone can help me now--"

"Do you remember her name?"

"Dr. --, Leibu maybe is going to remember her name. [He didn't remember either.] Very, very interesting person. Very, very capable, big person. Intelligent. Comes from one of the big families in Germany. Famous person she was.

She said, 'Irena', in Germany it was Irena, 'Irena, sorg sich nicht. Du west krigen papers. Ich woll dich besorgen. Ihr gehen noch Amerika.' (Don't worry. You will get papers. I will take care of it for you. You will go to America.) She sent me in to Frankfurt to the inner ministerium, not just to the Joint, and she put me down there with my Czech papers. I had Czech papers, and those are the first to go, the Czechs. They had the first priority to go."

"Why?"

"Because Masaryk fell that time. Czechoslovakia was the latest country to take by the Communists. They fell to Communism. They killed Masaryk, Benes. It was a big uproar then. I don't know if you heard about that era and if you remember that in history."

"I read about it."

"You read about it. It was a very serious situation there. And the Czechs, and a lot of Czechs were fleeing to Germany, new DPs, new immigrants, and they had first priority to go. They processed them, they were going. So she took me in that group, in the ministerium. She said, 'Go down to Frankfurt with your papers,' and a letter from her, recommendation. I got papers. I had to go down to the Czech Consulate. I went down to the Czech Consulate in Frankfurt. It took months, even for the Czech immigrants to get out.

But, I had to come now. These were new immigrants. First it was a big 'yichos' (advantage) I should be '47 already, [in Germany] the beginning, because to get any place out, you had to be by '47 already in Germany. If you came later you had difficulty to get out. I was there in the time. Then it became better to become a recent immigrant. Here I was, Czech already, in the DP camp, my 'ken carte', we had 'ken carte' [identification cards], I was '47. And here I'm coming to the Czech Consulate, and he said you were here in '47.

Originally, when we came to Germany, we were supposed to be, to be able to come to America, you were supposed to be in 1947 in Germany. So I had my papers [from Czechoslovakia] 1947 and I registered in Germany in 1947. I was there the right time to be there."

"At that time [1947] you were registering to come to America?"

"No, but just in case, if something comes up, everybody had to be there in 1947.

"I see. But you didn't really know where you were going to go?"

"No, but even to Canada, anyplace. But my goal was America."

"You would have gone to Australia if you could have gotten papers. Australia, Canada, America."

"To get out from Germany, you had to be there in 1947."

"Everybody got out eventually, right?"

"Yes, but as a DP, a displaced person, if you came in 1948, or '49, you weren't left from the war there. It was important. Later, then you were on your own. But to get out that time you had to be there."

"To get out by the Joint you mean? Who was doing this, the Joint?"

"The Joint. The American Consulate. That was the rules at the time."

"I see. Otherwise, if you came in '48 or '49 you were on your own, and you just tried to get wherever you could go, wherever you had relatives or whatever. The place that took just about everybody was Israel, right? "

"Israel everybody could go."

"But not till 1949, I mean, not till '48."

"No. When Israel became established. I could have gone there too."

Originally my mother made papers in 1947, that qualified her as a displaced person. Now it had become better to be a recent Czech immigrant who arrived when Czechoslovakia fell to Communism, in 1949. Since there was a special quota for these Czech immigrants to come to the United States, and since my mother had Czech citizenship papers, she was trying to get in on this new quota. But her papers showed our arrival in 1947. Here she was again with the right papers, but the wrong date.

"Meanwhile, Feigi and Mendel Wolf came, and they went to Israel. They couldn't wait. They weren't there in 1947 and they couldn't wait, they had to go someplace. And when they got there, [to Germany] I got them a room. I mean, I lived in Frankfurt, Ruderbergweg Strasse, I had a room there."

"That was after Bad Nauheim?"

"I was in Bad Nauheim. They came during that time, and I had a room."

"Even while you were at Bad Nauheim, you still had a room?"

"Yes, I had that room."

"You rented it?"

"I got it from Gizi and Magda, and it was my room. I kept that room. I was able to keep it. At the time if you got a room it was yours as long as you were there."

"Did you have to pay for it?"

