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5-Revisiting Austria in 1981, Relections and Photographs
Would you like me at this point to tell you how in 1981 I went back to Vienna. By this time, I'm already a married woman with three sons grown up. I had never wanted to return to Vienna. But my husband talked me into it and I decided I would retrace my steps. I had developed a fantasy ovin 1981er the years that I lived in a little brown beautiful house in Vienna.
So when we came to Vienna we were guests of the principal cellist of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, who we had met here. On the day that I was going to look back to that apartment, we went to the address - I had an address - and I stood there, there's this enormous apartment house. I was in a state of absolute confusion because I was looking for a little brown house. It took ten minutes, they didn't understand what was going on, and I said, "I just have to stand here, something's wrong." Then I suddenly saw that the windows of that bottom floor where they used to bring out cans of beans - because I told you about that free kitchen - but they actually make other stops in Vienna by taking the beans - the extra beans - out on these huge - they looked like garbage cans. They used put them on a truck and take them off to other places. And I suddenly saw those windows, and then I said, "Oh My God! I thought I was living in that dollhouse." All these years I had that fantasy of living in that dollhouse.
So then I knew where I was, the building suddenly became familiar. And to try to find the apartment I lived in was something. Looking at the apartment building I realized that it was old and decrepit and nothing had changed. And I said, "I know if I find that bathroom, with that tub, I know that will be the apartment I was in." So we went from apartment to apartment and our host would talk to the people. They would either open up a little window, a little shutter inside to look out to see who it was or open the door a little and he would say, "Here is a lady who lives in San Francisco who lived here in 1939." And since they heard that many of them would close the door, have nothing to do with us.
But we explored and we went to one place and then they said, "You know, on the first floor," that's above the free kitchen, "there is a woman who has been living there since 1941 and maybe she could help you." So we rushed to that place and we opened the door, and suddenly I knew I was home. Just by her opening the door, I saw the threshold and I recognized it. And he asked her - our host - if we could come in. He again explained who I was. And she welcomed us in and I knew just where to go. There was the bathroom and there was the tub and there was the ransom that was opened. It was just like time had stood still. And I had gone into the room we lived in and I touched the drapes, you know because I used to push them aside to look out there. And I felt that familiarity. It was really something.
And then we also went to Baden. I had, by chance, by real chance, received a telephone call one week before we left this apartment to go on our trip. It was from the son of the chief rabbi of Baden. We had spoken before. He called me up and I said, "You know what, we're going to Vienna in a week and we're going to Baden." And he said, "You're going to Baden," he says, "I've just come from Baden, and I have to tell you, you have to go see the compound of the religious, the Jewish organizations." That was not on my list at all. I didn't even remember that. And he told me that you can't tell what its like. He gave me the address, he said next door to that compound was where a concierge lived and I should ring the bell and she'll come out and tip her and ask her to let us in. He says, "I don't want to tell you anything more than that."
So we go to Baden and the minute I came into Baden, my German came back. I could start speaking German, it was the strangest thing. And the smell, everything was familiar. So we walked around. We tried to find our place where we lived. And I found out that in that compound - in the back of it - there was a furniture making factory. And when the Nazis took over they turned that into a munitions plant. And when the war started, the Allies knew about it through spy information, and they bombed this whole place. It was just bombed flat. So when we came to it all I saw was grass and the brook that I had remembered as being such a river with ships - my ships floating - had turned into a trickle. It was a trickle and there was cement on both sides of it. Great change in things. So then we walked downtown toward the area were the synagogue was going to be, and there was this beautiful open air cafe. We decided to have some coffee and every body was sitting there laughing like life was gorgeous and beautiful and nothing had ever happened that was bad, eating chocolate cake with whipped cream on it.
And then it was over and we walked to the address and we rang the bell of the concierge and she waved the tip, she didn't want it, she just opened the door. We walked into this place and there ahead of us was the big synagogue. And we walked into it and it was like time stood still. Nothing had been done to it since it had been fire bombed on Kristallnacht. It was full of broken glass and hunks of the building that had been all part of the damage done lying all around. The steps covered with the debris of glass and wood and junk and feces of rats from years of living there. It was just the most horrible site.
And we looked around the whole place. The other buildings were gone, just the synagogue standing there by itself like this monument, like this black - I thought of it as this cancer sitting the midst of this community. And outside is this other world were people are laughing and they're dressed beautifully, eating chocolate cake with shlag - which is whipped cream. And I wanted so desperately to pull them in. "Why do you keep this here?" And then I asked around, I asked our host, I asked people, "What's going on, why don't they do something with this?" I was told this is the mentality of the Austrians. They don't want to face the reality; there is the reality of what they did. Either rebuild it, or destroy it and open it up into the street. Couldn't face it, just leave the wall there, you can' t see anything that's going on behind the wall. And outside ivy grows, and let it be there. It was a horrible site. I wanted to get out of Austria as fast as possible. Because I felt I was amongst the enemy still.
