Tapestry of Hope Read online

  For Jennifer, Alex, and Willy

  LBN

  For Adam, Matthew, and Jean-Michel

  INW

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The editors thank the Vancouver Holocaust Child Survivor Group of B.C. and acknowledge the ongoing creative educational programming of Roberta Kremer and Frieda Miller. We also thank the Holocaust Education Centre for its inspirational exhibit “We Were Children Then,” curated by Viviane Gosselin. Special thanks to Angela Rebeiro, Publisher, Playwrights Canada Press.

  CONTENTS

  INTRODUCTION

  by Kathy Lowinger

  MAP

  by Visutronx

  CHILD SURVIVORS

  by Lillian Boraks-Nemetz

  I. Hiding

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT: LOUISE STEIN SORENSEN

  TELL NO ONE WHO YOU ARE:

  The hidden childhood of Régine Miller

  by Walter Buchignani

  HIDDEN CHILDREN:

  The Forgotten Survivors of the Holocaust

  by Andre Stem

  HIDE ME, BUBBA CHAYE

  by Rachel Korn

  CHILD OF THE HOLOCAUST

  by Jack Kuper

  THE SECRET OF GABI’S DRESSER

  by Kathy Kacer

  II. Loss and Exile

  SURVIVOR STORY:

  I Chose

  by Marion Kaufmann Cassirer

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT: MARGOT HOWELL

  SURVIVOR STORY:

  In a Time of Terror: When Will Mother Return?

  by René Goldman

  REMEMBER ME

  by Irene N. Watts

  SURVIVOR STORY:

  The Toy Steam Engine

  by Serge (Wajnryb) Vanry

  III. Selection

  SURVIVOR STORY:

  Auschwitz

  by Leo Lowy

  HOLDING HIM

  by Deborah Schnitzer

  NONE IS TOO MANY

  by Jason Sherman

  HANA’S SUITCASE:

  A True Story

  by Karen Levine

  IV. Ghetto

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT: RUTH KRON SIGAL

  THE OLD BROWN SUITCASE:

  A Teenager’s Story of War and Peace

  by Lillian Boraks-Nemetz

  CHILDREN OF NIGHT

  by Emanuel Gabriel

  V. In Flames

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT: MALKA PISCHANITSKAYA

  ROMEO AND JULIET IN SUCZORNO

  by Martha Blum

  THE GHOST TOWN OF KAZIMIERZ

  by Lillian Boraks-Nemetz

  VI. The Camps

  SURVIVOR STORY:

  Buchenwald

  by Robbie Waisman

  MASS GRAVES

  by Sarah Klassen

  THE COUNTY OF BIRCHES

  by Judith Kalman

  ALL THERE IS TO KNOW ABOUT ADOLPH EICHMANN

  by Leonard Cohen

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT: PETER SUEDFELD

  VII. Resistance

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT: BENTE NATHAN THOMSEN

  LISA

  by Carol Matas

  MY CANARY YELLOW STAR

  by Eva Wiseman

  A TIME TO CHOOSE

  by Martha Attema

  VIII. Identity – Family Secrets

  SURVIVOR STATEMENTS: ALEX BUCKMAN / MARIETTE ROZEN DODUCK

  LETTER FROM VIENNA

  by Claudia Cornwall

  GOODBYE MARIANNE

  by Irene Kirstein Watts

  ON SAINT KATERINE’S DAY

  by Lili Berger

  SHHH

  by Deborah Schnitzer

  IX. “The Holocaust and After”

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT: CELINA KOLIN LIEBERMAN

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT: RITA SMILOVICI AKSELROD

  THE HOLOCAUST AND AFTER

  by Mordecai Richler

  ALIEN

  by Kenneth Sherman

  ASSIGNMENT: ANNE FRANK

  by Ellen Schwartz

  I SAT IN LOEWS THEATRE STARING AT THE MOVIE SCREEN

  by Jean Little

  HALL OF REMEMBRANCE

  by Leo Vogel

  TIME LINE

  FURTHER READING

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  INTRODUCTION

  by Kathy Lowinger

  If the Holocaust were about evil alone, it would be best to shut its memory away, and never breathe its name. But if the Holocaust is about immeasurable suffering, it is also about courage. If it is about despair, it is also about hope. If it is about needless death, it is also about precious life.

  Among the things I treasure the most are two tiny cracked photos. One is of a curly-haired boy, about four years old, clutching a truck as he squints into the sun. The other is of a boy hardly more than a baby. He is perched, laughing, on the running board of a car. They are my brothers, Robert and Paul. They died five years before I was born, and all that remains of them are the photos, their names inscribed in one of Auschwitz’s carefully kept ledgers, and a memory that is older than I am. Now that everyone in my parents’ generation is dead, I am probably the only person alive who remembers that once there were two little boys who loved trucks and cars, and were dressed up to have their pictures taken on a sunny summer day long ago. They trod so lightly and vanished in smoke.

  Because I am the keeper of those brief lives, I understand the feeling of urgency in each contribution to Tapestry of Hope. There are so many lives to set down before time sweeps them out of reach, so many acts of courage and faith to share before they are forgotten. Through their stories, poems, and personal accounts, the contributors to Tapestry of Hope record the darkest of times, not to dismay us but to show us that nothing can extinguish the spark that gives dignity to life.

