Kanada (14 page)

Wednesday, August 1, 1945 –
Thursday, August 2, 1945

T
he sun was low on the horizon when we arrived at the Landsberg Displaced Persons Camp. My heart sank when I saw the barbed wire on top of the iron fence that enclosed it. It looked like a concentration camp.

“Sandor, are we crazy to do this willingly?”

Sandor was talking to an American soldier with a rifle slung over his shoulder. One of the sentries escorted us to a building for registration. A woman wearing a badge that said
UNRRA
was waiting for us behind a table piled high with documents.

“Welcome to Landsberg,” she said. “My name is Margaret. I work for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. Don't hesitate to ask me any questions.”

We remained silent.

She helped us fill out documents. When we finished, she picked up a spray can from the table and stood up. Sandor went first. Next it was my turn. I closed my eyes and held my hands in front of my mouth while she sprayed me with
DDT
. Miri came after me. I was glad that I was wearing trousers when she sprayed the ddt under Miri's skirt.

The woman apologized. “I am sorry, but we must do this to kill any lice.”

She passed us on to her colleague.

“It's a good thing that you have reasonably good clothes,” the second
UNRRA
lady said. “Our supplies are low.”

She gave each of us cooking and eating utensils, soap, and a prickly army blanket.

“Now go to that man,” she pointed. “He is with the American Joint Distribution Committee. That's a mouthful. We call it the Joint.”

The man led us to the camp kitchen. I don't know what I expected, but it wasn't the dirt on the floor and the filth covering the counters and the pots and pans. A cook with a messy apron and even dirtier hands dipped a ladle into a huge metal cauldron simmering on the stove. He filled our bowls with a green liquid.

“Pea soup,” he explained. “It's the best we can do right now.” He laughed and handed each of us a slice of corn-bread. “To sop up the soup.”

The Joint official looked at the documents we had been issued, and he led us toward red brick barracks in the distance.
Sandor was told to go to the men's building, while Miri and I were assigned to the women's block.

We climbed up to the second floor and were taken into a large room divided into cubicles by tall, wooden lockers.

“We try to group our residents according to nationality,” our guide explained. “Many of the women here are Hungarian, and most of them are Jewish but not all.”

He stopped in front of a cubicle. “Your new home,” he said with a kind smile.

The room contained a bunk bed made of rough wood, a battered table, and two upturned boxes that served as chairs. There was a hot plate on the table. We stowed our belongings in the lockers, and the official left.

Miri sat on the bottom bunk. She bounced up and down on the bed.

“A palace!” She laughed. “Can I be on the top bunk?”

“Sure.”

“Hello, girls,” a reedy voice said in Hungarian.

A woman with a wizened face stood beside our table. Her shabby dress hung on her skeletal frame. Her face was so worn that it was impossible to guess her age. She was coughing so hard that she had difficulty completing a sentence.

“Where are you from?” she wheezed.

“Papa,” Miri answered.

“I am from Komarom. My name is Andrea Forster.” She stopped to make a hollow whooping sound. “My daughter
and I were in Auschwitz. Her name is Magda. Did either of you meet anybody by that name?”

I shook my head. She stared at me.

“You look like my Magda.” She turned on her heels, as if saying another word would have taken too much out of her.

The woman in the next cubicle stuck her head out from behind the locker.

“Is Andrea still looking for her daughter?”

I nodded.

“She'll never find her. Her daughter was sent to the left. But did you run into my Jolan? Jolan Vidor from Gyor? She was in Auschwitz.”

Her face fell when I told her no. Others began to shout out names and where they were from. Everyone wanted to know if we had any news about their missing relatives.

“Lili Krausz from Balatonfured? She was in Auschwitz.”

“What about Moishe Stern from Paszto? Do you know where he is?”

Over and over we explained that we had no news. I thought my heart would break because I knew that we were killing hope. Except for Andrea's hacking cough, the room was silent once again.

