So I was born in Warsaw, Poland, in a Jewish hospital.

My name used to be Gita Milsztajn.

My mother came her maiden name was Sturman.

She was a manicurist.

And her clientele was most of it Polish people.

And she have very a lots of them.

Because she was a good worker.

She knew what she was doing.

And my father came from Mogelnica, Poland.

That's where he was born.

He did have another brother and a sister.

His mother become a widow when the kids were small.

And because eventually her sister came to the United States.

So the sister sent for her to come.

So in the thirties, exactly, I don't know when, but before the war, she came to the United States.

So I did have somebody in United States.

My father was a butcher.

And just before the war started, he and his partner open a slaughterhouse across the river Vistula.

Which didn't last too long, of course.

Now, as a small child, they put me to go to a preschool.

In the preschool, there was only three Jewish kids.

There was a little girl.

There was a boy and I.

And there was one seesaw and you needed to wait your turn to get on the seesaw.

And one time the other this small little Jewish girl was waiting patiently for her turn.

When it came, we used to have over there, now they call them the bully, the biggest kid.

He push her away and just say, I am going now on the seesaw, you dirty Jew.

And that's what I was called.

I was called dirty Jew.

And when I was looking myself, I couldn't understand because my mother pride herself that I was always dressed nice and clean.

I was also called the Christ killer.

I didn't know who Christ was.

How could I kill anybody?

But what was happening that the preachers in the church used to preach that Jews killed that the Jews killed Jesus.

And the teachers in the school used to teach the same thing.

But nobody ever mentioned that Jesus was born and die as a religious Jew.

So when he pushed that little girl, I even that he was a head bigger than I was, I couldn't take it.

I went.

I punched him in the nose.

He started bleeding and crying.

And I say, that is her turn.

You have to wait for you.

Well, from that day, I got a little bit respect.

But when it came to play with kids on the street, I tried to avoid.

In our house, we were speaking Polish.

When my father and mother didn't want me to know something, then they started to speak Yiddish.

They didn't know that I did know that I understood.

So I was just going in the corner and laughing because I figured, okay, you just talk.

I know what you're talking about.

And the only one that was really talking, not talking to me, but singing to me Jewish song was my grandfather.

He used to have a beautiful voice.

So you know, so I knew Yiddish.

My father was very was estranged.

I mean, supposedly he did love us, but he was good looking and he used to have girlfriends on the side.

So when he used to come from time to time and one time I ask to have a puppy.

And he say no.

And I was mad because I want I love dogs.

And he say no.

So he asked me for a book and I took a book and instead of giving it to him, I just throw it at him.

And he took me on his knees, took his belt off and beat the hell out of me that I did have marks all over my legs because I was wearing short dresses.

But he taught me a lesson.

He say, you don't throw something that has knowledge in it.

When you know how to read, you're going to find out that this is the best lesson that I can give you now.

And he was right, because when I started to read, I never put a book down.

There was rumors about the war.

But being a kid, I didn't understand what was going on.

So I didn't of course, even if they would explain to me, I wouldn't know.

And one time my mother took me to a parade excuse me, of Polish soldiers on horses, and she let me go for a second and I went to a horse.

I wanted to pet him and I was almost under his hooves.

Lucky that somebody saw it and pulled me back.

But any dog that I saw, I used to always go and pet the dog.

And one time a big dog jumped on me and my mother figure, okay, she's not going to go anymore.

It didn't help.

I was in our room, which was a luxury room.

One room, kitchen in the back.

Everything else in the back in the court yard.

And I woke up and there was noise.

There was bomb falling down.

The German used to have two kind of bombs.

One used to demolish the house, the other used to put the house on fire.

And on the street probably one of the houses got hit by the bomb.

And at that time, people used to have blankets from feathers.

And the feathers started to fly over the street like like snowflakes.

Okay.

So I still didn't know what was then.

And my mother came by home and I found out that we was being attacked.

Now, to live at that time in Poland, it was not it wasn't like today that if you have a Frigidaire, you load it up, you go to the supermarket, you load with everything, and you have.

You used to buy bread every day.

Used to if you needed milk, you used to buy.

There was no Frigidaire, there was not even ice boxes.

So starvation started right away.

In the beginning, the bakers started to bake bread.

You used to have to stay in line to get a loaf of bread.

My mother used to know the baker so she used to get a bread.

Now, right away, they also bombed the water pipe.

So it's not was only shortage of food, but also of water.

And Warsaw decided to fight them.

I mean, by fighting, it's not really fighting, but they took the trams that used to run, turn them over to make barricades, you know, making trenches.

Two weeks after two weeks, they surrender.

Because people were starving.

And the Germans march, you know, and you didn't see any smile on their faces.

Everything.

motorized tanks, motorcycle big, you know, cars, not a smile on anybody face.

And the first thing what they decided to do, it says, okay, you starving, we're going to feed you.

So they give flour to the bakers and they told them, bake the bread.

But right away they say there'd be no food for the Jewish people.