  I have always been inspired by the great Hungarian freedom fighter and poet, Hannah Szenes. She was tortured and executed by the Hungarian police in November 1944, when she was only twenty-three years old. Hannah Szenes wrote many poems including “Blessed is the Match.” In it she calls upon us all to be like a simple match: even as we are consumed, we can defeat the darkness with our light.

  Each of the writers you will meet in Tapestry of Hope knows about darkness. Each of the stories they share has to do with the darkness, it is true, but also with what counts: lighting the matches of hope that chase the night away.

  CHILD SURVIVORS

  From Ghost Children

  by Lillian Boraks-Nemetz

  For the Child Survivors of the Holocaust

  I drift among you

  my brothers and sisters

  a shadow of myself

  a wisp of memory

  recycling fragments

  of an anguished past

  in this room

  we recall as in a seance

  our former selves

  denied a childhood

  your voices

  come out of the cellars

  and the attics of time

  and frozen nightmares

  murmurings that stir

  even these foreign walls

  with sounds of guns

  and death rattling

  in the camps

  and ghettoes

  that God forgot

  and in His forgetfulness

  left us with a ghostly memory

  you my sister

  recall your shame

  at having stolen bread

  when your body ached with hunger

  and you my sister

  with helpless anger

  watched a sibling die

  and you my brother

  lived in hiding

  without your parents

  while you my brother

  died in Auschwitz

  no childhood for us then

  no schools no gardens

>   with a dog and cat

  no neat kitchens

  with mothers baking cakes

  only time’s catacombs

  where we play hide and seek

  sustain our memories

  I

  Hiding

  SURVIVOR STATEMENT

  LOUISE STEIN SORENSEN

  I was born in Holland in 1929, and lived there with my parents and older sister. I will never forget the panic and the ominous radio announcements that day in May 1940, when German planes flew over our home in Naarden, near Amsterdam. Two years later we were forced into the ghetto. By January 1943 we were separated and hidden by the Dutch underground. For the first six months I was moved around to seven different hiding places. From the late summer of that year until the Canadians liberated us on April 17, 1945, I was hiding in the tiny attic room of a farmworker’s house near Apeldoorn, never going outside or seeing other people for almost two years. There were no books or even writing materials available. Eventually my parents joined me there. The first Allied soldier I saw was an Aboriginal Canadian.

  TELL NO ONE WHO YOU ARE:

  The hidden childhood of Régine Miller

  by Walter Buchignani

  Jewish life is fill of peril in Nazi-occupied Belgium. The SS arrest Régine’s mother and brother. The ten-year-old girl poses as a Gentile child and is forced to change identity constantly. The threat of betrayal is always near. Régine’s dearest wish is that someone from her family will survive the war.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  The tall, narrow house stood on a quiet, tree-lined street that, like Boitsfort, seemed worlds away from the clutter and noise of Brussels. Régine’s room was on the upper floor and again it had a view of neighboring homes. But now she shared the room with the two other girls Nicole had told her about.

  Nicole had predicted that they could all be friends, and Régine hoped so, too. She looked forward to having other girls to talk to. But as soon as she walked into the room, she had the feeling that Nicole was wrong. The beds of the two girls had been placed side by side at one end of the room while her own bed stood alone at the other end. It did not seem friendly at all. That night as she lay in her new bed, Régine heard the two girls whispering in the dark. They did not want to include her in their conversation.

  The next day the girls went out on an errand.

  “You’re too young to come with us,” the first girl said to Régine.

  “And you have chores to do,” said the second. The girls giggled and walked out the door.

  Régine was left behind to make the beds.

  In the days that followed, Régine found herself being treated like a servant. She had to change sheets, dust furniture, and scrub floors. By the end of the first week, her hands and knees were covered with calluses.

  The hardest room to clean was where Monsieur and Madame Bernard worked. The room was at the back of the house and had two tall chairs and two sinks with mirrors above them. There was also a big hair dryer where women customers sat, reading magazines.

  The floor was always covered with hair. No sooner had Régine swept it than she had to start all over again. Customers came and went all day. Régine was expected to stay out of sight when clients were in the house. But as soon as they left, tracking hair all the way to the front door, she was called in to sweep up.

  As she swept and scrubbed, Régine felt the eyes of her father watching her. She doubted that he would approve of the work she was expected to do. But then again, she thought if he were here he would probably say it was necessary for the sake of Nicole, who was doing her best to hide Régine from the Germans. She decided not to mention anything when Nicole visited after the first week.

  “Are you happy?” Nicole asked, after handing over the pay envelope.

  Régine lowered her eyes and uttered a weak “yes.” “Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” Régine repeated, hiding her despair.

  “Good. I’ll be back in a few weeks,” Nicole told her.

  Régine would have liked to rush after her, but instead she stood and watched. She wished that she was still in Boitsfort. Madame Andre had not been friendly, but she was better than the Bernards. The two girls made Régine feel more lonely than when she had stayed with the solitary old woman.