"I don't think so. So Feigi and Mendel Wolf stayed there, and after a while they got papers to go to Israel, and they left for Israel. They wrote me letters I should come to Israel and I was very tempted to go to Israel. But then Feigi wrote that, you know, it's very difficult. There's not enough food. She didn't feel well, Feigi, she got sick there. She had like a nervous breakdown. Mendel Wolf was going to be a 'shomer' (guard) every night and he was working in a stone mine all day. And no food, they had very little food. They had a very bad diet. The children got polio. Shiyu [their son] got polio. There was a polio epidemic. Every second house somebody got polio, children, and Shiyu was very sick too. He was very sick. He had diarrhea, and he was very run down so he was very susceptible. He was in the hospital on and off. He was very sick, and Feigi got a nervous breakdown. Mendel Wolf was a 'shomer' every night, she didn't know if he comes back in the morning. She had a very sick baby, in the hospital, and she couldn't take it. She had a nervous breakdown. With that situation she wrote to me, that it would be lovely to be there, but there's no food, and the situation is very difficult. They were sent, new immigrants were sent away to border communities, borders, you know, wherever they had place for them.

"So I decided, with a little child, and not a well child either. You were at the time in Obersdorf, to recuperate, because you had bronchitis for years."

"When did I go to Obersdorf? After Bad Nauheim, or before, or during?"

"During. During. The end stages, the last stages. No. No. Bad Nauheim was already closed down, because I was visiting you

from, already from, Ruderbergweg Strasse."

"So Bad Nauheim closed down and you went back to Frankfurt, to your room."

"Wait a minute, it's not that room. No. It was in proper Frankfurt, in the city."

"That room I remember!"

"Gizi lived in Nied, outside the city."

"So when you came back from Bad Nauheim you rented a different room."

"After, when Bad Nauheim closed I got Ruderbergweg. After a while Serenke lived there also."

"Yes, that I remember."

"And Gizi and Magda, they got it somehow. I don't remember who got it, from where they got it."

"Did you have to pay?"

"I don't think so. I don't remember. I didn't have much money. I don't think I had to pay."

"I remember the street. I know it was full of rubble. I remember it was a hill, bombed out."

"Yes, run down, after the war, bombed out."

"And you don't know if anybody owned it?"

"The Jewish 'gemeinde'. It must have been pre-war, a Jewish- belonged to the Jewish 'gemeinde', so it did belong to the Jewish 'gemeinde'."

"Were there a lot of people living in that building?"

"Yes. It was a big building. You know, an apartment house."

"It was filled up?"

"Yes. Jewish refugees. My next door neighbors, I remember, a Polish couple, with children.

What I remember most about that room, that one day a drunk came up, and he lie down on the floor in front of the hall, and he was yelling, talking for a while. A German drunk. And I was very frightened, and I wouldn't open the door, and I didn't go out. And he fell asleep there, and I couldn't go out at least a half a day. That's my memory of that room."

"So do you remember when the home closed down?"

"1948. December, 1948. It could have been already '49, the beginning of '49. Very early. No. End of 1948, the end, because I left from Ruderbergweg to Butzbach, to come to this country, and I came here in August, and I was a few months in Frankfurt. It could have been '48, the beginning of '49, January, February."

"Now when did I- I remember going, just before [or after] Christmas [1948] to Obersdorf."

"Yes, you were there about--"

"Till spring. Till after Easter, because I remember being there Easter. So before Bad Nauheim closed?"

"I think I took you from Bad Nauheim."

"You knew it was closing. You were going to Frankfurt."

"Yes. And then I picked you up, Later I picked you up."

"Now Leo Brody arranged this. I must ask him how he did this. He had all these connections. So you took me to Obersdorf in Bavaria, right? By train? I don't remember the train. [I was now five years old.]"

"I think Leo took you."

"Leo took me? I don't remember going there. I remember getting there."

"I went to visit you."

"I don't remember you visiting me. I remember getting there, I don't remember with who. I don't remember Leo [taking me there]."

"No? I went to visit you there once. I'm sure he was there."

"Yes, that I remember."

"Or I took- I can't recall, if I took you. I just remember more when I went to visit you. I remember the little- the place where I stayed there."

"So it was just, it was Christmas time because the tree, Christmas tree was still up. Do you remember a Christmas tree?"

"No."

"Well I remember because it must have been the first one I ever saw."

"No. I don't remember a Christmas tree."

"I remember a Christmas tree, so I came either right after, or during, or right before Christmas. I remember a Christmas tree. I was there for Christmas. So it was the end of December."

"You had very bad bronchitis."

"In Bad Nauheim?"

"In Bad Nauheim, for a long time already. You came already with that."

"You mean, already when we came from Rumania, I already had it?"

"Yes. And I went to a doctor there I remember [in Bad Nauheim] and he used to give you injections, B 12. I used to carry you, down a hill. You couldn't walk."

"Yes. Yes. It was very painful. Why was it so painful? What did he do?"

"And I used to carry you, I remember, back to the home always. We went many times."