I wanted to wash up before changing into Frau Schmidt's dress. The bathroom was at the end of the hall. The corridor leading to it was lit by a dingy lightbulb, but even in the gloom I saw that the floor was littered with rotting food. My stomach turned when I saw human excrement along the walls.

The bathrooms were so foul that my stomach gave a mighty heave, and I wretched into a toilet. The sinks were plugged with stinking scraps people had tried to wash their dishes in them. I had to try several taps before I found one that worked to wash my hands and face. I wiped my hands on my trousers and my face on my sleeve.

Miri was waiting for me in the cubicle. “What's the matter? Why are you so pale?” she asked.

“I threw up. The bathrooms are revolting! Don't go!”

She laughed.

“I have no choice.”

I changed into my dress. I smoothed down my hair and used the edge of the documents that Margaret, the
UNRRA
lady, had given me to clean my nails.

When Miri came back, we went to look for Sandor. We didn't have to go far. He was in front of our building with a group of young people. Some of them were leaning against the building, others sat on the ground. Most of them were wearing their concentration camp pajamas. They were listening intently to a man in a British soldier's uniform with a Star of David on his sleeve.

Sandor moved over to make room for us, and we sat beside him on the ground.

“I was waiting for you,” he said. “Meet my new friend.” A stocky young man was seated beside him. He smiled and shook our hands.

“My name is Natan Weiszmann.”

“I am Jutka.”

“And I am Miri.”

She smiled at him widely. Natan's ears turned crimson.

Sandor pulled me close to him.

The soldier was speaking in Hebrew, pausing so that a boy could translate his words into Hungarian.

“Eretz Israel awaits you,” said the soldier. “Eretz Israel is the homeland for Jews like you and me. As you know, the British are preventing your return to your homeland. That's why we're here.”

“What do you mean?” asked Miri.

“The Jewish Brigade is here to help you get to our home-land. I came to Landsberg to make your dreams come true.”

“How?” asked Natan.

“It's best not to reveal our plans openly,” said the soldier, “but be assured that we know what we're doing.”

“They are going to take us by ship to Eretz Israel and then smuggle us into the country without the British knowing,” whispered Sandor.

The soldier had finished speaking. A young man stood up and squeezed out “Hava Nagila” on a battered accordion. We clasped hands and formed a circle. We danced slowly at first and then faster and faster. When we finally stopped, I had to bend over to catch my breath. I felt strange. It took me a while to realize that what I was feeling was happiness for the first time in ages.

After breakfast the next morning, we registered with
UNRRA
and the International Red Cross to trace our families. Hope
is an odd creature. I knew that it was foolish, but I kept on hoping that Miri's information was wrong, and by some miracle Papa and Dezso were still alive and were waiting for me in another
DP
camp. I explained to the officials that my name would not be on lists of survivors released from Auschwitz-Birkenau because I had lied when we were tattooed and registered in the concentration camp. I had said that my name was Judit Freis in order to be allowed to stay with my friends. This meant that if any of my relatives survived the war, they wouldn't know that I was alive. I would have to find them myself on the lists of survivors published daily in the camp newspapers or on the radio program that listed the names of survivors seeking their relatives.

Once we'd finished registering, the warm July day yawned ahead. Miri stayed behind with Natan while Sandor and I walked aimlessly. The size of the camp amazed me. Its littered, makeshift streets rang with different languages. It was easy to see that the camp housed both Jews and non-Jews and that the two groups were quite separate from each other.

The sun warmed our faces and cast a golden glow over the shabby buildings. Sandor and I held hands. When we arrived at the fence surrounding the camp, we had to stop. We gazed outside through the barbed wire and the golden glow evaporated. Across the street, well-dressed people were strolling and enjoying the summer weather.

“You'd think they won the war,” said Sandor. “They're outside and we're still in here.”

I watched a young couple stoop to admire a puppy on a leather leash. The plump girl's long curtain of hair hung to her shoulders. Her beau leaned his head forward and whispered something in her ear. I couldn't hear what he was saying, but her trilling laugh echoed over to us. She seemed so much younger than I felt, than I would ever feel again.

