[Cz-L] What a small world?

I would like to share 3 small incidents which show us what a small world
we live in.

My wife and I left for a 3 week, spring break and took a trip to Germany
and Paris.

As the Passover holiday took place we joint the Seder with the Frankfurt
Jewish Community.
We shared a table with two other families. On our left, a family which
included an elderly lady her daughter and her granddaughter. We
introduced ourselves and of course, I was asked where I was born. I said
Czernowitz. The elderly lady said that she too was born there. She told
me that she studied in the Czernowitzer conservatory and was a piano
teacher.

A week later we were invited to an acquaintance for a barbeque in a
small village outside Frankfurt. We made our introductions to the
company of people present and again an elderly lady asked where was I
born, I told her Czernowitz. She told me that she too was born there.
She wanted to know the actual place, I had always been told that I was
born in the Russischegasse and when I visited Czernowitz in 1988 I could
not find the hospital. She told me that there was no hospital in the
Russischegasse, I told her that perhaps my mother went to a private
clinic, or maybe I was born in a doctors clinic.. She replied that there
was no clinic or a doctor in the Russischegasse. I asked her how is she
able to remember. I was born in 1937 and it is now 67 years later, she
said that she has a good memory. I was always told by my father and
family members that I was born in the Russischegasse. I asked my cousin
Grete, who was 10 years old at the time, she told me that she too heard
the same story. Unfortunately now there is nobody alive that would know.
Is there somebody out there in the Czernowitzer list that has an answer?

On our way back to Israel on the ELAL flight, I bought a few things from
the duty free cart on the aircraft. The flight attendant gave me change
of approximately $16 in single Dollar banknotes. As I was counting the
change I observed a gentleman watching me. When I finished he approached
me and asked me if I was from Czernowitz. I told him ìyesî and asked him
how he was able to tell. He said that he heard me speaking to my wife in
English and to the flight attendant in Hebrew, but when I was counting
the money he was able to read my lips and could see that I was counting
in German and so he came to the conclusion that I had to be from
Czernowitz. Of course he was born there too.
What a small world?

Arthur Rindner
Received on 2005-06-20 08:33:04