"Yes, I remember. It was extremely painful and I remember I couldn't walk, that's all I remember. That stays in your mind 'cause it's very painful and I hated going."

"And you couldn't get rid of that so he [the doctor] said it would be nice for you to go up to the mountains. He recommended it."

"So you got in touch with Leo?"

"Yes, and Leibu arranged it through the Joint."

"Oh the Joint, how come the Joint?"

"Sure."

"The Joint made the arrangements?"

"Of course."

"That's interesting, because I always wondered how I landed up in this place."

"The Joint, the Joint. He worked for the Joint."

"I know he worked for the Joint."

"So they arranged it."

"Did other Jewish children go there too?"

"Not too many."

"I know because I don't remember seeing any, so I'm wondering why they arranged it for me."

"Because Leibu was working for the Joint."

"They arranged for children to go to Bad Nauheim and I was at Bad Nauheim, so why would they arrange for me to go up to this place?"

"Because, you know, if you have connections, and he had connections, and he arranged it. And it was wonderful for you."

"But I still had the bronchitis, it didn't help the bronchitis."

"But your general well being. You gained weight. Bronchitis is very stubborn, it's very hard to get rid of, and especially the situation, you know, traveling. But while you were there it improved a lot."

"The bronchitis too?"

"Yes, everything. You were much better."

"Because I remember they were going sledding, you know, as a treat for the children. They wouldn't let me go out because once they let me out, and after that they wouldn't let me out, because I started to cough a lot, because of the cold air."

"Too cold. And I was so nervous when you left there. I was, somehow I was afraid, a German place."

"Oh it was very German, Ma, it was very German."

"You know, I didn't trust them."

"Well, it was very German. It was a totally 'goyish place'. I never in my life was in a place like that."

"I think they were nuns there."

"No. No."

"No? They were nurses. Oh, that confused me."

"No they weren't nuns. That would have been a bit much."

"But I was very nervous when you left [for] there."

"I felt very strange there. I enjoyed it very much, but I felt very strange."

"You were out of place, completely different world."

"Extremely. It was like walking into another planet."

"But they were nice to you."

"They were very nice! That's what I could never understand."

"You see, I was very nervous, because I was afraid that they shouldn't harm you."

"Oh no!"

"I didn't trust them. You know me, I don't trust easily."

"They were exceptionally nice to me, and I always wondered."

"They made a special effort, because Leibu went to visit you, he came back, he said to me that they're especially nice to you. And you sit next to the nurse, 'foon oiven oon' (right in front) at the table, and if Americans come, they all- well-"

"I think it was propaganda, I think they were using me to show that they were good Germans, not the bad Germans."

"It was like a show piece."

"Yes, I was like a show child, a token. That's how I felt there. When I look back at it I always think that's what it was."

"Because I wonder why would they make you special. I didn't expect, I wouldn't expect special [treatment], but I was hoping they would give you the same treatment like the other children. But they gave you special."

"It was such a strange experience for me. I remember vividly when I got there. We entered into a large room with a large, beautifully decorated Christmas tree. I was staring at the tree in wonder. However, I was very uncomfortable because I had to go to the bathroom and I didn't speak German. Leibu must have left already, and I didn't know what to do. I felt really awful. I don't know how the situation resolved itself, but finally, I must have gotten to a bathroom, because I know I tried desperately not to have an accident and I didn't wet my pants. I would have remembered that."

It was so beautiful up there in the home, in the Bavarian Alps. I was away from my mother, in a totally alien and non- Jewish environment, but I enjoyed my stay there very much. The matrons in that children's home were exceptionally nice to me. I have often wondered about that. I slept in a large dormitory, with many other little girls. I don't know if there were any boys in the home but I don't remember seeing any. Each one of us slept in a crib, and I felt very strange because I hadn't slept in a crib in a long time. Perhaps they were really only beds with barred sides, so that we wouldn't fall out.

I remember one evening, after we had been put to bed in our beds, a matron brought me upstairs to their quarters to meet some visitors. I don't remember exactly who these visitors were, but I have the impression of uniforms, and I think they were some American army officers. What I do remember was that the matron gave me an orange. That must have been very unusual, because I remember finding the orange strange but good. Maybe I had never had an orange before. By this time I spoke German, the Bavarian dialect that was spoken in Obersdorf. I spoke to the people for a while and then I went back to sleep. I wondered much later if they brought me up to show that they had a Jewish child in the home. Maybe I was their token Jew.