Sandor ruffled my hair. “Curly top,” he said.

“My hair is too short.”

“It'll grow,” he said. “You're still pretty.”

I punched him in the arm. “Liar!”

“It's true,” he said, pulling me so close to him that I could hear his stomach grumble. “Sorry!” He grinned. “I'm hungry.” He looked up. “The sun's almost overhead. It must be noon. Let's get some lunch.”

We set out for the camp kitchen. As we turned the corner, our way was blocked by women shrieking and throwing stones at a lone figure in the middle of the crowd. The blond head of the woman in the middle was lowered, so I couldn't see her face.

“Murderer! You killed my Esther!” cried a woman as she flung a rock at the cowering figure.

“You deserve to die, you beast!”

“Die, Kapo! Die, Kapo!”

The woman in the center raised her head. Our eyes met. It was the Kapo of my block from Auschwitz. She was dressed in rags, and her face was gaunt, but it was her.

My memories overwhelmed me: the contempt in her voice when she cursed me, the hours we spent at Appell, the
bite of her baton when she took me to the Lagerführer's office to be put to death. I remembered her leer when she condemned Eva to die. I remembered and remembered. I knew that I could never, would never, forget. As if in a trance, I bent, picked up a stone, and threw it. It hit her arm.

“No, Jutka, no!” cried Sandor.

I ignored him. I picked up another stone and raised my arm. He caught my wrist. The crowd parted and three
GIS
appeared. One of them shot his rifle into the air and ordered us to leave. We scattered. I held on to Sandor's arm, the stone tightly clutched in my fist. When we arrived at the building that housed the kitchen, I let it drop to the ground.

“I am glad the soldiers came,” I told Sandor. “I don't know if I could have stopped myself.”

Saturday, October 20, 1945 –
Tuesday, October 30, 1945

T
he
DP
camp was run by
UNRRA
and the U.S. army.

When Major Irving Heymont, the head of the new American battalion, arrived in early October, the camp went through an incredible transformation. Heymont ordered the removal of the barbed wire from the top of the fence surrounding the camp. From then on, our own camp police guarded the gate. Best of all, we did not have to get passes from the Americans to leave the camp. It felt wonderful and scary at the same time to know that we could come and go as we pleased. The non Jewish residents were transferred to other
DP
camps or were sent home. Most of them had families waiting for them. I was glad to see them go. Many of them had collaborated with the Nazis. It was difficult to live with people who hated us with such a passion.

The men formed work brigades that spent hours with shovels and wheelbarrows cleaning the streets of the camp. Miri and I scrubbed and swept and washed with our block-mates until our building shone.

I never found a single familiar name on the camp newspaper lists of survivors. Surely I couldn't be the only one in my family to have survived! There had to be somebody else besides me. Nobody, nobody. Margaret from the
UNRRA
office had given me writing paper, a pencil, a few envelopes, and stamps. I sat down on one of the wooden boxes by the rickety table in our cubicle and tried to think who I could contact in Hungary. At first, I was going to write to Klari to tell her that I was alive, but I was afraid that my letter would be intercepted by her parents or by Tamas. The only other person I could think of was Julia, Agi's housekeeper. Julia had been kind to us.

My second letter was to Papa's cousin who had sent my family the package from Canada:

I put both letters into envelopes and sealed them. I had Julia's address, but the mail was not reliable in Hungary. I knew that Iren lived in Ottawa, but I had no street address. I wondered if either letter would ever be read. If they were and anyone answered out of the void, it would help me decide where I wanted to go. I would make up my mind only after I received their replies. I didn't tell Sandor about the letters.

I looked at the clock ticking on the wall. If I hurried, I would still have time to give my letters to Margaret before the day's mail left the camp.

“One more time, and this time faster!” barked Ari, the shaliach from Palestine. He was a member of the Hagana, and he had replaced the soldier from the Jewish Brigade who had spoken to us when we arrived. Ari had us marching every morning. I didn't mind.