And, you know, some of the Jewish people, they dressed differently, they look differently.

If a person like that would stay in line, he would get pulled, beaten up and say, there's no food for you.

And I mean, I didn't look Jewish and my mother didn't look Jewish, and that was our luck.

My mother was staying in line, holding me in her arms.

When our turn came the German that was watching the line give me a loaf of bread and my mother a loaf of bread, which was unbelievable because nobody got two loaves of bread.

So as we walk at the end of the line was staying a woman that she was living in our building.

And every time that she saw my mother, she would say, hey, look at that Jew woman.

And that was not an exception.

Say, look at the Jew woman.

She has two loaf of bread.

By the time it's going to be my turn, there'll be no bread left over.

So my mother gave her a loaf of bread, knowing that I'm starving, that I going to be crying for food.

And really, that loaf of bread was not only for us because across the street, the whole street was ther was only two Jewish families, okay?

Which across the street was living before he passed away.

before the war, my grandfather, his wife and two young uncles.

My grandfather passed away of cancer.

before the war at least.

So the bread was also to share with them.

Because we was living in a section that was strictly Polish.

It was called Volska.

Something like that, anyway.

So, you know, and the woman was staying with her mouth open.

She didn't know what to say.

But sometimes a loaf of bread change a person.

So anyway, in the meantime, before, a little bit before the Germans started attacking Warsaw, my father and a group of men left Warsaw to go to Russia because the border was still open.

But to get into Russia you needed to become a Russian citizen.

And I didn't find out about it.

I didn't find out that my father left even, so, I didn't know nothing.

My mother knew about it and eventually, after some time, some of the men came back and told my mother that the Germans killed my father.

He was trying to come back.

I don't know exactly what, but they killed him.

I didn't know about that thing til after the war.

And so by that time I really didn't care anymore because I was mad he left.

He didn't even say goodbye.

Every day there was other orders coming from the German.

And it started like, you cannot have more than 200 zloty in the bank and only take 200 zloty.

I always try to figure out how much it was in the dollars, but it doesn't work to feed your family.

If you have a business, you need to give the business away.

Doctors couldn't practice anymore.

Only on Jewish people.

Teachers couldn't teach anymore.

So the thing is, no money, no job.

Starvation started.

Then they decided to go do a calorie count.

Who was getting how many calories.

It started with false Deutsche.

False Deutsche is half a German, half not.

They used to get, I think, over 2,000 calories per day.

The Poles used to get I think 700 and something calorie per day.

The Jews used to get 182 or 84 calories per day.

Which was maybe a slice of bread, some butter and marmalade.

Okay, that was the food.

But still life was going on.

Til the Gestapo decided that they want everybody in a one section of Warsaw, close to the railroad track.

They gave us three days to move.

I mean, it's impossible.

So a group of elders from the Jewish congregations went to another city where there was sitting a general that was not an SS, and he hated the SS and he gave two weeks.

My mother didn't wait too long.

She figure, you know, let's do it.

She exchange our luxury apartment to an apartment that when you put three single beds, that was the size of it.

But and my grandmother and my two uncle got also a place in the same building.

They got even worse because they got with other people.

And it's not in we're not talking about an apartment.

We're talking each room and in each room was maybe ten, twelve people.

Because what was happening, let's say that today they gonna say, okay, the ghetto is going to be from here to here.

Next day they say, oh, no, it's going to be from here to here.

So the people that exchanged their apartment found themselves on the streets.

They didn't have where to go.

An area that was designated for a maybe a quarter of a million people.

There was half a million people.

Because it's not only from Warsaw, people starting to come from other places.

And then they decided that they needed to make a wall around the ghetto.

The brick you going to take from the houses that was bombed.

You're going to clean them and you're going to pay for them.

And you're going to build a wall, which was like over 11 feet high with glass.

You're going to take glass, you're going to break the glass, which you're gonna have to pay for it too.

There was 13 gates.

Each gate have a German, Polish policeman and Jewish policeman.

At the beginning we was thinking, okay, Jewish policeman, it's going to be easy.

But it wasn't.

You give a power to a man and he doesn't care how he takes it.

Starvation started in the ghetto.

Oh there was rich people.

They did have money.

There was even nightclubs.

There was a theater.

There was all different thing.

But there was not too many of those kind of people.

Most of it.

Everybody was poor.

And you try at the beginning, we was able to get out from the ghetto.

So you took whatever you was, have a little value to change for something, anything, just to get some food.

But, after a while the Germans say, no, you cannot get out anymore.

Some people didn't believe it.

They went out, they got caught and they got shot.

So we didn't know what to do.

Of course.

So it started to smuggle food in.

Who would smuggle the food?

Children and women.

There was a professional smugglers that they used to make lots of money.

But you used to have to have the money to pay them.

And that's when the Jewish police comes.

They used to have a quarter to bring the smuggler to the German.

So they have to take, drop all the food that they used to have.

And the German would still shot them.

Children.