Another incident that I remember, that reinforces that belief, happened just before Easter. One beautiful, sunny day, we were taken sledding on the mountains. That was another first for me. I loved it very much, the beauty, the speed, the fun! However, it was very cold and I started to cough a lot. So the next time they took us sledding, I was left behind in the dormitory in my bed. I was very bored and disappointed. Another little girl was also left behind. She was probably sick too. I don't remember her very well, or any of the other children. However, I remember that she suggested that we do something naughty, and I went along with her. Some matron came back and found us, and we were to be punished. The punishment was to be that we wouldn't be allowed to go on the upcoming Easter egg hunt and to the ensuing Easter dinner. The strange thing was that my punishment was canceled, and I was allowed to go on the egg hunt, and to the dinner. I didn't see the other little girl at the dinner, and I don't think that she was forgiven. I remember wondering about that, and feeling uncomfortable, that it was unfair somehow. We ate the chocolate Easter eggs we found on the hunt for our dessert. Soon after Easter, I left the children's home in Obersdorf, and went back to Frankfurt with my mother.

While at the home in Obersdorf, I had learned to speak the Bavarian German dialect that was spoken there. When I came back to Frankfurt, I had forgotten how to speak Hungarian and spoke only German. My mother spoke some German but had a hard time understanding my dialect. I called her 'mutti', the German word for mommy, even after we reached the United states. She found this embarrassing as we lived among Jewish refugees like ourselves. In the U.S. I learned English and forgot German. In the house we spoke Yiddish, which I still speak, and I can still understand some German and Hungarian. My stay in Obersdorf left a lasting impression on me. It is one of my most vivid memories from my early childhood, before I came to the United States.

"And I was very nervous, you know. First of all, I missed you very much. I was alone on Ruderbergweg, in that apartment. I was all by myself."

"It was a very dreary room, I remember."

"Very dreary, very depressing. I didn't know when I get out to America. Things weren't too hopeful. It was very difficult to get papers, and bureaucracy, and red tape, and every step things- You had to go- in many of these offices, Lithuanians, working in the consulates."

"Not German?"

"Many places they put in these DPs. They were working."

"You mean other DPs [Not Jewish]."

"Like in Butzbach, in these offices, many places. And they were extremely, very anti-Semitic."

"Even after the war, didn't change."

"Yes. They wore brown shirts, I remember. Even now they deport many of them, here and there. They came here. They didn't put down the truth, that they killed how many hundred thousand Jews, many of them. Quite a few were deported from here, the last few years just. But they lived down [their lives] here.

I remember one case. I had to go down to, my 'ken carte' to, some paper to take care of."

"'Ken carte' was a ration card, or ID card?"

"No, it was the ID card. And I had to go down for my papers to one of these offices. I don't remember was it Butzbach, or one- centralized place, very central, all papers from all DPs went there for papers. And I went in there and I had from the Czech consulate papers. Before, when I came to Germany, I got, it cost me forty dollars I remember, to become that I came '47, because I wasn't there in '47 the beginning. I was in Rumania. So it cost me forty dollars.

And I got the 'ken carte' that I was in 1947. When I got the Joint papers from this lawyer lady, the director lady from the home, the best way it was to get out- in 1949, the Czech quota had preference. They were first on the quota, because Masaryk, at the time Czechoslovakia fell to communists, and a lot of Czech refugees were there. And they gave them first choice to quota. So I was originally born Czechoslovakia. My papers were from Kosice, so I had a very good chance. So here I had my 'ken carte' is 1947, so I couldn't come from Czechoslovakia recently. And here I went to the Czecholovak consulate, and I said everything the way it was, that I have to get out, I don't have where to stay. The home is closed, and I am originally born in Czechoslovakia, and I was crying there. He had 'rachmonus' (pity) and he said to me, 'Listen, the only way I can do it, if you go down to Butzbach and you change there papers. There, there, they change it for you.'

This was the Czech Consulate. And when I got there to Butzbach, there was a Lithuanian in the office, with a brown shirt. He had a uniform some kind. And he looked at me, he looked at my papers, and he said to me 'You'll never get to America.' No explanation, anything. 'You'll never get to America.' He didn't want to do nothing."

"You mean you told him the story, and you wanted him to change it?"

"Yes. He said, 'You'll never go to America.' I went home crying, and where am I- and what am I going to do? "

"When was this, in 19- ?"

"In '49. Right after the home was closing, while I was making the papers to get out. I was already in Frankfurt. I just went back to the [Czech] Consulate and I said, 'It's hopeless, he doesn't want to do it.'"

"And the guy at the consulate was Czech?"

"Yes. From Czechoslovakia. And he did it for me. He corrected the papers."

"He went to Butzbach?"