“Good work, Weltner,” Ari said as I puffed through the finish line near the back of the group.

“But I am slow!”

“That doesn't matter. You try hard. I want to see you on track-and-field day.”

That seemed unlikely. My days were full. In addition to cleaning up the camp and marching and exercising every morning to prepare us for Eretz Israel, we studied Hebrew and Jewish history with Ari. But it was for a future that made no sense to me. It was as if someone had erased me my name, my home, my country.

Ari was confident. “When the time comes, you will know what's right for you. You'll realize that Eretz Israel is the only place for a Jewish girl.”

His certainty confused me. I marched and studied and hoped I would make the right decision. I knew that I didn't want to be parted from Sandor and Miri. I wanted to see Eretz Israel flourish, but I dreamt of Canada, all cold and pure and covered in snow. I had had that dream when Mama was alive, and if I gave it up, my old life would vanish.

Although I liked Hebrew classes, the most exciting part of my days was in the afternoon when I attended regular school. It was wonderful to be learning again. Math was still a struggle, but a dignified old man, Professor Berger, taught us literature. We had few books, so we relied on his memory. It was when I listened to his musical voice reciting poetry that I felt my soul begin to heal.

School had been canceled because the first democratic elections were being held in the camp. I was too young to vote, but my blockmates had all gone to elect the new camp committee. I lay on my bed, relishing the quiet.

I must have been dozing, because I was startled to see Andrea. She was at the foot of the bunk with a suitcase in her hand, dressed in a threadbare coat. She wheezed and covered her mouth. Andrea had taken a liking to me. I was the only person she spoke to and that wasn't often. Usually she would just come into the cubicle, sit down silently, and stare at me. At first, it rattled me, but after a while, I got so used to her that I forgot she was there.

“I came to say good-bye.”

I sat up. “Where are you going?”

She perched on the edge of my mattress.

“I'm going to find Magda,” she said. “She is all I've got. She must be in another
DP
camp in the American zone.”

“But, Andrea,” I said softly, “you know that you won't be able to find her. You know that she was sent to the left in Auschwitz.”

Her voice became strident. “I don't believe it! Magda must be alive! She would never leave me! She may be sick and waiting for me to find her.”

“No!” I shook my head for emphasis. I wasn't doing her a favor by feeding her fantasies. “I like to think that my papa and brother are alive too, but I know better. We must face reality!”

She stood up straight. “You don't understand …”

Footsteps pounded on the wooden floor and Sandor appeared. His vitality filled the cubicle, making it feel smaller than ever.

He grabbed my hands, pulled me up, and danced me around the tiny space.

“You'll never guess who is coming to our camp!”

“Who?”

“David Ben Gurion!” He spun me around. “Isn't it unbelievable?”

“Why would the head of the Jewish Agency in Palestine be coming to Landsberg?”

“I don't know, but he is on his way here from Munich.”

I turned to Andrea, but she was gone.

A cheering crowd lined both sides of the road. There were so many people that I couldn't see David Ben Gurion until he climbed onto a podium. Women held out bouquets of flowers to him while men waited to shake his hand. He was a small man, but I forgot his size as soon as he began to speak. He told us that Eretz Israel was our ancestral home and that Eretz Israel needed us. He asked us to be patient and not to lose hope. We would reach the promised land. Our voices rose in “Hatikva.” We sang:

The music washed over me and entered my soul. I felt at peace. I looked at Sandor. Tears were running down his cheeks.

When it was time to return to our blocks, Sandor was exultant.

“What a day!” he cried. “David Ben Gurion!”

“He's right. We belong in Eretz Israel.” As soon as I said the words, I felt as if a heavy load had been lifted off my shoulders.

Sandor grabbed my arms and looked deep into my eyes. “Do you mean it, Jutka? Don't say it if you don't mean it!”

“I mean it. I'll go with you. I promise.”

We said good-bye. I climbed up to the second floor and went to look for Andrea, but she had already left the camp.