They didn't care.

Sometimes.

And how how do you get out from the ghetto?

Sometimes, there was a rumor that there was a hole in the wall.

Everybody would run to get out.

Now the thing is some places they have a building that was empty on the Aryan side and on the Jewish side through the basement or through a sewage, just to get just to bring something.

Little children used to try to get just a potato to bring home for the family.

Many, many times we used to stay at the gate and wait for a good German to let us pass.

Now, Polish winters are very, very harsh.

Sometimes for hours we used to stay.

I used to cry and the tears was freeze on my cheeks.

I have in both of my feet two of my small toes frozen.

I cannot wear nylon stockings.

And sometimes we did find a nice German person that would let us out.

My mother used to go to one of her clients who used to have a restaurant.

She used to work.

I used to help.

We used to get food and needed to hide it on our body.

You couldn't just carry it in.

Now, in a ghetto, if a SS came to the ghetto, you needed to give him a whole sidewalk.

One time my mother and I was walking on opposite side when an SS came and a little child didn't have enough time to get out of his way.

He picked the child by his feet knock his head on the wall, and dropped the dead body in the gutter.

At the beginning, if somebody die, they still did have some money to buy a box to put the body.

Eventually, there was no no money for it.

So usually at nighttime they would take the dead body, take all the clothes off and throw it on the sidewalk.

The group that used to pick up the bodies on a little cart didn't even have enough time to move them all.

Sometime, a body would stay over there for three, four days before it was moved.

And you walk by the dead people and you didn't care.

Because you figure tomorrow it's going to be you who are laying over there.

So, you know, it was like nothing happened and the person is dead.

What the heck, you know, tomorrow I'm going to be laying there probably.

The things that was helping it was Jewish kitchens.

They used to have in some of the buildings, whichever they could put it.

And you needed to stay in line to get a slice of bread and a soup that a potato peel would float in it.

But it saves a lot of lives that way.

And usually what was happening that if when you get that slice of bread and you didn't have enough and you wasn't quick enough to put it away, a child used to come, grab your bread from you, stuff the whole thing in his mouth, or even if something, if there was water or sewage water, he would throw it in knowing that you are not going to pick it up.

He would pick it up and eat it.

It got to the point that people become like animals.

We used to have one cousin that was quite rich, so we went to visit him.

And he offer us a glass tea with a cube of sugar and he start preaching to my mother.

Why are you going out?

You know, you risking your life and your life of a child.

And I and my mother say, I don't want to starve.

And I was thinking to myself, you know, instead of preaching to her, why don't you give me some bread instead of the lousy glass of tea?

And it got worse and worse.

And it got to a point that already for sometime we didn't have any food.

Now, there was in the ghetto, there was factories that they used to do helmets and uniform for the German.

And the people in charge was Polish and one of them was a friend of my mother.

So he came to us and he said, you know, I'm gonna take that he going to take me with him and bring me next next day with food.

So he took me.

I slept in his house.

They slaughter a pig and the fat on the stomach, which is really bacon, you know, with the skin they wrap around my body.

I mean, so tight that I felt like I am in a cocoon, so I wouldn't carry nothing.

And it was under my coat.

And we go to the gate, the Germans say, Bitte papiern.

Looks at the papers, Alles in order.

Everything okay.

And then he looks at me and he put his hand on my shoulder and he say, are you cold, my child?

And I was sweating with every pore in my body because if that hand would go a little bit lower, it wouldn't be my child, it would be bullet on the spot.

That food lasted for a while.

Now, every day, 5,000 people needed to show up on the in the railroad station.

And if they didn't have the 5,000 people, if you was the lucky person that crossed by the railroad, sure enough, you would wind out being there.

Cattle cars, little window with barbed wire, Ukraine soldiers on top with machine guns.

The people were stacked like sardines.

The door would be locked from outside and the train was going or to Treblinka or to Auschwitz.

Some right away went to a shower, which was not a shower.

It was cyclon II that would kill them right away.

The stronger one survive a little bit.

Usually children, they didn't have no choice, no chance.

I mean, if a child was big enough and look strong, yes.

But the small children didn't have no chance.

And that was every day.

I only have after the war, two cousin that was left alive from the whole family.

One was in the ghetto.

She was with other three or four women in a building.

When the German came in, they told the women to go to the roof of the house and jump.

They were three of the women jump from one side.

She asked if she can jump from the other side.

She jumped from the other side.

She got caught on the pipe and slid to the ground When the German came down, saw her standing, he say, now you're going to go to a camp.

She was in Auschwitz and she survived Auschwitz.

The food that we did have ran out.

And my mother say, this is not living.

The hell with everything.

We have to do something about it.

And somehow we got out again.

So when we left the ghetto, we didn't have where to go.

We started walking the streets, sleep in basement, sleep under the steps.

And one day as we were walking, the woman that my mother gave the bread saw us.

And you never knew, knew who was your friend and who was your enemy because they would tell you to come with them.

You didn't have no choice.