  She was particularly upset because of the Jewish girl. She had hoped to be her friend and wanted to ask her questions. Where was she from? Where were her parents? Why was she staying here? Was she hiding from the Germans, too? But the girl paid no attention to her.

  One day, Madame Bernard announced a surprise.

  “We’re not expecting any customers today,” she told Régine. “Why don’t we do your hair? Would you like that?”

  Régine nodded enthusiastically. She had often wished to change the style of her hair, which was straight and plain. Its auburn color was more red than brown. Adults had always admired the color, but the kids at school used to make fan of her and called her “roussette,” or redhead.

  Her hair had been kept short by her mother so it would be clean and shiny, but it had grown long during the year she had stayed with Madame Andre.

  “How about a permanent?”

  A permanent! It was exactly what she had always wished for. Curls!

  Régine settled into one of the tall chairs, and Madame Bernard went to work. She tied a large bib around Régine’s neck and washed her hair in the sink. Without cutting her hair, she began applying the permanent lotion and putting on the curlers. Then Régine was put under the big dryer.

  It took an awfully long time for her hair to dry, or so it seemed to Régine, who was eager to see herself with curls. The dryer was turned off and Régine sat in the tall chair so the curlers could be removed. It seemed to take forever. Was something wrong?

  “Almost finished,” said Madame Bernard.

  “How does it look?” Régine asked. She could not see because the mirror hung on the wall behind her.

  “You have to give it some time. That’s the way it is with a permanent. After a few days it will look nice.”

  When the last curler was removed, Régine was handed a small mirror. She brought it up slowly and looked at her reflection. What she saw was worse than she could have imagined. She held the mirror at arm’s length for a wider view, but the sight did not improve. She brought her free hand up to her head and grabbed at her hair. The curls were so tight she could not run her hand through it.

  “Don’t worry,” Madame Bernard said. “It’ll get better.” She looked pleased with herself.

  But her hair did not get better. She still could not put a comb through it by the end of her first month when Nicole arrived. She reacted with shock when she saw Régine. She handed over a pay envelope and took Régine aside.

  “What did they do to your hair?”

  Régine lowered her eyes. She did not want to cause trouble for Nicole. Monsieur and Madame Bernard were standing right behind her.

  “It’s nothing,” she began to say, but her voice cracked. Nicole bent down and looked into her face. “What’s wrong? Tell me.”

  “It’s nothing.”

  “Is it your hair?” Nicole asked. “Don’t worry. It’s not that bad. It’ll get better.”

  “It’s not that,” Régine said, and held out her hands.

  Nicole took hold of Régine’s hands and her eyes widened. Calluses covered her knuckles completely. The tips of her fingers were cracked and showed traces of dried blood. Her fingernails were broken. Nicole rose and stared at the Bernards. Régine had never seen her so angry.

  “Go up to your room,” Nicole told Régine. “I have some things to discuss here.”

  Régine climbed the stairs, wondering if she had done the right thing. Would her father have approved? She sat on the edge of her bed and remembered what he had told her as he sat at his worktable and cut a square of red material into the shape of a star to glue on the back of the yellow Star of David the Germans were forcing them to wear.

  “If you are forced to
do something you think is wrong,” her father had said, “then you must protest.” Régine decided she had done the right thing by showing Nicole her hands.

  A few days later, Nicole returned. She took Régine aside and told her she had made arrangements for her to stay with another family. That was not all. Nicole said she had something to tell her. She could not explain to her right away, although it was very important.

  “Go pack your bag,” Nicole told her. “We don’t have much time.”

  What important news did Nicole have for her? Was it about her father? Régine hurried up the stairs. She was relieved to be leaving this household after only one month. She returned downstairs and said a curt goodbye to Monsieur and Madame Bernard. They looked embarrassed.

  Nicole was waiting outside. Régine went to join her, passing the two girls who stood watching. She heard them giggle just before the door slammed behind her.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Régine boarded the tram and took a seat by the window, with her duffel bag in her lap. She scratched her messy head and waited nervously for Nicole to tell her the important news.

  Nicole held her briefcase tightly as she spoke. She had to talk fast, she said, because there was very little time. They were going to the bus station in Brussels. Régine would take a bus that would bring her to a new hiding place in the countryside.

  “You understand? It won’t be like before,” she told Régine. “I won’t be able to visit you. It will be too far.”

  Régine could not hide her disappointment. “You mean, I won’t see you?”

  “It is only for three months,” Nicole said, “and I’ll write.”

  “Where will I be living?”

  “In Andoumont,” Nicole said. She put her briefcase flat on her lap. “It’s a small village in Liège.”

  Régine had never been to Liège but knew that it was south of Brussels, not far from the Ardennes mountains and the German border. She had learned by heart at the école primaire all the nine provinces of Belgium and their capital cities. The capital of the province of Liège was easy to remember because it was also called Liège.

  Nicole rummaged inside her briefcase. “It’s smaller than Boitsfort. And the people you’ll be with live on a farm.”

  Many children from Brussels had been sent to live in the countryside since the German Occupation began more than three years before. The countryside was safer than the city in the case of bombings and food was more plentiful.