"No, from there. He ignored Butzbach completely and he put me on 1949 Czech quota. He was a 'mensch', he was a human being, and he seen my situation. I was alone with a child and I have no place to go. You know, a widow, an orphan, if somebody has a little feeling for something that's the- they try to help. And I was really very desperate at the time. I had no place where to go, and there she [the director of the children's home in Bad Nauheim], couldn't help me either. You know, the German lady. She could get me the Joint should give me the sponsorship, but she couldn't go and falsify papers for me. That I had to do myself. So I got the paper, the Czech paper. I was on the quota, my papers were in order. I was moving. Now I had to wait."

"You didn't pay him anything?"

"Nothing. I had to wait for a while, till the papers got processed, till they call me, because there was a few hundred thousand people on these quotas. So I finally got the papers, the papers to go. It was a few months, about three months. Meanwhile I went down to visit you in Obersdorf."

"So this is, let's say in January, February [1949] You went, and this guy finally helped you, and then you had to wait. There was nothing you could do."

"There was nothing. I stayed in Ruderbergweg. I was in contact with Serenke. I used to go a lot down to Nied. She lived in Nied. I spent a lot of time in Nied. I came back to sleep, home, in that room. I was with Gizi and Magda. I spent more time in Nied than there. I met there Shari's future husband. He proposed to me there. He met you downstairs playing, and he got you a belt, and he was playing with you. He find out who I am and he proposed to me. But he was older than my father. He was forty something, and my father was in his 40's, and he was 45. I mean he was just too old.

And I met some other 'greener' there, you know. I had a few families with girls living next door to me. Two polish girls and a family, same floor, with children. So it was, you know, it was 'heimish' (homey), I wasn't alone. I had people there, all refugees, and Serenke, so time was moving.

Meanwhile, I went down to Obersdorf to visit you. I think Leibu paid for me. I had some money, not much, very little, because Bad Nauheim didn't pay much. I got room and board, and food, and very little pay, very little money. So I remember Leibu lent me money, and I said I would pay him back, after, in America.

"Did you ever pay him back?"

"I don't think so. He came to, he was every Pesach in my house. I invited him often [in America]. I mean I paid him back"

"In other ways. [I'm sure he never really expected my mother to pay him back. He was very generous.]"

"Yes. My biggest thrill was I went down to visit you, after two months I didn't see you. That's all I had, I mean my family, that was my family. And you know how you miss a child, especially a small child, and you were so young. And I got there, I got myself a room in a chalet, and you could even make a fire. I remember everything so vividly, it left such an impression on me.

"Well that place was incredible, let me tell you."

"Never in my life did I see, high mountains, with snow. The sun was shining in the daytime and twelve o'clock I could walk without a coat, just in a dress. I wasn't dressed at all properly. I had no boots. I was in a pair of shoes with heels. My heels broke off, one of them, because it was very hilly, snowy. I had no idea how to dress. First of all I didn't have the right clothes. You needed a pair of slacks, or a warm coat, and warm dresses, and some boots. But luckily daytime it was very pleasant.

And it just- just- out of this world. Never in my life did I seen such a beautiful place. And I always said, 'If I ever have a chance I'll go back to Swiss Alps, to, just to, it's so, just so, it's just so beautiful.'

"That's how I always felt. To this day I feel that way. [I have been to Switzerland three times since I grew up, but I've never been back to Germany or Obersdorf.]"

"The chalets, and those little places. And the families, the German families there, grandfathers, grandchildren, they were all on skis. Little kids, six, seven years old, on skis, and the grandparents and the families. It was something such beautiful, and it did hurt so much when you see something like that. You know? How people can live. They miss nothing in life. They have their families, they have their fun, they have their life. And what do have, Jewish people, for two thousands years? I don't know, all we have is always pogroms, and chase them from one place to the other, never security, and ghettos, and inferiority complexes. I seen difference of people, and beautiful, healthy children, with red cheeks, blond hair, blue eyes, you know, and so healthy looking. Outdoor, tanned, middle of the winter, all tan. A world I had no [idea existed]."

"Even after the war? It hadn't touched them much then."

"No. Very little. The soldiers at the front, they died, they lost, and the cities were bombed. But the population, they didn't have luxury food, but they had food. They had everything. You should have seen those families, those children, they were so healthy looking. And you seen the DP children, what I seen those last few years. Pale, sick, emotionally disturbed children. So you just couldn't compare them. Even this generation, our children are still not- still not, they still don't look like their children. I see our children, I see Feigi's children, I see my children. I see in general the European, the refugee parent's children, second generation, it's not a healthy crowd here, still not. It needs another generation, till maybe they will stabilize and become healthier, because with malnutrition, vitamin deficiency, emotional stress, everything reacts. You pay for it. It doesn't get wiped off in one generation.