You needed to.

They would take you to a police station.

You got shot, they got paid.

So she said, what are you doing here?

And my mother said, I'm looking for a place to stay.

So she said, okay, come with me.

She used to have a building in a cemetery when she was taking orders for headstones.

She took us over there to that building.

Every morning she would come from her house with food, eat with us, and share the food.

We couldn't and put that little tiny stove for us to warm up.

That was bitter winter.

At nighttime we couldn't have the heat because a smoke from the chimney would show that somebody is living in a cemetery.

But you see how a loaf of bread can change a person completely.

We stay with her a couple of weeks and then my mother found another place.

And that was already where the uprising in the ghetto started.

There was two uprising in the ghetto.

One was in January, which was very short one and that was in April.

At night time, I could see the sky all red because the ghetto was burning.

And one day and the thing is that was on a six and seventh floor.

And the woman, she did have a crazy son and there was a cat, a beautiful white angora cat.

And they took a person to pay more rent.

And the cat used to do her his business in a sink in the kitchen, covered in the paper.

But from the day that they took the guy that hated cat the cat was going under the bed and doing his business and the idiot son took there one day the cat and throw him through the window from the sixth or seventh floor.

Well, when you say cat have nine life, yes, they do.

Nothing happened to him and he went again under the bed.

So I was cleaning it quickly so he couldn't find it.

We were sleeping in a kitchen on a trunk that it was this way, but a bump was going this way.

No pillows, no blankets.

My pillow was my hand, but it was a roof over our heads.

And one day and of course, and the bathroom was in the courtyard.

So you needed to wait at nighttime til you hear everything quiet to go to the bathroom.

And sometimes somebody opened the door, you know, on the first or second floor, you run back up and wait for it to be quiet so you can go.

And one day I just decided to sneak out and I went to the walls of the ghetto and I could hear the shooting over there.

And I wanted to go over there.

I wanted to go and fight.

I wanted to help them.

And I was standing over there.

I was crying.

And a bunch of Polish kids, teenagers, came and saw me crying and they ask, oh, you want to go over there inside?

And I say, yes.

So they say, oh come.

We show you a way.

Well, I was stupid.

They took me to the basement, they was holding me and they was raping me.

Then some kind of noise came and they was afraid.

So they ran away.

I got up just clean myself and I never told that to my mother.

I was afraid to tell her anything.

But that day I made myself a promise.

First, I don't gonna trust nobody.

Nobody gonna ever see me crying.

And I'm going to be strong and I'm going to survive.

And I kept my promise.

It took the German more than a month to burn the ghetto.

There was nothing standing.

Everything was in a ruin.

And then they got another order.

The order was any Jew found in any of the buildings, the whole building, buildings would get shot.

So the woman said, you cannot stay here anymore.

So there was a my mother knew somebody, so she sent me over to the place.

It was an attic apartment.

The woman that was living underneath the attic apartment was the woman that used to have that restaurant that my my mother and I used to come and work.

So we was in the attic apartment.

And she has a room.

We have a room and in a third room she was raising rabbits.

and there was baby rabbits.

And I wanted to play with the baby rabbits because I didn't have any toys.

But the daddy rabbit didn't like me.

So every time that I tried to catch the baby rabbit, he would come behind me and bite me.

And I was so afraid of him.

So one time she decided to do rabbit stew.

Oh, boy, that was so good.

Because don't forget, we didn't have any meat or anything.

Now I could play with the baby rabbits.

Now, most of the time, I always just locked to stay over there and I didn't have what to do.

So there was a Bible and there was a book like Learning Esperanza.

Esperanza, the new language that was supposed to everybody knew it and learn so everybody can talk to each other.

And slowly, slowly comparing pictures from the Bibles and thing, I started to learn how to read.

And when my mother was coming back from working, cleaning houses, she used to help me.

And that way I started to read.

But one day I decided to sneak out.

And the thing is, every time that I sneak out, something would happen.

Across the street where we was living in the building was a movie house.

But when I started to walk, all of a sudden a person and I don't really I think it was a man stop me and say, aren't you Blima's daughter?

And I say, no, I am not.

And I started to walk and he start to walk after me.

So I was afraid that he's going to know where I am living.

So I sneak into the movie and I remember it was the old Titanic movie, the old, old version.

I was there for a while and I didn't know what to do, so I didn't even wait to the end.

I sneaked out and I started to walk in the middle of I don't think in Warsaw or some place over there, there was lots of people standing and looking at from the bomb.

There was like a hole and there was two places.

And I went.

So it seems that it was a woman was murdered.

Her body was in one part, her head was in the other part, and I still wasn't sure if I am being followed.

So I took the tram because there were there was the woman that we was living her friends was living on the other side of the river.

And I figured, okay, I'm going to go over there.

since I knew them.

So I took a tram and I went to see them and I stayed too long because there was curfew.

And after curfew, if you get stuck on the street, you'll get shot.

So I slept over there and I was so, you know, miserable that I bleed from my nose all over the pillow I have to apologize.

