Re: [Cz-L] Letter by ASF volunteer.

Thanks for posting this Hardy! what a beautiful touching letter....not
least because Paula is my sister. I hope Kate Powers doesn't mind that I
keep a copy of it and perhaps use quotes from it in the context of my own
work...

best wishes
Sylvia

On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 4:52 AM, HARDY BREIER <HARDY3_at_bezeqint.net> wrote:

> a.. Joana, we are from ASF, Action Reconciliation Service for Peace.
> https://www.asf-ev.de/en/**start.html<https://www.asf-ev.de/en/start.html=
>. We are an adult group and we come to Czernowitz since 2010. Read the
> report about our first stay, transalted by Julia Solis. I will post it
> again, Kate. (Auf Deutsch unter "Notizen")
>
> We Need Time
>
> The Ukraine gives us a loud welcome, long before we even reach the
> border. Men and women screaming at each other =96 that=92s the family sit=
com
> running in an endless loop on the bus ride from Berlin to Lviv. We=92re
> sitting directly beneath the speakers - sixteen volunteers, ready for
> atonement. We=92re entering a country that our fathers and grandfathers
> barreled across as masters of the imperial race.
>
> Our goal is Chernivtsi in Bukovina, now Ukraine, formerly Soviet Union,
> formerly Romania, formerly the Empire of Galicia, crown land of the
> Austro-Hungarian Empire, formerly Russia, formerly the Ottoman Empire,
> formerly Moldavia, formerly Kiever Rus. Each period left its traces -
> buildings, people, languages. Culture and barbarism.
>
> We=92re coming to clear the jungle out of the Jewish cemetery of Chernow=
itz
> - actually a tiny part of the cemetery. Founded in the 19th century, it i=
s
> one of the largest preserved Jewish cemeteries in Europe with 50,000
> graves. Until recently, it was completely overgrown. The ancestors=92
> children are no longer there to take care of the graves; they were
> deported, murdered or they left.
>
> Are we setting signs of atonement if we tear out roots and chop vine
> tendrils in the blistering heat, or are we just creating chaos in the
> cemetery=92s daily routine? Wouldn=92t it be better if we gave our invest=
ed
> money to the cemetery administration, so that they might clear the ground=
s
> more effectively with a chain saw, lawn trimmer and chemicals? Doesn=92t =
an
> overgrown cemetery seem more beautiful and enchanted; isn=92t the
> deterioration part of the natural order of things? And anyway - is it
> presumptuous to want to atone for something that is too large to be atone=
d
> for?
>
> These are German hands with German tools that want to dig a path to
> atonement. These are German questions that can=92t always be answered.
>
> On the second day, Paula arrives from the US to join our group. She is i=
n
> Chernowitz for the first time in 65 years. She chose this path to embark =
on
> a painful journey into the past: working together with Germans in the
> Jewish cemetery. We fell trees, remove tendrils and brush, while clearing=
 a
> path towards the graves. And as we defoliate tombstones, discovering the
> emerging letters, stories are remembered and told. Clawed by nettles and
> covered in mosquito bites, we try to discern and count the rows, forging =
a
> path in the search for the grandfather=92s tombstone. We come across blan=
k
> slates where the letters are too weathered to read, the engravings as if
> washed away by the wind and by time; just like the memories - a haze. The
> stone keeps its real story locked inside. What Paula has experienced and
> seen has been engraved into the body and soul; it isn=92t visible.
>
> It=92s good that we have time. Paula has offered to tell her story. This=
 is
> not the first time she talks about herself; she was a teacher and is an
> active member of the Breman Jewish Museum in Atlanta. But this is
> different. We=92re in Chernivtsi here, and we are Germans. We=92re right =
in the
> middle of the story.
>
> Chernowitz on August 17, 1941. Curfew had just started as Paula=92s moth=
er
> Etka was getting her first contractions. There was no way for the midwife
> to come: Since the raid by the allied German and Romanian troops on July =
5,
> 1941, Jews were prohibited from going out on the street after 8 p.m. unde=
r
> punishment of death. Earlier, during the Soviet occupation, the father ha=
d
> already been dispossessed and abducted by the NKVD secret police. So the
> three-year-old Paula was left alone when her mother took the coat with th=
e
> yellow star and disappeared into the night.
>
> That=92s Paula=92s earliest memory: the bronze handle of the apartment d=
oor
> and the fear in the night. Only the next morning did her mother return wi=
th
> the newborn sister. A few months later, in October 1941, the Romanian
> officers drove 50,000 Chernowitz Jews into a pre-established ghetto under
> orders from the German army units. That was where the first deadly
> deportations to Transnistria started from. How could a newborn survive th=
e
> death march? How was a mother to take care of her two little children on
> this hellish journey?
>
> The current mayor, Traian Popovici, was able to convince the Romanian
> governor that the city would fall apart if all Jews were deported. He was
> allowed to issue special exemptions. He wrote as many certificates as he
> could and was able to save the lives of 20,000 Jews.
>
> Paula and her little sister were also spared for now. Traian Popovici wa=
s
> discharged and arrested in the spring of 1942. The coveted certificate lo=
st
> all value and could no longer protect Paula from being deported to
> Transnistria. This new province under Romanian command in occupied Ukrain=
e
> was used as a giant ghetto and extermination camp. Those who survived the