So the whole thing was a very strange emotional experience for me. And I even lost a tooth, I remember. Then I had to find a dentist, and I lost the heels. But all in all- and the snow was melting during the daytime, the streets, and I was walking those little main streets. There was shopping, shops. It was some experience. But I still left you there. Leibu didn't go visit you there, Leibu went to pick you up to bring you home."

"It's funny, I don't remember the trip there, and I don't remember the trip home. I just remember being there."

"O.K., when time was up, I don't remember, two months, three months, you were there."

"Three months, because I remember being there from Christmas to Easter."

"Then Leibu went down to pick you up and brought you home. And then you stayed with me in Ruderbergweg till we were ready to leave. But there were a lot of difficulties, yet, till we were ready to leave. The papers to- to 'shlep', it was April, May, June, July. Finally I got papers called, I should go. I'm accepted for this and this shipment. And usually, if you had a shipment, you had a number. Then there was, you had to go into Butzbach."

"Where was Butzbach?"

"Oh, Butzbach was a clearing- before going to Bremen Haven, to go for the ship already to America, you had to stay [in Butzbach]."

"How far was Bremen Haven from Frankfurt?"

"Bremen Haven was a city, a few hours, two, three hours from Frankfurt."

"And Butzbach was in between?"

"In between. It was like a camp, a clearing center what you stayed there for about a week, till they cleared your papers. They went over, they processed the papers, and you spent about a week there. It was a camp. A lot of- a few hundred people were staying there, every week. They came in groups, and they left after a week. Every week a few [hundred] new people.

So I was called in- I left August [1949]- it must have been June or July, July. Middle of July I was called in for the week. I picked you up, we went in there. So it was a big excitement, I'm on the way to America. Papers was the biggest headache there. I had so much headache. I was never legal. Illegal, kosher, not kosher, I never had the right papers. And from one office to the other. Red tape was terrible. And it's so difficult to accomplish something with papers. They refused you constantly, here and there. It was a tremendous hardship with the papers, what I went through. Everybody, but I had even harder because I came the wrong time, I had the wrong papers. Just, just, and I didn't have money enough to- always you had to 'shmear' all over. So finally I was hoping that everything is going to go smooth from here on. I got the number, I'm called to Butzbach. From there on you're supposed to go, one week here, and then you go home for a day or two. They call you, you come back to Butzbach, and then you go from Butzbach, with the transport, to Bremen Haven.

So I got in Butzbach, a whole week, from one office to the other. They called you here, they called you there, and papers, always with papers. New papers, they took papers, they got me papers, so it was papers, papers, papers, a whole week, one office into the other. It got very exciting. The last day, Friday, they usually sent you home. I go in to pick up all my papers, and the 'ken carte', and everything. Everybody got a paper when that shipment assigned, which day to come back. I got a paper 'indefinitely dismissed'. Dismissed indefinitely. I didn't understand, it was in English, so I had to go to a translator. And that's what's translated, I'm dismissed indefinitely. I had that paper for many years, I wanted to keep that because that paper gave me a lot [of heartache]. I just wanted to keep that paper."

"You don't have it anymore?"

"It got misplaced. I don't have that paper anymore. And Hungarian citizenship papers what I wanted to keep as souvenirs, a few papers, and all these papers I lost someplace. And my ship papers, everything I lost. I don't remember where, and when, and how."

"It's a pity. You had it in the United States?"

"Yes. I brought them all, and I kept them all, I can't recall where. I just know that paper said very officially, this and this date, Irene Friedman, dismissed indefinitely, wait for further notice."

"And no reason?"

"And no reason. Probably insufficient papers or something. And I wasn't kosher to begin with."

"Maybe because they had checked in Butzbach. They had papers in Butzbach which were different than what the Czech guy had done."

"Yes, maybe, it could be, I don't remember. I just couldn't find out what, because all I can remember is indefinitely, postponed indefinitely, postponed. That's all I remember. Wait till further notice. So, I went back."

"After all that you must have been so disappointed!"

"I went back sick. Then I really thought I have a nervous breakdown. It was such an anticlimax, shock, and such a hopelessness came over me. What am I going to do now? The Ruderbergweg, all that thing was temporary. It was, everything was scaling down. Everything was closing slowly. Everybody was leaving. I couldn't stay too long there either. And there was really no place where to go anymore. I had no job, I had no money, I had no place where to go. Everything looked so bleak, so hopeless. I just didn't know what to do.

