FW: [Cz-L] What else?

Professor Schneider's poignant story about his lucky Yiddish experience
in Czernowitz, reminds me of my father's similar encounter with a
Russian officer. Although it was not in Czernowitz, it does reflect on
the importance of Yiddish as a means of communication between
like-minded people. He was told just one word, whispered hurriedly by a
Russian officer,- "ankloifts"! (Escape!) in '44. So my father worked
hard to get us out just as the King abdicated,- withou knowing where we
would end up!

My late father was a staunch believer in "transporable languages". To
him Yiddish was a world-wide language of communication between Jewish
people, and as international as German, French or English. Dad always
remembered that initial warning he received via his knowledge of
Yiddish and always tried to impress upon all who would listen,- . the
importance of Yiddish as our reliable means of communication all over
the world.

Apparently we have here in Melbourne quite a community of former (post
ww2) Czernowitzers, who are all Russian speakers.On the other hand, many
of them also seem to speak Yiddish..

Malvina Malinek
Melbourne, Australia.



> -----Original Message-----
> From: bounce-2228158-3499504_at_list.cornell.edu
> [mailto:bounce-2228158-3499504_at_list.cornell.edu] On Behalf Of
> ALFRED SCHNEIDER
> Sent: Friday, January 11, 2008 8:25 AM
> To: Czernowitz-L
> Subject: [Cz-L] What else?
>
>
> Dear Landsleute,
>
> Rachel Cylus must have been overwhelmed by all the "help" she
> got for her paper and I hope she gets an "A" for it. What may
> have been an added surprise was to discover how much
> Czernowitzers usually disagree with each other and that this
> characteristic had survived intact ocean crossings and was
> passed on to succeeding generations.
>
> I would like to share with you three language-related experiences:
>
> I belonged to the German speaking faction of Bukowiners who
> often distorted the grammar, syntax, and pronunciation of
> German in the belief they spoke Yiddish. During the war I
> lived with the parents of my stepmother who hailed from
> Poland and spoke Yiddish and I managed to learn to speak,
> read and write this language. One of my most respected
> teachers, the mathematician Hersch Segal, had been an avid
> collector of Yiddish folklore and this also had an influence on me.
>
> In March 1944, the German retreat had been in full swing and
> the continuous rattle of tanks, trucks, horses and wagons
> could be heard in the basement of the apartment house on
> Stefan Wolfgasse (Gheorghe Lazar) where we were hiding.
> Suddenly, the noise subsided and an eerie silence descended
> on the city. After a day, I had sufficient courage to crack
> the door and stick my head out. Facing me was a soldier on a
> horse, wearing a fur hat and the cape of a Cossack. Since
> units of the Vlasov army (renegades from the Soviet army who
> were allied with the Germans) had also been passing through
> Czernowitz, I was quite apprehensive but could no longer turn
> back. I proceeded to greet the soldier with 'Sdrastvuytie'
> and noticed the red star on his hat. Whether it was my
> limited knowledge of Russian or my apprehension - I could not
> understand what he asked me. He then said: "Redst Yiddish?" When I
> excitedly said "Nu, farshteyt sich", he dismounted, took his
> cape off, and I noticed that he was a major. He took me
> around and said that I was the first Jewish youngster he had
> met since he left Stalingrad several months ago. There were
> some tears, we didn't talk much and the major then rode away
> in the direction of the Volksgarten. During the past
> sixty-four years I often wondered how much I would have
> missed out had I not known Yiddish.....
>
> In 1955 I had to take the foreign language examination for
> doctoral candidates at the Polytechnic Institute of New York.
> The choice of languages were French, German, or Russian. With
> the customary Czernowitzer modesty, I asked the Professor to
> pick the language and he said it had to be German, because
> much of the chemical literature was in that language. I
> passed the exam, but I felt it was "kein grosses Kunststueck".
>
> In 1963 I was at the McMurdo Base in Antarctica in connection
> with the installation of a small nuclear power plant to
> provide electricity and desalinated water for the Research
> Station there. The hut once used by Captain Scott was nearby
> and it had become the custom of visitors to inscribe on one
> of the walls "I love Antarctica" in their own languages. I
> found that there was no Yiddish inscription, so I wrote (with Hebrew
> letters): "Ech hob Antarctica ser lib". It would have been
> superfluous to indicate that I was from Czernowitz, since any
> linguist or anthropologist who would read this would have guessed it.
>
> Alfred Schneider
> Professor Emeritus of Nuclear Engineering
> Georgia Tech and MIT
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> ---------------
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Received on 2008-01-11 11:55:52