> massacres and shootings soon died of hunger, cold or typhus. Etka had to
> leave the little children every morning to perform forced labor in a ston=
e
> quarry. At only four years old, Paula was left alone with her sister. It
> was well into the night when their mother returned and nursed the baby.
> Each day was marked by the dread that their mother would never come back.
> Each day she hoped that there would be an end, that one day all of this
> would be over.
>
> Paula survived. Only as they returned to Chernivtsi did they see how man=
y
> people did not make it. Nearly all relatives and friends had been murdere=
d.
> The worst was that their father never returned. In their native city, the=
y
> were without country and home. Etka decided to leave Chernowitz. They mad=
e
> the arduous journey to the American troops in southern Germany. Paula liv=
ed
> in the Displaced Persons=92 Camp for six years until the family emigrated=
 to
> the US.
>
> It is difficult to talk about these experiences here. The suffering is
> intimate. Paula=92s story ends with the approaching Sabbath. We leave for=
 the
> synagogue. The rabbi invites us to the service.
>
> It=92s good that we have time. Time to talk and ask questions. But ten d=
ays
> are not a long time to open up, have all of the needed discussions with t=
he
> Jewish community, the German community, the Hesed welfare center. We visi=
t
> the Jewish museum and the former pilgrimage site Sadhora. And we absorb t=
he
> city. Anew each day in many small encounters.
>
> At lunch we buy bread and cheese at a nearby market. =93Where do you com=
e
> from=94, asks the babushka who is selling us tomatoes from her garden. Ou=
t of
> an old habit of not wanting to be German in Eastern Europe, I reply: =93F=
rom
> Berlin=94, and then correct myself: =93From Berlin, from Germany.=94 =93O=
h=94, the
> old woman says radiantly, =93Tell me - isn=92t it good that Hitler is gon=
e?=94
> =93Yes,=94 I say, =93that=92s good, it=92s really great.=94 =93And=94, sh=
e continues,
> =93isn=92t it good that Stalin is gone?=94 =93Yes=94, I say, =93that=92s =
really
> wonderful.=94 =93But now=94, she adds, =93everyone is going away, everyon=
e is
> leaving home. That=92s not how it used to be.=94 Her granddaughter is wit=
h her
> at the market, smiling. No, she no longer lives here. She=92s studying
> medicine in Kiev. Now she=92s on vacation, visiting her grandmother.
>
> It=92s night in the hotel bar. The restaurants and cafes close at 11 p.m=
.;
> no alcohol is permitted outside. There are few cafes that have special
> licenses to stay open for celebrations, such as weddings, which seem to b=
e
> the most important and frequent celebrations in Chernowitz. Dance music i=
s
> blaring from the restaurant; it=92s the third wedding this weekend. Weddi=
ng
> guests are smoking outside the door; there are high and even higher heels=
;
> the women are outdoing each other with their dresses and the hair stylist=
s
> are fully booked for the weekend. Marrying couples are standing in line a=
t
> the registry office while a music ensemble is playing. After church, they
> sway through the city in a precisely choreographed photo session; once th=
ey
> would have stopped at the memorial for the soldiers fallen in the battle
> against fascism in the great war of the fatherland, but now they pose nea=
r
> gaudy iron carriages, buckets of flowers, the rented and heavily decorate=
d
> Mercedes. They stand and wave into the camcorder from the top deck. The
> highlight is a round plaza that the married couple is swaying in as the
> Mercedes drives circles around them, the brother-in-law rolling down the
> window to capture the immortal 360=B0 tracking shot: Sway, sway, and kiss=
.
>
> Inside the bar, we come across the local youth: Dima, Masha, Shenya. At
> 19, they=92re no longer teenagers but young adults entrenched in their
> professional life or studies. They show a lot of interest and ask many
> questions, then offer to take us to us the Carpathians. Hiking, climbing,
> rafting. =93Anyway,=94 they tell us, =93we like the Germans.=94 =93Becaus=
e of
> soccer?=94 I ask. =93No, all around, the economy, the industry, everythin=
g.
> Germans are well-respected here.=94 For a moment I let go of any guilt, s=
hame
> and the past, and turn towards the future, the hope, and the youth of the
> Ukraine: web designer, architecture student, transportation entrepreneur.=
 I
> ask about politics, the local parties, the elections. Silence. =93You kno=
w,
> it=92s like this,=94 Shenya starts. =93Back then, during the so-called Or=
ange
> Revolution, we talked about politics all the time. We got into arguments.
> We argued so much that it tore apart the friendships. Now we no longer ta=
lk
> about politics.=94
>
> Maybe there has to be silence for a while when something is still so
> fragile.
>
> In the end we cleaned nearly 500 graves. Yes, this is a sign. Something
> invisible has emerged into view. Long hidden inside a green darkness, it=
=92s
> now returning into the light. It has been there, in front of us, for a lo=
ng
> time. And it will continue to be there long after we have stepped back on
> the bus. We=92re tired and also cheered. The 15-hour bus trip is ridiculo=
usly
> short and we love the heated Russian comedies.
>
> Before starting on her trip, Paula asked herself who these Germans might
> be and why they would come. Each one probably gave a different response.
> But I=92m back at the beginning, immersing myself in the story of this ci=
ty,
> its wealth and its terrible tragedy. I need time.
>
> by Kate Power
> translated by Julia Solis
>
> a..
> b..
> c..
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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Received on 2013-10-02 08:21:51