But they say, don't worry, everything was fine.

And it was still dark, like 4:30, 5:00.

I wanted to catch the first tram to go across the river back to Warsaw, and I needed to go through a cemetery through a German post in a wooded area.

And it didn't matter to me.

I really wasn't afraid.

I was afraid what my mother going to do to me.

By the time I got to the gate was open, I sneaked in.

When I came up upstairs, my mother was so happy to see me that she even didn't beat me anymore.

And what happened?

Because I was out there was a window where the woman have her bedroom.

But there was a window in the roof.

Somebody broke the window came and she stole things.

So every time I did something, something bad happened.

Now I was for good locked.

I couldn't get out completely.

I didn't have no choice.

And then one day, all of a sudden, I hear somebody, you know, is trying to break in again from the roof.

And I went to her window and started yelling, you know, somebody help, they trying to, you know.

Nobody could hear me because it was so high.

But the person that was on the roof heard and he ran away.

Eventually, the woman she didn't know that we was Jewish.

Okay.

But she I think she knew because at one time a brother, her brother came with a man and he left the man with her.

And at one time I was staying next to him, and I heard him counting.

Now usually if you go to a yeshiva or something like that, you're going to count in your language.

He was counting in Jewish.

And I went to my mother and I say, he's Jew.

And she say, no.

I say, yes, he is.

I heard him counting.

And she didn't believe me, but she went to him and she said, you know, two of us cannot stay here.

And he say, why?

Because I am the same thing like you.

So the brother came and he took him away.

Also for a short time because when I was sneaking out on the bottom and it was a how do you call it when you make a different kind of things from wood?

Like a carpentry shop?

Carpentry shop.

So for a while and it was the smell of the wood.

It was so nice.

And there was a little little girl over there and we was playing and my mother found out about it.

So they sent me to a place, you know, all those little towns over there.

And by a couple that used to have a farm.

And the only thing that I remember is the oven that they used to bake black bread and that black bread with butter.

It was the best thing I ever ate.

You give me good black bread or cake, I'm gonna reach for the bread.

And when I came back I used to have long hair.

The lice was crawling on me.

My mother took a special comb, put the newspaper and comb my hair.

And there they was, falling to the paper.

She put kerosene in my head, in my hair, so I wouldn't have lice anymore.

Okay.

Now what was happening?

The front already started from one side, the American, French and English, from the other side the Russian.

And it seems that the Russian was very close to Praga.

Praga was called the place over the river.

It's not Czechoslovakia, Prague, but Polish.

Okay.

In 1939, the Polish government that escaped to London, England, they didn't want the Russian to come to Warsaw.

They wanted the other side to capture.

So they told the Polish underground to uprise.

So it was two uprising in the ghetto and one uprising the Polish uprising.

At the beginning, we was everybody was in a basement.

The woman have a little cubicle near the steps and we was over there and she didn't lock us.

So I was able to walk around and listen to people what they have to say.

And I hear, you know, people saying, oh yeah, there was a Jewish man that told the underground he wants to fight with them.

Instead of they shot him.

And other things like that.

I used to come and tell my mother the whole thing.

They decide that it's no good that somebody can see me, you know.

So she locked us in the little cubicle.

I mean, it was probably this size.

We used to only sit over there.

So it was locked from outside.

For how long?

Like hours?

Days?

Couple of days.

We did have a little food and some water.

Not for long.

And then one day, all of a sudden, there was a noise.

Hand grenade was throwing down the steps and we was next to the steps and we heard rouse rouse, rouse.

5 minutes or 10 minutes later, a Polish guy say, you better leave because the house is going to be put on fire.

And my mother said, well, we cannot leave.

We don't have papers.

And I say, I don't care.

I, I say, I'd rather get shot than burned alive.

So I start kicking the door, tear it open.

And we went out and I see a little dog laying, you know.

He got caught with the hand grenade.

He was still breathing.

We started to walk.

Sure enough, in the middle of the street there is checking for papers.

And my mother said to me, do something.

I mean, what I can do?

I'm a little kid.

I can't do nothing.

But I figure, okay, I try.

So I started jumping up and down, yelling, I have to go to the bathroom.

I have to go to the bathroom.

What else could I do?

So one of the German over there say, you see that building over there?

Go over there, do what you have to do and come back.

Well instead of coming back, we just went behind him and started to walk.

Now, the thing is, at the beginning, when they came back, the German, they went to every building and they were shooting everybody.

The street was full of bodies laying.

That was for two weeks.

By the time they came to our building, they cooled off or maybe they got orders not to shoot anymore.

So we started to walk and on outskirt of Warsaw, there was a big, big church.

and everybody was put in that church.

And there was only one German with a rifle and whoever came close to him, he would beat him with the gun.

My mother found the person that we was living.

She was something wounded.

And then it came order, whoever wants to march today can march today.

And my mother went to her and she asked her if she want if she wants us to stay.

And she said, no, you go, I'm going to be okay.