I came home. And we made up [with] Serenke, that for Shabbos, I come home Friday afternoon, I won't have time to cook or anything, I come straight to her house, and I'll be there for Shabbos. That she'll prepare food for us and we'll stay with her."

"We used to go pretty often there for Shabbos, I remember."

"Yes. And from there we'll go to Butzbach. I'll go back Sunday to Ruderbergweg and we pack up. Shaya and Isaac are going to come to help me pack up, because I had to pack up completely. So I came to Serenke. And, when she learned from me what happened, she knew how I felt. And she, if not her, really I would have gotten sick that time. I'm sure I would have gotten sick that time, because I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep, I was just losing my mind. So she didn't stop talking to me, the whole weekend. 'Suri, d'ost fuhren. Suri, zorg sich nisht. Got ot'er helfen, d'ost di sehn, eppes an ihrtung. D'ost di sehn, d'ost fuhren. Dan tatte et sich miehen far dir. D'ost fuhren, sorg sich nisht, 'forget about [it]' s'is Shabbos.' (Suri, you're going to go. Suri don't worry, God will help you, you'll see, it's a mistake. You'll see, you're going to go. Your father is going to intercede [with God] on your behalf. You'll go, don't worry about it, forget about it, it's Shabbos.) And that's all I needed. That's all I just wanted to hear a whole day, that I'm going. And that's what she was doing.

She's a very smart woman, she understood the situation and she's smart, and she's kind. She wanted to help me. And she did everything possible to make me feel better. And the boys were taking care of you. Friday night, she made a very nice meal, and they were singing 'zemiros' [shabbos hymns], and they were joking around. And you know, I really got cheered up. Shabbos morning, I'll never forget that, they brought, we were, I was sleeping in one bed, Serenke in the other bed in the bedroom. The boys were sleeping in the kitchen. They brought us water, 'ugissen de hent' (to wash the hands), the boys, in bed, and they brought us breakfast in the bed, me and you and Serenke. She made 'delkelach' (small danish), cheese 'delkelach', and 'rugelach' with cinnamon, and they brought us a glass of milk. We had breakfast in bed.

After that they went to 'daven' someplace, there was a 'minyan'. And we went, Serenke, we went out for a walk, and then we came back. And we had chulent, she made, we had lunch. And she just made sure that she kept me busy, Serenke. After lunch, we didn't go lie down. She took me to some kind of a water, a river, or a lake, whatever. She took me to the lake. I'll never forget it, sitting near the lake, so beautiful, a beautiful sunny day, like today [October 27, 1985]. Sunny, calm weather, clear, beautiful, near a lake and trees. Germany is a very beautiful country, unusually beautiful, 'leider' (alas). And we were sitting there a whole afternoon with the boys, and you playing with a ball, and chasing here and there. You had a ball. You had a very good time."

"I always liked them very much."

"You liked them very much, and they liked you. And you- how old were you at that time? Five years?"

"Five."

"You had just one worry, you said to me what are you going to do, you don't know which one you want to marry. If you marry Isaac, Shaya is going to be sad, if you marry Shaya, Isaac is going to be sad."

"Yes, I remember that."

"That was your biggest problem at the time. So I said, 'Don't worry, by the time you grow up, things going to straighten out.' And Serenke didn't stop a whole afternoon, that 'You'll see Suri, d'ost fuhren, ost'de sehn, horch zech tzi, m'omer aheim gein, d'vest tzerick gein tzi de Ruderbergweg, fang sich uhn packen, greit sich tzi.' (You'll go, you'll see, listen to me, we'll go home, you'll go back to Ruderbergweg, start to pack up, get ready.)

So Shabbos was over, 'in a mazeldige shuh' (at last, literally- in a lucky hour). Sunday morning I went back to Ruderbergweg, and started to straighten out things there, what I could, what I'm going to throw away. You go with a child, I couldn't take more than two suitcases in my hands with a child. You accumulate, you know, from Bad Nauheim, from the Joint, clothes, this and that. I couldn't take everything. I had to liquidate what I had to get rid of, and clean up the house. Just in case, just in case.

Monday morning, not even morning, after lunch, I got a telegram. From Butzbach. It came down to the Jewish 'gemeinde', down there, and they brought it up for me. I should be in Butzbach, Tuesday morning, nine o'clock."

"They sure gave you a lot of warning."

"To be ready to go to Bremen Haven. So if there is any miracle, if I ever seen a miracle, two miracles, I seen. One miracle was how I got in Kosice, on the train, with a 'sheitel' and with a baby, and with a 'sheigitz' (young gentile boy) there, and here that morning that I got that telegram. The mailman brought it up."

"But you said that Isaac heard your name being called out."