How did you feel when you arrived back home?
We had planned to just stay a few days. I had thought it would be fun if we took a train and retraced my steps to Genoa. But that train station was gone, which we had left, which was full of the sight of us leaving Austria came back to my mind. It was a huge glass station and coal burning trains at that time. And all these fleeing Jews, each one carry one suitcase to get on a train, hopefully, you know and all these miserable, disgusting SS officers all over the place, blowing whistles and screaming and dogs and all that. So we went to the big train station, but now it was super new with electric trains. We took a train to Venice. And I swore I'd never go back and I haven't I won't.
You won't go back
I won't go back. Although it's a different time and I don't really want to put the blame of the sins of the parents onto children. That's not what I want to do. But just going back to the country - no thanks. It was, it was very traumatic, very traumatic to go back.
Reflections
Has your faith changed due to your experiences from when you were younger until now?
It hasn't. Look what's going on in the world. Look what's going on in the world. Those of us who were lucky enough to survive thought that "My God," the world is going to change, people are going to recognize that human beings have to - everyone has a right to live, no matter what your religion is and what your color is and what your culture is. It was going to be a new world. All the refugees thought that. And now look at the world. I mean there is more - there are holocausts all over the place - genocide let's say. It doesn't end.
Is it hard to talk about what happened?
I must say I've talked about it so many times but you never - every time I talk about it I'm transported back in time. You can hear my voice, you know, it chokes up. You don't forget it.
Is there something that you remembered here today that you haven't remembered in a long time?
It just so happens that, you know there's been of course, all of you know, you're doing the work yourself of oral history. And for years it's been - and rightfully so - mainly those who survived the camps. And then there opened up other categories of survivors like hidden children or transport children etc. And finally down at the bottom of all of this, the refugees, which I am one. And so I of course represent in your project like the very beginning of it all.
When the Spielberg oral history project was going on, somebody called me and I said, "You know I'm not a survivor, I'm a refugee, and I think you want to take, you want to work only with the survivors." Then I spoke to my sisters after that and we decided to do our own project. So each one of us has taken a major chapter of our lives and have recorded it and are putting it on cds. My older sister put out 13 CDs. And her's goes back - since she's five-an-a-half years older than I am - hers goes quite a bit back of recalling what life was like in the mountains, in the big city, and in little Baden, and in great detail. She brings the whole story, talks about herself with the red dress and all these close shavings, and all these big huge miracles that stand out quiet prominently that saved our lives.
She takes the story of the family up to the ship arriving in New York Harbor seeing the Statue of Liberty - that's where she ends. And then I pick up the story, passing the Statue of Liberty, New York, and then settling in Boston and in Roxbury - which became a transported Polish community, from Poland to Roxbury - a section of Boston. I go through all of that. Mine will be three CDs. It is also going to be in a jacket which I'm designing with my son who does Photoshop - it will be full of collages of my family and pictures of them.
Of course the big challenge will be Lisa who was just five years old when we arrived. And she has nothing to say about the past, and she happens to be a professional journalist. So I said, "Look, you're a professional writer. Just pretend that you're at the word processor. You take two letter and stick into that two letters a big story." I'm looking forward to that. That's a very nice project that we're doing - which is something we are sending down to our children and their children.
Why is it important that you share your story?
Oh, it's very important. It's very important that everyone should know about all of these things. Even now, even as we are sitting here, I'm sure you know there are Holocaust deniers. And when my generation dies it will be a battle for the historians to be constantly fighting to keep this story alive. And it's important for people who are not threatened by holocausts to know that this can happen to anybody. It can happen just because you're white and you have blue eyes, because maybe another race has become more powerful. So if this is part of the human condition it has to be told. And maybe in some way that story will have some impact to change the human consciousness. All of the stories of Genocide have to be told and everyone should know them.
We all want to thank you for giving us your interview today, it was very informative. Thank you. I am very glad that you came and I am very glad to have told you what I know.
Photographs
Could you describe the picture we're seeing here?
Yes. These are my parents. It was taken shortly after we arrived in Roxsbury. I have to tell you that when I first saw my father after being away a year, I couldn't recognize him. He looked like an old man. He was 36 years old in this picture - 36 to me is very young and he looked to me he looked like an ancient man of 60.
Could you describe the picture we're seeing here?
Yes. I think it was taken probably at the beginning of 1938. Here I am and I'm 8 years old. Here is my mother and Lisa the baby, she's 4 years old here. And my sister Nina who is 14 years old here. And we are sitting in front of a part of the Kurpark which was the big gorgeous park in Baden where my mother used to like taking us everyday at noon.
Could you describe the picture we're seeing here?
This is the front page taken from the passport itself. Here I am age 9.
Could you describe the picture we're seeing here?
This is just another page of the passport giving the immigration identification number.