So my mother said, go and ask him if we should stay or we should go.

And I say, if I go, he's going to kill me.

But for some reason, when I was young, I was lucky.

So he pat me on my head and he said, go today, my child, because today it's going to slow march, tomorrow it's going to be worse.

But in the meantime, they closed those big heavy gates and I say, but the gates are closed.

He say, I open it.

So he open and there was a column of people.

And what do you saw?

Old people, mostly woman, children.

You didn't any men, you didn't see any teenagers.

These were all Poles at this point, right?

That was the Poles.

These were the poles.

Not.

Yeah.

Oh, no, no, that was the Poles.

You're walking with the Poles.

Yeah.

We walk, we march.

I don't know, six or seven miles.

And there was only one Ukraine soldier on a big horse just going around the column so nobody could escape.

We came to a little town where there was a factory of rubber, and so half of it was taking for the factory and half of it was taking for a hospital.

And it's run by the German, of course.

And the workers are Polish and they staying on this street, you know, because nobody know what was happening in Warsaw.

And everybody wants to know.

And of course, with the German, nobody opened their mouth to say anything, you know, and a woman, Polish woman, say, well that little girl I would take.

And my mother say, what about me?

Am I a dog?

So she didn't really know what to say with all the German and Poles standing.

And I say, if you can pass like a line, I will take you.

So we passed that thing.

They took us to the office.

It was August, hot, no food, no water.

But you know, eventually you would get used to it.

So they right away, give us something to drink and a German officer came in and start asking, you know, what was happening.

Different questions.

And in the meantime, the woman disappear.

And we sitting over there and of course, we don't know what's going to happen.

And he say, do you have where to go?

The German officer.

And my mother said, well, there was a woman.

As she was saying, the woman came in.

Now, he didn't want us to go through the front like we came in.

So he took us through the whole place, to the back and let us out.

She was living with her sister and the sister did have the key to the house to the apartment.

So we were standing.

It was a house, a small house with different apartment, a couple of apartment, small.

And we were standing and there was bushes in front.

And all of a sudden that Ukraine on that big horse is coming and ask any bandits over here?

And my mother used to hold a little basket with our belongings.

So she throw that thing to the bushes and we say, no, there's nobody here.

So he went away.

So we have a roof over our heads.

We slept on the floor because she did have one room.

And of course somebody needs to make a living.

My mother couldn't go any place really.

So I decided, okay we make a little box on a string.

I bought cigarettes and I was selling cigarettes in the factory hospital.

And I was really doing good money.

My business was really good.

And all the other kids, they envy me and they started, she must be Jewish because she's so lucky.

And my mother said, you better take it easy.

I say, I don't give a damn anymore.

You know, if somebody comes next to me I gonna I'm gonna punch him, you know, I don't care anymore.

One day, I was late for some reason and all the other kids they were so happy jumping, yelling, singing.

I said, what happened?

And they said, oh, they caught a Jewish engineer and they shot him.

Of course, you know, he did have papers, but they told him to, so they shot him.

So I went over there and I took a look and there was his handkerchief laying over there.

I pick it up and I put it in my pocket.

I went in a corner that nobody could see me.

And I started to cry.

I couldn't understand how kids can be so happy to see somebody being killed.

It so hurt me, you know, I really didn't cry so much for that person that I couldn't understand why they would do something like that, why they was so against the Jews and happy to see a Jew being killed.

Then came a tank division, and they was looking for people to work in the kitchen.

And my mother say, okay, I'm going to go and I'm going to work.

So she was working in a kitchen and the guy that was in charge in the kitchen started to talk to her and she say and she told him that, yes, that she has a child.

So he said, well, why don't you tell your child to come with the pot.

If food is left over, we going to give it to her.

The same with the other women that have children.

So I have the pot.

I was staying, you know, and everybody I always I try to be the first one because then you get from the bottom he used to pick it up.

Was this like soup or something?

Soup.

Soup with meat.

This is a German tank division?

German tank division with a black skull.

Yeah.

And something happened.

I don't know.

And I was laughing something.

And the guy that was watching us didn't like it.

So he took me and he put me to the all the way to the end line and I start cursing him.

Well he didn't like that.

So he picked me up and he tried to throw me in a well.

But luckily for me, another Germans came and he say to leave me alone.

And then came an officer and he needed somebody to clean his room.

And my mother went to clean his room and she did a terrific job.

So the highest officer came and he say, who clean this officer the room?

And everybody put, oh Jadwiga [her mother's alias].

So he said, I want you to clean my room.

So she cleaned his room and he give her a paper.

She signed a paper that she is working for the German tank division.

So there it was already, something that we have right?

They left and all of a sudden it got quiet like before a storm.

You didn't see a German, you didn't see nobody.

The only bread for some reason that you can find, it was with kerosene in it.

I don't know why, but.

And then one day all of a sudden, there was a rumor that the Russian tanks are in the next town.

And I started to run like crazy.

Sure enough, there is this.