"Wait a minute. Yes. All right. I got that telegram. Meanwhile, Monday morning before the telegram- no, no, they left. I left Sunday morning home, because they were supposed to go, and Serenke had her papers to go."

"Oh, you mean they were already going?"

"They were, a week later they were going. They were called in to go to Butzbach a week later than me. So they were leaving Monday to Butzbach. Monday morning. They got in Monday morning to Butzbach, and on the loudspeaker, he [Isaac] heard called, Irena Friedman and Judith Friedman should come and pick up the papers, Monday morning. And Tuesday morning to go 'anmelding sich' (register) in the office, and one o'clock to leave for Bremen Haven. And meanwhile, I got the telegram from them."

"So they had your address in Frankfurt."

"In Frankfurt, yes. Downstairs they had my address, the Jewish 'gemeinde'. They came up, and at the same time, while I got the telegram, a half an hour later, Shaya and Isaac dropped in. They came from Butzbach, they came in to me. They went in the office to check. They couldn't believe their ears, maybe it's a mistake, maybe it's not true. They didn't want to let me know before they [checked]. They went in the office with the paper and they said they want to double check. Irene Friedman, she left, she's in Frankfurt, they just want to make sure that she has to be here tomorrow morning. So when they went in the office and everything 'hut geshtimt' (checked out), they got on the train, and they came down, the two of them to Frankfurt, to tell me, and right away to start to pack. They started to pack for me, the two of us, the three of us. I took some suitcases, and we packed up that afternoon. They helped me pack up. After we packed up they went back, and the two of them were traveling on their own."

"How old were they?"

"Eleven, twelve. They were extremely mature."

"They had to be."

"Next morning they were expecting me, Serenke, and Shaya. And I got to Butzbach, I went with my papers. I didn't ask many questions, I just came in, Irene Friedman."

"But what about- you didn't show them that paper, that said postponed indefinitely."

"I didn't ask questions, I didn't show that paper. I just showed them my 'ken carte' and my other papers, and I was processed, and I was shipped off that afternoon to Bremen Haven. And you know, I was packed from in the afternoon like that's today afternoon, and tomorrow morning I was in Butzbach and the same day [we were on the way to Bremen Haven]."

"When did you take the train to Butzbach?"

"In the morning, the next morning. It was about a half hour to travel. And I was there by nine o'clock. I got up early, and the next day I was in Bremen Haven."

"So that was already July [1949]."

I have memories of our years in Germany because I was already four, five years old when I lived there. I remember Leibu taking me to the Frankfurt zoo and buying me ice cream. We even have a picture of us at the zoo. I remember my stay in Obersdorf very well, as I have already described it. I also remember Serena Taub and her sons Isaac and Shaya. They were very good to us and it was such a treat for me to spend Shabbos in their house. I especially remember that they used to sing 'zemiros' so loud and beautifully. They had very nice voices. When I was with them it was like being with a family. I guess we were two broken families who felt like a whole when we were together. Even in America, all the years I was growing up, I used to go to their house for shabbos every now and then, and it was always a wonderful treat for me.

I remember one incident with Isaac very vividly. We were walking down the road from our room on Ruderbergweg to a kiosk that was somewhere on the corner. I don't remember what we were going to buy, a drink maybe, or ice cream. We didn't like to walk on the sidewalk because it was still full of rubble from the bombings during the war. It was especially difficult for me because if I walked in the rubble, little stones would get in my shoes, and I was wearing ankle high, laced up shoes. Unlacing those shoes, cleaning out the dirt and stones, and relacing them, was a big job for a five year old.

So we were walking on the side of the gutter near the sidewalk. Suddenly we heard a car coming down the hill at great speed. We stopped, turned around to look, the car swerved at us, and then sped away. I was quite frightened by the close call and couldn't understand how it had happened. After all, we were all the way at the side of the road, and the driver had plenty of time to see us. But we recovered and continued walking. About two minutes later the same car came speeding down the hill again and did the same thing! He came zooming towards us and veered away the last second. We were really scared. Now we realized that the driver had done this on purpose. Isaac always wore a cap or a yarmulke on his head, and I believe that the driver saw we were Jews and deliberately tried to scare us. I guess we were lucky he was only trying to scare us and didn't really hurt us.

But I was very hurt emotionally. I was so shocked that someone could hate me, could hate two young children, so much, for no reason. I hadn't really experienced that before, since I was too young to remember the war itself, and had never experienced direct anti-Semitism before. If it had happened only once, I would have put it down as an accident; but the same car, doing the same thing twice, convinced me that it was intentional. I was trembling, and I remember my fear and shock to this day.