The Russian tank with this star on it.

I jump on one of them as they start rolling to the town that I was.

Now, another thing is that.

You jumped on the tank?

Oh, yeah.

Because there was people already and I jump also on it and the thing the next town town what it was, it was the town that they have over there a camp.

From that camp, they were sending people to different camps.

So it was our luck that we never got as far as that.

So there I am riding on the tank, to my town.

All the people are staying on the street and my mother is staying over there and she's afraid that I'm going to go with the tank to Warsaw.

Of course we didn't go to Warsaw.

I went down.

So now all of a sudden the Russian soldiers started to come.

And one was looking to her as Jewish.

With their long coat.

With that Russian thing.

And she ask him if he was Jewish and he said yes.

So she said, I'm Jewish too.

What should I do?

And he say, in the meantime, just stay quiet, because they didn't, you know, it's still Berlin.

And now all that thing was going on.

In the meantime, you stay quiet.

So she took over my business.

She started to sell cigarettes and also Russian newspapers.

And there came another person and she found out that he was Jewish.

So she say, how should I know if somebody is Jewish?

So he say, you know what?

When you talk with the person just say to him, Am Hoo [hebrew term].

Okay, if he is Jewish, he's going to answer you.

If he's not, if he ask you, what did you say?

Say nothing.

Am Hoo.

His nation.

Okay.

Am Hoo, his nation.

Okay.

Now, most of these Jews knew about it.

So then more and more people started to come.

Officers, and they found out that there is a Jewish woman, with a child.

And they say, you look for a place to stay and we're going to find for you what, get for you, whatever you find.

So we find in another little building a room, we needed a bed and officers, a Jewish officer, give us beds, everything you know, whatever they could.

Warsaw open too.

So you was able to go to Warsaw.

There was a place that you needed to sign your name that you're alive.

So if a relative would come, he could find you.

So one day, I am walking on the street and I see a man walking and he looks at me and I'm looking at him and I say, Uncle Henry?

That's where I found out that my father was killed.

I got very sick.

I got sent to a sanatorium in Germany to recuperate.

I was over there for a year.

With your mother?

No, my mother got a job in a cafeteria.

She was in charge of a cafeteria in Warsaw.

She needed to work.

I was after that, I went to Lodz, to another city, which was like a kibbutz over there.

A city kibbutz.

I was in the younger group.

We used to go because I did have a good voice, we used to go places singing.

I was singing solo.

And now the group decided to leave for Palestine.

The group was going first to France.

My grandmother that was in the United States, of course knew already that my uncle was alive, that we was alive.

She wanted to come to France to pick me up.

And I said, no way.

I'm going to Palestine.

So because my mother was working, she couldn't take care of me.

So I went to live in an orphanage.

And all the children over there was Jewish.

In my room, there was a piano.

My mother wanted me to learn piano.

I said, no, who needs it?

I'm sorry now, but it's too late, of course.

And she used to give me money to buy fruit.

Instead of buying fruit, I used to go and buy books.

I used to belong to three libraries because you only could take one book at a time.

And there used to be a German shepherd.

He used to have his own house and everybody was afraid of the German shepherd.

I used to go lay in his house and he was up front so nobody could see me.

And I was reading.

Or under the bed with a flashlight, just to read, read and read and read.

And then become the State of Israel.

The minute it became the State of Israel, of Israel, we put papers to go to Israel because I was Poland was a socialist communist.

It wasn't a free country.

People think that socialist communist is the great.

You have to live under.

Then you're going to know how great it is.

So I plus, I didn't want to live over there because there was quite a few people that used to come and they went, they did have property.

They wanted to go and get their property.

The Poles used to kill them.

I didn't want to live in a country that was hating me so much, that they would kill me because I am a Jew.

It took us two years to get permission to leave.

We was the second group that was allowed to leave Poland.

We went through Europe to Geneva I think it was.

From there, we took a ship.

A Israeli ship with Israeli sailors.

And watching those people, it opened my eyes, how they felt.

You know, free, not afraid.

No nothing.

I befriended one of them.

He tried to teach me Hebrew.

We were friends for many, many years.

His wife, kids.

I know.

It was terrific.

Everybody was inside, you know, bunk beds.

So I figured I'm not going to stick over there.

I was on the top.

I figure I gonna inhale the fresh air, be with people that are feel free that.

After a few days we came to Haifa port and I saw those beautiful city on the mountain.

I mean, it took your breath away.

Now it's not because it's so many building, big building.

They now what happened on the train, I found out that another girl, a friend of a good my good friend and a boy from the orphanage was also.

So we already have you know, we've been together three people, which was fine.

So they put us in a place that was very close to Haifa with barbed wire, like quarantine place.

And him and I, we say, what the hell is that, you know?

We don't got to sit over here.

Let's go see Haifa.

So we started to walk to Haifa, not knowing how far it is.

In the meantime, we went to a place that it calls Ma Barach where the people that already went over here was free to stay over there.

And there was a little girl.

And of course, we didn't know only Polish and Jewish a little and we didn't know how to communicate with her.

And so her mother came out and we communicate in Yiddish with her.

She say, you don't want to go to Haifa, it's too far.

So we decided to go back.

Now, I never asked people for their name, which sometimes it's a mistake.

My mother knew that we have a family in Israel.

We knew that they live someplace in Haifa.

And we started to look and we found out the family.

So they make a reunion.

And at that reunion, all of a sudden I see the woman that were asking [the distance to Haifa], is there.

I also found that my father's cousin was alive and he married the woman that jumped from the building.

Okay, so that.

And then was another cousin of my father.

He left from for Australia.

So that's from the whole family.

My uncle found his wife.

She also survived and that's it.

That's the whole thing from all my family, which it was.

There was two young brothers, I mean, two young uncles.

There was an older one which have quite a bit of children, there was cousin and everything.

That's it.

Nobody survived.

Okay.

So from that place where we were stuck, they sent us to Ma Barach in a place.

We used to sleep under an, I mean tent.

Summer.

Hot in Israel.

Okay.

Then I started to going to Aliyat haNoar, which is for young people, and I was helping the doctor over there.

I knew how to fix things, you know.

And then came a group from Switzerland, kids, and they went to a kibbutz and one was sick and after he was fine, I took him and I liked that kibbutz and I say, I want to go on that kibbutz.

And the guy that was in charge said, you know, I send you to the best kibbutz there is.

Don't go over there.

Well, you know, you tell me something I'm gonna do what I want.

So I went to that kibbutz and I hated it.

I was supposed to learn half a day and work half a day.

They took advantage of me.

So every time that I did have a day off, I was going to a recruiting station and saying that I want to join the army.

How old were you?

I was 17, and you have to be 18 in Israel.

But I was so bugging them that they got sick and tired and they say, if your mother sign the papers, we're going to take you.

My mother say, no, I'm not signing.

I say, if you don't saying I'm going to forge your signature.

So she signed.

I went to the army, I went to military police with K-9.

I was mostly sometime I was training dogs, but mostly I was working with a doctor.

And the first time we have an operation to take gallstone from a doctor, and the doctor looked at me and he say, are you going to faint?

And I said, because there was blood all over.

And I say, no, and I didn't.

So I was I was in two Independence Parades in 1952 and in 1953 with my dog, I got discharged after two years or more than two years.

And then my doctor from the army recommended me to a friend that was running the Tel Aviv Zoo.

So I was a zookeeper.

And my rich cousin from the United States, every year used to come and used to say, your grandmother wants to see you.

She's getting older.

Why don't you come, you know.

And every time, I was saying, no, no.

But then in 1957, I said yes.

And I came to the United States.

And this is your father's mother?

Yes.

And my mother.

my mother's mother passed away.

when she was young.

And so I came and I really didn't feel too comfortable with my grandmother because she was crying about her daughter, two children, that they was hiding in a place.

Somebody give them up.

And then German came and then killed them.

But, I mean, and I didn't, what you crying?

I was saying to myself, you're crying.

You still at least have one grandchild.

Be happy over there.

Don't remind me all the time.

So I wasn't too happy.

And then I met my husband, who was from Brooklyn, of course.

We got married.

Uh, we moved to Hartford, Connecticut.

We have two children.

We wasn't religious, but we was, was observe the High Holy Days.

And the thing is that I remember going to the big temple in Warsaw because every time that I did hear a melody of the Kol Nidre and that was always in my head, the melody of the Kol Nidre.

But we wasn't religious.

My grandfather was religious, we wasn't.

But we was observing.

What I was questioning is if there was a God.

Okay, maybe the older people, maybe they sin.

Maybe they have something that they did.

But a million and a half children?

What did they do?

They didn't do nothing.

Why did they have to die?

Why in the ghetto did children used to have to die and nobody give a damn about them?

That I couldn't understand.

And if somebody telling me about God, I say he must be on a very long vacation because he's not doing nothing.

I never told my story to my children.

Why?

Because I wanted them to grow like normal person.

You know, my mother used to say from time to time, something to them.

I never did.

The first time my daughter heard my story is when I went to Fort Huachuca and I was talking to the soldiers over there.

That was the first time that she heard.

My son lives in New Jersey, so he never heard my story.

You know, when I go to school and I tell my story and I get letters from the students, one of the letter was a girl was saying, I was thinking of committing suicide.

Because of you speaking, I decided I will not do it.

And that what keeps me going.

When I left Poland, it was the happiest day of my life.

I felt free.

I can talk whatever I wanted to.

I can do whatever I wanted to.

And the hell with everything else.

To teach history.

You don't have a country if you don't have history, and if you don't teach history.

And it seems that this is what is happening over here today.

Nobody knows the history.

Some gonna say, eh, it's nothing important.

Some gonna say, maybe we learn something from it.

Maybe there is.

Maybe things should be changed around.

You don't know human.

You know?